Better Than Revenge

Chapter Ten

Chapter

ten

“WE COULD’VE HELPED YOU,” DEJA said as we all drove home together from the family dinner party turned real party turned secret-keeping party.

I left minus Jensen’s stuff, not because I’d burned it in the nonexistent bonfire but because he’d marched in and took it without asking like he seemed to be doing with everything in my life. Did he just go around looking in bags, or did someone tell him? The only person who knew outside our group was Theo.

“You didn’t have to ask the devil himself,” she said.

“I could not have helped,” Max said. “I know nothing about kicking anything, really, but especially a football. The devil will be a better teacher, what with all his devil powers.”

“ Jensen is the devil,” I said. “I needed to recruit a helper to take him down even if that helper is—”

“A devil as well?” Deja said.

“In your world there are multiple devils?” Maxwell asked.

“I’m hoping he’s a lesser devil,” I said. “A demon maybe?”

Deja laughed. “As long as you know who you made a dealwith.”

“Believe me, I know,” I said, pulling a wipe out of my purse and scrubbing off the remains of my lip stain.

“I think you made a deal with someone who wants to see Jensen suffer as much as you do,” Lee said.

“Does he, though?” I asked. “And why? Because he was a little annoying on the football field? It doesn’t make sense.” Deja was right—could I really trust someone I hadn’t trusted for so long?

“Whatever the reason, five…,” he said, pointing at all of us and then back toward the house to indicate Theo, “like-minded people can accomplish a lot.”

“Did Jensen try to talk to you tonight?” Deja asked, looking over her shoulder and switching lanes.

“Didn’t even look at me.” I dropped the pink-smudged wipe back into my purse.

“That you know of,” Maxwell said.

“It’s going to feel so awesome to march in there and take his football position.” I tried to say those words with confidence, but I was feeling far from confident.

“I guess that’s the one silver lining in this deal,” Deja said. “When did Theo say he could help you?”

“Tomorrow. He said we are starting tomorrow.” I tugged on the top of my seat belt, lengthening it, then letting it slide into place.

“Motivated,” Max said. “I like it.”

“We don’t have a lot of time.” I was sure that was the only reason he suggested tomorrow. He knew that four weeks was pushing it as I much as I did.

“Apparently I’m still going to have to share you with a boy for a while,” Deja said.

“Yeah, but I think you support it more now than you ever did before.”

She let out a long laugh. “If Jensen suffers as a result, I do.”

“YOU’RE UP EARLY,” GRANDMA SAID the next morning. “Isn’t it Saturday? Time to sleep in and procrastinate homework or surf.”

“I don’t surf, Grandma. Apparently, that’s you.” I sat at the kitchen table eating oatmeal coated in brown sugar and sliced bananas. I had a feeling Theo was going to kick my butt today, and I wanted to make sure I ate enough to support a butt kicking.

“You should. It’s fun.” Grandma sat next to me eating her own bowl of oatmeal. Hers had bananas but only a small sprinkle of brown sugar.

“Tell me more about your surfing. How long did it take tolearn?”

“Andrew Lancaster taught me nearly every day for an entire summer.”

“Every day? Did you get really good at it?”

“Not particularly, but I had fun.”

That wasn’t the pep talk I needed this morning. “I’m going to pretend you became a competition-ready surfer.”

“Why would you pretend that?”

“Because I have big plans, Grams, and I need some inspiration.”

“You’re good at everything you do,” she said.

Good was the right word. I was pretty much good at things I tried. But good didn’t make me a star soccer player. Good didn’t make me the host of the school’s podcast. And good would definitely not turn me into the starting kicker. I needed to be beyond good. I needed to be exceptional.

“Wait. Andrew Lancaster?” I asked. “Isn’t that the famous painter?” The Andrew Lancaster I’d heard of was a pop painting icon. Especially famous around here because he grew up on the Central Coast. He’d died about five years ago, but his art lived on. An art installment of his works traveled the country. He painted on surfboards and tires and old road signs and records and anything he could get his hands on, it seemed.

“Yes, he painted. I told you that. He painted my surfboard. Mine was the first one.”

“Really?” Could that be true? My grandma had owned the first piece of art painted by Andrew Lancaster? “What happened to that surfboard again?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is it part of his art installment?”

“No, my friend borrowed it, and I never got it back. She lost it, I think,” she said, like I hadn’t just asked her what happened to it and she hadn’t just told me she didn’t know.

“Huh. Maybe we can find it somehow.”

“Maybe,” she said.

“I have to go.” I kissed her cheek, rinsed my bowl out in the sink, and loaded it into the dishwasher.

“Bye, honey.”

“Mom! Dad! I’ll be back later.”

Mom poked her head out of her bedroom on my way to the front door and gave my outfit—running shorts and a tee—a once-over. “Where are you going?” she asked.

“To work out with a new friend. And then maybe grab lunch.” I only said that last part because I had a feeling this would take a while. I wanted a cushion of time to work in. I didn’t want to tell my mom what I was really doing until I knew it was even the slightest possibility.

“Okay,” Mom said. “Also, I’d like to meet this new friendsoon.”

“Sure.” Not happening. I wasn’t even sure if Theo thought of me as his friend. I certainly didn’t think of him as mine.

My phone buzzed with a text to our group chat as I left the house. Kill it today, was the message from Deja. She must’ve had to work if she was up this early.

Lunch tomorrow? I typed back.

I’m in and I’m sure the guys will be too when they wake up.

Sleeping, Maxwell responded. Your buzzing woke me up.

Put your phone on do not disturb, goof, I quickly texted back, then climbed in my car.

My drive over to Theo’s house was uneventful. Yes, we were doing this at his house. Yes, I felt like I was imposing. But he’d been the one to suggest his place and it made the most sense because he had the net and the gear and it wasn’t as public as the school where anybody could wander in and see what we were doing.

His house seemed even bigger during the day. We’d exchanged numbers before I left his party the night before, and I shot him a text as I walked the path to his front door.

Here.

Above the text was the one he’d sent last night: Okay, see you at eight-thirty.

The clock on my phone said eight-twenty-eight.

I scrolled up to read the whole exchange that had landed me on his porch.

He was the first to initiate contact at 10:43p.m., right as I’d gotten home: Were you serious about stealing the kicking spot?

I had texted back: So serious.

Ready to start training then?

So ready.

My house tomorrow still work?

So there.

Am I going to regret this?

Probably.

Okay, see you at eight-thirty.

I knocked on his door, hoping he’d beat his mom to answer it since I’d warned him with a text.

He did. The door swung open to reveal a sleepy-eyed Theo. He had a few pillow lines on his cheek, and his hair was ruffled. He was dressed, wearing some workout shorts and a tee…well, unless that’s what he slept in, it was hard to tell.

“Hey,” he said. “Come in.” He was barefoot but holding a pair of socks.

“I didn’t wake you, did I?”

“I look that bad, huh?”

I wasn’t sure Theo could ever look bad. He actually looked kind of adorable with sleep face. “No, you look good, I mean fine. I mean— Never mind.”

He let out a low chuckle and led the way down the hall. “You look good and fine too.”

I knew he was mocking me, so I rolled my eyes. “Is your mom okay with all this?”

“What’s all this?” he asked, plopping onto a kitchen chair and pulling on his socks.

“Me. You. Not like…me and you…like me being here, you teaching me. Wow, what is wrong with me?” I didn’t normally stumble on words, or I tried not to, but I seemed to be doing that a lot when it came to him.

“Not sure,” he said, looking up at me through his lashes. “Sometimes I have that effect on people.”

“You did not just say that.”

“I only speak the truth.” He stood and retrieved a pair of shoes by the island. “Did you bring your soccer cleats?”

“Should I have?” The shoes he was holding were regular running shoes. “I don’t even know if I have them anymore.” They were probably somewhere under a pile of clothes in my closet.

“Did Jensen never tell you that kickers usually wear soccer cleats?”

“No, he didn’t.”

“Huh. Maybe in the back of his mind he always knew you could steal this from him.”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I’ve kicked a football once. Not sure I’m stealing anything from anyone.”

A scar ran down his kneecap, and I studied it as he tied his shoes. He brushed his hand once over his knee, catching me staring. I averted my gaze. “What happened?” I asked.

“Partially tore my ACL the practice before the last game.”

“Oh, right.” His injury. I didn’t realize it had been so serious. “You had to have surgery?”

“Yep,” he said, standing, his single-word answer and his body language telling me he didn’t want to talk about it. He gestured toward the back door with his head. “Let’s go see what you got before we hit the weights.”

“Hit the weights?” I asked. “What does that mean?”

“You’ve lifted weights before. I’ve seen you in the weight room at school.”

I hadn’t been in the weight room since soccer season last year. He’d seen me? “I wasn’t sure if it meant something else in kicker terminology.”

His eyebrows popped up like he was trying to decide if I was as stupid as I seemed. “It means the same thing.” He opened the back door, and soon we were out by the net and the shed with a football that he’d put on a small plastic stand on the grass. The ocean and its rhythmic waves made up the background noise.

“Don’t I just drop-kick it?” I asked, looking at the ball.

He leveled me with a stare.

“I take it that’s a no.”

“Tell me you know how this game works.”

I cringed. “I mean…mostly?”

“I have to teach you how to kick and all the rules and regulations of the game you want to play?”

“You don’t have to do anything,” I said. “This is probably the worst idea anyway. I can leave right now and save us both a lot oftime.”

“No need to overreact.”

“I’m not overreacting. I’m just reacting.”

He held up his hands. “Don’t be mad.”

I looked at his hands and his doe-eyed expression. “Does that usually work for you?”

“Girls aren’t usually mad at me.”

“I find that hard to believe.”

He smiled.

“And I’m not mad at you,” I said.

“See, it worked.”

I shook my head and gave a reluctant smile. “I will research the rules and regulations of football on my own. But a few pointers would be nice.”

He straightened his shoulders and proceeded to tell me the difference between a punter and a kicker and how Jensen wasn’t a punter. How punting was more about power (which was apparently why a beefy guy named Greg did that) and kicking was more about accuracy. How the ball was normally held for a field goal, but we’d start by practicing with the plastic stand.

When he was done explaining, Theo picked up the ball and walked until he stood in front of me. “You ready?”

No. “I think.”

He squatted down and ran a hand down the back of my right calf until he held the heel of my shoe in his palm.

I barely contained the shiver that went through me. “What are you doing?”

He placed the football on my instep. “Don’t kick with this part of your foot. Wedge kicks aren’t as accurate. Your boyfriend loves wedge kicks.”

“He’s very much not my boyfriend.”

“Right. Jensen does a wedge kick. It’s why he’s not as accurate as he could be. He has gotten better, though, so you’re not going to be able to walk into this position. Plus, he has experience.”

“And he’s a guy,” I said.

He didn’t try to pretend that wouldn’t make a difference. “And he’s a guy. But Coach is pretty cool. If you’re better, you’re better.”

“Then let’s make me better.”

He stared up at me from where he was still squatting down, still holding my foot. He seemed to be taking this job very seriously.

“No wedge kicks. Got it,” I said.

“Right. I want you to kick with this part of your foot.” He stuck the ball on the big bone toward the inside of my foot but close to the shoelaces.

I swallowed and took my foot from him. “Okay.”

He replaced the ball on the holder and then took about three steps back from it and two to the left. “Pretend there’s an invisible line going from the center of my body to the left of the ball. That’s the line I want you to drive along.” He turned and looked at me. “You’re a right-footed kicker, yes?”

“Yes.”

“That’s what I thought. You’ll plant with your left foot to the left of the ball. Your right leg will swing through and strike just to the left of the seam there.” He mimicked the motion without actually kicking the ball.

“Are you going to kick it?” I asked.

“No,” he said shortly.

“Why?”

“This is your session,” he said.

“And that means you can’t kick it? I think it would be good for me to see how it’s supposed to look. Wait…can you not kick anymore?” I pointed to his scar. It ran along his left kneecap, which I was just now noticing was his planting leg. If it was weak, it would probably affect his kicking a lot.

“I’m working on it,” he said defensively. “It’s only been four months.”

“I’m not judging you. I just didn’t realize. Does it throw off your balance?”

“We’re not talking about me,” he said. “Kick the ball.”

“No need to overreact,” I said, quoting his earlier line.

“You asked me to teach you. You don’t think I can teach you because I can’t kick a ball right now?”

“I definitely didn’t say that.”

“Then let me teach you.”

“You don’t want to actually talk or get to know each other at all. Got it,” I said.

He sighed, like he’d run out of patience for me. This was going to be a long four weeks. “What do you want to know? That I got hit so hard in practice that I lost my college offer and that I’m trying to figure out what my future looks like without football?”

My breath caught in my throat, and his gaze went to the ground as if he immediately regretted saying that. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I thought podcasting was my future, so I get it.”

“And it’s not anymore?”

“It will be harder,” I said. “What about you? You don’t think football can be your future anymore?”

“It will be harder,” he mimicked.

“In the meantime, you’ll help me with revenge?” I asked.

“Yeeesss,” he said on an exaggerated sigh as if I was finally coming around to his plan instead of him being part of mine.

“Okay, okay, let’s get started,” I said, squaring my shoulders and facing the ball.