by Claire Adams
I pouted. Jess had a natural talent for math—how, I had never been able to understand. It wasn’t that I thought she was stupid; in order to manage good grades with all of her partying, she had to be smart, but I wouldn’t have thought that math, of all subjects, would be her strong suit. She was planning to major in Physics and become either an engineer or a theorist.
“Fine. I will go with you, if you’ll help me ace the Stats midterm.” If I got an A on the midterm, I could almost—not quite, but almost—coast until it came time for finals without having to worry too much about my grades.
“Good girl! Okay, get dressed in something comfortable but cute; you never know who you’ll run into at a game.”
Jess ran off to her room to get ready, and I rummaged through my closet. Comfortable but cute. I frowned at my choices and finally settled on a skirt that came to my mid-thigh and a light sweater in the school colors. I pulled my hair back into a pony tail and changed clothes, putting a little bit of makeup on my face before Jess called to me from the common area of the dorm. “Aren’t you ready yet?”
“Coming!” I shouted back, feeling irritated already.
We walked out to Jess’s car in the student lot next to the dorms; by the time we got to the car, two other girls were waiting for us. My irritation increased. Why did Jess need me to go with her if she had two other friends already going? Admittedly, I didn’t have anything special planned for that night—I was going to hit the dining hall for some take-away dinner, and maybe stream a few episodes of Bones—but the fact that Jess had gotten me to go along with her on a lie bothered me.
Fortunately, since I was her roommate, Jess decreed that I had infinite call on shotgun; the other girls piled into the back seat and we made our way to the game, blasting Beyoncé and Lorde all the way out to the stadium. The campus was huge—almost a town in itself—so with all the people headed to the game, it was slow enough to enjoy the ride. I started to relax; I had watched enough high school games as Zack’s girlfriend to know what was going on around me, and I had heard that we had a decent marching band. It could actually be an interesting evening out. It still bothered me that Jess had convinced me to come even though she didn’t really need my company, but I told myself that it was something at least that she wanted my company with her, even with the other girls she’d invited. It wouldn’t be too bad, all in all, I told myself as we pulled into the parking lot outside of the stadium.
Jess had managed to score surprisingly good tickets, and the four of us found our seats down on the lowest level of the stands, close to the band but with a good view of the game itself, too. The stadium was packed—both the rival school and our own college were out in force. The other team wasn’t from that far away—maybe a few hours—and the game was starting early in the evening, so most of the people from the other school would have plenty of time to get home. Against my better judgment, I looked around on the bench in the sidelines and spotted Zack. He looked good in full gear; but then, he had looked good in his gear in high school, too. It shouldn’t surprise me that he still looked great. I turned my attention to the band, to anything but the guy I had dated in high school, while we waited for the game to get started.
Jess was chatting up everyone around us, especially the guys; the band was playing a set of golden oldies hits, something for the alumni in the crowd to appreciate. I had grown up on the music—my mom had loved the Beatles and Motown—so I sang along under my breath, trying not to laugh at the way Jess was obviously flirting with one of the guys seated near us. Her other friends were chatting people up too, and for a moment I felt like, in spite of the fact that I didn’t really want to, I should be following their lead.
The game started and Jess at least had to pretend to be interested in it. I knew our team was decent, but as I watched, I started to actually get invested in us; I was swept up in the energy of the crowd. Near the end of the first quarter, I heard myself groan along with everyone else at the sight of the harsh tackle our QB took—and then everyone went quiet as he failed to get up right away. We all waited to see what had happened, and I felt my heart pounding. Football was a brutal sport; even in high school, with more safeguards in place than professional ball, I’d known several guys on the JV and Varsity teams alike who went out for a few games at a time due to injuries. Finally the QB got to his feet and limped off of the field, helped by one of the coaches. There was no penalty—technically the tackle had been fully legal—but it was clear from the way the quarterback was limping that he was out of the game. My heart skipped a beat as Zack walked up to the coach, nodding a few times before he put on his helmet and charged out onto the field.
“Man, that’s some bad luck,” the guy Jess was talking to said, shaking his head. “They better rally fast.”
I looked over, wondering at the comment. Jess caught me looking and shrugged.
“We have the best quarterback in the nation,” she explained to me. She turned to the guy she’d been flirting with. “It is going to be a tough climb—we’re still a few games away. We have to win this game and the next one to get to the playoffs, and that didn’t look like a minor injury.”
I nodded; I had heard that we had a great team—and that the starting QB had held the title of number one in the nation the previous two years. It was bad luck for him that he’d fallen the wrong way.
Zack huddled and the rest of the team and the crowd—me included—watched with bated breath. What was he going to do? Would he be able to take over from Saunders? I knew that Zack was a good QB; he had gotten into the school on a scholarship, and though he wasn’t a top-line pick, he was at the top of the second tier of recruits that the colleges had all looked at. It was just his bad luck that the starting QB was too valuable to sit out many games. But I knew that Zack was feeling the pressure. For a moment, I felt sympathetic towards him.
But from the first play after Zack took over—a long pass that he handled like a pro—it was clear that Zack would be just fine. He played every bit as well as the original quarterback, and I was cheering as loud, or maybe even louder, than the people around me as he went through play after play. In high school Zack had been more of a passing QB; he had a great arm, and could throw not only far but accurately. It looked like he had improved his running game since I’d last seen him on the field. I could barely pay attention to the half time show, thinking about Zack in the locker room, how psyched he must have been for the chance to prove himself. He hit the field just as hard in the second half, and I cheered as wildly as before. I had no reason to be personally gratified by the fact that Zack was doing so well, but a little part of me was warmed by the fact that the guy I had dated in high school was kicking ass on the field.
In the end, we won by a wide margin, and I almost had to sit down as everyone started to straggle and file out of the stadium seats. It had been such an exciting game, my heart had been pounding and I had cheered until I was nearly hoarse. I told Jess that I needed to use the restroom, and that I’d meet her at the gate; she nodded, barely hearing me. I went to the restroom, shaking my head at my roommate. I was glad, deep down, that she had convinced me to come to the game. I wasn’t a huge football fan, but it had been fun, and it may have been one of only a few opportunities I would have gotten to see Zack playing as a college QB; I had no doubt that the coaches and staff would work hard to get the starting QB back on the field as quickly as possible. I washed my hands and smoothed my hair before I left the restroom, making a beeline for the gate where we’d come in.
Jess wasn’t there, and neither were the other two girls who had come with us. I stood and waited; Jess was probably flirting with that guy and she’d be out soon enough once she’d made a date with him. There were some already-drunk students straggling out of the stadium, headed to parties around the campus, I was sure—probably at least one on frat row. It wasn’t that late, but I wanted nothing more than to go back to the dorms and get a shower, maybe catch an episode of one of my favorite shows on TV, and go to bed
. I was tired.
While I waited for Jess to show up, the team started to come out of the stadium one by one or in pairs. They paid me no mind, talking amongst themselves and heading to the frats or their own parties. After winning such a big game, they’d all be partying it up, and I couldn’t really blame them. I called out “Good game!” to a few people, just to not look like too much of an idiot.
Zack came out of the stadium and started to walk past me, headed to the parking lot; I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to call any attention to myself, in spite of the warm fuzzy feeling I had from his success. But just like before, it didn’t matter; Zack spotted me and stopped in his tracks, smiling slowly. “I didn’t know you came to any of our games,” he said, grinning more broadly.
“First game I’ve been to,” I said, shrugging. “Jess made me come out and just my luck—you get to show off for me.” My heart was beating faster.
“Are you waiting for a ride, then?”
I shrugged. I wondered what was taking Jess so long. Normally when she flirted with a guy like the one in the stadium, she made a quick date and then was on her way. I wondered if she was making out with him in the nearly-empty seats.
“Kind of,” I said with a little smile. While it had given me a warm, fuzzy feeling to see Zack doing well, I was still uncomfortable around him.
Before I could make an excuse to go after her, or something that would help me get away from Zack, Jess came strutting out of the stadium with the guy she’d been talking to all night. Neither of the other two girls was around, and I wondered just what had happened to them.
“There you are, Evie!” The guy’s arm was around her waist. “Derek has this great party he wants to take me to. Can you grab a ride home? Unless you want to come with us.”
I considered going with them, but it was easy to see that it would be a party where I knew no one; Jess would go off with Derek somewhere and I’d be the sad sack in a corner nursing crappy beer and waiting for the chance to go home. Zack was still right there next to me.
“I can get you home,” he said cheerfully. Jess glanced from Zack to me and she grinned.
“A ride home from the winning QB? I’m a little jelly,” she quipped.
I bit back a retort; the last thing I wanted—or so I thought—was a lot of time alone with Zack. But for the moment, at least, it seemed like that would be a slightly better option than a strange party by myself waiting for Jess to finish hooking up with a new guy.
“Have a good time,” I said to Jess. She walked away quickly with the guy she’d taken up with for the night, headed to the parking lot and off to a party. I looked at Zack. “So, where are you parked?” Zack smiled slowly—a rueful, slightly guilty-looking smile.
“It’s… actually back at the frat,” he said.
I sighed. “Seriously? You offer a ride when your car isn’t even here?”
“Would you have hung around if I’d said my car was back at the frat?” I shook my head. “Besides, it’s not as far away as the dorms are. It’s only ten blocks.”
I looked down at my shoes. They were comfortable at least—much more so than the heels I had worn to the party the other night. I sighed. Ten blocks to the frat. It could be worse, but not much. I looked up at the sky and told myself that at least it wasn’t about to rain.
We walked back to the frat house together, and my irritation started to fade as Zack jollied me along. He hadn’t wanted to take his car to the stadium; it wasn’t that long of a walk, as he pointed out, and parking was always a nightmare. I could see his point. He was used to running several miles regularly as part of his practice and training; ten blocks was nothing to him. It was a little more than nothing to me, and by the time we arrived at the frat house, I was ready to take a break and sit down for a little bit.
It shocked me to see the house totally empty. “Everyone’s out at parties,” Zack explained. “Our sister sorority is throwing a victory party—if we’d lost, they’d have changed it to a condolence party.”
He grinned at me as he led me through the door. Without droves of people in the place it was easier to see that at one point it had been a really impressive house—huge, with wood floors and strong walls. There were scuffs and the monkey-house smell of a bunch of guys all living in one place, some of whom didn’t take as much trouble to stay clean as they should, but it wasn’t positively gross.
“I’m kind of surprised this place isn’t dirtier,” I said, sitting down tentatively on one of the couches in the main common area.
Zack laughed. “We make all the pledges keep everything tidy. It’s part of their job as the newest members; instills a sense of pride in the frat.”
I chuckled. “That’ll do it, I guess.”
Zack grinned. “Yeah, some of the guys get a little too into it; one of them cleans the baseboards with his toothbrush.” I shook my head at that. “Hey, hang out here for a second; I need to find my keys.”
I shrugged. It wasn’t exactly spick-and-span in the common area, but I had come to the conclusion that I wouldn’t contract an STD from the leather couch, and I was happy enough to stay seated for a few more minutes.
“I’ll be here.”
Zack went off to his room and I looked around. The frat house was enormous, and it was almost a little creepy to be in it while it was so empty. I had managed to avoid all of the frats and sororities since I’d started the semester, at least until the party that Jess had dragged me to. If I hadn’t known that this was the ‘bad boy’ frat on campus, I wouldn’t have been able to tell it from what good shape the whole place was in. It had the guy-reek, but the floors were clean and free of vomit, and the furniture was in good shape. I didn’t want to necessarily think of what all had gone on in the common area over the years, and I was sure that if I took out a black light, there would be more stuff on the walls than I would be comfortable knowing about, but for the moment it was decent.
Zack appeared once more a few moments after he had left, jiggling his keys to show he’d found them. He leaped over the back of the couch and came down next to me grinning.
“Why didn’t you join any sororities when you started?” he asked me curiously. “I mean, I know you’ve got your grades and all that, but the sororities are good for connections—good for networking.”
“It just didn’t really seem like my scene—throwing parties and stuff like that.”
I knew for a fact that some of the sorority sisters were pretty smart; that their giggling, wet t-shirt antics were only a counterpoint to sharp minds. But I couldn’t see myself fawning over some guy in a toga, or spending my time in a house with dozens of other girls. It was more than enough to hang out with Jess and hear about her conquests. Zack leaned against me slightly.
“Hey, I remember you gave great shoulder rubs back when we were in high school,” he said, giving me a suggestive look. I rolled my eyes. “No really, you were great at it—better than the physical therapists here. Can I get one from you now?”
I sighed. I shouldn’t—it was stupid—but I couldn’t completely deny him, not after he had won the game and not when he was going to drive me home.
“Turn around,” I said, stretching my hands and warming them up.
Zack turned his back to me and I reached up, running my fingers along the velvet-soft skin of his neck. He was a little sunburned in the gap between the helmet and his pads and jersey, the skin darker there than it was anywhere else. I started kneading away at the knots of tension I found along the back of his neck, working my way down to his shoulders. Up close, I could tell that Zack had managed to find time for a good shower after the game, before he’d shown up at the gate where I was waiting for Jess; he smelled clean and fresh and he still wore the same cologne he had when we were in high school together. I smiled to myself at that fact, shaking my head where he couldn’t see, paying attention to giving him a good, thorough shoulder rub. I worked my way down along his upper arms and then back up, knowing where the muscles would be the tightest
from playing.
Zack groaned in pleasure, rolling his head around and turning into my touches, and I felt myself tingling all over. I smiled to myself again, my heart starting to beat a little faster. I shook my head at myself. I was being ridiculous. It didn’t mean anything to Zack; I was just convenient. He wanted a shoulder rub, and I was there and capable. Zack leaned back against me and my hands came to a stop, resting on his shoulders instead of kneading them.
“It’s just like back in the day,” Zack said, turning around and looking at me. “It’s like when I’d have a game in high school, and we’d hang out afterwards before the parties.”
I smiled. “Yeah, it is kind of like that. Down to the shoulder rub.”
Zack raised an eyebrow. “We’d fool around, too,” he pointed out, his hands going to my waist.
I thought about it for a second; he was right—normally as soon as he was out of the locker room, we’d make out, sometimes not even waiting until we left campus to do it. Zack had taken me under the bleachers more than once to fool around when we’d been together, and I’d tingled just like I was tingling now. When we started having sex, it wasn’t that exciting, but the making out had been thrilling.
“We shouldn’t,” I said, pulling back slightly.
Zack shrugged, pulling back a little bit as well. “You used to be a lot of fun, you know,” he said with a little grin. “I think you could be fun right now if you’d let go a little bit.”
I rolled my eyes. “You were a bad influence. You were the person who gave me my first drink.”
Zack laughed. “I was, wasn’t I? What was it—your parents’ New Years’ party, right?” I nodded, unable to keep myself from smiling a little bit.
“Yes and my parents gave me so much shit over how hungover I was the next day.”
“Yeah, well, I did tell you to hold off on that third drink.”
I pinned him down with a stare. “You poured it for me,” I pointed out.