Old Fashioned - Becker Brothers

In retrospect, I knew Jordan wasn’t wrong about the way the boys would react to me. The fact that it was sexist and not my fault didn’t matter — boys would be boys, as they say. Still, this was my first day of work after years of being a stay-at-home mom — a job I didn’t choose, but rather, was selected for me. If it wasn’t for my sister’s friendship with Principal Hanley from when they were in school together, I wasn’t sure I would have been able to find a job as an athletic trainer after all the time I’d taken off. Before my daughter was born, I had been primed and ready to start my career, and I had offers waiting.

But things changed.

And no one in that locker room saw me as anything but someone new to the team. They had no idea that that day symbolized freedom for me. To them, and to most of that town, I was the bitch who divorced the sweet, amazing hero who kept this town safe. What they didn’t know is that I’d been anything but safe in my marriage with him.

But in a small town, when the Police Chief is beating you with his words and his hands, you have no one to run to.

And you believe him when he says you’re crazy, and that you deserve it.

I swallowed, shaking those memories off before they could slide in to ruin the first day of my new chapter. It didn’t matter if no one else knew it, I knew it.

It was a new beginning.

A new era.

A tiny smile curled my lips at the realization, but as soon as Jordan lifted his head, I straightened again.

“Anyway.”

It was the first word Jordan spoke, and I watched as confusion swept over the faces in the locker room — mine included. The boys glanced at each other, wondering if they’d missed something, while the staff of coaches stood behind Jordan with similar gazes.

“The past five years, this team has had a word of the season. Every day, we come back to that word. When we lose, when we win, when we practice, when we’re on this field, and when we’re off it — that word is our guide,” Jordan explained.

His eyes were a storm in and of themselves, a swirl of gray-blue like an ominous sky with a burst of golden-brown around each iris. They locked on each of the boys looking up to him, as if he wanted to ensure they each felt seen. The way he stood next to that trophy, with his bicep muscles bulging out of his polo, his broad shoulders square and straight, his chin high, brows bent and determined, jaw square — he looked like he was about to take these boys into battle rather than onto a football field.

And with the way they looked at him, I knew they wouldn’t hesitate to go to war for their sergeant.

“Our first year, the word was work. Then, growth. We took growth to perseverance, and then to discipline, and last year, to determination.”

That last word fired up the boys who I assumed had been on the team last year, and they chanted the word three times in different cadences before giving a deep-chested ooah! that echoed through the locker room.

Jordan smirked, but the curl in his lips faded as fast as it had come. “This season’s word is different. It doesn’t look motivational if you slap it on a poster and it probably won’t make sense to anyone outside of this room. And that’s exactly why I picked it. Because the truth of the matter is this: we are the unit. We are the team. And we, alone, are responsible for what happens this season.”

There were a few nods, an unspoken understanding, the locker room so quiet you could hear my sneaker squeak against the floor when I shifted my weight.

“This season is going to be hard, but we’re going to persevere, anyway,” Jordan said after a while, glancing around the room. “Practices are going to be long and hot, but we’re going to show up, anyway. There’s a lot of pressure on us to perform, but we’re going to excel, anyway. There are going to be days we all want to grumble or scream or throw our helmets or quit, but we’re going to stay here and fight, anyway.”

The more he used the word, the more fired up that locker room became. I watched the boys hold their heads higher, their brows furrowing deeper, their chests puffing out more and more with every word. I’d sat in the bleachers behind this team for years, every Friday night that we had a home game, watching Jordan lead them to win after win — but I’d never seen the inside of the machine, the one we watched work so effortlessly together on the field.