“A couple.” I glance out of the tent entrance—again.“A few concussions, the occasional broken bone. Nothing you can’t handle, I’m sure.” I give him finger guns, my eyes still searching the entrance, bleachers, and field for any sign of Malcolm.
“Let’s hope for none of that today!” Emma chirps. “Safety first!” The woman is a beacon of hazard prevention. She once forced my classes to wear tinted glasses during aBig Bang Theorypresentation. She was convinced the bright flashing of light could cause optic nerve injuries—from the tiny three-foot box television with a permanent black circle in one corner. “Who did their safety debriefing?” Emma joins me under the tent opening, the area of shade around us disappearing as the noon sun starts to come out.
“Uh, I don’t know.” Still no sign of Malcolm. “Maybe the coaches.” I stand on my toes and see the first group of players making their way toward the field.
“Hello! Earth to Stanley!” Emma waves her hands in my face, the yellow sun hat she’s wearing is folded up in the front, resembling a sunflower.
I blink back to her, slightly distracted by the beam of yellow surrounding her head. “Hmm?”
“Tell me what is going on in that curly head”—she trickles her fingers through the air between us—“of yours.”
“I’m just ready for the scrimmage to start.” My eyes dart between her and the field, still searching. The second team starts to file onto the turf with the coaches following close behind.
“Kate…” Emma eyes me warily. Her patience has always been calming, that motherly patience I missed out on. “Talk to me.” Her voice is tranquil and almost hypnotizing as she waits for me to respond—another motherly tactic she has mastered.
I focus on her and the horrendous hat. “I just…ugh…” I gnaw on my thumbnail and speak around my hand. “I need to talk to Malcolm. I need to clear things up.”
“I agree. You should. But you can’t do that anytime soon. He has to focus on the team, and you do too.” She hands me a sideline duffel bag full of tape, Band-Aids, and other essentials. “That’s why you’re here.” She turns me to face the field and bleachers, my group of girls lining the front rail that overlooks the guys, sporting team shirts and cheering on their counterparts. My heart swells at the team spirit. “Worry about the game right now. You have time to talk to Malcolm. He’s not going anywhere.”
Her reassurance powers my steps as I head to the field, duffel and enormous water bottle in tow. I find the group of coaches for the first team with Coach Lawson giving his usual pep talk. The players and younger coaches listen so intently a missile strike wouldn’t distract them. Eric waves at me from the field, stretching as he prepares to play. Nausea burns my throat at the weirdness between us. The friendly dinner I had hoped for, the closure I needed, gone in the blink of an eye—all because he had a surge of testosterone after a couple glasses of wine.
I spot Coach Daniels across the field, standing with a few coaches I don’t recognize. I peer over them, looking for the one I do, with no luck.
“Hello, Ms. Stanley,” Daniels greets me behind his orange framed sunglasses.
“Daniels, hi! Where’s Malcolm?” There is no way I don’t look like a lunatic with how fast my head whips back and forth as I look around for him.
“He’s letting me—”
Coach Lawson blows the whistle, cutting off Daniels, as four players take the field, each wearing a band wrapped around their biceps with the letter C stitched on it. Team captains. The sunbakes us, and I shade my face with the giant water bottle, my gaze distorted from the rays of light as I watch the coin flip. The sun makes it hard to tell who from our team is out there until my eyes land on a familiar set of forearms and farmer’s tan. The red-tinged, pale skin and light-colored hair that trickles up the chiseled arms is hard to mistake. He turns around, adjusting his helmet strap as he makes his way back to the sidelines. Bright-blue eyes meet mine, and my jaw feels like it could dislocate from how hard it drops.
“What. Are. You. Doing?” I bellow at Malcolm as he joins the pre-play huddle. He smiles at me, ignoring my question. Oh, heck no. I stomp across the sidelines, shoving my way into the huddle. A few familiar faces smile at me, and a few stare at me like the mad woman I am. “Malcolm, what are you doing? You can’t—”
They clap once, the huddle breaking up, and they take the field. Malcolm attempts to follow, but I grab him by the collar of his jersey and drag him backward a few steps.
“Whoa, ma’am! What was that for?” He readjusts his shoulder pads, rolling his neck and arms.
“What are you thinking? You can’t go out there!” I gape at him.
“It’s just one game, Stanley.” He squeezes my elbow.
I grab his wrist. “What if you get hurt?” I’m too concerned for Malcolm. I don't even try to hide the whimper in my voice.
He stops mid-step to turn back to me and grips my shoulders, leveling his gaze with mine. His eyes soften as his smile stretches across his face, a thousand unspoken words passing through the thick air between us. “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”
“You know that’s impossible for me.”
He belts out a boisterous laugh as he tilts his face up to the sky. The sound would be contagious, causing me to laugh with him, if I wasn’t on pins and needles. He pulls his helmet up to the topof his head, and sweat glistens on the edges of his face and tip of his beard. “It’s not even a full game, Kate.”
My eyes sting, either from sweat or the sheer idea of my friend getting plowed over by some teenagers. As if he can sense the worry boiling inside me, Malcolm cups my jaw with both hands and squeezes my cheeks. From afar, the motion would look silly, but something about the slow way his callused thumbs graze down my face makes all the air leave my body. “Everything will be fine.”
I blink back the moisture swelling in my eyes. “You promise?”
“I promise.” His smile falters for a moment before he forces it into a wide grin and heads back out to the field, like he, too, can sense the conversation coming, the boundaries we have to set. He’s telling me, and himself, that everything will be fine.
“He’ll be fine,” Daniels reassures me when I join him on the sidelines. “I’ve heard the guy is a tank out there.”
Tankis an understatement.
