I smash a dollop of paint onto the tree and realize I am not doing great from the start. I brush the paint in both directions and I feel a sudden responsibility not to let an entire group of thespians down.
I hate Coach in this moment.
What kind of skills did he see in me that would qualify me for this kind of job?
“This is harder than it looks,” I make a joke to Melissa, trying to let myself off the hook if this turns out horribly.
Melissa, who is doing an excellent job with the blue-black night sky, shoots me a concerned look. “Are you up for this? I can put you somewhere else.”
Wow, this girl is intense.
She obviously gets that quality from her dad.
“No, I was kidding. Sorry,” I tell her looking back at my section of the backdrop.
Melissa takes a deep breath and says, “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be so high-strung. I don’t know if my dad told you but I was kind of saddled with all this responsibility and I am a little overwhelmed. So… thank you for being here. Really.”
Something inside of me melts.
It’s the way that she is looking at me that does it.
I know she doesn’t mean anything by it, but she is gazing up at me from underneath a fan of eyelashes and it is making me feel some kind of way.
I am not a ladies’ man by any means.
I can be shy and a little awkward around girls, so I try to avoid them altogether. I know. I’m a football player. I should be better at this, but I’m not. And my friends gave me crap for it in high school while they dated the cheerleaders and the dance team.
But I just didn’t know what I was doing.
Sitting here with Melissa, though, I get it.
I may not be winning her over with words, but I like being around her. And I like how she makes me feel. This may not be the worst punishment after all.
“You’re welcome,” I tell her. “I’m just happy to be useful.”
Melissa, returning to painting, asks, “Yeah, Dad mentioned you were hurt. What happened?”
I realize that she probably doesn’t go to football games. If she did, she would remember my injury. It was pretty publicized.
“I tore my ACL in the first game. My first game ever, actually. It really sucked. I had surgery a couple of weeks ago, but I’m out for the season,” I tell her.
She turns back to me. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I would do if I couldn’t act.”
“Yeah, I feel like I’m missing a part of my body without a football in my hand,” I admit. “I can’t wait for next year.”
“Well your loss is kind of my gain,” she says, shrugging. “Who knows? Maybe you will love the theater so much that you try out for our spring musical.”
She laughs before I do.
But I definitely laugh at the idea of me belting out a song on a stage.
Never going to happen.
“I highly doubt that,” I say. “You don’t want to hear me sing.”
She laughs again.
Melissa has a pretty laugh, if that makes sense. It’s this soft kind of laugh that makes you want to lean in to hear more. And I think…. I may be having fun?