He was here, in her own kitchen, with coffee and donuts. And he smelled so good—fresh showers and soap.
“Thank you for taking me to the hospital last night. I’m sorry I gave you shit for it in the car.”
“You’re welcome. What did the doctor say?”
“Well, after threatening me for lying to him about you being my sister, he said I had a mild concussion, and yeah. That’s it.”
“Did your mom come?” she asked, trying to skate right past the implication that he remembered their almost kiss. Some things were better left unsaid and totally forgotten. At least until she could figure stuff out—like why she wanted to kiss him and why it would probably be a huge mistake.
“Yes. The nurse who came in with him was my mom. She wasn’t very happy about everything.”
“Everything?” she asked, trying not to wince.
“Yeah. She said I shoulda avoided the safety. That dick.”
Avery laughed but ducked her head in case the embarrassment and shame she was feeling showed on her face. They weren’t talking about the almost-kiss, and that was fine with her. More than fine. But she couldn’t escape the fact that the reason he’d even wanted to kiss her was because he thought she was a good person, someone helping him out of the kindness of her heart. And she wasn’t. She was helping him because she wanted Lucas to play well enough to help her father.
She sipped some more coffee and sat on the opposite side of the kitchen. “So how long are you benched for?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Depends if your dad lets me play when I haven’t been to practice in a week.” He sat on the chair across the island from her. “I don’t feel bad, though. My headache’s just a dull ache now, but I have to show for a checkup Wednesday, and they’ll tell me when I can practice again.”
As he spoke in the quiet of the kitchen, she recognized his accent was slightly different from hers. She liked it. She liked him. She hadn’t even kissed a boy since Blaine. Oh. Maybe that was why she wanted to kiss him? Just because she hadn’t kissed anyone in ages. And then she looked at him. He was gorgeous. Dark hair, dark eyes, a smile that suggested he knew things that she didn’t—which was so hot she couldn’t even—and a body. An athlete’s body.
Damn. She was being ridiculous. She didn’t know him. All this…yearning was based solely on the way he looked. How shallow was that? Snap out of it, Avery.
“What do you remember about the game last night?” she asked, trying to keep the conversation where she needed it. Football.
He laughed, almost uncomfortably, she thought. “I don’t remember much, to be honest. I think I got spanked pretty badly out there. I listened to some of the aftergame on the radio. At least we won.”
“It helped that the safety who tackled you was ejected from the game, and his replacement couldn’t even keep up with Mac, who, you know, can’t really run.”
She squished her mouth to one side, wondering if she should show him how bad it had been. Or if it would mess with his head seeing himself taken out like that. “I have the play on my phone, if you want to see?”
…
“You videoed me?” he asked, surprised, and…what was the other thing? Surprise and warmth, was it? She’d videoed him playing football. Only his mother had done that before.
“I thought it would help you get fixed,” she replied, instantly deflating every hope he didn’t know that he’d had. “Do you want to see?”
“Sure.”
“Be right back,” she said, flying through the swing door. It swung slow enough that he saw her running up the stairs two at a time.
He grinned. He liked her. He had no earthly reason why, but he liked her. She seemed so open, like she wasn’t afraid of anything. Yet there were obviously things she was scared of. He could see it in her eyes. It was the same look he’d seen in the mirror these past four months or so. But hell, all that aside, he just wanted to touch her so bad. To touch her, to kiss her. What was up with that?
She blew through the kitchen door again, holding her phone aloft. She jumped up so she was sitting on the marble counter and patted the spot next to her.
He hesitated for a second and jumped up beside her, ignoring the throb in his head the sudden movement had produced. She was swiping to get to the right spot. “There.” She handed the phone to him and peered over his shoulder to watch with him. Her chin almost touched his shoulder. If he moved it just a tiny bit, would she jerk away or rest her chin on him? He didn’t want to risk finding out.
On the video, the crowd was chattering as they came out of the huddle, but as soon as the players took their positions, there was silence. He heard Lexi say, “Here we go,” as Colin took possession of the ball.
It was embarrassing at how out of place he’d been for Colin’s throw, but even more so, when freaking Avery said in disbelief, “Oh my God, he caught it.”
He gave her a look. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
She pressed her lips together and returned her attention to the small screen.
Wow, he was fast. He was back on form again. A small part of him remembered his legs pumping and the entire belief, no certainty, in him that he’d reach the line.
And then the defender hit him. There was a crack as their helmets made contact. It was a totally illegal tackle. He watched as his head snapped back and forth with the impact. Wincing, he looked away. “Okay, I’ve seen enough.”
“It was bad,” she agreed. “What did your mom say?”
“She was a little freaked,” he said slowly. “I’ve never been hit like that before. Speaking of…do you have any Advil I could use? I didn’t bring mine with me.”
“Sure. Let me go find my bag.” She slid off the counter and ran off again, and instantly he felt the lack of her next to him. It was like the sun had gone behind a cloud, and oh my God, I can’t believe I'm thinking in freaking poems. His eyes widened, and he shook his head at himself. What was the matter with him? It must have been the bang on his head. Shit, maybe it had changed him. How could it not have? He slid his finger on her phone to the moment of impact. He played it over and over. Watching his head snap back and forth. A dizziness came over him just watching. Truthfully, the impact scared him a bit. He went to set the phone down where she’d left it but then picked it up again to watch the footage again. He really hadn’t ever been hit that hard before.
At his old school, everyone had protected him; he was the golden one. Someone had always watched his back. The whole team protected him at all costs on the field. Not so much when the game was over, though, as he’d found out.
“You’re going to look for that safety all the time now, aren’t ya?”
He looked up from the phone. She stood leaning against the doorjamb, holding the swing door with her foot. She threw the small bottle of pills at him. “Sorry it took so long. Colin had taken them out of my bag.”
He caught the bottle, thanking God that he didn’t fumble it, popped the cap off, and took two dry, lobbing them into his mouth and tipping his head back.
Avery offered him a sip from her iced coffee, even though there were three sweating cups full of caffeine just a reach away. It felt…intimate. He took the cup, touching her fingers as he did. The kitchen grew smaller as he lowered his mouth onto the straw that had so recently been in her mouth. He sucked down the cold liquid, unable to drop eye contact with this girl he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
He had to shake this…crush?…off.
He gave the coffee back. “What did you say?”
“I said I’d found the Advil in—”
“No before that,” he said, making a winding-back gesture with his finger.
She took a sip of her coffee, and something twinged deep in his stomach. A tightening as he watched her lips touch where his had been. Jesus. Christ. Knock it off.
“Oh, I said you were going to sta
rt looking for the guy checking you now.” She plopped down on the dining room chair that was obviously excess to needs in the actual dining room, so it sat against the counter, next to the microwave.
She was probably right. The second cardinal rule of receiving was to keep your eye on the ball, though, not the opposing player who was looking to snap your head off with a fucking illegal tackle. Speed was supposed to take care of that player. But yeah.
“That’s why you can’t play again until you’re a hundred percent. If you have any headache, any tension, even any tenderness from your bruises, you’re going to be hyperaware of anyone coming near you. I’ve seen it before. A lot of times. You’ll not make the play because your subconscious is scared. And your subconscious would be right, too, I should say.”
Thinking about it, that was what had happened to Jake Rodder—Henderson High’s QB when Lucas had been a freshman. He’d been sacked so bad he’d broken two ribs just from the weight of a linebacker jumping on him. He flubbed a bunch of passes the games after. He should have taken some time off maybe, and then he wouldn’t have been benched. He blew a breath out. “I never thought about that. I’ve seen it happen, too.”
Not for the first time, he realized that Henderson’s coach hadn’t really “coached” them much at all. He’d taken the top players and just let them play with little guidance. In the past week, it had become clear to him that he didn’t have a good technical foundation to fall back on. And Avery seemed to know more than he did about actually playing football. How was that even possible? How was a coach’s daughter who’d never played, better than a 5A high school head coach?
“I guess I’m just going to have to run faster than the safety then, aren’t I?” he said. He’d have to work on his sprints. Maybe next week he’d be able to run.
“Oh wow. I forgot to say—I don’t think anyone in the crowd had ever in real life seen a wide receiver run as fast as you did last night. Jaws dropped open, I swear.”
He allowed himself a half smile. “I heard about the comments on Brady’s Balls Facebook page. They showed the first part of the play but cut in footage of the Road Runner running and then being squished by an anvil?” It was a question. He hadn’t seen it himself; his mom had described it.
Avery giggled. “I saw it! That edit was a piece of art. I saved it. You didn’t see it?” She grabbed her phone, swiped to get at her Facebook, and clicked through. “Here.”
She handed her phone over again. He watched it. It was better than his mom had described it that morning. They hadn’t cut to the cartoon, as much as cut out the cartoon and pasted onto the football field. They laughed. And then watched it again and again and continued laughing until Avery clutched her sides and his head started pounding again.
Her eyes were shiny with unshed laughter tears and her cheeks pink.
“What are you doing today?” he asked, still laughing.
Her face fell. “Oh shit. What’s the time? I’ve got to get ready for work.” She glanced at the clock on the stove and took a breath. “I’ve got fifteen minutes before I have to leave.”
His heart dropped. Somehow, he’d figured they’d spend the day together. He thought they’d go out maybe. He still had twenty dollars in his pocket. The last twenty dollars he had.
Shit. He needed to get a job, too. “They’re not hiring, are they?”
“Who, Hardy’s?” she asked. “I don’t know. Mr. Hardy is always looking for someone to help him in the repair shop. Are you any good with your hands?” She blushed, like literally as soon as the words came out of her mouth.
The question weighed heavily in the air for a second as he deliberately grinned and cocked his head to one side.
“I mean, mechanical? Like, with tools?” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “I’m just going to stop talking and get cleaned up. You can come with me if you like. To talk to him.”
He was still grinning at her blush as she flew through the swing door and took the stairs two at a time again.
Chapter Fifteen
Avery drove them to Hardy’s. What if he ended up working there?
Pros: She’d be able to look at him all day
Cons: Oh God. Mr. Hardy might say something to him about the team and her father. Would that make a difference? She didn’t know Lucas well enough to know.
Pros: Mr. Hardy might take it easy if he had help and notice that Mrs. Diaz was a little sweet on him.
Cons: …
She guessed the pros had it.
“Is there anything I should know about working there?”
A small flurry of tumbleweeds blew across the road, and one hit the passenger-side window. “He’s a weather savant,” she said, smiling.
They pulled into the tiny parking lot behind the store where her father could get the car later if he needed it. As she opened the door, a stiff gust tried to blow it shut again. She only just caught it from slamming on her knee.
“Are you okay?” Lucas asked, opening the door from the outside and holding it.
She couldn’t help but smile. Wednesday evening, Mr. Hardy put a special on brooms, and sure enough, the windstorm was starting to blow in. Everything was as it should be. “I’m fine!” she shouted against the wind. “Come on!”
She grabbed her backpack from the seat behind her and hurried in through the back of the store. “Mr. Hardy?”
“Here, dear,” he replied with a smile as she rounded the corner into the store. “Who’s this?” He pulled his glasses down from his head and tipped his head back to peer through the bifocal. “Oh yes. Forgive me, I’ve forgotten your name, but I definitely remember you nearly dying last night. How’s the head, son?”
“It’s all right, thank you, sir,” Lucas said, touching the side of his head. “I can’t play for a few days, but I should be okay.”
Mr. Hardy’s eyes skittered away, back to the register. Avery thought he looked embarrassed, but there was no way he could have known she’d overheard his conversation with Mr. Duchamp. “That’s too bad. You looked as if you had a little potential tucked away in there somewhere.”
“I hope so, sir.”
“I brought Lucas to work to see if he could help you with the repairs in the back. He needed work, and I know you needed a hand.”
Mr. Hardy paused and looked at her. And then his gaze shifted to the room at the back of the store. “It’s true that I could use the help, so let’s see how handy you are.” He nodded back to the workshop, and Lucas followed him back, only turning to wink at Avery.
Something inside buzzed with happiness at the wink. It felt private and personal, as if they shared a secret. She took a breath and then remembered the other secret she was keeping. The happy buzzy feeling disappeared.
Avery started her usual duties. She opened the cash register and counted the cash float. She put on her apron and started taking out the baskets of brooms and doormats and rakes. The wind blew strong but warm against her face. She anchored the baskets with Mr. Hardy’s sackcloth bags of metal pellets and looked up and down the street. No cars, no one in sight. Except Mrs. Van Sant—the baker—putting out her breakfast sign. Although Avery couldn’t actually smell the bread and muffins baking in the store, she could imagine it.
She made a deal with herself that she would slip down and get a muffin as soon as everything was straight in the store. But she didn’t have a chance. Within a few minutes of opening, the construction workers started to arrive.
By eleven, the store was busy. With no big stores nearby, Hardy’s was a weekend mecca for Hillsdale. Mr. Hardy could show people how to fix an A/C unit or hang a picture straight or set mouse traps. He would lend his tools to people, knowing that some couldn’t afford to buy a tool just for one job. People came for science project ingredients, storage boxes, and even dividers for kitchen drawers.
Some just came to hang out with Mr. Hardy. Like Mr. Duchamp.
This morning he brought a friend, and Avery’s blood grew hotter.
“How can I help you, Mr. Duchamp?” she asked, forcing a smile.
“I’m just headed back to see Benny.” He nodded to the back of the store and started back without waiting for her to reply.
The man with him hung back. “Do you go to the high school here?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” she said, slotting some wrenches back in the tool box that a construction worker had been looking at.
“You a Hammers fan?” he asked.
She looked up and wondered if this was the guy. Mr. Duchamp’s oldest customer’s son. The guy angling to take her dad’s job. He looked barely older than the guys on the team.
“Everyone in town is,” she replied evenly.
“Cool.” He leaned on the counter where she was still fitting the tools back in the box. “I used to play football at school. I was the QB.” He smirked. “QB. You know what that means?”
She looked back at the wrenches and just nodded.
“I ran my team right into the conference playoffs. We won three years in a row.”
She finally looked up and snapped the tool box shut. “And what do you do now, Mr…?”
“Seymore. But you can call me Billy if you like. What do I do? A little of this, a little of that. Looking at getting a new job ’round here.”
A little of this, a little of that. So, nothing? Now she was 100 percent sure he was here to take her dad’s job.
Every time his players had a good game, her father reminded them that their glory days shouldn’t be in high school. That they had to work on ensuring their best days were after high school. That the feeling of elation they were experiencing from the win was a feeling they had to aspire to after graduation.
She guessed Billy Seymore hadn’t had a coach like her father. Which meant that he wouldn’t be a coach like her father. He wouldn’t teach his players to respect people, to be polite and helpful off the field. Hillside wasn’t a place guys came to score a football scholarship, her father had always said, but while they were his, they’d have to learn about life as well as football.
The Love Playbook Page 10