The Hard Count (24 page)

“Jesus, Noah…” I hum, my lips tingling and my mind picturing every word he says.

“Yeah, I know,” he says, glancing to me, but only briefly. “The guy was high on something. I could tell, and I don’t think he was going to let us go without getting way more than we gave him. Especially since I’m on crutches; it’s not like I could make a break for it.”

“Oh my God, Noah. Why didn’t you tell me about this? We need to file a police report, or do something, or…”

Noah chuckles and pulls his glasses down, turning to look me in the eyes.

“Reagan, I don’t need to file a public document that says I was out buying drugs in West End,” Noah says, his mouth set in a hard, serious line.

I pull my lips in on one side and nod.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. I just…Noah, if Mom knew all of this…”

“Nico saw us,” he interrupts.

I look up to find my brother’s eyes still waiting for me, his expression unchanged.

“He…saw you?” I hold my breath, pushing my hands into my thighs harder, my shoulder tense and arms flexed.

“He walked up and got in the middle of shit that was going down. He told the guy that we were connected to someone that could bust him, third strike or something like that. The guy stared at him for a long time, and I was waiting for him to call bullshit, but eventually he just nodded and threw a bag at me. That’s how Mom found it…”

“I don’t understand,” I say, my focus on him intense.

“I was so freaked out, I left it in Travis’s Jeep. His mom got the call from your dad, about A&M, last night. He came over to tell me, and grabbed it on his way. He didn’t want any of it near him, kind of freaked out about testing or shit I guess, and then I got distracted with his news, and then Dad came in to tell me that Texas was pulling their interest in me…”

“Wait,” I say, holding up a hand. “Texas is pulling out?”

“Yeah, well…it’s not like I’m putting up numbers this year, and other guys are so…”

“Noah,” I say, my face falling in sympathy.

“Don’t,” he says, pushing his glasses back up and looking back out to the field. He spits the final few seeds from his mouth. “It sucks enough without you pitying me about it.”

“You’ll go somewhere else,” I say.

“Maybe,” he sighs.

I look back out at the field and watch the squads break out to run drills, Nico working with Travis. His movements are rigid, and he’s throwing angrily—forcing the ball instead of letting it work naturally. That’s my fault.

“How’d Mom find your pot then?” I ask, greedily, wanting my brother’s screwup for a distraction.

“I left it on the middle of my goddamned desk. Which, ha…I mean come on, I never have homework out on that thing or anything. I might as well have just tossed it to her,” he says, laughing at himself.

“She probably would have just smoked it,” I deadpan.

Noah snorts out a laugh.

“True statement,” he says. “She said she’s not going to tell Dad, so who knows. Maybe she’ll keep it for herself.”

I chuckle, but eventually my laughter fades. We both sit silently together watching The Tradition run drills. I quit filming several minutes ago, so I lean the tripod and camera back, hugging it to my chest, resting my chin on the top of it. It looks like any other practice, only that our practices never look ordinary. Things are off. The field is quiet, and players look tense. You can see it in their eyes—my dad’s ultimatum. You can see it on my dad, too—the way he walks, hesitates, guards his words. He’s snapping at players and coaches, but without the backup material he usually unleashes on them. Chad Prescott is known for calling players out on their weaknesses, but then he spends thirty minutes teaching them why and how to fix them. Today, he’s just hurling insults.

“They all hate him,” I say, not really expecting a response.

“Dad? Or Nico?” Noah responds. I turn and meet his gaze.

“Both of them,” I shrug.

My brother looks at me and pulls his lips in tight, filling his chest with a long inhale. He turns to look back out on the field, and eventually pulls his crutches in his hands, lifting himself to stand.

“They don’t hate Nico,” he says, taking a few strides toward the field before stopping to talk to me over his shoulder. “They resent him. He’s better than they are.”

My brother swings his cast in long bounds on his crutches, crossing the track and eventually meeting Dad at the sidelines. They stand next to one another and watch the plays happen in front of them. Every time, my dad yells something. My brother doesn’t react. He doesn’t know what to say, how to fix things for Dad. He can’t even make the right decisions for himself, but somehow I feel like maybe…maybe he’s trying.

I watch as the frustration level grows, evident in my father’s face—the red color it turns, the wrinkles deepening on his forehead, the tantrum he throws with his hat and clipboard. It isn’t that any of the guys are making mistakes, it’s just that they aren’t playing with passion.

The same plays happen over and over, and players take turns running to the water station, drinking and rushing back to the field, almost as if they’re afraid to take a break. Sasha gets too ill to continue eventually, Bob calling my dad over to tell him that he has to let him rest. My dad looks at Sasha, knowing that he isn’t one of the ones he needs to motivate. Sasha will play for Nico, no matter what. My dad’s hand comes down on Sasha’s shoulder, and I watch as he grabs his gear and makes his way to the locker room and eventually his car, pulling out while the rest of the team keeps pushing on.

Nothing changes, no matter how many times they run through drills. An hour turns into two, and soon the sun is setting, and the field lights are buzzing above our heads—the bulbs warming. This practice is going to happen well into the night. My dad intends to keep them here until he sees a change. I don’t know that he’s going to get one.

And Nico—he’s going to have to ride his board home eleven miles, in the dark.

My legs tired from sitting in the same position, I take my camera in my hands and stand, stretching them out and walking onto the field. Coach O’Donahue eyes me, and I acknowledge him with a wave, not wanting him to think he has any power to intimidate me. He doesn’t wave back, but he does look away.

I move near my dad, behind the line where Nico is taking snap after snap from Colton while Travis sprints down the field, trying to catch up to his ball. Nico’s overthrowing, and even though his arm should be dead tired, somehow his passes seem to get farther and farther out of reach.

“You know, Coach,” Bob says, leaning in close to my father. I stand quietly between them, my camera rolling, my ears listening. “There’s this saying they have about experiments, how if you repeat the same thing over and over again and get the same result, that maybe it’s a sign you should move on and try something else.”

“You think I should start Brandon, Bob?” my dad asks, his voice coming out clipped and his tone irritable.

Bob puts his hand on my father’s back and pats it twice, leaving it in place while they both look out on another failed play in front of them.

“I think maybe you’re coaching with something hot on your mind, and those boys—they can tell. I think maybe you can run them into the ground tonight all you want; won’t change how they show up to play for you tomorrow. I’ve got no opinion on who you start at QB, Chad. I
do
have some thoughts on the man I see standing right here, though,” he says, patting my father one more time before putting his hands in the front pocket of his sweatshirt and rolling his shoulders. “This ain’t you, Chad. I know the boys disappointed you, and I know they’re struggling, but this way? This has never been how you get things done. Besides, you keep this up, I’ll be taping every single one of your players up just so they can make practice.”

Bob spins and our eyes meet, his giving me a small wink. I smile at him on one side of my mouth, but don’t turn when he walks back to the training bench. I keep my focus on my dad, the way he looks to the side and ruminates on the words Bob just said. My dad chews at the inside of his mouth, just like my brother always does—like Nico—and eventually pushes his whistle between his lips.

“All right, bring it in,” he says.

His tired players fall in line, forming a half circle around him, each of them taking a knee, some of them pulling their jerseys off, taking off their pads, their bodies drenched despite the frosty air coming from their mouths. Fingers are pink with cold, and faces are red with heat. My father simply looks exhausted, the stands behind him dotted with boosters watching it all play out.

Everyone is on display.

Everyone is judging someone else.

“You worked hard today,” my dad says, shaking his head, warding off saying the wrong thing. “We didn’t get great results, but that…that’s partly my fault.” He rests his hand flat on his chest.

A few heads turn up to look at him, but most of his players are looking down. Nico is staring straight ahead, to the empty lot and the dark field he probably wishes he never left. I stare at him and let my body fill with regret. My eyes go directly to his lips, to the mouth that whispered the sweetest things against mine. I let my gaze travel to his chest and arms, to the way he kneels, balancing his weight on his helmet on the ground. His shoes are scuffed, and wrapped with tape, holding them to his feet. His body, so strong, is sheer exhaustion. Even so, I know if my father asked him to, Nico would stay out here until midnight—until the sun came up—throwing that pass again and again. He would throw until he got it right. And then, he’d keep going.

When I move back to his face, I flinch. His eyes are waiting for me, and I don’t know how long they were. He stares at me, not blinking, and I look back into him. My father’s voice fades to the background, and all I hear is the sound of his breath, despite being several feet away. Nico’s chest rises and falls in slow, calculated draws, his face blurred periodically by the frost from the air escaping him. I never break my hold on his eyes though, and neither does he.

Were our tale one of the Grimms’, it would end right here and right now. The earth would open up to swallow him whole in front of me. Fire would rain from the sky and burn us all, scorching and marring our skin. That man in the car in West End would kill my brother, and nobody would be able to stop him.

But Nico did.

Nico is the twist in the tale. He’s the element of good. He’s what humanity should be—the lesson to be learned. He is hope.

Nico stands, his eyes leaving mine, and I startle, realizing that everyone is breaking for the night. They all move to the center, and I fold my tripod up, and hug my camera again. My brother hops to the center with them, and my dad looks to Noah, urging him to send them all off.

“Whose house is this?” Noah shouts.

As broken as they are, as beaten and disheartened and filled with doubt, The Tradition answers.

“Our house!”

The chant plays out, and I find Nico’s eyes in the sea of faces, his mouth screaming with just as much passion as it did the first time he chanted those words in the gym.

They don’t hate you. They resent you, because you’re better than they are.

You’re better than us all.

The players all begin to step back, and before it’s too late, I move into the crowd.

“Nico!” I shout. When he doesn’t turn, I yell again. “Nico!”

I shout four times, Travis finally hearing me and nudging Nico on the arm. My hero turns toward me, but doesn’t come. He’s waiting…waiting for me to do something I should have done a long time ago, something I should have done Saturday, when my dad found us.

He’s waiting for me to be proud to be his.

My eyes dart around the field, my heart pounding so hard I feel it in my fingertips. My body shivers from the cold, and I catch my father’s eyes on me, just as I’m about to speak. I make a choice—this time, I choose differently. I rip the Band-Aid off.

“I’ll wait for you right outside the locker room. Let me take you home,” I say, my eyes pleading for him to say “okay.” His lip quirks, just enough, and my lungs fill fast.

“Get a ride home with one of the guys,” my dad interrupts, stepping closer to me.

I turn to look at my dad, his eyes on Nico, his expression one of authority.

“Dad, I can take him home. It’s fine,” I say.

“I’d rather you didn’t, Reagan. It’s late,” my dad says, still not bothering to look at me while he speaks.

“It’s not that late, Dad. And it’s only eleven miles. I’ll drive carefully, and…”

“Reagan!” my dad shouts, looking down, his chin at his shoulder, but his eyes still not on me. “That’s enough. Go home. Don’t worry, someone will give Nico a ride.”

My body vibrates with my pulse, and every piece of me grows tense. Others are watching us now, watching me be scolded—watching my father want to protect me from this
at-risk boy
.

“I am not a child, Dad. If I want to give my boyfriend a ride home, I’m going to,” I say, mentally lining up the next part of my argument.
I’ll start buying my own gas. I’ll save up and get my own car. I’ll talk to Mom and see what she thinks. I’ll make Noah come with us.

“Nico, go on, get changed. I’m sure you understand,” my dad says, his nostrils flaring. My face flushes red. I’m mortified, and I’m heartbroken. I open my mouth, ready to protest, but stop the moment he speaks.

“Yeah…I get it,” Nico says, stepping into the space between me and my father, his head down until he stops right in front of my dad, lifts his chin and looks my father in the eyes. “I’m good enough to throw the ball for you, but I’m not good enough for your daughter.”

“That’s not it,” my dad says, stopping short, shaking his head
no
, but lost for the words to go along with it. He has nowhere to go from there.

“Sure it is. You might not think that’s what you mean, but…I bet you wouldn’t have a problem with her driving up north, to Metahill. I just live eleven miles in the wrong direction.”

“Nico…” my dad says, his weight shifts, his voice a little less urgent—less sure.

“Coach.”

Nico stares my father in the eyes, not to intimidate, but to challenge, certainly. Several of his teammates are still around, including Colton and Travis, who both look on, their eyes fixed on the field between Nico and my father. It becomes clear soon that my dad isn’t going to have a miraculous change of heart.