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“Neither do you, so stop acting like you do and hear me when I tell you to get out of it.”

“Everything is just a headline to you, and I’m done being a part of it,” he said. “You hear that? Because maybe it’s time you listened to me.”

“I’m not going to back down because you don’t like my findings.”

He looked at me for a good long while, and I tried my absolute best not to show the fear I had inside me.

“Of course you’re not backing down,” he said with a scathing laugh, and walked away.

16

Trace

I hadn’t planned on reading it before the kickoff. I’d meant to glance at it later, on the bus or on the way back to my room, when everything was quieter and easier to ignore. Instead, I found myself standing near the equipment table with one glove half-pulled on and the phone angled low in my hand.

The pregame noise had swelled around me, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. It was the headline that hit me first, but it was the line that came after that felt like a punch to the gut.

‘Wunderkind with more promise than he can handle?’ That was what she decided to call me in the newest edition of ‘Dakota actually doing her job.’ The longer I looked at it, the sicker I felt. It was so hard for me to just be okay with it.

I slowly dragged my thumb over the screen as my eyes moved over every word. It wasn’t my choice though, and I couldn’t have stopped if I wanted to. Dakota hadn’t written anything outright. She made no accusations and no claims that I could point to and call unfair.

Her phrasing was very careful in a way that stuck. She wrote about my rise, saying that it was unstable and unpredictable. She treated it like it had an expiration date, and she spoke about me as if I were already teetering on the edge of something I couldn’t control.

With a frustrated huff, I locked my phone and threw it into my locker. It landed harder than I intended, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. She had already ruined everything, so it wasn’t like she could make it worse. I slammed the door, and it rattled softly before settling into place.

“Yo,” Lucas called from across the room as he threw a mouth-guard into the air and caught it again. “You look like you just read your own obituary.”

“Shut up,” I scoffed, grabbing my helmet.

Lucas gave me a wide grin. “Was it that bad?”

It wasn’t like he needed my response. The entire team had already read the article, and the news had probably spread halfway through the school by now.

When I stepped into the tunnel, the field buzzed with energy. There were bodies moving around and shoulder pads kicking lightly as we filtered through. I rolled my neck once, trying to shake the irritation loose, but it clung to me like a disease.

By the time I stepped out, the noise hit me with full force. The stands were packed, and not just with the usual amount of supporters. There were definitely more people than we had last week. A few of them stood out because they were leaning forward in their seats, pointing and watching while having casual conversations.

The problem was that they were all watching me. I adjusted my grip on my helmet and tried to scan the field instead. I needed to focus on what mattered because I couldn’t afford to botch another game and give Dylan more ammo to use against me.

The Golden Bears had already begun running drills on the opposite side, and their movements were worth paying attention to. Like many other teams we had played against, they were sharp with efficient movements and no wasted energy.

Their receivers cut clean routes even in warm-ups. The quarterbacks released the ball with quick, precise flicks, and they looked more ready than we had ever been. That didn’t mean we weren’t prepared though. We had to be, and like always, this game was something we would take in our stride.

“Let’s go,” Malik shouted, clapping his hands as the defense broke into formation drills.

I jogged through my reps, trying to loosen my legs and settle my breath into a rhythm. I caught a quick toss from Ethan, then pivoted and burst forward. Then I cut between two cones and eased up so we could do it again.

On the next run, we tried to do it faster, but as Ethan let go of the ball, flashes of the article invaded my mind. I swore under my breath as the ball flew right past me, but Ethan didn’t seem too fazed. He just gave me a knowing look and tried again.

By the time the whistle blew for kickoff, the tension I had felt shifted into something electric. The first drive belonged to the Golden Bears, and they came out aggressively. There was no hesitation, and they definitely weren’t trying to feel things out.

The quarterback snapped the ball and fired a quick slant that split the linebackers before Malik could close the gap, and he gained eight yards. For the next play, there was a run up the middle that shoved the line back a step.

Then there was a deep throw down the sideline. It was the perfect spiral that had the receiver stretching just enough to pull it before he stepped out. We adjusted by tightening our coverage, but the Bears kept pushing and they were relentless.

By the time we hit the red zone, the defense was already on our heels. The snap came, and they faked a handoff. Their quarterback rolled right, drawing our defenders in before flipping it short to a tight end who slipped past the line, earning them a touchdown.

The crowd reacted with half of them cheering and the other half groaning. I stood near the sideline marker and watched the extra point sail through cleanly.