Triple Threat

by Mike Lupica

  “Got it,” Alex said.

  On second down, she tried a quick pitch to Tariq. But he started running before properly securing the ball and flat-out dropped it.

  Alex was close enough to the play to get to the ball first. And she was smart enough not to attempt to pick it up and run in traffic. Not with two Lions defenders right on top of the play. So she fell on the ball, right before their linemen fell on top of her. She felt players trying to rip the ball away from her before the ref started untangling the bodies in the pile.

  Then she felt something else. Somebody shoving her facemask into the ground, twisting it a little, as if forcing her to eat dirt and grass. It was dark inside her helmet, and hard to breathe.

  “How’s our field taste?” she heard somebody say from above her. No. 58.

  Once the whistle blew and the refs dismantled the pileup, she was able to shift her body and pull the front of her mask out of the turf. She clutched the ball to her chest in victory.

  As she got to her feet and handed the ball to the ref, she saw No. 58 staring at her. She stared right back.

  “You got something to say?” he said to Alex.

  “Yeah, I got something to say,” she said. “Scoreboard.”

  Coach called time-out, and Alex could see him waving her over to the sideline.

  “Been in a lot of those pig piles myself,” he said. “Something happen at the bottom of that one?”

  “Nothing I can’t handle,” she said, repeating Jabril’s mantra.

  “You want to serve up some payback?” Coach said.

  Alex looked up at Coach through her helmet. “What did you have in mind?” she asked.

  Coach told her the play he wanted her to run.

  “You like?” he said.

  “Love,” she said.

  She was in the shotgun. After she took Cal’s snap, she rolled to her right. No. 58’s side of the field. It was supposed to appear as if Alex was planning to throw the ball, probably to Gabe. No. 58 wanted to sack her before she did. He flew toward Alex. She stopped, made a perfect pump fake with the ball, watched as No. 58 kept flying right past her.

  And took off.

  For a minute, she thought she might have enough open field to go all the way. She had the speed, for sure. But then she saw one of the Lions’ safeties coming across the field, cutting off her angle. Alex didn’t tackle herself in this case. Just ran out of bounds to avoid a hit.

  The safety didn’t stop. He plowed into her at full speed, sending her crashing over the edge of the Lions’ bench. She could hear the ref blowing his whistle before she even hit the ground, yelling about unnecessary roughness. When she rolled up into a sitting position, she saw the ref signaling that the safety was out of the game. Done for the day.

  As soon as Alex stood up and felt the pain in her knee, she knew she was done for the day, too.

  23

  No point in bluffing.

  She was hurt, all right.

  After she limped her first few steps, Jabril came sprinting across the field to help, but she waved him off. She didn’t want to be assisted off the field. Nevertheless, she knew she had to come off. And out of the game.

  She saw Coach Mencken and the Lions’ coach talking to the ref at midfield. When the Lions’ coach spotted Alex, he came over and apologized, saying he didn’t coach his guys to make dirty plays like that.

  “Thanks, Coach,” Alex said. “But I can take it.”

  When she got to the bench, Jabril knelt down next to her and said, “Which knee?”

  “Left,” Alex said. “I’ll live.”

  “Nearly scared me to death,” Jabril said.

  Dr. Calabrese, Cal’s dad, had Alex pull up her pant leg. They both observed a colorful bruise beginning to form, and some swelling. But after having her put some weight on her leg and do a few range-of-motion movements, he said he didn’t think it was anything serious and suggested she ice it for the rest of the game.

  “Hey,” Dr. Calabrese said. “No more injuries.” He was smiling.

  “I hear you,” Alex said.

  Holding the ice pack to her knee, Alex turned around to where she hoped her dad still was in the stands. He’d remained in his seat, even though she knew he was probably anxious to come down and check on her himself. When they were in the car on the way home, he told her what he’d really wanted to do was come down and have a chat with the safety.

  “That would’ve been a conversation worth live-streaming,” she said.

  “It was a cheap shot,” he said, anger visible in his expression.

  “The cheapest,” Alex said. “And it probably won’t be the last.”

  “When are these boys going to get over themselves?” Jack Carlisle said.

  “If it had been a close game,” Alex said, “I would have asked Coach to put me back in there before it was over.”

  She saw him turn his head slightly, so she could see him in the rearview mirror. His face had softened.

  “My girl,” he said.

  “You think you’ll ever get tired of saying that?” Alex said.

  “Not anytime soon,” he said. “How’s the knee?”

  “That’s like the fifth time you’ve asked me.”

  “What can I say, I’m an involved parent,” he said.

  They had just turned the corner onto their street.

  “You think you’ll be okay to practice on Tuesday?” he asked.

  “What do you think?”

  “My girl,” he said again.

  After she showered and changed into gym shorts and her favorite US Women’s Soccer T-shirt, she came downstairs to ice her leg again and watch college football with her dad. The swelling, she saw, hadn’t gotten any better. But it also hadn’t gotten any worse.

  About an hour later, Jabril called to see how she was doing.

  He was the only teammate who did.

  24

  Most days Alex ate lunch with Sophie in the cafeteria. Some days she ate with Jabril. Some days with both.

  Gabe had started eating with other teammates, not just Jeff and Lewis. They sat at the same table, on the opposite end of the cafeteria from where Alex usually sat. She didn’t want to be near them. They didn’t want to be near her.

  On Monday it was just Alex and Jabril. Sophie had stayed home from school with a bad cold.

  Jabril asked Alex if she had talked to Gabe over the weekend, but Alex shook her head no. They really had nothing to talk about. On the field, they got along fine. But that was all the relationship they had right now.

  Alex asked Jabril if he’d discussed any of this with Gabe, and Jabril said he had.

  “What did he say?” Alex said.

  “That he didn’t want to talk about it,” Jabril said.

  Alex felt herself deflate. “Then neither do I,” she said.

  “You two are friends.”

  “Not right now,” Alex said. “But I’m cool with that. I really don’t have any friends right now besides you and Sophie.”

  “That can’t be true,” Jabril said.

  “I wish I were lying,” Alex said. “Playing football turned out to be a way bigger deal than I imagined.”

  “A lot of this is because of Jeff,” Jabril said.

  Alex waited for him to elaborate.

  “Not many people, other than Lewis, liked him that much before we all joined the team last year.”

  “So why is everyone so enamored with him all of a sudden?”

  “Can’t explain it,” Jabril said. “But he got Lindsey all fired up, and then she got the girls’ soccer team fired up.”

  Lindsey. Jeff’s cousin. She and Alex had never been all that close, even as teammates. They were two of the better players on the girls’ team. But Lindsey was as self-absorbed as her cousin. Alex determined it must be a family trai
t.

  “Somehow Jeff and Lindsey have convinced people that you think you’re better than the other girls in school,” Jabril said.

  “Well, that just means they’re spreading lies,” Alex said. “I swear, J, if I’d known it was going to be like this, I would have stuck with soccer.”

  “Nah, that wouldn’t’ve been you,” he said. “You had to try. And now it turns out you got more than try in you. You got game.”

  “I don’t want you to take any heat because of me,” Alex said.

  Jabril’s lips curved up into a smile. The look he gave Alex made her feel as though somehow everything was going to be all right.

  “Like a real good friend of mine says,” Jabril said, “I can take it.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Sophie was well enough to come to school the next day. Jabril was eating in the library, working on a history assignment he hadn’t finished the night before. He didn’t say why, but Alex knew. He’d been watching Monday Night Football.

  Alex and Sophie filled their trays with food and walked over to the long table of seventh-grade girls in the middle of the lunchroom. Some Alex recognized from the soccer team, and others were on Sophie’s cheerleading squad.

  “You ready?” Sophie said.

  Alex nodded.

  She and Alex sat down at two empty seats at the end of the table.

  Everybody else at the table except the two cheerleaders, Isabella Martinez and Ava Bianchi, stood up and walked away. For a moment Alex thought maybe Isabella and Ava might leave, too. But to her relief, they stayed and even smiled at Alex.

  “Whatever happened to sisterhood?” Sophie said.

  “Seems to me it just got up and left,” Alex said.

  * * *

  • • •

  Alex’s dad came home early so he could run through some conditioning exercises with Alex in the backyard before the Owls’ practice that evening. They were meeting at Orville High tonight, after the varsity players had their practice. Jack Carlisle had Alex throw a few balls and run some routes to prove that her knee was back to full strength.

  “Look like a QB to me,” he said. “Know why? ’Cause that’s what you are now. You can throw, you can run. And even the ones who won’t admit it know that. Keep that in mind. You’re a threat because you’re good.”

  Alex warmed up in a T-shirt and her football pants. It was almost time to go upstairs and get into her Owls uniform. Usually there was a feeling of excitement when gearing up. Just not today. She felt as if she’d already taken her first hit of the day, from the girls’ soccer team.

  She told her dad what had happened at lunch.

  “I didn’t do this so everybody would be talking about me,” she said.

  “You don’t have to tell me,” he said. “You’ve never been one to draw attention to yourself.”

  “I know!” she said. Then more seriously, “I didn’t want to admit it, but it’s starting to get to me.”

  He cupped a hand on her shoulder and smiled down at her.

  “You’d tell me if it got to be too much . . .” he said, the concerned father coming out in his tone. “There shouldn’t be more things making you unhappy about this whole experience than happy.”

  “There aren’t,” she said. “Being good at football makes me feel good about myself.”

  “I don’t say this often enough,” he said. “But you’re one of the strongest people I know.”

  “Dad,” she said, embarrassment flushing her cheeks.

  “I’m serious,” he said.

  And as much as they liked to joke around, Alex knew he was being sincere this time.

  She nodded, acknowledging the compliment, then said, “Okay, enough of the mushy stuff. Go long.”

  Alex’s dad ran out, and she threw him a great deep ball. When he caught it, he spiked the ball and went into one of his goofy touchdown dances.

  She was ready for practice now.

  25

  The thing was, it wasn’t as if Gabe wasn’t talking to Alex.

  But they both knew they weren’t really talking to each other—not at practice, not at school. Not the way they used to. A lot had happened since Alex announced she was going out for the team. An awful lot.

  But she never expected this from Gabe.

  She felt bad for him. She did. She could see how much pressure he was under from the other guys on the team. Except for Jabril. Jabril was as rock solid as ever. He could be Gabe’s friend and Alex’s at the same time. The only thing that had changed since the start of the football season was that Alex and Jabril were closer than they’d ever been. Whatever lost time she had with Gabe, it was like she was making it up with Jabril.

  She had a good practice Tuesday night. They all did, getting ready for their next home game against the team from Seneca. It was the first time Alex thought she might have gotten as many snaps with the first-team offense as Jeff Stiles did. Lewis Healey’s ankle sprain was healed, and he was back to practicing at full speed. But it was clear that Coach Mencken no longer saw Lewis as an option for backup quarterback. For now, that was Alex’s job. They’d played two games, and she’d gotten to play in each one.

  Another surprise of the football season?

  She seemed to be winning over her coach.

  It gave her hope. Maybe if he could get past her—what, her girl-ness?—maybe the rest of the team would follow. Eventually.

  But every time she allowed herself to hope, something else would happen. Tonight it came at the end of practice, Alex out there with the first team, Coach giving her one last chance to get a score. Like it was fourth down at the end of a game.

  The offense was at the twelve-yard line. Coach was letting Alex call her own play. She called a pass to Lewis, since she’d made no secret that she preferred throwing the ball to Gabe. In the huddle, Alex didn’t call one of their set plays. She just told Lewis to run for the end zone, make a quick break to the outside, and get open. She’d handle the rest.

  Alex dropped back and was given plenty of time by her blockers, mostly due to Cal putting a perfect block on a blitzing Jabril. She gave a quick glance to her left—looking the defenders off, the way pro quarterbacks did—then turned to Lewis, who was making his break.

  To the inside.

  Not the outside.

  Her pass sailed out of bounds.

  Practice over.

  She’d told him where to go. Couldn’t have been any clearer. The guys in the huddle had heard her, too. But she didn’t make a thing out of it in front of the team. She knew better, and besides, she had enough trouble with Lewis Healey as it was.

  He was walking back to the bench when she came up alongside him.

  “What was that?” she said, keeping her voice low.

  He already had his helmet off and carried it in his hand. Turning to her with a smirk on his face that Alex thought was permanently there, he shrugged and said, “Oops.”

  “You know I said to break to the outside.”

  “I heard inside,” he said, continuing to stare straight ahead.

  Alex stopped and planted herself in front of him, blocking his way. “No, you didn’t.”

  “Calling me a liar?” he said. “Because if you are, say what you have to say in front of the whole team.”

  “You’d like that,” Alex said.

  “Man up,” Lewis said.

  And walked away.

  * * *

  • • •

  “You should quit,” Sophie said.

  They were at Alex’s house the next day after school, Wednesday. Kelly was downstairs in the kitchen doing homework, which is what she usually did when she came to the house to watch Alex. Alex and Sophie were on the swing set in her backyard. The one her dad had assembled for her as a birthday gift when she was six and refused to take down.


  Alex had debated whether to tell Sophie what had happened with Lewis Healey the night before. She didn’t want Sophie to think she went running to her every time somebody on the team tried to hurt her feelings.

  Or did.

  But right now the only person other than Sophie in whom she could confide was Jabril. And as good a guy as Jabril was, he was still a guy. Even so, he would never have suggested she quit.

  But that’s exactly what Sophie was telling her now, much to Alex’s surprise.

  “Wait, what?” Alex said.

  They had been swinging pretty high, but now Alex kicked her feet to the ground to slow herself.

  “You’ve been my biggest cheerleader up to now,” Alex said.

  “I see what you did there,” Sophie said.

  “And now you’re the one telling me to quit?”

  “I’ll tell you why,” Sophie said. “This is supposed to be fun for you, even with all the junk you’ve had to put up with.”

  “Lots of junk.”

  “And I know it’s a lot. But sports are supposed to be fun. If cheerleading made me as miserable as football makes you, I’m pretty sure I’d quit, too.”

  “But your teammates want you on your team.”

  “Listen,” Sophie said. “I won’t pretend cheerleading is always sunshine and rainbows. There are times when it’s really tough. The hours are long, people get hurt, my teammates don’t agree on stuff, and we argue a lot. I mean, a lot. But at the end of the day, we’re all passionate about the same thing.”

  “I just feel like the guys are never going to see it from my point of view,” Alex said. “Like, there’s no light at the end of the tunnel. I’m going to be dealing with this for as long as I want to play football, and it’s not fair!”

  The last sentence came out in hot anger. Louder than she’d intended, and not meant to be aimed at Sophie. She quickly apologized, but Sophie shook her head.