Dare You to Fall for the Catcher (Rock Valley High 3)

Every part of me instantly disliked them.

“Hey, Sarah.” Charlotte tucked her hair behind her ears. I couldn’t help but notice the way she took an extra step away from me. “Hey, girls. How’s it going?”

“It’s going.” The one I could only assume to be Sarah stood in the middle of the pack. Her wavy shoulder-length blonde hair looked like it had been sprayed with stiff glossy paint. She smiled at my sister in a way that reminded me of a hyena circling its food. “Hey, you coming to my house on Saturday? My parents just got a new hot tub.”

“Definitely.”

“Definitely not,” I said at the same time.

Charlotte’s eyes grew wide as she glanced from Sarah to me, and then back to Sarah.

“If your babysitter changes her mind, come on over,” Sarah said with a hollow laugh as she shot me a smirk. I fought back the intense desire to see what would happen if I kicked her in the shin with my boot. “See you later.”

As soon as they were out of earshot, Charlotte turned to me. She jumped into a high-pitched rant about how I was ruining her life forever, but I was having a hard time following it. Instead of interrupting, I patiently crossed my arms over my chest and waited for her to finish.

“Do you really think I’d let you go to her house after what happened on Monday?” I asked when she finally stopped. A muscle throbbed between my eyebrows and I rubbed it. “Isn’t that the Sarah that let you drink her mom’s Boone’s Farm? Why would you want to be friends with them anyway? They seemed awful.”

“It was just one drink,” Charlotte hissed. She stomped her foot. “I can’t believe you’d do this to me. Why are you so awful?”

I searched for the words that would end this little tiff. “...because. Because someone has to keep you from ruining your life.”

It wasn’t exactly the comeback of the century, but it was just enough to get Charlotte to throw my backpack on the ground and storm off. It didn’t matter any way, my locker was just down the hall. I grabbed it by the strap and dragged it the last few feet.

Seriously, something evil had taken over my sister’s body. We never used to fight like this. It was like she was hostage to some demon force with an addiction to fake tanner. I didn’t act like that when I was fifteen. I didn’t have the luxury. Mom’s heart condition diagnosis had effectively put a stop to any bad teenage behavior.

I wasn’t going to risk putting more unnecessary stress on her. Not then, and not now. Charlotte might hate me, but I could deal with that. What I couldn’t deal with was Mom getting sick again. My little sister might have been too young to remember, but I could remember that day my mom collapsed

at the diner after working double shifts all week long. I remembered the thick, nauseating taste of panic in the air. The sound of the EMTs rushing into the kitchen to pick my unresponsive mother off the floor. And the paleness of her face as they wheeled her away, while I wondered if I’d ever see her alive again. I might not be able to control her condition, but I could definitely help to prevent another scene like that.

I stuffed my books into my locker and hurried toward Coach Padilla’s office near the science lab. There were fifteen minutes left before the first period bell. Hopefully, that left just enough time for Coach to chew me out, but not enough to make her kick me off the team.

Hopefully.

“Hey, Coach.” I hobbled through her open door and made my way to one of the seats across from her tiny desk. She looked even more massive than usual sitting behind it, her shoulders scrunched uncomfortably forward as she squinted at a computer screen. “Did you still want to see me?”

She looked up at me, her lips forming a displeased pucker. “Sit, Hale. We’ve got something to discuss.”

Part of me had been hoping she was super forgetful, like my great-uncle Don, and she’d wonder why I’d stumbled into her office so early on a Wednesday morning. Then, offer me a fuzzy candy from the depths of her pocket—just like Uncle Don. No luck here.

“Is this about yesterday? Because I swear I won’t try to help the freshmen anymore.” I held up my hands in surrender. “I shouldn’t have been on that track. I’m sorry.”

The lines around her mouth grew deeper. “You’re right, you shouldn’t have been on that track. You’re going to get yourself injured even worse.”

“I know. It was stupid.”

She nodded. “And irresponsible. And disobedient. The list could go on and on.”

I winced. Coach Padilla pulled no punches, that was for sure.

“Listen, the reason I called you here today is to come to a solution,” she said, steepling her fingers as she gazed at me. “To be honest, I see a lot of myself in you. The same fire. The same burning desire to succeed. You could go far, Mandy. In running, or anything else you put your mind to. I believe it.”

I leaned back in my chair, feeling as if I’d been struck on the side of the head with the world’s softest pillow. Never in a million years had I imagined Coach Padilla would call me to her office and compliment me. Or compare me to her. It felt amazingly good. She was the kind of strong, take-no-prisoners female role model we needed in this world. To hear her say I would go far had me dancing on air.

“Thanks, Coach.” I flashed her a nervous grin.

“That being said”—she set her elbows on the desk and frowned—“that same fire is what’s going to ruin your career before it even starts. You can’t help yourself. It’s impossible for you to stay off the track. You’ll never heal correctly because you won’t let yourself. And because of that, I’m going to have to kick you off the team.”

In a flash, all of those good feelings went away and I was left gripping the armrests of my chair and gaping at Coach. Horror coated my esophagus like a massive case of heartburn.