40. Mason
Mason
Coach waves me over.
“Sinclair,” he says, pulling out his clipboard and looking back up at me. “You’re running with all the starters today. Don’t disappoint me.”
A wave of pride runs through me. I’ve been working my ass off since I got here a couple of weeks ago, and this feels like the encouragement I needed to tell me I’m not screwing it all up.
I’ve been pushing through most days since leaving Florida, and honestly, if I didn’t have football to distract me, I don’t know what I’d do. I’d probably just be rotting away in bed or slumped over a toilet, puking out the night before’s contents.
I know I slept last night, yet I feel like I never even closed my eyes. I’m exhausted today, but I’m still pushing through.
We line up, and I let my mind drift a little, waiting for everyone else to be ready.
I should have gotten some water before we started. My mouth feels like cotton, and my head is spinning a little.
The sound of the whistle blowing startles me, and I snap my attention back to the play we’re running, shaking off the sweat I feel under my skin even though we just got out here.
It has nothing to do with physical activity, and everything to do with what I’m denying myself right now.
My hands feel like they’re shaking, even though I can’t tell if they actually are or not.
My head is fighting to get out of the fog I woke up with, and I’m doing my best to keep the nausea down.
I know I told myself I wouldn’t drink before practices, but I’m really regretting that today.
All I can think about is the coach calling it a day so I can get back to the Sig house.
I rush forward, snap my hips, then run downfield. Muscle memory is the only thing that carries me through the route. The whistle blows, signaling the end of the rep. Coach nods his head at me while holding his clipboard.
I hate how bad I need to be perfect on the field because it’s about the only time anyone recognizes anything I do. I know it sounds pathetic, but I have this sad, desperate need to hear that I am doing a good job constantly —no matter what it’s for.
And I’m good at this. I’m good at using my body and letting loose all the stress that I have built up on the football field.
We move into practicing some more plays, doing them over and over again, until my calf muscles are burning and my lungs feel like they’re literally being ripped apart.
I love it, though.
The quarterback drops back, then launches the ball into the air. The ball hits my hands while I am mid-stride. It’s a clean catch, and the sound of the ball hitting the palm of my hand is as close thing to me feeling any sense of peace in weeks.
Once we finish working on drills, we switch to 7-on-7, and I am running with the first stringers. I catch Coach watching me from the sideline as I jog back to the huddle.
“Sinclair,” he calls out. “You keep playing like that, and I’m considering starting you this year.”
I nod, appreciative.
Makes me feel good. Makes me want to push even harder. Makes me want to forget the way my body is begging for a break—begging for a drink.
Sadly, that restraint only lasted until the following morning, though.
Every day has only gotten harder and harder to push through.
The nausea, the way my muscles feel tight, the headaches, the relentless dry mouth, the way my hands are starting to actually shake so much to the point where I can barely hold my phone still—all things that go away easily with the liquid in that bottle.
The thing is, those problems are only traded for new ones once the alcohol is in my system.
The bourbon goes down easily in my car before the sun is even up.
I shouldn’t have drank before practice. I know that. I knew it while I was doing it. But my head wouldn’t shut the fuck up, and it felt easier to fog up the thoughts so I couldn’t feel them than sit with everything I don’t want to feel—mentally and physically.
By the time I step onto the field, my body feels off. I’m a beat behind everyone, and that beat matters out here on the field.
We start with press coverage drills, and I’m not ready when the whistle blows. I hesitate for just a fraction of a second. My break is sloppy, and the timing is off. The quarterback throws anyway, and the ball sails just past my fingertips.
“Dammit,” I mutter under my breath.
The same things happen again on the next rep. My feet feel heavy, my head feels full, and I can’t seem to lock in.
We move into team reps, and it gets worse. I drop a pass I’ve caught a thousand times. A linebacker lights me up crossing the middle because I ran my route wrong. I hit the turf hard, and the impact from my helmet hitting my head makes my vision blur for a second.
Coach whistles loudly, and I know it’s for me.
“Sinclair. Sideline. Now.”
I jog over, heart pounding for reasons that have nothing to do with pushing my body to its limits on the field.
“You fucking around with me?” he asks.
“No, sir.”
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Then why are your routes lazy?”
I swallow, feeling the shame, and feeling like I wish I could take back drinking that half-pint of Jim Beam this morning.
“I don’t invest in players who don’t invest in themselves,” he continues quietly. “If this is you messing around, fix it. If it’s something else…talk to someone and fix it. Either way, I won’t carry dead weight on this team, and I don’t want to regret telling you I might start you.”
“I won’t let it happen again,” I say fast.
He studies my face, like he knows there’s more I’m not saying. “Make sure.”
Coach has seen more of me than most people over the last two, going on three years. I’m not the same guy I was my freshman year out here. I’m better in the game since I started—but I’m also more fucked up everywhere else. I’ve let a lot of things catch up to me, and I’m starting to pay the price.
It’s a debt I don’t know if I can outrun.
After that day, I learned how to balance the buzz I needed to get by and the level of performance I needed to show up with.
I can quiet the noise to a level that’s not noticeable, then indulge as my reward at the end of the day.
The nerves of today are also making me itch to grab more than I’ve been limiting myself to.
Simone is back on campus, and all I can think about is seeing her again.
When did I become so wrapped around her finger?
I didn’t expect summer to be this hard without her around. I didn’t expect to miss her this much. I never need people, not like this. People always let you down. I’ve never put too much into caring about anyone, because when they inevitably leave, it won’t bother me.
Yet, there’s nothing I could have done to stop myself from needing Simone around like a hit I’m desperate to take.
She’s more potent than any alcohol, and if I could choose a hard drug to try, it’d be her.
I feel my phone buzz, and pull it out.
Simone: I’m downstairs stranger
Fuck.
My heart drops, and I feel a sheen of sweat break on my forehead. I hop up, rushing to throw on some pants.
I’m still in my room searching for a shirt when I hear a knock on the bedroom door, and turn around to see Simone standing there in the doorway, smiling ear to ear.
I slam my dresser drawer shut and run over to her, picking her up and spinning her around.
When I set her down, she’s breathless from laughing so hard.
“Missed me?”
“More than I should,” I tell her.
She stares up at me, grinning. “You cut your hair.”
I run a hand through my now shorter, dirty blonde strands. “Yeah, guess I finally gave in to the business look my dad has always hounded me about.”
“I like it. It makes you even hotter.” She backs up a step and trails her eyes over my body. I forgot I’m still shirtless. “And it looks like you spent a lot of time working out this summer, too.”
My smirk turns a little cocky. “You checking me out, pretty girl?”
She rolls her eyes. “I can’t help it.” She waves a hand over me. “This new look is giving very Chad Michael Murray vibes when he played in Dawson’s Creek. But a little more clean-cut, and a little more…ripped?”
I bite back a smirk.
I’m stuck staring at her, eyes trailing down to her lips and then back to her eyes, where she’s already staring back at me.
“I really wish I could kiss my best friend right now. You know…give her a proper hello.”
I can see her bite the inside of her cheek. “Then why don’t you?”
I can’t help but suddenly be pulled back into all the thoughts I had while being away from her, how much I know I’m not good for her, especially right now, how she couldn’t want anything past the friendship, flirting, and good times.
But the permission she gives me is all I need to say, screw all of those thoughts right now.
I take her face in both my hands and kiss her the way I have in every dream of mine all summer long.
I pull back and rest my head against hers. “Fuck, I missed you, pretty girl.”
“I missed you too,” she tells me, still catching her breath.
“Did you, really?”
She rolls her eyes playfully. “Of course I did.”
She goes to sit down on my bed like she belongs there, like nothing changed while she was gone.
I sit on the floor, back against the frame, and my knees drawn up, watching her talk with her hands as she tells me about Lydia, about rehab, about how she finally heard back from a law firm she applied to and got a part-time position at.
“I’m proud of you.”
She waves me off. “It’s just an admin position, but it at least gets my foot in the door.”
“We should celebrate tonight. There’s that big party to kick off the year happening. A lot of alcohol, a lot of fun, and…”
I turn and reach my hand out, grabbing her thighs and bringing her closer to me, needing to feed this new addiction. I grab her face, and she leans down into my touch, following my lead while keeping her curious eyes on mine.
I hover my mouth above hers. “A lot of secret places I can do this at.”