Playing With the Boys (12 page)

“But nothing. I
don’t
want you playing. I
don’t
want you getting hurt.”

Lucy couldn’t believe it. “Who died and made you boss?” she spat, then realized what she’d said. They both knew who’d died.

“Go to your room,” her dad said sternly.

“Dad . . . wait . . . I’m sorry—”

“GO!” he ordered.

Lucy tearfully thrust the bowl of macaroni and cheese at him. “Fine.”

As she slammed her bedroom door and collapsed on her bed, she thought back to being in the hospital with her mom. She thought back to sitting by her mom’s bedside, talking to her, telling her about some stupid thing she and Annie had done in school, or how she’d done on some test that didn’t matter—not really—or what disgusting meal her dad had attempted to cook for dinner. And then she’d told her she couldn’t leave her, that she had to wake up, that she couldn’t be in this world without her. . . .

And then her dad had come in and told her that he’d made a decision.

Now, today, Lucy was certain of one thing. There would be no more letting her dad make the decisions. He’d controlled her fate for long enough. She was sick of it! She’d made this team, and no matter what anyone said, she was playing football.

Period.

eight

The smell of stale sweat hit Lucy like a ton of bricks as she pushed the weight room doors open. It was six-thirty in the morning, and the players who didn’t have eighth period free to lift had to do their weight workouts twice a week before school. Lucy was definitely not a morning person, and the idea of getting up before the sun rose was not exactly her cup of tea. Of course, she didn’t drink tea, she drank coffee . . . so whatever. It wasn’t really her cup of anything.

At least getting a ride hadn’t been a problem, since her dad had already offered to drop her off early so she could tell Coach Offredi that she was quitting the team. Which, for the record, she wasn’t. Although her dad didn’t know it.

As soon as she’d hopped out of her dad’s car, she’d run into the girls’ bathroom and changed out of her white knee-length peasant skirt and ribbed orange tank top into her workout clothes. Wearing baggy shorts and a white sleeveless tee, with her hair pulled up into a messy bun on the top of her head, she’d hoped to blend in as much as possible. But as soon as she walked into the weight room— into a sea of biceps and testosterone—she knew she’d be out of place no matter what she wore.

All heads swiveled toward her as the door opened. Chalk dust filled the air. The squeak of the machines came to a grinding halt as the guys gawked at their new
female
teammate. It was amazing, the difference boobs could make—even relatively little ones. It was like they were looking at an alien from Mars.

Across the room, Benji stopped his leg presses. Ryan was mid-pull-up. He continued, unfazed by her entrance. Lucy was grateful. She stared at him, momentarily transfixed. Being that cute should have been illegal in all fifty states.

Coach Offredi stepped in front of Lucy and turned to the guys. “What? You boys never seen a girl before? Let’s go!” Then he turned to Lucy. “You’re late.”

Lucy inhaled quickly and then explained. “I know. I’m sorry. I had to change—”

“I don’t want to hear excuses. I want you here on time. You want to be on this team? You show up with the team.” She felt as though she’d been slapped across the face. Public humiliation was never fun, but especially not before 8 A.M.

“Go join Benji,” Coach Offredi said dismissively.“He’ll show you what to do.” Lucy rolled her eyes.
What was
with
this guy?
Music blared from a radio that looked so old, it might have been Coach Offredi’s when he was in high school. Obediently, she wove around the guys, making her way over to Benji. Ryan hopped off the pull-up bar, landing right in front of her. She stopped abruptly.

“Oh, hi,” she said quickly. God, he could even make sweaty pit stains look hot.

“Hey,” Ryan said as he moved around her, headed to the bench press. “So, you made it,” he said, hitting her on the arm.

“Oh yeah,” she responded. “I just had to change—that’s why I was late.”

Ryan laughed. “I meant the team. You made the team.” Lucy’s eyes widened. “Oh, right,” she realized. “Right, right. Yeah. I made it. The team.” She shifted uncomfortably, staring down at her gray New Balances.

“Lucy, you ready?” Benji asked, interrupting the moment. Lucy spun back around. Benji was standing at the leg press, smiling, waiting for her.

“See ya,” she told Ryan. She hurried over and Benji engulfed her in a huge hug.

“Congratulations,” he said proudly. “Obviously, you made the team.”

“I know,” she admitted bashfully. “I hope—I know you wanted to be the placekicker—”

“Hey, hey,” Benji reassured her. “I’m glad we’ll get more time together. I just can’t believe I was beat by a girl—”

“Wait a minute,” Lucy said, punching him in the arm. “When you say it that way, it sounds like a bad thing—like a huge insult to girls.”

“Insult?” Benji gasped. “It was a compliment. There’s no one I’d rather be beaten by.”

Lucy smiled, then nodded toward the leg press. “So . . . what do I do?”

“It’s called a leg press,” he teased. “What you do is you use your legs, put them right there, to press the weight.”

“Oh, really?” Lucy asked sarcastically. “I couldn’t have figured that out.”

“You two!” Coach Offredi snapped. “Enough talking.” He tossed a thick binder in Lucy’s general direction. It landed near the leg press machine with a thud. “Playbook,” he explained. “I suggest you learn what’s in there.”

Lucy picked up the binder. Her arms sagged under the weight. She gulped and looked at Benji, holding up the book. “Well . . . maybe I could just leg-press this.”

 
By the time Lucy had showered and made her way to first period, word about her making the team had already spread. As soon as Pickle saw Lucy, she bounded over.

“You have
got
to be kidding me!” she said with a huge smile on her face. “You made the team? The boys’ football team? Martie just told me. She’s so excited!”

Lucy giggled. “I know. It’s crazy.”

“Everyone’s talking about it,” Pickle bragged.“We’re all so proud of you! We have to celebrate!”

“Oh God,” Lucy groaned playfully.“I can’t take another Vermonster.”

Pickle laughed. “When are you free? Today? Tonight?”

Lucy considered. “Well, definitely not after school today.” She smiled, then told Pickle, “My first practice.”

Pickle smiled. “Then tonight it is.”

 
At the end of the school day, Lucy stood in the girls’ locker room, completely alone. Coach Offredi had reluctantly given her pads and a helmet to change into. Getting dressed for football practice was more work than getting ready for prom—not that Lucy had ever been to one, but she could imagine.

There was the helmet with a face mask—because she was a kicker, Lucy’s face mask had just a single bar across it, while linemen wore something that looked more like a cage.

There were two jerseys—a blue and gold away one and a white home one, each with the number 2 on the back and front. Apparently in the pros, quarterbacks and kickers had to be numbers between 1 and 19; Coach Offredi had implemented the same policy on their team.

There were football cleats that fit Lucy’s feet like a glove . . .although she had been told by Coach that kickers often used a football cleat on their plant foot and a soccer cleat on their kicking foot. Most comfortable in soccer cleats, Lucy planned to do the same.

Then there were the pads: shoulder pads, thigh pads, elbow pads, hip pads, and knee pads—there was even a butt pad! And although Lucy had eventually sorted it all out, it hadn’t been easy to tell which pad was supposed to cover which body part.

But when she slipped on her jersey, she noticed it didn’t quite cover
all
body parts. Lucy gasped. Two giant holes had been cut out of the chest, where her boobs were supposed to be. She stared at her reflection, horrified. She couldn’t go out onto the field like this, with her sports bra showing through . . . or could she?

Lucy shook her head defiantly. Someone had obviously sabotaged her uniform. Someone who wanted to keep her down in the locker room, too embarrassed to show her face. Well, she’d show ’em her sports bra instead.

She put on her helmet and tucked up her hair.

She couldn’t go as far as to say she looked like one of the guys. In fact, with her bra showing through, she looked more like a girl than ever.

She sighed. It was now or never. She figured she had come this far. It might as well be now.

She told herself to be tough, to be strong. She couldn’t let them get to her. That was what they wanted—to drive her away. Besides, what would Pickle and Charlie and all the girls think of her if she let some stupid holes in her jersey force her to quit? Not much, probably.

She looked at her reflection again, steeling herself for what she was about to go do. It was time to start playing football.

If Lucy had thought soccer Hell Week was torture, it was nothing compared to her first official football practice with the team.

“What happened?” Coach Offredi barked as he took one look at Lucy’s cut-up jersey.

“Oh,” Lucy said, acting surprised. “It wasn’t supposed to come like this?”

A few of the guys stifled a snicker or two. Coach Offredi folded his arms across his chest.

“Run a lap,” he said. And before Lucy could protest, he added, “NOW!” As Lucy took off running, she heard him ask an assistant coach to get her another jersey.

By the time she returned, she was out of breath and a new jersey was waiting for her on the bench. She quickly pulled off her old jersey and changed.
Who cares,
she thought.
Why be modest? They’ve already seen my bra. . . .

And once she was fully dressed and covered, things went from bad to worse.

It wasn’t just the fact that Coach Offredi treated her as though she had the plague, or that a few of the guys kept knocking her thigh pads intentionally—it was that she simply had no idea what she was doing. And she hadn’t exactly had time to read the playbook between geometry and U.S. history. Luckily, she was paired up with Benji.

After warm-ups, when the rest of the team moved onto sled drills or pass plays, depending on their position, Lucy and Benji walked over to the sideline to warm up their legs and alternate taking kicks. The truth was, since you never knew what could happen on the field, Lucy and Benji had to be prepared to take over for each other at a moment’s notice. Just as Benji had to be ready to kick point after touchdowns, field goals, or kickoffs, Lucy had to be ready to punt on the fourth down.

“Deep punts first,” Coach Offredi instructed as he walked off to work with the rushers, the group of guys who would try to block the opponent’s kicks. “Then take some shorter, low ones.”

“Low ones?” Lucy asked, confused.

Benji explained. “It’s basically a low line drive, closer to the ground. It’ll bounce around when it lands, be hard to settle.You can punt a squib or kickoff that way.” Lucy squinted, staring at Benji.
Uh, translation please?

“Why would you do that?” she asked, feeling overwhelmed by how little she actually knew about a sport she was supposed to play.

“You know, like, if the weather is bad,” Benji offered. “Or if you have a really tight lead with only minutes to go, or their return man is really fast. You might want to kick off that way to do an onside kick. . . .”

A
what
kick?
Lucy nodded fiercely, as if it all made perfect sense—even though it hardly made any at all.

Benji stared at her a moment longer than was necessary.

“Uh . . . what?” she said.

“Do you have plans tonight?” Benji asked. “Because if you do, cancel them.”

“Okay, why?” She felt bad canceling on Pickle, who’d been so enthusiastic and sweet.

“Because tonight,” Benji explained, “I’m giving you a crash course in all things football.”

 
The sun was just setting over the ocean, and it was that special time of night when the sky deepens to dark blue, but it’s still light enough to see.