by Aubrey Irons
“Oh, sweetie,” Meredith grins, and I see it even before she says it. “I already did.”
Oh, shit.
“I had my suspicions weeks ago, so I already did write it.” Meredith smirks at us, like she’s won something and she’s gloating about it. She holds up the little recorder in her hand and clicks a button, turning the little red light off. “And it looks like I was right, so yes, it’s going to print. At midnight, actually.”
No.
“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God…” Hailey’s sucking in breaths, turning to push her fingers through her hair as she shakes her head side to side, like she can’t actually believe what’s happening.
“My dad, he’s-”
“Oh, honey, I can’t imagine he’ll be thrilled to hear about his little princess with his golden boy quarterback.”
I can feel my jaw tense as I narrow my eyes at the harpy reporter. I instinctively move in front of Hailey, as if I need to somehow shield her from this bitch. “Get the fuck out of here, Meredith.”
“Oh, honey, you couldn’t pay me to spend any more time following around you and your little band of sweaty football players.” She laughs, “You know, they weren’t as much fun to interview as you, Ten,” she snickers at me and I can feel Hailey’s hand tighten furiously in mine.
“But,” she smiles at us like some sort of wicked fairytale witch. “Some of them were a lot more willing to, um, play ball with the press than some people.” She winks at me, and every muscle in my body tenses.
“And you know what? Some of them were willing to share a lot more about what goes on behind the scenes with this team than you were, Dalton.”
She levels her eyes right at me.
“Like all the little friendly bets y’all like to make.”
It’s like there’s ice-water in my veins as I feel the ground start to shatter beneath my feet. I want to roar at her, or rage or do something. But it’s like I’m frozen, or watching this whole horrible crash happen in slow motion through a lens.
“You may have lost the game tonight, but it looks like you’re still a winner. Isn’t that right, Ten?”
No. Not now, not here, not like this.
“What’s she talking about?”
I turn towards Hailey, and Meredith laughs wickedly behind me. “Oh, God, does she still not know?” She clucks her teeth. “The bet, honey,” she says curtly, directed right at Hailey.
I whirl at Meredith, my face a frozen snarl. “You shut your mouth,” I growl.
“Oh, I think I should tell her.”
“Tell me what?”
I turn back to Hailey, my mouth opening but nothing at all coming out of it.
Because there’s nothing to say to this.
Nothing.
She furrows her brow, peering into my eyes. “What bet, Dalton?”
“Hailey, it-”
“To get in your pants.” Meredith’s words come like a slap.
“Big Ten here managed to win himself a thousand dollars for sleeping with the Coach’s daughter.”
And right there, the light goes out in her eyes. Right there, I literally watch that little flame I’ve seen in her eyes since the second I met her just snuff out. Her face falls, the color draining from it as that look I love turns to ice in front of me.
“Hailey-”
“Get away from me.”
“Damnit, Hailey, that is not what this-”
“Get away!”
“Hailey-”
“Get away from me. Dalton!”
She’s screaming then, the tears starting to roll big and wet down her cheeks as she shoves me back.
“What the fuck is happening over here?”
We both turn to see Roxie storming back over to this scene, her fists balled up.
“Just- can we just go?” Hailey’s yanking open the Subaru door before her friend even answers. “Now? Please?”
Roxie narrows her eyes at me over the roof of the car. “Yeah, get in.” She glares one last dagger look at me before she slides into the car and slams the door as it roars to life.
And then it’s just taillights illuminating the spot where we just stood like some sort of crime scene. The spot where my lips were just on hers, the spot where she was in my arms, and the spot where I left it all on the line.
The place where I said it all.
And then even the red glow fades as the car takes the corner and speeds away into the night.
44
Hailey
“You sure you don’t want me to come in with you?”
I shake my head quietly in the dark of the car. “No, I-” I take a breath. “I’ve got this.”
Roxie nods as I open the car door.
Three minutes later, I suck in a big breath of air before I raise my hand and knock on the door to Dad’s office.
“Come on in.”
He stands from the chair behind his desk when I step in, and I can feel every nerve ending in my body buzzing with the same dread I can feel tugging at my face.
“Dad, I-”
“Hey, are you okay?”
I shake my head. “What? Yeah, Dad I’m fine, but there’s something I need to tell you.”
Slowly, he shakes his head. “You don’t, honey.”
“No, Dad-”
“Because Dalton already did.”
I freeze, feeling the ache in my chest ready to drop through the floor.
“What? No, Dad-” I blink. “Wait, he what?”
It’s a whirl of emotion and confusion, and I stagger a step, feeling like I might fall.
“He told me, Hailey - how he felt about you, I mean. After the game tonight.” He shakes his head. “That kid’s got iron guts, I’ll say that.”
Dalton told my dad he loved me?
“That magazine called, by the way,” Dad says slowly. “Wanted a reaction quote for some tabloid junk story they’re running tomorrow.”
Oh, God.
“Dad, it’s not- I mean-” The room is spinning, and I feel like claws are dragging up my chest to clutch at my throat. I take another staggered step, feeling my legs start to go weak before my dad is suddenly there, wrapping his arms around me.
“Hey, I’ve gotcha, kiddo” he says gently, stroking my back as I squeeze my eyes shut and try to keep the tears from falling onto his shoulder.
He pulls back and smiles at me, that sort of parental smile that soothes like a well-worn blanket on a stormy night. “C’mon,” he jerks his head towards the office door. “Let’s take a walk, honey.”
The field is lit this time. The lights bright and searing past the shadows and the secrets I’ve been carrying, as if proving they can be laid bare.
“Damn boosters can’t make up their fool minds about whether or not to light this place at night,” Dad says with a shrug.
We walk in silence down the sideline of the football field.
“I’d like to consider myself a molder of men, Hails,” Dad says after a minute. He nods slowly, as if considering his words, “I knew who Dalton was when I took this job, or when I got involved with Heather for that matter.”
Dad takes a deep breath. “Look, Dalton Cole is-”
“Dad, I know,” I cringe, feeling that sinking feeling in my chest. “I know what he is.”
He shakes his head. “No, kiddo, that’s not what I was going to say. He’s more than that, I know. Hell, we’re all more than what shit-kicking tabloid papers say we are. This whole team is more than just a win or a loss on a scoreboard or a page, not that the papers want to admit it. I’m more than an “opportunistic high school coach” who proposed to the Dean of this school for a job, believe it or not,” he says with a roll of his eyes.
“And Dalton Cole is more than the caricature they want you to think he is.”
We walk in silence another few yards down the field before Dad stops and blows air out through his lips. “But at the same time, I don’t know how I feel about my daughter with him.” He turns to me, “I never wanted you with a foot
ball guy, kiddo.”
I snort. “Me neither.”
He shakes his head. “I guess you’ve been around it for so long, how could you not? I just never thought you’d go for a guy like that.”
“I mean, Mom did.”
Dad grins, “Yeah, she did.”
“Anyways, it’s- there’s nothing there, Dad. Not anymore.”
He smiles at me, reaching out to stroke my hair like I’m a little kid again. “You sure about that?”
No, and that’s the worst part.
“Some things were said-”
“I heard.” Dad’s voice is suddenly edged. “That reporter gal told me everything, honey.”
I cringe a little as I look away.
“He ever hurt you?”
I shake my head. “No, Dad.”
He sighs again, looking up at the bright stadium lights and running his fingers through his salt and pepper hair.
“Look, boys say some stupid shit in locker rooms, Hails. Hell, look at all the time we spend pretending this game we’re playing is anything more than that, just like little kids.” He looks at me wryly, “I don’t know if this sounds sexist or anything, and maybe I’m just old fashioned, but sometimes it takes a woman to show us how to stop being little boys and be the men we’re capable of being.”
I raise a brow at him. “Like Mom?”
“Just like Mom, kiddo,” he says quietly with a smile. “He’s not a bad guy, Hails; Dalton, I mean. It takes a man to tell me what he told me earlier tonight, you know. It takes a real man to stand up to a girl’s father and tell it straight, I’ll say that much.”
We stop at the far end of the field, and Dad kicks his foot against the base of the goal post. “So you still sure there’s nothing there?”
I shake my head. “There can’t be, Dad.”
“Because you think there can’t be or because people tell you there can’t?”
I roll my eyes. “Dad, it’s scandalous.”
He shrugs. “You know how scandalized Harper, Texas was when the daughter of the richest guy in town fell for the wide receiver from the wrong side of the tracks?” Dad grins and shakes his head. “People get over scandals, honey. Because most of the time, they ain’t nearly as interesting as people think they are.”
“Dad, you and Heather are getting married. I think that makes it more than slightly scandalous.”
“Yeah, that’s true.” He shrugs, “Well, we could call off the wedding.”
“Dad!”
“Kidding,” he says with a wink. “I guess I could legally relinquish parenting rights if that’d help. You’re almost nineteen anyways.”
I make a pout. “You want to not be my dad?”
He laughs and throws an arm over my shoulders. “Honey I’m always gonna be your Dad.”
“So what do we do?”
“What you do when people tell you you’re going to lose or that you can’t win or that the other team is bigger and faster, or that it’s impossible.” He grins as he gives me a look. “You prove them wrong, kiddo.”
I frown and look down, kicking at the turf under my feet.
This is real.
“How?”
“You win.” Dad looks me in the eye, his hand on my shoulder. “I’d like to think I raised you to be a fine young woman, Hails. And if I didn’t trust your intuition, or have faith that you could make good decisions, I’m not sure what kinda father that’d make me.”
He pulls me in for a hug, and I wrap my arms around him.
“Dalton- he’s a project, for sure. But if it’s worth it, it’s worth it.”
“People will talk,” I mumble into his chest.
“Let ‘em,” he shrugs. “People will always talk.” He pulls back to look me in the eye, “Look you’re an adult, kiddo, you don’t need my blessing.” He laughs, “He sure as hell does, but you don’t.”
I laugh as I hug my dad again fiercely.
“But you’ve got it anyways. Both of you do.”
45
Dalton
“Don’t even think about walking out that door until we talk about this, mister.”
Fuck.
I pause, bagel in my mouth and one foot out the patio door off the kitchen. So much for sneaking into the house for a quick breakfast and a getaway.
I turn to the sounds of my mom’s voice, a Hall and Oates record drifting in from the living room.
She’s leaning against the doorway to the kitchen with Coach’s goofy ass cat in her arms. And when she arches a brow at me, it’s almost like furry little Beasley does it at the same damn time.
“I thought that cat didn’t like anyone but Jim.”
Mom shrugs, “Seem’s Mr. Beasley has good taste.”
I grin, “So does Coach, mama.”
She nods and gives a quick smile. “Good one, but it’s not going to get you out of this conversation.”
I drop the grin. “Guess you saw the news, huh? Look, mama, I-”
“Dalton.” Mom stops me with a raised brow and a shake of her head, “I’m your mother, Dalton - I didn’t have to read about that in a silly magazine.”
“You haven’t read it?”
She laughs, “Sweetheart, there are seven-hundred emails in my inbox about it right now. Of course I’ve read it.”
I groan, hanging my head and wishing with everything to be literally anywhere else having literally any other conversation in the world. Because twenty-four hours after losing the girl and having the collective shit hit the fan, talking about it is basically the last thing I want to do.
“But Dalton, I could see that coming a mile away.”
I jerk my head up. “What?” I frown, shaking my head. “Jesus, how?”
“Because you’re your father’s son, that’s how. He was a wild man for a while there himself you know.”
I grin. “Oh, is that what I am? A wild man?”
“Dalton, what on Earth should I call you with all the shenanigans you’ve pulled over the last year?”
“Fair point,” I mumble. Beasley yowls at me, and I glare back at him.
“Growing up is hard, sweetie, I get that,” Mom says quietly, stroking the Maine Coon in her arms.
“So that’s my similarity with Dad? Being a wild man?”
Mom shakes her head and smiles, “Oh no, honey.”
“Well why else am I like him then?”
“Because it took a girl with a backbone to show him how to be a person of substance.”
I raise a brow. “I’m guessing that’s you in this story?”
“Lucky guess.” Mom sighs, “Hailey’s a strong girl, Dalton. Strong enough to stand up to you and that chip you carry around on your shoulder. You’d do well to hang onto that.”
“Her or the chip?”
Mom gives me a look and I shrug.
“Yeah, well, too late,” I say darkly, scowling at a blank spot on the floor between us.
“What does that mean?”
“Exactly what I said. It’s too late.” I tighten my jaw as I look up at her. “I screwed up, Mom, I lost her.”
“Well that doesn’t sound like the Dalton I know.” She steps towards me and puts her hand on my cheek. “The Dalton Cole who’s my son and who I am fiercely proud of, doesn’t lose. He might get knocked down, but he learns. And if there’s one thing I know about him…” She looks me in the eye and smiles.
“He sure as hell doesn’t quit.”
The Hall and Oates record goes quiet, and the kitchen falls silent except for Beasley, who yowls again and paws at my chest.
Mom smiles as she looks down at the fat cat in her arms. “You know I think Beasley here is becoming a bit of a family man.”
“Coach got a good one, Mom.”
She shrugs. “Oh, I know.”
I crack up as I give her a hug, pecking her on the cheek. “Gotta get to class.”
She nods, and I grab my bag and head for the door before I pause with my hand on the doorknob.
“Hey, Mom?”
“Thanks.”
She nods. “No matter what happens, you’re my son Dalton, and I believe in you. Don’t ever forget that.”
46
Hailey
“So…we gonna talk about that whole thing?”
I drop the book to my lap and raise a brow at Roxie, lounging across my dorm room couch by the window.
“About what?”
Roxie rolls her eyes. “Oh, I don’t know, I was thinking maybe about you swapping between dead silence or hysterical crying for the entire three hour drive back to school the other night?”
I stare down into my textbook, avoiding her look.
“He’s not going to disappear if you keep reading that thing you know,” Roxie says, nodding at the science book in my hand. “Oh, and spoiler alert, the ending is boring.”
I raise a brow at her. “Since when do art history majors read books about photo-plankton cell structures?”
“Oh, we definitely don’t but it’s a fucking book about photo-whatever cell structures, dude. I guarantee the ending is boring.”
I grin and roll my eyes at her.
“And anyways, you’re avoiding the subject at hand here.”
“I am not,” I pout into my book.
Roxie snorts. “Oh yeah? Talked to him since that night?”
I’ve barely showed my face since that night. I’ve been to class exactly once since that night, and I could hardly get across campus without being assaulted by half the student body and about twenty different media outlets. Heather ended up granting me a sick leave to do homework from my room for the week while my professors emailed class notes.
Heather - by the way - who didn’t judge, or give me any looks, or even get angry when I walked into her house with my dad that night after our talk on the field. Heather who instead just threw her arms around me and held me tight and only said “I’m so sorry, honey.”
“No, I haven’t talked to him.”
“You should.”
I groan. “No, I shouldn’t.”
“God you’re stubborn.”
She grins as I make a face at her.