Offside

  Had Rumple heard any of this?

  Oh shit! How could she not have?

  “And you were there the whole fucking weekend? ‘Cause Paul said he saw your car there on Saturday afternoon, and Clint saw you…”

  Shit, shit, shit.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck.

  What was I going to do?

  I looked all around the lunchroom, but I didn’t see Nicole anywhere. I did see Heather Lones.

  “Hey, Heather,” I called. I shoved myself out of my chair and left Mika still babbling. She stopped and turned around though her expression was not friendly.

  “What?” she asked. Her tone was even less friendly.

  “Have you seen Nicole?”

  Her eyes narrowed.

  “She left,” Heather finally said.

  “Left? What do you mean she left?”

  “She left the school,” Heather said. “Went home, I guess. After having fifteen guys practically jump all over her this morning and then finding out why, she took off.”

  “Shit.”

  “She’s not like that,” Heather said quietly, “and you made her sound like she was.”

  She turned and walked away from me as Mika walked up behind me.

  “So, since Nicole’s free game again, I was thinking of asking her—”

  My fist hit his face before he could finish his sentence. He went sprawling to the ground.

  “Hands OFF!” I screamed at him. “You don’t fucking touch her, you piece of shit!”

  As temped as I was to finish beating the shit out of him, I had to find Nicole.

  I drove all over fucking town, trying to find her with no luck whatsoever. Where could she hide an ugly-ass car like that? It was obviously running again since it wasn’t in her driveway anymore, so she had to be in it somewhere.

  Deciding she had to come home eventually, I parked at her house and sat myself down on the front porch. Everything that had happened over the past few days started running through my head. What could I have done? Even if I had stopped Clint and threatened him, someone else had obviously seen my car at her house on Saturday. I should have thought about it when she drove me to her house. I should have just told her to take me home.

  No…I couldn’t bring myself to regret that.

  For the first time in a long time, I dug into the bottom of my soccer bag and pulled out a pack of Camels. Unfortunately, smoking a cigarette only agitated me more and didn’t calm me down at all. It made my lungs hurt, too. Smoking also didn’t make her appear.

  My side was starting to ache, and I probably needed another one of the prescription pills, but they were at home, and I didn’t want to leave without seeing her. I leaned forward and dropped my head into my hands, closing my eyes and just trying to figure out what the hell I was going to do or say. My mind spun, and I lost track of time. When I heard the crunch of tires on the gravel drive and looked up, it was not the vehicle I wanted to see.

  It was a sheriff’s cruiser.

  Shit.

  Sheriff Skye eyed me as he got out of the car and walked over to the porch.

  “Thomas?”

  “Um…yeah,” I stammered. “Hi.”

  “I didn’t really expect to see you on my porch,” he said.

  “Well,” I said, “I didn’t really expect to be here.”

  “You want to tell me why?”

  “Not really.”

  He tilted his head to one side to look at me.

  “Why don’t you explain it anyway?” It wasn’t really a question.

  I took a deep breath. I had absolutely no idea what to say.

  “I was just…looking for Nicole.”

  “She doesn’t seem to be here,” he remarked.

  “Yeah, I noticed that.”

  “Maybe you should wait to see her at school tomorrow.”

  “I’d rather not,” I said.

  “What’s going on, Thomas?” Sheriff Skye asked in a very police officer, no-nonsense tone.

  “She’s pissed off at me,” I told him. “I just wanted to…talk to her.”

  “What did you do?”

  I really didn’t like the way he leaned back and put his hand over his gun. I swallowed hard and tried to come up with something I could actually say.

  “It was all a misunderstanding,” I started to explain.

  “If you touched her…” he said with a snarl, “I don’t care who you are…”

  “I didn’t!” I yelled. “That’s just it! I didn’t do anything—I swear! But…well, someone thought I did…and told someone else, and…shit!”

  “Don’t swear,” he growled again. “Do you think I don’t know your reputation?”

  I was tempted to completely lose it and start screaming. In the back of my mind, I knew he wasn’t going to do anything to me even if I came out and said I’d fucked his daughter on the hood of his patrol car. He couldn’t touch me, and he knew it, too.

  But that wasn’t going to help the situation.

  At all.

  Against my better judgment, I opened my mouth and told him the truth.

  “She helped me,” I said quietly. “Last Saturday was…um…the same day as…”

  I couldn’t finish. Sheriff Skye’s voice softened.

  “I know what day it was.”

  I nodded.

  “Um…Nicole saw me…at the cemetery.” I put my head back in my hands and pulled at my hair. “I wasn’t doing that well. She…she brought me back here. She made me dinner.”

  I didn’t think he needed to know all the gory details.

  “And?”

  “And…um…someone saw my car here. They just assumed…” I looked back up at him. “I didn’t do anything, Sheriff. I swear I didn’t. But people talk, and Nicole heard it. Now she’s mad, and I just wanted to tell her I didn’t say anything.”

  “That explains it,” he said with a bit of a smirk.

  “Explains what?” I asked.

  “All the Mexican food,” he said. “I couldn’t believe she ate that much of it.”

  I chucked a little.

  “I hadn’t eaten all day,” I told him.

  We both looked up as the rattle of the Hyundai met our ears, got louder, and then was joined by the sight of Nicole pulling into the driveway. I could see her eyes go wide as she took in the scene before her.

  I stood up off the porch and took a few steps forward. For a moment, she just stayed in the driver’s seat, looking out over the driveway at the two of us. Sheriff Skye reached up and scratched the back of his neck. A minute later, Nicole’s eyes narrowed as she slowly opened the door of the car and climbed out. Her hands were balled into fists.

  “Oh boy,” Sheriff Skye mumbled under his breath. “You just might be on your own here.”

  He actually took a couple of steps away from me as she approached, kitten claws out and sharpened.

  “You son of a bitch!” she yelled. “What are you doing here? Bragging to my father, too?”

  “Nicole, I didn’t—”

  “Do you have any idea how many people came up to me today?” she continued. “How many guys came and asked me out? Because suddenly I’m another chick who puts out for Thomas Malone, and now that’s he’s had me, I’m fair game to everyone else!”

  “Ouch,” Sheriff Skye said with a whistle. “You know, since I already got the short version of this, I’m just going to excuse myself…”

  “No!” Nicole and I both yelled at the same time.

  “What the hell did he tell you?” Nicole said as she glared at me.

  “I’m gonna let you two work this out…” He tried to escape again, but Nicole told him to stay. Then she glared at me again while I tried to figure out how to form words.

  “There is nothing you could possibly say that I would want to hear.” Nicole turned and started to walk toward the door. “And I really don’t have anything to say to you.”

  “Please, Nicole!” I said as I finally found my voice again. “Just let me explain!”

&nbs
p; “Explain? Explain how I’ve been trashed all over school because I felt sorry for you? Explain how all any of you jocks care about is bragging to your friends about what you’ve done with which girl? I’m really not interested!”

  “If you would just listen for a minute—”

  “Go away!” she screeched.

  “You really should at least give the boy a chance…” Sheriff Skye started to say, but the kitten claws dug into him, too.

  “Are you serious?” she screeched. “This is why I left Minneapolis, Dad! Or had you forgotten that? I left because of this kind of bullshit, and now, because I tried to help this jerk, it’s all happening again!”

  “Don’t swear, Nicole…”

  Now I was lost. I looked back and forth between them and watched the sheriff cringe a little.

  “What’s happening again?” I asked. I couldn’t have been more confused. Sheriff Skye shook his head a little.

  “None of your goddamn business!” Nicole yelled at me.

  She might have been yelling, but the façade was broken. I could see it in her face and focused on her eyes enough to see that they were red and swollen. She wasn’t just angry, and she wasn’t just hurt. Not by this. There was something else.

  “Rumple?” I questioned. “What is it?”

  “What the heck is a Rumple?” her father asked as he looked at me from the corner of his eye.

  “Never mind, Dad,” Nicole said with a sigh. “I just want to go inside and make dinner.”

  “Please listen to me,” I said again. “I never said anything to anyone—I swear. I spent most of yesterday in the hospital and hardly talked to anyone! It wasn’t me. Someone just saw my car parked here…”

  She looked over to me with deep furrows across her brow.

  “Oh my God,” she muttered, and she dropped down to the porch where I had been sitting and covered her face with her hands.

  “Good luck,” Sheriff Skye mouthed to me as he slowly opened the door and slipped inside.

  I walked up to her and slowly sat down on her right side. I was in completely unchartered territory here. Aside from never actually trying to comfort a girl before, I had never really apologized to one, either. I had no idea which one I should do first.

  I decided to try comfort, but I didn’t really know how to accomplish that. I remembered what she had done for me and reached out to tuck her hair behind her ear.

  She punched me.

  “Oh fuck!” I gasped as breath left me and pain shot down my side. She didn’t actually hit my ribs, but just below was close enough.

  “Are your ribs taped up?” she exclaimed.

  “Umm…yeah,” I admitted as I tried to keep my eyes from watering.

  “You really were in the hospital yesterday?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What happened?”

  “Nothing,” I said with a shake of my head. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “What happened to your ribs?” She accented each word, and when I looked at her eyes, I knew she wasn’t going to let it drop.

  “I got hit during a scrimmage yesterday,” I told her. “Just cracked one—no biggie.”

  “During a scrimmage?”

  “Yeah—you know, just a quick, friendly game.”

  “Doesn’t sound too friendly,” she remarked.

  “Well…shit happens.” I looked away, unable to meet her eyes. I felt her hand on my arm, and I looked over at her scrunched up face.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  “It’s okay,” I told her. “I deserve it.”

  “Deserve a broken rib?”

  “Yeah…um…no, I mean…”

  Shit.

  “I mean, I deserved you hitting me.”

  “Hrm.” Her eyes narrowed at me again. She took a big breath and huffed it out. “Who saw the Jeep?”

  “A couple people saw it Saturday, I guess,” I told her. “And Clint saw me leaving in the morning. He just assumed…”

  I turned to her and leaned closer.

  “I swear, Rumple—I didn’t say anything to anybody. I didn’t even tell anyone I saw you. I never would have done that, not after…”

  I looked away for a second and then looked back at her.

  “Not after what you did for me.”

  There were tears in the corner of her eyes.

  “I hadn’t even gotten into the building yet,” she said, “before Clint came up and smacked me on the butt and told me he was ready when I was. By the time I got to the door, Mika grabbed my waist and asked what I was doing for dinner. I had four more offers before my first class was over.”

  “Shit…”

  “And then Crystal Lloyd called me a slut,” she said. “She told me only the really stupid girls spread their legs for you the first time, and I should have at least held out until the second date.”

  I balled my hands into fists. I wouldn’t hit a girl, but I might go smack her brother around for having the same last name.

  “Next thing I know, I find out the whole school is talking about how you fucked me in my Dad’s bed.”

  The tears slipped out of her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. I felt my chest clench and wished I could do something about it, but I knew there was nothing I could do.

  “I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “I had no idea…I mean, people were saying shit to me, but I didn’t even know what they were talking about…not until lunch—but you were already gone.”

  She nodded.

  “I looked all over for you,” I told her. “Where did you go?”

  “To the trailer park on the other side of town,” she said with a shrug.

  “Why the heck did you go out there?”

  “Just to see a friend.”

  She didn’t seem interested in elaborating, so I let it drop.

  “What am I going to do?” she whispered as she finally looked over to meet my eyes. “No one is going to believe nothing happened, even if you tell them. Now I have a bunch of guys chasing me because they think I’m going to put out and a bunch of girls hating me for the same reason. I can’t believe this is happening again.”

  “What’s happening again?”

  “Forget it,” she grumbled, and she started to stand up.

  I reached out and grabbed her arm.

  “Tell me,” I insisted.

  “It’s really none of your business,” she said again.

  Taking the chance, I reached over and put my hand on top of hers.

  “Tell me what happened,” I said.

  Nicole looked over at me with narrowed eyes.

  “How about I make you a deal?” she said as she pulled her hand away from mine. “We go out to the soccer field at school, and if I can’t get a penalty kick past you, I’ll tell you the whole story. If I do get one past you, you have to answer one question completely truthfully—anything I ask.”

  I couldn’t help it—I laughed.

  “You think you’re going to get a PK past me?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “I’ve never tried. It doesn’t look that hard, though. Besides, you’re hurt.”

  I shook my head.

  “If that’s what you want,” I said.

  “So we have a deal?”

  “You got a deal, Rumple,” I snickered. “You’re an idiot, but you got a deal.”

  “Now?”

  “Sure.”

  Shakespeare wrote, “Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.” Somehow, I still had to admire her tenacity.

  Now to get this over with so I could figure out what had happened to her.

  CHAPTER 9

  GOLDEN GOAL

  Nicole leaned over and double knotted her tennis shoes as I juggled the ball around, only half paying attention to what I was doing. Mostly I was watching her bent over, tying her shoes, wearing red short-shorts. She really did have gorgeous legs, and I didn’t think I had really appreciated them before. Firm…shaped…must be from all that running she does. I could see the flex in her calves and th
ighs—she had some muscle there. I was very tempted to run my hands over them.

  I shook the thoughts from my head.

  The girl had to be just a little bit crazy, I figured, or maybe she was just looking to lose the bet. Anyone would have to be damn good to get past me, and from the very beginning, she obviously didn’t know what she was doing. Maybe it was her way of saying she wanted to tell me whatever this dirty little secret was but without just coming right out and saying it.

  I didn’t know; girls were weird.

  I smirked as she walked toward the goal. I popped the ball up in her direction with my knee, and she squealed and batted it away from her face. I laughed as she glared at me, picked up the dirty ball with her fingertips, and placed it at the top of the box.

  “You’re making it a lot harder on yourself!” I chuckled.

  “What do you mean?”

  I pointed to the white circle in between us.

  “That’s the PK spot, baby.”

  “Oh.” She mumbled something else that I couldn’t hear and then took a few steps forward to place the ball on the right spot. “Here?”

  “That’s it, Rumple.” I winked at her as she glowered at me.

  She stood right behind the ball, looking back and forth from one side of the goal to the other. I crouched down a little, bouncing on my knees a bit.

  “How many tries do I get?” she asked.

  “Normally, one,” I explained, “but you can have three because I’m such a nice guy.”

  She snorted.

  I might have let her kick all afternoon, but eventually I’d get tired. It was still a little hard to breathe, too.

  “Okay.”

  She brought her foot back with bended knee and kicked. The ball glanced off her toe and rolled at about the same pace as a toddler’s plastic truck. I jogged over and picked it up before it hit the side bar.

  “Rumple, Rumple, Rumple,” I teased. “You gotta get some power behind it!”

  I walked over to her with the ball, placed it down on the circle, and started explaining the physics of kicking to her.

  “Use a running start to give yourself more power, but the main thing is to keep your leg as straight as possible. You gotta use those beautiful thighs.”

  She whipped her head up from the ball to me as she narrowed her eyes.