Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
“How was your break?”
I looked up from my spot on the ground, pulling my socks up high to see Gardner standing over me. “Good. I got to spend some time with my family, and you?”
He shrugged, crouching down. “I slept a lot.”
“Nice.”
Gardner made a pleasant face but didn’t reply. He stayed next to me as I pulled my cleat on and tied it. “Sal.” His voice was so low my gut immediately knew something was wrong. “More pictures popped up this weekend. I want you to be smart, okay?”
I didn’t even tilt my head to take a look at him, only slanting my eyes over in his direction as my guts crawled up into my throat. “We’re friends, G. That’s all.”
The grave expression on his face wasn’t exactly reassuring. “Look, I believe you. I’d believe you if you told me pigs flew, but I know Cordero’s going to be pissed, and there’s only so much Sheena and I can do.”
Time seemed to slow down. “What are you trying to say?”
“I want you to think about what you’re doing and what you want from the future.” Gardner put his hand on my shoulder. “I want the best for you, Sal. That’s the only reason why I’m saying anything. I don’t want you to get blindsided.”
Blindsided by what?
Before I could even start to get my thoughts together and ask him for clarification on whether I was overexaggerating what he was implying, Gardner straightened up and walked off.
There’s only so much Sheena and I can do for you.
Think about what you’re doing and what you want to do in the future.
I don’t want you to get blindsided.
All I did was take my friend home with me. That was it. It.
I hadn’t done drugs, flashed a crowd, stolen anything, or killed anyone.
If my guesses were on track, Gardner had just warned me that my career was in jeopardy.
Maybe I should have panicked. Cried. I would have sworn that I would stop being friends with someone who so obviously needed a friend.
But I didn’t do any of those things. Not even close.
While Gardner had just been trying to be a good friend and warn me, I was suddenly pissed. Really pissed.
I hadn’t done anything wrong, and I knew that in my heart. Sure, there was a stipulation in my contract about fraternization, but I hadn’t been freaking fraternizing with anybody. Not even close, and I was being punished? Or at least sort of being punished?
This was horseshit. Absolute horseshit.
And I really wanted to punch Cordero in the face.
Repeatedly.
Tension screamed through my shoulders and down my arms. I had to ball up my fists to contain my frustration with this entire situation. Honestly, I liked Rey. It wasn’t easy, and he got on my nerves at times, but I felt a closeness to him that I didn’t feel with anyone else I played with.
The fact that only a few of the girls on the team spoke to me during practice didn’t make things any better.
The rest cast me side-glances that I wasn’t a fan of.
But they didn’t say anything to egg me on, so I managed to keep my mouth closed.
I knew better than to be the one to start anything. You’re only young and dumb once.
When they weren’t giving me snide glances, they were looking at Kulti like they were expecting to find him with my bra around his neck. The thing was, while I could keep my mouth shut, the German didn’t have to.
And he didn’t.
He had met my eyes early on during practice and frowned. His frown had continued to deepen the longer practice went on. Kulti didn’t try to ask me what was happening, but somehow I knew he was aware something was bugging me, and it had to do with the girls looking him up and down.
My favorite thing that came out of his mouth was “I don’t know what the hell you’re looking at, but you need to be looking at the field and not braiding each other’s hair!”
It was so sexist and untrue; I couldn’t help but snicker and then try to hide it.
In the long run though, it didn’t help me be any less pissed off.
They were still talking about me and giving me looks.
Murmuring. There was nothing I could do.
SOMEONE WAS SEATED at the bottom of the stairs leading up to my apartment by the time I got home from work that evening. It took all of a split second once I got out of the car to recognize the brown hair and the long body that stood up, brushing off the back of his loose workout shorts.
He didn’t say anything to me as I parked my car a couple feet away from him, and he didn’t say a word as he took my duffel bag, even as he eyed the baggy pants and the long-sleeved shirt I had on.
He hadn’t seen me in my work clothes before, and I couldn’t find it in me to care that I had dirt and grass stains all over my knees and that my hair had doubled in volume since that morning.
“Hey you,” I said with a smile as we climbed up the steps to get to the front door.
Unlocking the door, he followed after me, locking it as soon as he was inside and dropping my bag in the same place I always left it.
I sat on the floor and yanked off my work boots, too exhausted to even bother trying to do it standing up.
They got tossed in the direction of the door harder than they needed to be.
The German held out his hand to me.
I took it and got to my feet, not moving an inch when we stood maybe four inches away from each other.
I’d been telling myself the second half of the day that this was technically his fault.
That if I hadn’t been nice to him, we wouldn’t have started spending time together and become friends.
If he was anyone else in the world, save for a handful of other people, no one would have given a single shit what we did together.
I had spent my entire career trying to get through day by day and improve.
I didn’t want fame, and while a fortune would have been nice, it wasn’t what got me going every morning.
I’d been careful, always careful, always sacrificing whatever was needed to succeed.
Kulti had come in and doomed all that.
I had put time and effort into building a working relationship with the girls I played with. I helped them out, wanting them to do well, and all that hard work was now pretty much in the shitter. No one except Jenny and Harlow had bothered to—
The German squeezed the hand that I hadn’t even noticed he hadn’t let go of. Palm to palm, his thumb rubbed over the back of my hand, once. Just once. “If you would like me to apologize, I won’t.”
I closed my eyes and stood there, letting him hold my hand and not letting myself think about it too much.
I was an affectionate person, and even though Kulti hadn’t really been one in the entire time we’d been getting along, you couldn’t be a soccer player and be weird about physical contact.
So I would take everything he was willing to give me.
“What do you have to not be sorry about?” I asked him, eyes still closed.
His long fingers squeezed again. “Forcing you to be my friend.”
I felt myself smile. “You didn’t force me to be your friend.”
“I did,” he argued.
“You didn’t. I was nice to you when you were still being an extra-large pain in the ass.”
There was a pause. “Was this before or after you called me a bratwurst?”
I opened an eye. “Both.”
The corners of his mouth tipped up just slightly, but he stayed serious. “I won’t let them bench you.”
I nodded, staring straight at the man who mastered the resting bitch face, and said, “All right.”
Words hung in the air between us. I felt compressed, squeezed. I was torn between knowing I wasn’t going to tell him to beat it and knowing I probably should.
Was this worth it? Was this worth being ostracized by my teammates? Being on my general manager’s hit list? Having my photo plastered on fan pages with the words “die bitch” at the bottom?
I really had no idea. I hoped so.
“Sal! You got a minute?”
My fingers gripped the nylon strap of my bag, and I felt my insides stir. The day before I had managed to avoid the two reporters loitering off the side of the field by hauling ass while they were busy talking to other people, but now… I hadn’t gotten so lucky.
I’d gotten to the field for practice early, but not early enough. Damn it.
“Come on, one minute. Please!”
With no one to hide behind or any other way to pretend like I hadn’t heard the guy calling out to me, I took a deep breath and resigned myself to getting this over with.
The twenty-something guy looked friendly enough in khaki pants and a neatly tucked in, button-down blue shirt. He smiled at me, his little handheld recorder ready and waiting. “Thanks for stopping. I have a few questions for you.”
I nodded. “Sure. Okay.”
He introduced himself and the website he was doing the interview for and let me know he’d be recording our conversation. “You’re about halfway through the season now, how are the Pipers looking?”
All right. “Good. We’ve only lost one game so far, but we’re trying to stay focused and get through the next few weeks so that we can move into the playoffs again.”
“At what point does the pressure really start to get to you?”
“At least for me, it never lets up. Before the season even starts, I’m already worried about how things are going.
Every game is important, and that’s what our coaching staff has really drilled into us.
It’s easier to stay focused when you’re worried about putting one foot in front of the other rather than trying to take on a huge obstacle at once. ”
He smiled and nodded. “Who are you looking forward to watching this Altus Cup?”
I smiled at him, feeling a little easier. The Cup was starting in September, right after our season ended. “Argentina, Spain, Germany.” Almost absently I added, “The U.S.” Well, that didn’t sound sincere at all. “I’m pretty excited.”
“Any plans for rejoining the U.S. Women’s National Team?” he asked.