Chapter 13 Iris
iris
Quentin's shoulder is fine. I press along the joint one more time while he sits on the edge of his bed, tolerating the second examination with the same patient silence he gave me on the field.
The trainers already confirmed the grade one sprain but my hands need to verify it for themselves, my fingers tracing the swelling, testing the range of motion until I'm satisfied that nothing has shifted since this afternoon.
Milo hovers behind me making jokes about girlfriend privileges and Sports Medicine adjacent credentials, his voice pitched a little too high, his hands fidgeting with a loose thread on his sleeve. He's nervous. We all are.
"I'm going to my dad's," I say, stepping back from Quentin's shoulder. "Tonight. I'm not waiting for tomorrow's meeting."
Milo's mouth opens. Quentin's hand finds my wrist.
"I need to do this alone."
They don't argue. Milo kisses me before I leave, lingering until he steps out of the way for his brother. Quentin's kiss is brief, his hand squeezing the back of my neck once before letting go.
The porch light is on when I pull into the driveway.
He always leaves it on for me, even when I'm not coming over, even when I haven't called ahead.
It's been that way since we moved here, since he bought this house three blocks from campus so I'd never be too far away. The light stays on. Just in case.
I sit in the car for a full minute after I cut the engine.
The house is a single-story colonial with a yard he mows himself every Saturday and a mailbox that tilts slightly to the left because neither of us has gotten around to fixing it.
My mother would have fixed it the first week.
She would have also planted something along the walkway and hung curtains in the front windows and made this place feel like a home instead of a house where two people sleep and eat and carefully avoid talking about anything that matters.
You got this Iris. Just rip the bandaid off.
I head inside, unsurprised that the door is unlocked, the smell of coffee grounds and wood polish and the faint ghost of whatever he heated up for dinner meeting my nose. The living room is dark but there's light coming from the kitchen, telling me he’s still awake and probably waiting for me.
Blowing out a heavy breath, I round the corner and find him sitting at the head of the table.
Fourteen years ago, he sat in that exact spot and told me that my mother wasn't going to get better.
He held my hands across the table and his voice cracked on the word "gone" and I remember thinking that if my father's voice could crack then the whole world might be breakable.
He looks up when I come in. His reading glasses are pushed up on his forehead, a mug of coffee sitting beside a legal pad covered in his handwriting.
Game notes, probably. He always reviews his play calls after a win, cataloguing what worked and what didn't, building the foundation for next week's preparation.
But the pen is capped, and the pad hasn't been touched recently.
"Hey, baby girl."
"Hey, Dad."
I pull out the chair across from him, the same chair I sat in when I was twelve, and lower myself into it. Some part of me is braced to run, calculating the exit, and I hate that instinct because this is my father, and he has never given me a reason to be afraid of honesty.
Except I've been giving myself reasons for weeks.
"I'm not here because of tomorrow's meeting," I say. "I'm here because you deserve to hear this from me. Tonight. Not in your office with the boys sitting across from you like it's a disciplinary hearing."
He studies me for a moment, then sets his mug down. "What I said on the field today, I meant. But that was for the team." His voice is quieter now, stripped of the coaching authority he wore on the sideline. "This conversation is for us."
Here, in this kitchen, he's my father. And he's giving me the space to talk to him as his daughter.
"I'm dating Milo and Quentin Vark." The words come out steady because I've been rehearsing them in my head for the entire drive, shaping them into something that sounds like a statement instead of a confession.
"Both of them. It started the night of the Fab Feb auction and it's been going on for almost two weeks. "
He nods once. "I know."
"You knew before today?"
"I suspected after the first week. Your mood changed. You started smiling at practice, which you haven't done since freshman year." The corner of his mouth twitches, just barely. "And Milo's scent control is genuinely terrible. The boy smells like a bakery every time you walk onto the field."
A sound escapes me that's somewhere between a laugh and a groan. "He's on suppressants. They're just not strong enough for—"
"For being around you constantly. I figured." He takes a sip of his coffee, his eyes steady on mine over the rim. "I didn't say anything because I was waiting for you to come to me. That's always been our deal, Iris. You handle your business, and if you need me, you ask."
"I should have asked sooner."
"Yeah." No softening, no reassurance. Just the truth, delivered bluntly the way he always has.
"You should have. Not because I needed to approve it or because you need my permission to date anyone.
But because I've been watching my daughter hide something that makes her happy, and that's a hard thing for a father to sit with. "
Seeing the disappointment in his eyes hurts. "I was scared," I admit, though the word feels too small. "Not of you. Of what it would mean. For the team, for your position, for how people would look at you if they found out your daughter was with two of your players."
"People are going to look at me however they want to look at me. That's been true since I took this job." He throws me a small smile. "What I care about is you. Are you happy?"
"Yes."
"Are they good to you?"
"Yes." My voice catches on it, just slightly, the composure I've been holding cracking at the simplest question he could have asked. "They're good to me, Dad."
He holds my gaze for a long moment, reading my face the way he's read it my entire life, cataloguing what's real and what's performance. Whatever he finds must satisfy him because his shoulders drop a fraction, the tension he's been carrying releasing into something closer to resignation.
"There's more," I say, because stopping now would be a half-truth and I'm done with those.
"Chad Mercer has been harassing me. It wasn’t that bad but it escalated recently.
He called me from Kevin's phone, threatened to tell you about the twins, and tried to use it as leverage.
" I pull my phone from my coat pocket and set it on the table between us.
"He confronted me between classes two days ago.”
The softness drains from my father’s face, replaced by something harder. "How long has this been going on?"
"The asking out, over a year. Forty-seven times. I kept count." A thin smile crosses my face. "The threats started after the auction. The physical confrontation was two days ago. And you saw what he did to Quentin today."
"You kept records."
"Dates, times, everything. I also found evidence that he paid someone to write his ethics paper last semester. And there are supplements in his locker that aren't on any approved list."
My father's hand flattens on the table, his palm pressing against the wood.
I can see him processing it, filing each piece into the framework he uses to handle problems, separating the personal from the professional the way he's trained himself to do.
“Did he touch you?” My hesitation is answer enough but my dad has always wanted my words. “Iris, answer the question.”
“Yeah, when he cornered me, he grabbed my arm. He told me he'd been watching my apartment and tracking when the Vark twins come and go." I innocently rub my wrist and then stop, knowing my father tracked the movement.
His nostrils flare once, the only visible crack in the composure, and I know that underneath the coach is a father whose daughter just told him that a boy has been harassing her. "I'll handle Chad. That’s not your problem anymore."
"Dad—"
"It stopped being your problem the moment he put his hands on you. I should have stepped in a long time ago. You told me you could handle it, and I believed you, and I shouldn't have let it go on this long." He clears his throat, his hand sliding off the table into his lap. "That's on me."
The silence that follows is heavy, cutting into me. I twist my hands on the table, waiting for the next beat. I can already feel that it’s going to be a strange question.
"Can I ask you something?" His voice changes, going quieter, the professional edge receding. "The nest."
My breath stops.
"Someone mentioned it?" I manage.
"No. Nobody mentioned it." He looks down at his coffee mug, turning it between his hands.
"Your mother had one. You know that. After she passed, I boxed everything up because I couldn't look at it.
The blankets, the pillows, all of it. I put it in storage and told myself I'd deal with it when I was ready.
" He pauses. "I was never ready. And it occurred to me, watching you grow up, that I never talked to you about it.
About what it meant to her. About whether you might. .."
He trails off, his jaw working, and I realize my father is sitting across from me, trying not to cry.
"I have one," I whisper. "I've had one since freshman year."
He nods, pressing the heel of his free hand against his eye.
"I should have known. I should have asked.
You were always so much like her and that was your favorite place in the whole house.
" His voice comes out rough. "Your mother would have known what you needed.
She would have seen it in a heartbeat and she would have sat with you and helped you build the damn thing.
" A breath shudders out of him. "I didn't know how to look for what I couldn't see, Iris.
I thought I was giving you space. Turns out I was just giving you room to hide. "
My chin trembles. "You didn't fail me, Dad."
"Feels like I did."
"You raised me. Alone. You moved across the country and built a career and made sure I had everything I needed." I reach across the table and take his hand, his fingers closing around mine. "Mom would be proud of you. I'm proud of you. You really... it’s not weird? Me as an Alpha with a nest?"
"No, Iris. It’s not. I just... I need some time," he says finally, clearing his throat, pulling his hand back to wipe his face.
"To process all of this. The relationship, not the nesting. Everything about you is beautiful. I need time, but it’s not because I disapprove, Iris. I just want to get it right."
That’s not how I thought this was going to go. "Take whatever time you need."
"The meeting tomorrow still happens. I need to see the boys in my office and have a conversation with them face-to-face." He straightens in his chair, the coach settling back over the father again. "And I need to deal with Chad before he sets foot on my field again."
"Okay."
I stand, pulling my coat tighter around me, my keys biting into my palm. He walks me to the door, his hand finding my shoulder as I step onto the porch. The early spring air immediately cuts through my coat, my breath clouding between us.
"Iris."
I turn back to see him standing in the doorway.
"Your mother would have liked them." He manages a smile. "She would have liked the way you are around them and how happy they make you." I nod, not trusting my voice as he says one more thing. “I’ll get there, baby girl. I’ll do better, I promise.”
I step back up to him and hug him tight. “That’s all I need, Dad. That’s all I need.”