by Shandi Boyes
“I’ll give it a shot, but I don’t see it doing any good. He’s more likely to open up to you than he is me.”
Coach pulls a face like he doesn’t believe me, but he keeps his thoughts to himself while guiding me out of his office. “He’s in the conference room. Down the hall and on the right, then follow the scent of bagels. You can’t miss it.”
He crashes into me when I stop walking. “You want me to talk to him now?” I ask through the lump in my throat. When he nods, I choke on my spit. “But it’s game night. You have very strict rules on game night.”
I’m not lying. If I so much as breathe on the players, Coach breathes fire down my neck. He wants the team to enter the field with nothing but the game on their minds. That’s why he makes them hand in their cells at the start of every game. For the two hours before kick-off, he has a zero disturbance statute. If I wasn’t interning as a sport therapist, I wouldn’t be allowed within six hundred feet of the locker rooms.
“I need Elvis’s head screwed on right for tonight’s game. If you do that, I’ll get those tickets for your friend.”
My jaw drops as my heart rate climbs. I asked Coach James last week if he could put me in contact with someone who could grant Skylar cheaper tickets to any 69er home games. Her birthday is coming up, and I want to get her something I know she’ll love. He was apprehensive until I showed him the sneaky picture I took while Skylar wasn’t watching. She was dressed head to toe in 69er gear, and it had her specially-made bedspread in the background of the photo.
“I’ll give it my best shot.”
I glide down the corridor with more spirited steps than only minutes ago. I’ve never been in the “business” part of the stadium, but with my intuition about Elvis guiding me, I soon find him. It’s just not how I hoped. He’s in a storage closet at the side of a conference room. With all the equipment moved out, it looks more like a walk-in closet than a room housing the mugs and glasses board members use on a regular basis.
Unfortunately, he’s not alone. Lillian is standing next to him. She’s leaning intimately close to his shirtless torso, and her index finger is tracing one of the veins in his thick bicep. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but Lillian’s smile reveals everything in sickening detail. She’s in her element. . . and I’m swimming way outside of my depth.
Not willing to watch the nauseating event for a second longer, I pivot on my heels, preparing to race back down the hallway. Like things could get any more awkward, I crash chest-first into a cooler.
While clutching my bruised boob in my hand, I raise my eyes, confused as to why there’s a cooler in the middle of a walkway. My stomach swirls when I’m awarded the same seedy grin Skylar and I witnessed a group of cheerleaders getting last month. It’s Seedy-McWeedy, the drink vendor who cools more than cans of soft drink in his cooler.
“Excuse me.” I push him out of my way, my eagerness to leave spurred on by a deep voice calling my name. I know who the voice belongs to. I’ve heard it shout, chuckle, and moan my name multiple times the past three months, so you can sure as hell be guaranteed I know what it sounds like when it’s full of deceit.
“Willow, wait up!”
Just before I break through the door separating the underbelly of the stadium from its fancier counterpart, I sling my head back. Elvis is following me as suspected. His usually fast pace is slowed by him yanking a shirt over his naked, sweat-slicked torso and buttoning his pants.
When I enter the locker room, things go from bad to worse. Elvis’s teammates have covered his locker with high-resolution photos. That’s nothing out of the ordinary. Whether it is birthday week or a bad photo shared by a fan, if it is embarrassing, it’s displayed. This is both embarrassing and devastating. They’re photos of Elvis and Lillian—intimate photos. Neither of them appear to be wearing any clothes.
The players’ boisterous laughter dulls to barely a hum when Elvis storms to his locker to rip down the photos. His movements are so aggressive, the vein Lillian was toying with earlier protrudes as far as his nostrils. “This isn’t fuckin’ funny.”
After pointing his finger to the aggressors, he dumps the now ruined collage into the nearest waste bin before spanning the distance between us. Although his broody, temper-filled frame sends excitement sparking down my spine, I flee as quickly as his teammates pretended to act busy when subjected to his wrath.
I make it all the way to my cubicle before a blistering hunk of fury catches up with me. Elvis pins my arms behind my back with one of his hands before using his other to raise my weighted head. He peers down at me, the baby oil slicking his skin more concerning than soothing.
“It’s not what you think.”
My eyes roll skyward, and for the first time in my life, they make it all the way around without twitching. “Geez, could you be any more original?” My voice is as vile as the vomit creeping up my esophagus.
Elvis is about to respond when a deep rumbling rolls into the room. “Two hours until kickoff; let’s get this room on lockdown.”
Coach James claps two times, sending the usually quiet room into a hive of activity. The only player ignoring his demand is Elvis. He continues staring down at me, his concentration only breaking when Coach James taps him on the shoulder. “Room is on lockdown; you can finish this later.”
Coach James gives me a look, one that reveals he’s panicked that my attempt to talk Elvis from the ledge has instead inched him closer to it. Refusing to accept the shit shovel he’s handing me, I return his glare. I’m not the one in the wrong here. If anyone needs help digging themselves out from the stench, it’s Elvis, not me.
My eyes shift back to Elvis when he says, “I’ll be a minute.”
His remorse-filled eyes stop bouncing between mine when Coach replies, “No, Carlton, now or find your ass warming the bench during playoffs.”
I take his threat as idle, but Elvis doesn’t. He frees my hands from his tight grip before taking a step back. He’s barely lodged an inch of air between us when Coach James fills the gap by thrusting the bucket he stores the players’ phones in at the start of communication lockdown. I forget every silent plea Elvis’s eyes gave me the past five minutes when he removes his cell from his pocket to place it in the box. The screen is clear, meaning not only did he see the dozens of text messages I sent him, he also ignored them.
“We’ll talk about this after the game.”
Stealing my chance to tell him to break a leg—figuratively—he runs his index finger down my flaming-with-anger cheek before stalking back to his locker. His steps are as heavy as mine when I was ordered into Coach James’s office, but they have nothing on the weight that hits my chest when Coach James requests I stay in my cubicle until after the game.
He’d never say it, but supposedly I’m no longer Elvis’s good luck charm.
I can’t help but wonder who stole my title.
“UGH! COME ON, E!” I rake my fingers through my hair when Elvis foils his third play of this quarter. He’s playing like shit, and that’s putting it nicely.
With how worked up I was, I hadn’t planned on watching the game. I only switched on the TV in the locker room when the roars coming from the crowd vibrated under my feet. I’ve never heard them so frustrated before. Now I understand their pain. The plays the team is running are complex, but their opponents are responding to them as if they’re child’s play. They seem to know Elvis’s game plan before he’s even decided which play he’s pursuing.
When Elvis’s throw is intercepted by the opposition, I switch off the TV. I’d rather not know what’s happening than see the onslaught firsthand.
I’VE BARELY RESTACKED my supplies cupboard when a flurry of noise bursts into the locker room. My eyes drop to my watch. There are still eleven minutes left in the third quarter, so it can’t be the players making a ruckus. But if it isn’t them, who is it?
My curiosity is satisfied when a blast of air hits my face. Three big burly men throw open my door with so much force, it near
ly comes off the hinges. I leap to my feet when the urgency of their visit breaks through the fog in my head. They’re carting Elvis on a stretcher. His face shows an immense amount of pain.
“What happened?”
While lifting his stretcher onto my massage table, a range of answers are flung at me. From what I can gather between breaths, he was illegally tackled midair, went down and never got back up.
“The team’s doc is on his way. He went in the ambulance with Terrence when he got a concussion.” This comes from head assistant coach, Mick Salter. “We were going to keep Carlton field-side, but he insisted we bring him here. Can you watch him until Doc arrives? We’re getting slaughtered out there.”
I’m shaking my head, but Coach Salter doesn’t notice. He just gestures for the men who brought Elvis in to exit before locking me in a room with a man grunting more in frustration than pain.
“Willow?” Elvis’s one word takes him almost ten seconds to articulate.
After breathing out my nerves, I spin around to face him. “Yeah?”
Holding his left shoulder in his arm, he shuffles to a half-seated position. “I’ve popped my shoulder out.”
“No shit, Sherlock.” I’m surprised I can talk with how much I’m cringing. The low hang of his shoulder makes horrid memories race to the forefront of my mind.
My eyes snap to Elvis’s when he says, “I need you to pop it back in.”
“Nooooo.” I shake my head while drawling out my short reply as if it is an entire sentence.
He jumps off the massage table to pace closer to me, the plea in his eyes doubling with each step he takes. “Please. It’s only a partial dislocation, but if you don’t put it back in its place, it will keep hurting like a bitch.”
“The doctor is only a few minutes away—”
“I don’t have a few minutes. Please, Willow. You’re trained to do this. You can ease my pain.”
I’m about to say no again when he adds a final “please” to his reply. He truly needs my help, and he’s right, I am trained to handle dislocations, not just from my studies, but in my private life as well. My knee has popped out a handful of times the past two years. It’s why I was apprehensive about returning to dance. I nearly vomit when my knee cap dislocates. Aside from losing my parents, it’s the worst pain I’ve ever experienced.
With that in mind, I instruct, “Remove your jersey and lie down on the table, face first.”
Relief crosses Elvis’s features before apprehension overtakes them. Since he’s holding his arm into his shoulder socket, he has no way to remove his shirt.
I guess that leaves the task up to me?
“Sorry,” I murmur when my endeavor to remove his shirt causes him more pain.
After standing on a chair so our difference in height doesn’t hinder my ability to undress him, I dump his muddy jersey on the ground then warm up my cold hands by rubbing them together.
Air hisses between his lips when I press around the area that is swollen and red. “I need to check the possibility of muscle damage before I can guide it back in. More times than not, popping a shoulder back in can make matters worse.”
He doesn’t reply, and I don’t mind the silence. Furthermore, I’m comfortable with my assessment. His shoulder has popped out of its socket, but only barely.
“I’ll need to apply pressure to your arm to see if we can slip it back into place.” I lower myself onto my knees before flattening my back on the carpet beneath Elvis’s dangling arm. Because we have such contrasting heights, I have no choice but to use this method. “Tell me if it hurts too much.”
I wait for him to grunt in agreement before circling one of my hands around his elbow then clamping his wrist with the other. When I pull down, the groan that tears from his throat fills my eyes with tears. I know I’m hurting him, but with this being the lesser of two evils, I don’t have much choice.
“Keep going,” he pleads when I back off. “I can feel it sliding back into place. You just need to pull a little harder.”
I’d laugh at the double-meaning of his words if they weren’t laced in pain.
“We’re supposed to slowly guide the ball back into your shoulder, not ram it in there.” I’m grunting, the strain I’m placing on his arm felt by both of us.
I stop weighing down his arm when a familiar pop sounds through my ears, closely followed by Elvis’s relieved sigh. When he moves to a half-seated position, I shout, “Wait! I need to make sure everything is in the correct position before you can move.”
“It’s good. It’s fine. I’m good.”
When he heads for the door, I clamber to my feet. I barely beat him to the exit a mere second before he charges through it. “Where are you going? Your arm needs to be placed in a sling.”
“No, it doesn’t.” His wild eyes bounce between mine, his chest movements frantic. “It’s fine. Look.” He rotates his shoulder, his expression blank. I would have believed he wasn’t in any pain if his eyes didn’t flare with every rotation.
“You need an ice compress, a sling, and a full work-up by a proper doctor. You’re not going back onto the field tonight, E, and perhaps not for the rest of the season.”
My strides to the ice bin halt when he growls, “Give me a shot of Toradol, and I’ll be good to play.”
“You can’t play! You’re injured!” I pivot to face him, my twirl slow since I can feel the anger radiating out of him. Fury is rising from my gut as well. The images of him and Lillian broadcasting through my head on repeat are too frustrating to stay on the back burner where I placed them when he was injured. “I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you dislocated your shoulder. That’s an instant sideline for six to eight weeks.”
Devastation fills his eyes as he steps closer to me. “It’s playoff month. I can’t be sidelined for six weeks. Just give me a shot of Toradol and keep your mouth shut. That’s all you need to do.”
“You want me to lie? To say we didn’t just pop your shoulder back in?!” I thrust my hand to the massage table holding his dirty jersey. It trembles as badly as Elvis’s thighs did when I showed him my trick to minimize back pain. “I can’t do that. It’s morally and ethically wrong. Besides, it’s just a game, I’m sure your team will survive without you for a few weeks.”
“This isn’t just a game! It’s my fucking life! Everything I’ve been working my ass off for the past year is out there, waiting for me, but you’re standing in my way! This isn’t a stupid dance recital, Willow. It’s my fucking career! It means more to me than anything.”
I take a step back, physically stunted by his words, but before I can fire off a rebuttal, the ruckus I expected earlier breaks the silence between us. Players pour into the room Elvis is blocking from my view with his brooding frame, their mood hanging as low as my heart rate.
“Hey, what's the deal? One minute I see you charging down the sideline; next minute, you’re being carted off the field on a stretcher.” Elvis acts like Foster’s tap on his shoulder isn’t hurting him. “Don’t worry, man, you’re not the only one wanting to hide your face in shame. We’re getting slaughtered tonight. I’m glad you’re up and moving, or we’d have no chance of a comeback.”
Elvis raises his brow, silently demanding I remain quiet. He shouldn’t waste his precious time. I’m too stunned by his scorn to say anything.
“What was it? A cramp?” Foster slips through the thin gap between Elvis and the doorframe so he can see his face. “You should eat more bananas. They’re full of potassium.”
Staring right at me, Elvis lies, “Yeah, it was a cramp. I’ll be sure to take your advice on the bananas.”
Happy he’s helped his fellow teammate, Foster backhands Elvis’s chest before returning to the locker room. “Elvis is alive and ready to rock this place! Now the rest of you fuckers need to get your heads in the game! We can win this; we’ve just got to fight for it.”
His excited cheer inspires a joint one from the players surrounding him. It also doubles the grit in
Elvis’s eyes. They’re no longer brimming with pleas. They’re arrogant and cocky, as confident I won’t rat him out as he is about winning tonight’s game. That’s all that matters to him, right? The game. Not me. Not my dancing. Just the game.
“Is it true? Was it just a cramp?”
In his excitement, Coach Salter yanks Elvis back far enough to help me hatch my escape plan. After snagging my bag from my desk and my cell from the top drawer, I hightail it out of the room. I make it three steps out of my cubicle when a hand clutches my elbow, stopping my hasty retreat. I pray it is Elvis, but there’s no zap shooting up my arm, crushing my dream as quickly as it surfaced.
I bite the inside of my cheek, warning my eyes to hold in their tears before slinging them to the person accosting me. Coach James’s hold isn’t firm, but the concern in his eyes is.
His lips twitch as he prepares to speak, but I beat him to the task. “I’m done.”
“For today?”
He doesn’t need me to spell it out for him, but I do. With a shake of my head, I murmur, “No. I’m done for good.”
Ignoring his quick intake of air, I charge down the corridor, not the least bit concerned when my tornado-like speed has me careening past a grinning Lillian.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Presley
F ans huddled around the entrance of the stadium clear a path for me when I kick a waste receptacle in anger. Tonight was my worst game on record. The difference in the figures on the scoreboard leaves no doubt of this. The pain zooming through my shoulder isn’t to blame either. I fucked up long before Willow popped it back into place.
My head hasn’t been in any game the past forty-eight hours, much less the one I just played. Lillian’s return to my life has been as toxic as always. Just being around her reminds me of why I drank so much when we were together. She does my head in, but instead of putting her in her place as Willow suggested, I have to cozy up with her to film infomercials.