“It’ll mess with the team dynamic. We’re two games away from the end of the season. Do what you want after the playoffs, but until then Billy stays on the team.”
“Why? He’s a shit player. Adds nothing to the team chemistry. Is literally more useless than the waterboy. Unless he’s blackmailing you, why shouldn’t he be forced off the team?”
Carter throws his pads over his head. “Because I’m superstitious, that’s why,” he huffs impatiently. “Dance with the girl you brought and that shit. You know? Fuck. Newbies,” he mutters under his breath and stomps off.
“You didn’t know?” Grant asks. “Home boy puts on his shoes in the same order every day. Left foot first and then right foot. He always eats a quarter of a Snickers bar and then tucks the rest of it away until after the win.”
I rub my head. “First, I never watched him dress and second, I thought he only ate a couple of bites because Snickers are terrible candy bars and he kept forgetting about it because of all the hits he takes on the field.”
Grant snorts. “You’ve got good hands, Fast, but sometimes you’re as oblivious as fuck.”
He means off the field. On the field, I’m razor sharp and even though Carter is irritated with me, he still throws me the ball and I still catch everything.
After practice, I make my way to sewing class. Ace is already in her seat with a bunch of girls huddled around her. They scatter when I step inside.
“Did I interrupt something?”
“Nope.” Ace smiles sunnily up at me, but I see the furtive way that Melody tucks her phone away.
“You guys looking at porn? Pillowcases? Trig formulas? I can take it.” I slouch down in the seat next to my girl.
“Tampons. We’re talking about which ones have the best leak protection,” Melody says with a tiny defiant tilt of her chin.
“Let me know in case I have to buy any,” I reply.
Ace rolls her eyes. “I can buy my own supplies, thanks.”
“Sure, but if you have an emergency, I should know. That way I can take care of it.”
“Are you for real?” Melody interjects.
“Pretty sure I am. What do you think?” I glance to Ace, who colors cutely.
“He’s real,” she says. She pats the pile of fabric. “Let’s get working on these.”
These are baby hats we agreed to make for the children’s hospital. When Ace delivered the blankets, she asked if there was anything else we could do and they suggested the hat project because they send each newborn home with a blanket and a hat.
The other girls do as Ace suggests and we get busy cutting out squares that will eventually be turned into baby caps. I volunteer to join the cutting team. Ace heads for the group that will hand sew the two layers of fabric together.
Melody ends up by my side. “If you hurt, Ace, I will take these scissors and cut your dick off,” she whispers menacingly. Melody is all of about five feet four. I could squash her with one hand.
“Okay.” There’s no point in arguing with her. Ace looks over at us and I smile sweetly at her. She doesn’t need to know that her best friend wants to take a sharp object to the very piece of me that Ace is dying to have thrust inside her.
“Will you take me seriously for one second?” Melody demands.
“I have no plans of hurting Ace. I love her so make all the threats you want.”
“It’s the football team,” Pixie says at the sewing machine two people over.
“What do you mean?”
“We don’t trust the football team. Carter runs that program and he doesn’t care if there are bad apples so long as they win. Billy isn’t the only guy that runs around thinking he can touch girls because he wears pads on Friday so excuse us for caring about Ace here.” Pixie nods her head toward my girl.
Ace gives me a resigned look. “It’s true. Ever since I started here, there have been rumors about the football team. You’re a good guy but the guys you hang around with have a bad reputation.”
“They’re not all bad,” I start to argue but then I wonder. What do I know about these guys? I didn’t even realize that Carter was superstitious. “Are they all bad?” I ask, genuinely curious. I never much liked Billy from the start, but the other guys seemed decent.
“Not all of them,” says another girl. “And, sure, if you complain, that guy gets punished but there’s no, like deterrence. No one explicitly comes out and says Billy got his nose broken because he touched a girl wrong. Instead, it’s all just assumed. And Billy? He’s saying he ran into a door so half the school believes that and not that Aly was assaulted.”
“It’s the silence that’s part of the problem,” Ace affirms. “I know you took care of Billy for me, but what about all the other girls that don’t have a boyfriend to beat Billy up? The other guys seem to think that the football team believes it’s okay so it must be okay.”