He steps over toward the exit, and I notice a tarp hanging over the door that wasn’t there before. We all remain where we are while Coach reaches up and tugs the thing down.
In clean black letters just above the door, it reads:
“No Easy Days.”
“Today, we start a new tradition, gentlemen. It’s time we let go of the old Rusk. We’re no longer one of the weakest teams in the conference. We’ve been put through the fire, and we’ve come out stronger for it. Now who’s ready to prove it?”
We surge to our feet with a roar, and I let myself be carried away by the energy of the group. Our bodies crash into one another as we raise our hands up and scream.
As we line up and file out the door, each player reaches up and slaps a hand on the phrase above the door.
And I know as I stare at those words that it’s the hard days that end up being the most important in the end.
Four fifteen-minute quarters. That’s all we’ve got.
I can lay it all out there for sixty minutes, and I trust that my team will do the same.
We gather in the blow-up tunnel that leads from our locker room out onto the field. They’ve got the fog machines going, so that it’s hard to see anything that isn’t right in front of us.
The crowd is deafening outside, and I make my way up to the front of the team, and Silas is there waiting for me. I’m still a little unsure how to feel about the guy, but he’s undeniably the other leader of this team.
We’re nothing alike. Where I’m all about discipline and focus, Moore is pure heart. I wouldn’t trust him with a thing off this field, but on it, I know he’ll always have my back, and he’ll give it everything he’s got.
When everyone is inside the tunnel, huddled close, I shout, “Are we ready?”
The team roars back.
Silas shouts, “Will today be easy?”
The returned “No” drowns out even the crowd.
I yell, “How many wins are we leaving with today?”
“Four!”
Silas and I turn to face the end of the tunnel, and the team howls behind us.
When we burst out of the tunnel and out onto the field, my ears ring from the noise, even through my helmet.
I don’t let myself look at the stands, knowing I wouldn’t be able to find Dallas in the masses even if I did.
Coach catches me before we head out for the coin flip. He places his hand on my helmet. He does this before every game. Usually he looks past my face guard, into my eyes, and asks, “You got this?”
It’s become our routine.
Today, though, it’s different. He looks at me for a few long seconds, and then in lieu of his normal question he nods and makes a statement instead.
“You’ve got this.”
From the start, luck is on our side, and we win the coin flip.
We receive, and Brookes catches the opening kick and tears up the field. Moore sticks with him, blocking as they run. Brookes goes down just past the fifty, and then it’s my turn.
The stadium is loud right up until the moment I take the field, and then it all just disappears. There’s no nerves, no fear, no nothing. Instead it feels exactly like Coach said . . . like I’ve come home.
I’ve spent hours and days and years preparing for this, so now I can just turn off everything else and do what I know how to do. I run, and I pass, and I hand off, interspersed with hits and misses.
But I just get back up. I keep going. We’re a team, and the more we play, the more we begin to click together, each person doing their part to move the overall machine.
When I’m not on the field, I walk the sidelines, checking in with the other players. I talk them up when they need it, listen when they tell me what’s working and what’s not.
One quarter passes, then another.
Halftime is a blur of coaches and plays and analyzing what’s happened so far.
When the final buzzer sounds, and we’ve won by six, it almost doesn’t feel real. Not even with the team surrounding me, screaming. Not even when Coach is in front of me, his hand back on my helmet, reminding me that I can take it off now. I pull it off, and all the noise rushes back in.
It takes me a few seconds to tune in to what Coach is saying. I miss all of it but the end.
“You did good, son.”
The field is flooding with students decked out in red, and the team is making their escape back into the locker room. I follow, a smile tugging at my face as it all starts to settle in.
Win number four.
I don’t know what’s coming next. Our hardest games of the season are still ahead of us, and I don’t know if we’re good enough yet, but I know we’re better than we’ve ever been.
I know I’m better than I’ve ever been.
And when my eyes land on Dallas waiting for me near the entrance to the locker room, wearing one of my workout shirts with my number and name written across the back . . .
Well, things just keep getting better.
She throws her arms over my shoulders, lifts up onto her tiptoes, and kisses me. And once again, all the other noise disappears.
There is only her body, her lips, the smell of her hair, and the tug of her fingers through my damp hair. Her lips move harder over mine, and I hate the pads that keep her from getting closer to me.
I don’t hear the cleared throat behind me. Dallas waves Stella off when she thumps her shoulder, and I know that everything else has disappeared for her, too.
It takes a hand on my shoulder before I even pull back enough to breathe. Dallas’s eyes are soft and so green, and they widen when they catch sight of the hand on my shoulder.
I look, and then wish I hadn’t.
Coach Cole is at my back, his lips in a firm line, and my arms are still around his daughter’s waist.
He clears his throat again and says to Dallas instead of me, “I need my quarterback, Dallas. I’ll send him back to you when we’re done.”
She unwinds her arms from me to hug him instead, and when I take my first steps toward the locker room, Coach’s eyes are closed, and he’s hugging her back.
Epilogue
Six months later
Dallas
I love the silence before the music starts.
There’s potential in the quiet, an opening for something new and beautiful to enter the world. I close my eyes, relaxing my muscles, and think back to that moment at the beginning of the year when I’d been so sure that this place would only hold misery for me.
I remember the way it had felt when I saw Carson at Dad’s practice. Even then, I think a part of me knew how perfect we would be together. That’s why it hurt so badly.
It’s easy to tap back into that feeling now as the music starts, and I begin the dance I choreographed that night as I sat in my car trying not to cry.
It’s still angry and raw, but there’s softness in it now, too. The happiness I’ve found has crept in, and rather than just being about pain and loss, it’s a story about what can grow out of that.
I’ll always be the girl who grew up without a mom. I’ll never forget what it was like to grow up sharing my dad with football. I’ll remember forever how I almost let my bitterness and my fear keep me from moving on.
Those things will always be in me, but they no longer feel like separate pieces or different versions of myself. Somewhere along the way those things were stitched together, and I no longer need to hold myself together by holding other people at bay.
It wasn’t the prettiest journey.
Sometimes I was stupid, and I let my anger get the better of me too often. But if there’s anything I’ve learned from creating this dance, it’s that sometimes mistakes bloom into the most colorful moments. They’re unexpected and different, and that’s where the character of the dance lives.
I relive the last year through my movements, and I know that every single moment was worth it.
It got me into the summer program in San Francisco, and on the choreography trac
k, too.
And more important, it got me to a point where I’m at peace with the past and a little less scared of the future.
Dance fixed me. As it always does.
I’m the last performance of the end-of-the-year recital, and when the music ends, and I look out at the applauding crowd, I find Dad and Carson standing together, clapping.
Carson winks at me, and Dad’s clapping so hard, you’d think I’d just brought home the Heisman. The season didn’t end up exactly how they both wanted. There were too many other tough teams in the conference, but a solid 6–6 record was still a vast improvement over the years before. But Carson got his scholarship, and Dad’s contract was renewed.
And as Dad told Carson at the end of the season, “We’re just getting started.”
I feel that way, too . . . like my life has just really begun.
I exit the stage, in a hurry to change out of my costume and go meet them. I don’t bother messing with the hair that’s twisted into a tight chignon at the back of my head. Nor do I bother removing the dark eye makeup; I’m too impatient.
I pull on a skirt, a tank top, and some flip-flops, and find Carson waiting for me in the hallway that connects the dressing rooms to the auditorium.
I throw myself into his arms, and he catches me, swinging me around once before letting my toes rest on the floor again.
“You are amazing,” he breathes into my ear. “I love you. So much.”
I’m still breathing heavy from the dance and my mad dash to get changed, but that doesn’t stop me from pulling him down for a kiss.
He cups my neck, kissing me slowly until my breathing settles and it’s my heart’s turn to race out of control.
“Your dad will want to see you,” Carson mumbles against my mouth.
“He can wait. I’m not quite done here.”
He laughs. “We’ve got plenty of time tonight.”
“Shut up and kiss me, quarterback.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
It’s another five minutes before I’m willing to part with Carson and our isolated hallway to join the other dancers and the lingering crowd out in the auditorium.
The rumor about Carson’s ill treatment of me hadn’t lasted more than a week or two after we made our relationship public at homecoming. He was too sweet for anybody to believe it for long, and now we’ve traded out that nasty gossip for the unending attention of being the school’s golden couple.
Maybe it’s because most of the athletes don’t stick with one girl long enough for people to know they’re a couple. Or maybe it’s because the quarterback and the coach’s daughter just make a good story. Either way, I cherish every second of alone time we can get before we’re back under the watchful eye of the gossip mongers . . . and my father.
Though when we enter the auditorium, he’s not waiting for me like I expected. I scan the room, waiting for him to come striding out of the crowds, but I don’t see him. I’m just about to tell Carson that maybe I shouldn’t have made him wait quite so long, when I catch sight of his familiar hulking back.
It’s not until Carson and I walk up the aisle next to him that I realize who has him deep in conversation.
Annaiss. My dance professor. The one who first mentioned the San Francisco program to me.
She’s dressed in a pretty purple dress, and her dark hair is silky and shiny. She’s smiling, and when dad says something, she laughs and puts a hand on his forearm.
I raise an eyebrow at Carson and he smirks. “Way to go, Coach.”
I flick his shoulder. “Ew. He is my dad. Not Ryan or Silas or Torres. And she’s my teacher.”
He rolls his eyes, and when I go to flick him again, he catches my hand and laces our fingers together. “Come on, Daredevil. Let’s go say hello.” I let him drag me forward and he adds, “Be nice.”
Annaiss spots me first, and she inches back just a hair. “Dallas, I think that might be the best I’ve ever seen you do that routine. You’re going to grow leaps and bounds in San Francisco.”
Carson squeezes my hand, and I smile. “Thanks, Annaiss. I’m looking forward to it.”
I leave in less than a month, right after final exams, and I’m at that point where I’m both wishing for time to speed up so I can leave already, and hoping it will slow down so I can spend a little more time with Carson before I have to leave him for six weeks.
I stand in front of Dad, and we’re both still feeling out how this new supportive version of him works. He’s never going to be the supernice and encouraging kind of father. He shows his support through yelling and making people do sprints and push-ups. I’m a little afraid that one day he’s going to learn enough about dance to actually put me through my paces, and then I’ll definitely be in trouble.
He wraps one arm around my shoulder, and pulls me in for our usual awkward side-hug.
“You were the best one up there, kiddo.”
“It’s not really a competition, but thanks, Dad.”
He gives me a look and I know he’s probably thinking, Everything is a competition.
“You two have big plans tonight?”
I barely restrain my blush, because yeah . . . we’ve definitely got big plans.
“We do,” I say. “Carson’s cooking for me.”
He laughs. “I’m trying to anyway.”
Dad claps Carson on the shoulder. “Good luck. It can’t be any worse than the food she grew up on.”
“That’s for sure,” I mumble.
“Hey, now,” Dad says, and Annaiss laughs, low and throaty, and oh my God, I have to get out of here or I’m going to be sick. I finally understand how Stella feels when she gets all awkward around Carson and me.
“We’re going to go,” I say. “But thanks for coming, Dad. It means a lot.”
He places his usual kiss on my head, which would hurt if I hadn’t inherited his hard head.
I say goodbye, and leave him to do whatever it is that he’s going to do, which I refuse to contemplate for my own sanity.
Even so, I spend the ride to Carson’s complaining.
“She has to be like eight or nine years younger than him. That’s weird, right? I mean . . . weird.”
Carson won’t even reply. He just laughs harder the more worked up I get.
“I mean, that’s the equivalent of me dating some pimply preteen.”
I think Carson might actually be in danger of a collapsed lung from laughter.
“Or that would be like me dating someone in his late twenties. Like Coach Oz.”
Carson pushes his truck into park a second too soon, and the whole thing jerks, sending me into my seat belt.
“Let’s not joke about you dating one of my coaches, hmm?”
Stella always goes on and on about how hot Coach Oz is, and it drives Carson crazy. He slides out of the truck and rounds the front to come open my door.
I unbuckle my seat belt and say, “It’s the same thing, though! Imagine how pissed Dad would be.”
“Yeah, I’m having no issue imagining that kind of anger.”
“I mean, Coach Oz—”
I don’t even manage to finish my sentence before Carson hauls me out of the truck and over his shoulder. He stalks over to the stairs to his apartment, and starts up them with me still in his arms.
“Man, you really don’t like it when I mention Coach—”
Something firm whacks at my backside, and I gasp.
“Carson McClain, did you just spank me?”
He just does it again in response before pushing his front door open and carrying me inside.
“Jeez! It’s not like I’m actually interested in—”
He pulls me back over his shoulder, depositing my feet on the floor, and presses me back against his closed door. He hovers above me, his eyes dark and his chest brushing mine with every breath.
With his arms braced on either side of me, he asks, “Are you done teasing me?”
I smile coyly. “That depends . . .”
“On?”
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I duck out from the cage he’s formed around me and take a few steps toward the hallway leading to his bedroom.
“On whether you can wait a little while longer for dinner.”
I don’t actually wait for him to answer before I turn around, peeling off my tank top on the way to his bedroom.
I hear him groan and a thunk that’s most likely his head hitting the door. His quick footsteps follow, and I’ve just pushed open his bedroom door when he overtakes me.
He pulls me up, cradling me in his arms as he steps through the doorway. I squeal in response, and I don’t manage to hook my arms around his neck before he deposits me on the edge of his bed. His room is pristine and smells like vanilla from a candle on his bedside table. His bed is perfectly made, and a bundle of tulips rests against the pillows.
I swallow and turn to face him, but I think I might have pushed him a little beyond his control. He’s kneeling in front of me, and his eyes are fixed on the bare skin of my waist and the strapless blue bra I’ve worn for the occasion.
He removes my flip-flops and tosses them over his shoulder before running hands up the backs of my calves.
I lean back, bracing my hands on the bed, and he follows me forward, placing a hot kiss just above the button on my skirt. My arms shake, and now I’m the one being teased.
“You know,” he says, his voice raspy and deep. “I was actually hungry.”
“You can go start dinner if you want. I’ll wait here.” I reach back and unhook my bra, tossing it over his shoulder like he did my shoes.
He growls low in his throat, standing to lean over me until I lay all the way back. “You’re playing with fire, Daredevil.”
I hook my fingers around his belt buckle and use it to pull him closer.