Breaking Tackles: A Taking Flight Novel (39 page)

“You do just realize you’re cheering for the wrong team,” Brandi says, kind of bitchily, to Nadia.

“I’m cheering for Adam,” Nadia says. “I may be wearing a Vikings jersey, but I’m a Kistler fan.”

“Damn straight,” I say, giving her a look of solidarity.

The second half is even more intense than the first, but at the end, the Saints win by one touchdown.

“Jason is going to be a nightmare, you know,” Mike says to Nadia.

“Nothing I can’t deal with,” she says breezily.

As we all head down to the field, where we’re to wait for Jason and Adam to shower and then come back to the field for a photo op with all of us, Nadia, Ashton, and I chat and joke around as if the three of us are old friends.

Then it hits me—not once after meeting Nadia did I think about food or my body or where the cameras were. Because I was having a good time. I felt like my old self—the girl who didn’t stress about what people are or thinking about me.

I faced my fear of meeting Nadia and was amazed by how well it turned out. How I didn’t meet someone who made me feel enormous or bad about myself, but someone who was intimidated by me, thinks
I’m
cool, and wants to be friends with me.

It seems like this year isn’t just a year of stress. It’s a year of change, yes, but a lot of the change, once I faced it, has been good. Sure, there’s still a lot more change to come. But I’m excited about it.

I get to marry the man of my dreams. Move to a new city. Buy a house.

I’m actually, finally excited about it.

Adam and Jason make their way down the ramp that leads from the locker rooms to the field, and all of us begin clapping and cheering. I’m delighted to see that they’re both wearing their jerseys with jeans—mostly for the freaking amazing Christmas card picture we’re about to take with the entire family—and that Jason looks like he isn’t going to be a nightmare to deal with.

Adam comes to me before anyone else, giving me a big kiss.

“Great game today,” I say.

“Thanks,” he says, smiling hugely. “Have fun?”

“Yeah,” I say. “I really did.

Adam

When I’m finally off the plane in St. Louis, I nearly sprint to the escalators. I’m so excited to see Courtney I can’t stand it.

Since the Vikings game, the majority of our games have been on Mondays or Thursdays, annoyingly, so Courtney hasn’t been able to come to those. She came down to New Orleans during our bye week so that we could check out some houses, but since then, we haven’t been able to make the timing work out due to her finals schedule and the fact that we made the play-offs and have been practicing non-stop to prepare.

Luckily, the coaches let us travel for Christmas. But we had practice on the
twenty-third, so I’m traveling on Christmas Eve.

Which has been a nightmare.

When I asked Willa for tips on how to have an easy travel day on the busiest travel day of the year, she literally laughed and said, “Good luck.”

I probably should have just driven.

As I get on the escalator, I see Courtney leaning against a pole. She walks toward the escalator as I get to the bottom of it, and I reach out to her, grabbing her hips and pulling her toward me before crushing her mouth to mine. She kisses me back as fiercely as I kiss her, and when we finally break apart I say, “I really, really missed you.”

“I missed you, too,” she says, smiling. “Did you check a bag?”

“Nope,” I say, holding up my carry-on.

“Okay, then we need to get on the road if we’re going to make it to your parents’ for dinner.”

This year, instead of doing two Christmases, our families just decided to do a joint Christmas Eve dinner and presents. It’s fifteen people in total, and if we hold them up from eating because we’re running late, that’s thirteen people who will be annoyed with us. Luckily, traffic moves pretty swiftly and we make it to my parents’ place with ten minutes to spare.

“We’re here!” I yell, as we come through the door and I hear cheers and the noise of chairs scooting back and plates clinking. This group does not mess around when it comes to eating.

I leave my bag in the entryway, and we greet everyone as we make our way into the kitchen. Courtney gasps and yells, “Oh my God, yay!” when she sees Kent standing beside Lizzie, who has a ring on a very important finger, before giving her a hug.

Jason takes photos of everything, including the dishes stacked up in the sink. I assume he’s documenting this entire dinner on the Internet.

Courtney has been seeing a nutritionist biweekly, and though it’s been harder for her to gain weight back than it was for her to lose it, she’s getting there. She’s been following the recommended diet, and though she’s still running every day, she’s cut back the gym workouts to three times a week.

She’s been much more open with me and her friends about what’s going on with her, which I think has been a big help for all of us. She doesn’t have to keep everything bottled up inside or be afraid that we’re going to judge her. Even over just a few weeks, there’s a huge change in her—she’s obviously happier, less anxious, and seems like she’s handling the stress of wedding planning, school, and long distance much better.

When everyone goes into the living room and sits near the enormous tree to open presents, I run to my bag to fish out my gift for Courtney. I shopped online and shipped everything else to my parents’, but Courtney’s gift I had to keep with me.

After the presents are arranged into piles for each person, we all dig in, just like little kids when they get to open presents.

“Courtney and Ashton, this may seem weird, but can you open your presents from me at the same time?” Nadia asks, and the girls make eye contact and nod. Nadia points out which they are, and as Courtney and Ashton unwrap them, huge smiles break out across their faces.

“Thank you, Nadia,” Courtney says, and then holds up a framed photo of the three girls.

“This is perfect,” Ashton adds. “But my present is going to be a letdown because I definitely framed the same photo for both of you.”

“Stop it!” Nadia says, and Courtney laughs.

When the Christmas present unwrapping begins to wind down, Ashton says, “So, Mike and I have something special for Vicki and Jerry.” She hands them a small wrapped box, and when they open it Mom gasps and puts a hand over her mouth. My dad looks up at Mike and is speechless.

“What the hell did you do to Mom and Dad?” Jason asks.

“We’re having a baby,” Ashton says, and Mom holds up the teeny Texans jersey. The room explodes in congratulations and squealing and people giving hugs to pretty much everyone around them.

“An engagement, a pregnancy. What else could this year hold?” Mom says, and I clear my throat. Everyone looks at me expectantly and I hand a small white box with a red bow on top of it to Courtney.

She furrows her brow at me and says, “I thought we agreed on no gifts.”

“We did,” I say. “But I couldn’t help myself.”

She rolls her eyes and opens the box, her eyes widening.

“We got it?”

“Yeah. We got it.”

“Got what?” Ryan asks, sounding exasperated, and Courtney pulls out the key attached to a fleur-de-lis keychain.

“We got the house!”

After we found a house we both loved, I told the real estate broker to put in an offer. When she called, we found out that there were six other bids in on the house, but that our bid was in the top three.

I told her to do whatever she had to to get us that house. It was well under our budget, and we had a lot of wiggle room to outbid the other potential buyers. Luckily, we blew all the other bids out of the water with our second offer. But I didn’t tell Courtney that. I let her believe that the sellers were taking their time weighing the options and that they wanted to come back with a decision after the holidays. She was certain that we weren’t going to get it.

After the second round of congratulations, we all have pie and coffee while watching
It’s a Wonderful Life
, and when the movie ends, everyone starts saying good night and Merry Christmas and head off to bed.

When Courtney and I get upstairs to my room, she says, “I might have a little something for you, too.”

“Oh really?” I ask.

She reaches into her purse and hands me a white box with a red bow on it, a little larger than the one I gave to her.

“Open it while I’m in the bathroom,” she says, which I think is odd, but I agree. Once she’s in the bathroom, I remove the lid, and my jaw drops when I see what it is.

In a frame is a black-and-white photo of Courtney with her naked back to the camera, but giving a sexy look over her shoulder, and wearing underwear that says, “Tackle Me.”

I look up when I hear the bathroom door open and see Courtney standing there, wearing a black lacy number.

“Merry Christmas,” she says.

“Really?” I ask.

She smiles and nods. “Game on, Kistler.”

“Really?”

She walks across the room to the bed, leans down, and kisses me deeply. When she breaks the kiss, she looks me square in the eyes and says, “Absolutely.”

There are few things included in
Breaking Tackles
that I want to clarify and explain, my dear reader.

Let’s start with the football stuff. Though the NFL Draft moved to Chicago this year, for story purposes, I kept the draft in New York City. Additionally, the New Orleans Saints training camp takes place in West Virginia, which I never mention in the book, possibly making it seem as if the Saints recruits go straight to New Orleans after the draft. It isn’t my intention to mislead or anger anyone (perhaps you have really strong feelings about the Saints training camp location—I don’t know!) but to tell the best story that I possibly can, it sometimes means I have to alter reality a little.

On a much more serious note, the body image issues that Courtney deals with in this book are very real things that many people experience—especially during their adolescent and college years. If you would like to know more about body dismorphic disorder, or would like information on how to find a support group in your area, please visit bdd.iocdf.org

Willa

Why can’t I afford all of the books?

I’m standing in Barbara’s Bookstore in O’Hare with two books in my hands. I only have twenty dollars on me and the price of both of the books is more than that. So I have to choose. I consider playing eeney-meeney-miney-moe, but at fourteen, I know that there’s a trick to that when you have an even number of items.

Sighing, I go with the Meg Cabot novel and put the Sarah Dessen back. I’m sure Dad will give me some money for the trip back. I’ll pick up
This Lullaby
then.

I head to the counter and get in line behind a priest with the newest book from Tom Clancy. I smile, glad to know that even clergy members have book vices. That must mean that there’s some sort of hope for me yet.

My best friend, Ana, can’t understand why I love to read. Not that she hates it or anything, but she’d rather spend her time playing with her hair and trying out new makeup that she knows her dad will frown at when he sees it on her. If she didn’t already look like an eighteen-year-old he probably wouldn’t care so much. Try as I might, I just can’t get into hair and makeup. I get bored with it. Well, more often than not I get frustrated because it’s impossible for me to do anything with eyeliner that doesn’t look like a giant blob and my hair refuses to be anything but wavy. If I was better at doing my hair and makeup, I’d probably be more into it.

“
The Princess Diaries
,” I hear someone mutter behind me. I look over my shoulder and see that it’s a guy about my age. He’s tall and really skinny and has a mouth full of metal. I slyly appraise him, eyeing him from head to toe—messy hair, glasses, wrinkled Spider-Man T-shirt, baggy jeans, black Converse shoes. Even though he looks sloppily put together and not really my type, there’s something about him that makes me want to talk to him, despite the fact that he obviously thinks my book is dumb. But, being from New York, I know better than to engage strangers in conversation without a really good reason. I go to turn around and ignore him, but he catches my eye. Instead of being a shrinking violet, I turn to face him full-on.

“I take it you’re not impressed with my book.”

He blanches a little, clearly surprised that I heard him, and stammers out, “I didn’t mean, um, you know, that you shouldn’t read it. Or whatever.”

“Or whatever is right,” I say. “So what is it that you picked up?”

He holds up a book called
Ender’s Game
. I’ve never heard of it and judging by the cover—which I know you’re not supposed to do, but everyone does it anyway—looks really nerdy and sci-fi.

“I see,” I say snottily. I don’t want to be a book snob, but I kind of have a chip on my shoulder since he already made fun of my book. “Well, enjoy your space nerd adventure book.”

“I will,” he says, a challenge in his voice, which I notice has a Southern twang to it. “And enjoy your time in fantasy princess land.”

My jaw drops and I can feel my face starting to flame. I’m not a frivolous girl who has delusions about being a princess. I just happen to like this book series. I want to bite this guy’s head off, but instead I turn around and force myself to be quiet. I’ve been trying really hard to think before I speak lately, since I have a tendency to say anything that pops into my brain aloud. When I was a kid everyone thought it was cute. But now girls at school are starting to think that I’m a know-it-all and one even called me a bitch. With Ana’s help, I’m working on improving myself by biting my tongue.

The priest finishes checking out and I can’t help but notice when he gives a small smile toward me and the guy behind me. He had to have overheard our entire conversation and I feel a little bit bad that I was kind of a jerk. But he started it.

I step up to the check-out and place my book on the counter.

“Oh, I love these books,” the woman working says. 

“Me too,” I say excitedly, my heart soaring at the fact that someone else loves these books. I hear the guy behind me breathe out through his mouth in a way that, I dare say, sounds exasperated. But at least now I feel vindicated in my choice.

When the book is purchased and officially mine, I gently place my new book in my purse. I hear another sigh and I look pointedly at the guy and say, as sweetly as possible, “Have a great flight.”

As I walk toward my gate, I make a mental note to look up what
Ender’s Game
is about. It kind of looked good.