Chapter 12
Academic Probation
Luke
“You okay, Carter?”
I looked up. Kayla was standing in the aisle, clutching a stack of flashcards. She looked tired—midterm season came for everyone—but her smile was sympathetic.
“Fine,” I lied. “Stiffness from lifting.”
“Right. Lifting.” She adjusted her backpack straps. “Devon said he heard you pacing at three a.m. last night. He was going to write you up for a noise violation, but then he realized you were walking in circles.”
Heat rose in my neck. “Sorry. Tell him I’ll buy him earplugs.”
“He’s an RA, Luke. He normally sleeps like the dead. But you look like you’re running on fumes.” She hesitated, then tapped my arm. “If you need the notes from last week, let me know. You were staring at the wall for most of the lecture.”
“I might take you up on that,” I said, genuinely grateful.
“Do it. Don’t fail. Devon hates doing the paperwork when athletes get academic suspensions.”
She gave a little wave and headed for the door. I watched her go, the word suspension ringing in my ears louder than the dismissal bell.
I hoisted my bag and headed for the faculty wing, the dread in my stomach growing heavier with every step.
The hallway outside Professor Delvecchio’s office was lined with still photos of last year’s case-study champions—three deep rows of smiling undergrads in tailored blazers clutching fake oversize checks.
I resisted the urge to tug my Frost Demons hoodie lower. The Carver School of Business always made me feel like I’d walked into the wrong locker room: wrong gear, wrong game.
Eight of us waited on the bisected leather couch.
Nobody spoke. Pages rustled; highlighters squeaked.
A kid in a charcoal suit scrolled his phone, lips moving like he was rehearsing a pitch deck.
Office hours, fifteen-minute slots, first-come first-served.
The paper sign-up sheet on the door showed my name fourth.
I checked my watch—3:07. Practice started at six. Plenty of time
The first kid was in and out in five minutes, almost in tears.
Suit Kid slid inside when Dr. Delvecchio called “next.” I tried not to eavesdrop, but the walls weren’t thick. Balance-sheet ratios, discounted cash flow, language I recognized but never heard from a goalie crease. My backpack felt heavier with every acronym.
Fifteen minutes, then the door cracked. Suit Kid emerged looking victorious, thanked the professor twice, and strode off like he’d closed seed funding. Delvecchio’s voice followed: “Next.”
I stood, shoulders doing an involuntary pre-game roll. The bruise protested, still purple under compression but manageable.
Dr. Delvecchio wore a tie patterned with tiny dollar signs, sleeves rolled. “Come in.” He gestured to the chair opposite his desk, the kind that swallowed you lower than the interviewer. Power displacement in furniture form.
I sat in the hard plastic chair, my knee bouncing a nervous rhythm against the leg of the desk. I had the speech memorized in my head already: ‘Student-athletes need to prioritize… maybe this major isn’t a good fit… academic probation is looming.’
Dr. Delvecchio didn’t look up. He was grading, his red pen slashing through someone’s work with violent efficiency.
Finally, he capped the pen. “Mr. Carter.”
“Professor.” I straightened up, bracing myself. “I know the midterm is coming up, and I know that sixty-eight last week was… below standard.”
“It was,” Delvecchio agreed, opening a folder. “It was lower than the average. Which is why I was surprised by this.”
He slid a paper across the desk. Face down.
My stomach dropped. I reached out, expecting to see a fifty. Maybe a forty. I turned it over.
Eighty-two.
I stared at the number. Then I looked at Delvecchio. Then back at the number.
“Eighty-two?” I said.
“You got the entire section on adjusting entries correct,” Delvecchio said, leaning back in his chair. “Last week, you didn’t know a debit from a hole in the ground. This week, you balanced the ledger on the first try. That is a statistical anomaly.”
“I… studied,” I said, the word feeling inadequate.
“You didn’t just study. You changed your method.” He tapped the paper. “I see scratch work in the margins here. You’re drawing out the flow of cash before you journalize it. You didn’t do that before.”
I looked at the margins. There were tiny, faint arrows drawn next to the accounts—Austen’s “water flow” method. Cash flows down, equity builds up. I hadn’t even realized I was drawing them until now.
“I found an excellent tutor,” I admitted. “He… explains things differently. He makes it about logic, not just rules.”
Delvecchio hummed, a low sound of approval. “Well, whatever he’s charging you, pay it. I haven’t seen a turnaround this clear in my section in a few years.”
He pulled the quiz back to log the grade in the computer system.
“You’re not out of the woods, Carter. One quiz doesn’t erase a month of struggle. But this?” He gestured to the grade as he handed it back. “This keeps you on the ice.”
“That’s the plan, sir.”
“Get out of here. And start studying for the midterm today. Don’t make the mistake of waiting to the last minute.”
“Yes, sir.”
He made a shooing motion. I had been dismissed. The dread that had been sitting on my chest for a week suddenly gone, replaced by something lighter.
I looked at the quiz in my hand. Eighty-two.
I hadn’t just survived. I’d understood it.
I pulled out my phone. I didn’t text Ryan, Coach, or my dad. I opened the thread that had become the most active one on my phone.
Me: 82. The arrows worked.
I hit send, grinning like an idiot in the middle of the business school hallway.
I slipped out of Carver Hall, notebook tighter under my arm than the blocker usually was on my hand. A snow-dusted quad funneled students to late afternoon classes.
Phone buzz—Dad again. Declined. Another buzz.
Ryan: Lift at 4:30, don’t be late, Monk.
I thumbed back: on schedule.
Campus wind slapped the thought away. I tightened my parka hood and crossed toward the dorms, boots punching through crusted snow. Practice countdown: two hours, twenty-nine minutes. Enough time to eat and stretch.
Stony Creek Hall shimmered with radiator breath on the windows. I climbed to third, shoulder twinging from the notebook weight—even paper felt heavy now. Our door was ajar the regulation two inches.
Inside, Austen stood at the sink area rinsing a mug. His hair looked like he’d shoved a hand through it five times, then decided it was fine. He set the mug upside down on a towel, glanced over.
“Training room?” he asked.
“Office hours.” I dropped my backpack, the thunk louder than intended.
“Action-packed. Congrats on the eighty-two, by the way.”
I peeled off my parka, draped it on the bedpost. He didn’t dig; he never did. Returned to his side of the room, shifting a stack of printouts to make space on the desk.
“Thanks, it was your tutoring that did it. I really can’t thank you enough.”
“Glad I could assist.”
I opened the fridge, found two blueberry oat bars lined beside a Post-it note reading inventory: 3. Lifted one, offered it across the gap. “Trade?” I said.
“Accepted.” He took the bar, slid a mechanical pencil and a yellow pad into the vacated space.
My pulse thudded in my ears. “I’m lifting at 4:30, practice at six.” I unwrapped the bar with deliberate care. “Weights’ll wreck me.”
“We can continue with tutoring tomorrow then.” He broke the bar in half, ate.
I chewed, swallowed chalk-sweetness. “I understand the theory. Execution still… leaks.”
“An athlete complaining about execution feels ironic.”
“Funny.” I crumpled the wrapper, aimed for the trash. Rim, in. “No pointers besides ‘reallocate ice time.’“
Austen made a noncommittal sound, spun the mechanical pencil between fingers. “Tonight, after practice?”
Practice would end at 8:15. Showers, media, maybe 8:45 back to dorm. “I’ll be disgusting.”
“Mathematics is odor-agnostic.”
I almost laughed. “You sure?”
He met my eyes—steady, no sympathy gimmicks. “Yes.”
Embarrassment prickled anyway, like forgetting a piece of gear before warm-up. “I don’t want to drag you.”
“Reciprocity,” he answered, a word now so coded it skipped argument. “Nine-thirty? Gives you time to rotate the bruise and the laundry.”
That precise. My chest loosened an inch. “Nine-thirty.”
He tore a scrap of paper, wrote 21:30 – FAcct on it, stuck it atop his monitor. Then he reached into the freezer, retrieved the bag of peas. “Ice your shoulder. I saw you wince.”
I nodded, throat tight. I ripped off my hoodie and T-shirt to let the peas sit on my skin.
Austen’s eyes lingered on my six-pack before making their way up to my face. Did he just blush? He spun around, no longer looking at me.
“Thanks,” I said, barely above normal volume.
He capped the pencil, clicked it twice. “We’ll solve for direction. Magnitude follows.”
I pulled out a book for my film class and learned about the history of documentary filmmaking.
I kept getting distracted. The image of Austen’s hazel eyes as they had raked up my torso flooded my mind and distracted me.
I’m sure I’d imagined it, but for just a second, I swear there was longing there.
But then, maybe I’m seeing things that don’t exist because it’s been so long since I had any man-on-man action that didn’t involve the ice.
My phone chimed—Ryan’s twenty-minute warning. I grabbed my gym bag, slung it over the opposite shoulder to spare the bruise.
At the door, I hesitated. Austen looked up.
“Radiator good?” I asked.
He angled a thumb toward the valve. “Posts aligned.”
“Oh, Ryan wanted me to remind you that you are invited tomorrow night to trivia.”
“As for right now, that sounds entirely probable.”
Weights hammered every muscle fiber; practice finished the job. Harper barely spoke, but her stopwatch did, beep after merciless beep. By the time I limped into the dorm, the bruise sang in three languages. Clock read 9:22.
Room 317 glowed warm. Austen sat cross-legged on the floor, T-accounts sketched on the yellow pad, his mint tea sitting next to him. Next to him, he had a lime seltzer, a nutrition bar, and a bag of peas laid out waiting for me sitting beside my notebook.
He didn’t say hurry or you’re late. Looked up and patted the rug.
I dropped the gear bag, toed off shoes, and sat opposite him, shoulder loosening under the radiator’s steady breath. Embarrassment lingered, but trust inched forward, enough to pick up the pencil and meet his eyes.
“Debit equipment,” I started, voice steadier than I felt. “Credit cash.”
“Show your work,” he said, and the lesson began.