Ready to Score

Chapter 26

26

Jade had been six years old when she’d gone to her first football game. Dead in the middle of November, on a misty Friday night, the temperature had dipped down into the low sixties. This meant that her mother had bundled her up in a thick sweater and scarf that made the bottom of her face too warm for comfort. Jade’s father had brought her to Greenbelt Senior High School’s stadium to see her older cousin play in one of their playoff games. The stands had been packed to the rafters with people, but she and her father had found seats in a middle row of the bleachers, near the fence that kept folks from falling off the sides.

Jade remembered the awe she’d felt at the sheer size of the crowd. She remembered hearing the marching band play, the way each bang of the drums thumped in her chest. The smell of popcorn and the almost blinding lights that stood tall above them all. The way the crowd roared and how the bleachers shook with the force of people’s stomps. It had been a heady experience, a total overload of her senses. She had never been able to forget it. That game had been such a catalyst in her life. It didn’t matter how many times she’d experienced that roar, how she’d managed to migrate from the stands to the sidelines. She never got over the overwhelming elation that filled her body whenever she was at a game. She wouldn’t have admitted it to anyone else, but it was the one time she understood why people got so hyped at church.

Today was no different; Greenbelt had come out in full swing for their first game of the season. With the stands packed tightly, all she could see when she looked around the stadium was a sea of green and white. And West Beaufort had a decent turnout on the away-team side, filling it with black and gold. The energy was so palpable, she felt high just being in the middle of it.

She wore her standard coach’s uniform—a pair of khaki pants and a green polo shirt. It was a mild night for August, not much humidity, with a dark sky and a high moon. Still, the fabric of her shirt clung like hell to her lower back.

She’d started sweating before she and Franny had even left the house. The other woman had forced her to drink three glasses of water and eat half a deli sandwich before she’d relinquished the keys to Gladys so they could leave.

Jade eyed Francesca, clad in a pair of skinny jeans and a Greenbelt Gators T-shirt from the student center, as she huddled with Coach Carr. She should have been wearing the same thing as the rest of them. She should have had a whistle around her neck and the actual authority to call shots for the offensive line.

Jade had never wanted to see someone clad in an ugly green polo shirt more in her life.

“Coin toss in three,” Landry said as he jogged over to her, his eyes lit up and his jaw tight. “You think we’re ready?”

Jade had to look over her shoulder to make sure he was talking to her. It had been weeks since Landry had spoken to her with such levity in his voice. Their talk in the weight room had eased the tensions some. At least enough that Jade wasn’t on the receiving end of the silent treatment anymore. But it still hadn’t been the way it was before. She feared that even if he did pass the token along to her, their relationship as mentor and mentee would be forever fractured.

So many of her thoughts had been taken up with trying to make peace with it. She’d apologized, acknowledged her wrongs, and had taken great effort in getting her shit back together. That didn’t mean Landry trusted her again—or liked her, for that matter. Much the same way she’d forced herself to come to terms with the uncertainties of her life’s potential outcomes, she had to do the same for her relationship with Landry. There were only so many limbs she could go out on before the tree was stripped bare.

But there he was, standing at her side with the type of energy that had inspired Jade to want to work with him in the first place. He was the only person she knew who seemed less stressed during games than he did outside of them. He bounced on his feet and surveyed the scene before him. She could almost see the kid in him. The one who’d played college ball, wearing the same pair of lucky socks, checking the sturdiness of his cup one last time, before running out on the field the way their boys were about to.

It was too endearing of a vision for her not to smile at.

“We’re as ready as we’ll ever be,” she answered. “Their energy is high. They’ve spent all summer going hard, working for this. We’re taking it. But even if we don’t, it won’t be because they didn’t give it everything they had.”

Landry’s eyes were on her then, something thoughtful coloring his expression. She was seconds away from outright asking him what he was thinking, but a low rumbling sounded behind them. The noise built progressively until it turned to banging followed quickly by deafening cheers.

The boys descended on the field just as the sound of the screams swelled. There was no banner for them to break through, but they shot out like rockets all the same, waving at the crowd. Hooting and hollering.

“See?” She had to talk loudly over the noise. “They know it’s theirs.”

Landry bumped his shoulder against hers, catching her eye with a stern nod, that twinkle in his eye even more prominent. “Let’s go help them take it, then.”

West Beaufort came out on top in the coin toss, and instead of choosing to defer their claim to the ball until the second half, they started the game off with the ball in their hands. Immediately after kickoff, Jade was reminded that the other team hadn’t shown up in their fancy coach bus with their pristine new cleats just to fuck around. They saw the win as theirs and had come to claim it.

West Beaufort kept possession of the ball at kickoff. One of their running backs had gotten the ball from the quarterback at the snap, taking off downfield in a mad sprint toward Greenbelt’s end zone.

Their defensive linemen were on him, though, leaving the side of West Beaufort’s quarterback to book it down the field. That wide receiver barely got five yards before a nose tackle caught him around the waist and brought him down. The ball slipped from the running back’s hands and onto the turf—a fumble.

Jade’s breath caught in her throat, her spine immediately straightening. On the sidelines, she could hear her colleagues yelling, screaming with excitement. The ref blew his whistle, signaling the end of the play, and at once, all the boys were in the exact spot the receiver went down, waiting for the ref to place the ball and start the next down.

She surveyed the eleven players Greenbelt had on the field. The game was early yet, so they were still spry. Not bogged down by the type of tiredness that only came with being four quarters and three downs in. There was still plenty of time for that.

Landry was standing a few yards away from her, his attention on the spiral-bound playbook in his hands. Then his eyes went back to the field. This time, they were on West Beaufort’s players. The boys got into their three-point stances as normal. That’s when she saw something shift.

West Beaufort’s quarterback moved to the right of the center instead of behind him, and just as quick, the running back slid into his place.

Jade booked it over to Landry. “They’re about to do a Wildcat formation,” she said in a rush.

Normally, the center would snap the football back between his legs to the quarterback, who would then run or pass it. A Wildcat formation was a sort of trick play where instead of snapping the ball to the quarterback, a running back would situate himself in that spot to get the ball directly.

If the other team got through the snap without anyone noticing, they’d have at least a few seconds’ lead time. And in a game where a few seconds could mean more than a few yards, it had the potential to be a very effective strategy. It was still early in the game, and while West Beaufort pulling this off didn’t automatically mean that Greenbelt would be completely screwed, it would give the other team a hell of a head start. The points they’d gain on Greenbelt would not only sting but throw a wrench in her team’s morale. And that was far too precious a thing to lose so early on.

Her heart started thundering in her chest as she hoped like hell their players caught on quickly. There was no way to talk to them, to prepare them for what was to come. It would have to play out naturally while they stood around hoping they’d taught their boys enough to be observant.

The second-down snap was as quick as any other, and just as she’d thought, their running back shot off like a rocket down the field, ball in hand. Jade ran along the sidelines, yelling as loudly as she could, hoping like hell they could hear her voice. Time always seemed to move slower in the milliseconds during plays. It felt like something out of a movie, the way they descended on the running back as he made his way toward Greenbelt’s end zone.

The running back saw that his time on two feet was short, pausing to look for an opening, then sending the ball down the field to the tight end, who completed the pass.

Jade’s voice went hoarse from the way she yelled when the tight end took off running. He made it far, too far. Everyone took off after him, and the kid seemed to weave through their bodies like a bat out of hell. Then, in mere seconds, he pushed his way past until he was at Greenbelt’s end zone, making the first touchdown of the season in the first quarter of the first game like it was nothing.

Her heart fell into her ass. She looked over her shoulder, spotting Landry, then Carr, and, finally, Francesca. Their faces were drawn, all pinched lips and hollow cheeks. She imagined hers looked the same.

Out on the field, she watched as the boys tried to shake it off. She couldn’t see their faces through their helmets, but their body language was loud. The West Beaufort players were nimble, slamming into one another in a celebration that was short-lived when their coach decided to go for a field goal kick instead of a two-point conversion.

Then, just as quickly as that 6 appeared on the scoreboard in the other team’s favor, it was updated to a 7 once their kicker sent it flying through the uprights.

Jade jogged back down the sidelines, keeping an eye on the game as the players went for kickoff at the 35-yard line. They’d have a short break after this, and she wanted to talk a game plan with Landry.

“I don’t want them getting any further ahead of us than this,” she said. “We need to change our lineup a bit.”

“What are you thinking?”

“Defense needs to be a little nastier. I figured West would come at us light and ramp up toward the end, but that’s not how they’re playing it. We need to keep them from gaining but make sure we’ve got enough energy toward the end when they tire themselves out.”

“Yeah.” Landry said. “We’ll put Tyrie in now.”

“And Joshua too. Let him send some of them to the ground.”

After a few yards’ gain on Greenbelt’s part, they had a quick break. Just enough time for water and subbing a few players out. Jade made sure she made some room to talk to her team as well.

“Your hustle is incredible, y’all. Nice clean hits, staying on their tails—I’m proud of the work you’re doing out there.”

“We let them score, Coach,” Ozzie Alfaro grumbled, sweat pouring down his face. “That ain’t good.”

The other boys hummed in agreement.

“No, it isn’t,” Jade agreed. “But you know what? I think that having them get one on you early won’t do anything but show you that they didn’t come to play, so we can’t either.”

Next to her, Landry nodded. She paused, waiting for him to say something of his own like he normally would, but he kept silent.

She cleared her throat. “When you get back out there, I want you to remember one thing. Repeat it over and over in your heads if you have to. But tell yourself that this is yours. That ball is yours, this field is yours, this win is yours. Nobody can take it from you, least of all them.”

The boys murmured their affirmative, and she watched one by one as their shoulders squared while they put their helmets back on.

“Now what did I just say?” she yelled.

“This ball is ours!” they yelled, repeating her words.

“And what else?” Jade got louder.

The boys followed suit. “This field is ours!”

“Tell me more.”

“This win is ours!”

“So go take it, then.”

Fourth quarter, fourth down, twenty-five seconds left on the clock. The score was 37-43, with Greenbelt down by six.

The boys were tired, sweat staining through their pads, bodies slower under the mounting pressure of taking it all home. On the sidelines, the coaches held their collective breaths as the players lined up.

There was time for one last play, and Greenbelt had possession of the ball. This was their last shot, and everyone could feel it. Even the crowd was eerily quiet, having spent an entire quarter with bated breaths as the two teams squared off.

Jade squinted across the field, using her twenty-twenty vision to spot West Beaufort’s head coach. He’d taken that ugly tan sun visor off his head, sweat pulling around his temples, face stone-cold mad.

Landry was still light on his feet, face impassive. The only indicator of his stress was the way his right fist balled up tightly in the pocket of his khakis—and even that was obvious only if you knew where to look.

“They didn’t expect us to come this hard,” she told her head coach.

“We haven’t had a season opener this good in years.” The grin on Landry’s face was downright wolfish.

Her own grin stretched out, and she briefly wondered if it was just as intense. Everything inside her believed that this game was theirs, that winning today was inevitable for her team. It was the type of foolhardy delusion she forced herself to stand in. She’d keep it until the very end too—even if it ended up being a bitter one. Jade figured a little delusion was allowed, if not necessary, at times like these. And hell, even if the impossible happened and they lost, she’d do nothing but keep that spirit alive at the next game. And the one after that. And the one after that too.

Total defeat was not an option. Not for her. Not for her team.

“I know,” she said. “Thirty-seven isn’t an opener score. Not for us.”

“Let’s see about forty-four.”

“Fifty-one, even.”

Landry cackled, and she did too. She knew they must have looked wild as hell. Looking possible defeat in the eyes and making jokes all the while. But shit, it felt too good to be back.

They’d had a quick break moments before, enough for the boys to gulp down some water and for Jade to tell them how they were going to finish the game.

A flea flicker. The type of trick play that wasn’t at all uncommon but would hopefully still work to their advantage. Greenbelt was tired, but West Beaufort was too. They hadn’t expected to work as hard as they’d had to to get this far and not even be ahead. Sluggish and slower than they’d been when they started, Jade figured that getting tricky with them in the final play during the final seconds would work to Greenbelt’s advantage in a major way. A winning way.

The snap happened quickly; Greenbelt’s quarterback handed off the ball to the running back behind him, who took off fast and furious down the line of scrimmage.

On the sidelines, the Greenbelt coaches stood in a tight row, acting almost like a wall of excitement and anticipation. Jade’s eyes were glued to the field, but in her peripheral, she could practically see them suck in a collective breath of air and hold it in their chests as their running back gained yard after yard. It would have been hilarious if it weren’t so tense.

She eyed the clock, watching as the seconds ticked by faster than seemed possible.

Ten seconds left.

Their running back stopped suddenly, only to pass the ball back into the hands of their quarterback, who immediately threw it downfield to a wide-open receiver. West Beaufort’s actions stuttered for just a moment, but it was long enough for Greenbelt to get a good lead after their little trick.

Suddenly, all the coaches on both sides were yelling. Red-faced, veins popping, Jade screamed as her wide receiver got closer to West Beaufort’s end zone. The seconds ticked as his legs worked hard and fast. His body twisting and spinning as he evaded their players trying to tackle him.

When it happened, it was too quick to elicit a real reaction. One second left, the crowd and the coaches screaming their lungs out, and their wide receiver was taken down by a defensive tackle. The kid caught him right around the waist, wrapping his arms around tightly and bringing him to the ground so suddenly and hard that he fumbled the ball. It bounced once, then landed right there on the turf a few feet away from the boys on the ground.

The players scrambled to dive for possession of it, but before they could even formulate a plan of action, the clock reached zero, loud buzzers sounding throughout the stadium and signaling the end of the game.

There would be no overtime. There would be nothing to bring them back from the edge. They’d lost. It had been the first game of the season, and they’d lost.

But damn if it didn’t feel the way a loss usually felt. On the field, their boys looked downtrodden. Shoulders dropped, limbs heavy, faces to the ground. They’d fought hard—anyone watching could see that. But it still hadn’t been enough to earn them their win. Jade knew they were crushed. Her position along the sidelines had allowed her to see that they’d played a hell of a game and had nothing to be ashamed of. But they were still deep in it.

She turned to Landry, who was standing at her side, clapping. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected to see, but the look on his face was a pleasant surprise. He wasn’t smiling, but his expression was awash with pure pride. His eyes were damn near glistening, shining brightly as he looked over his team.

It put things into perspective even more. This wasn’t a win, but it wasn’t quite a loss either, not truly.

The boys started to make their way off the field as the crowd in the stands slowly filed out. All the coaches stood in a line, slapping them on the backs as they made their way toward the locker rooms. They’d go in after them, letting them get a few minutes to themselves before they did their duty and came in with a pep talk. Any focus on what could have been done better would be saved for another day. On this day, they’d be celebrated.

Once the last kid was off the field, Jade put a hand on Landry’s shoulder. “Well, look at that, Coach. You’ve done your boys good.”

His eyes were still shining when he glanced down at her. The look in them felt like a bottle rocket taking off. It felt like kissing Francesca square on the lips once they got in the car together every afternoon. It felt like when her daddy had given over the keys to Gladys that fall morning.

It felt like winning.

His big hand reached out to squeeze her shoulder. “Just make sure you keep doing right by them, yeah, Coach?”

Something welled in the middle of her throat, and she had to wrap a hand around her own waist to keep from falling over. She’d come to realize over the past few months that this moment hadn’t actually been everything she’d ever wanted. There were other things too. A full, happy life. A lightness in her body. Mostly, right now, what she wanted was to run up to the woman a couple of yards away pretending not to snoop on the conversation they were having.

Still, she couldn’t discount that this felt fucking incredible. Her heart was racing, and she was shuffling her feet. Sweat started beading on her forehead. Her body didn’t seem to know whether it wanted to throw up the contents of her dinner or do a bunch of backflips until her legs followed suit.

In lieu of making a mess all over Landry’s pristine windbreaker or taking off down the field screaming bloody murder, she pushed every ounce of reactive energy down into her chest until a slow smile stretched its way across her face.

“You know I will.”