“It was a close game—“
That was an understatement. We barely managed to squeak by with a win.
“—but we did it, ladies. Don’t take this for granted—“
Standing together, sweaty and worn out, I bumped arms with Genevieve, a younger player standing next to me, who’d scored the winning goal in the last five minutes of the game. She shot me a huge excited smile that I returned wholeheartedly.
A heavy damp arm wrapped around my neck, in what would have been considered a chokehold, if it had been anyone other than Harlow. It was just the way she hugged me. Her mouth pressed up against my temple, as she spoke low and excited. “We fucking did it, Sally.”
I wrapped my own arm around the middle of her back and squeezed tight, nodding up at her with a grin on my face. “Of course we did,” I whispered back, excitement still thrumming through my veins.
Gardner continued his spiel about setting a standard for the rest of the season and bringing up a few things we needed to work on. Finally after a few minutes, he held up his hand for all of us to try and reach for, and he said, “I’m going out tonight. Who’s coming?”
I wasn’t. My family was in town, and I usually celebrated with them and the rest of the gang. I’d just finished burning hundreds and hundreds of calories playing the entire game; I could fit in a reasonable Mexican meal with a gallon of water all to myself. Jenny was coming with us, like she usually did, on season openers.
A few staff members cheered and claimed that they’d go out with him.
I finished changing in the locker room and met up with Jenny outside, so that we could go find my family. Gardner and his small group were ahead of us, making their way out to the parking lot too. I couldn’t help but notice that Kulti wasn’t with them.
As we crossed the double doors, I spotted a black Audi idling by the curb.
Then I spotted the crowd of people wearing various versions of Reiner Kulti uniforms, close by it. I watched as long as I could, curious to see whether the German would make his way out or not. By the time I got in my car and pulled out of the spot, nothing had changed. I’d spotted Gardner’s truck zipping out of the lot ahead of me.
But still, the black Audi hadn’t moved and neither had the people hovering by it.
Afew dayslater I heard, “Twenty-three!” and wanted to bang my head on an imaginary door.
How many times had my number been yelled in the last hour and a half? My best guess was somewhere between a dozen and twenty. Anything more than two, was too many.
I wanted to punch him in the dick. Any guilt I felt for how he hadn’t played in two years, or how the poor guy wasn’t able to walk to his car after a game without being surrounded by people, didn’t matter at all at that point. Not even a little bit.
Patience, Sal. Patience.
I walked quickly over to where he was and tipped my head back, ignoring the fact that three weeks ago, I hadn’t been able to talk to him in a complete sentence. “Yes?”
“Don’t you have some drills to do?”
“No.” I hiked my thumb back. Twenty seconds had possibly passed since I’d finished them and when he’d called my number. “I’m waiting so I can start stretching.”
Those lazy eyes did that lizard blink. Keeping his gaze on mine for what seemed like a minute straight, he finally lowered his voice and asked, “Do you want to play today?”
Uhh.
I felt like I had stadium spotlights and a dozen cameras on me. I had to fight the urge to look around and make sure I wasn’t getting pranked. My quad gave a pulse of nervous anticipation. “I can’t?” I said it like it was a question, taking in the confused look in his eyes. “You almost killed me the other day. Maybe this weekend?”
He only missed a single beat. “Fine.” Was that disappointment in his eyes?
Oh hell. I think it was.
I watched his face while I suggested, “I have some friends that play recreational softball. They’re all pretty good and sometimes I play with them. They’re having a game tonight. We could go.”
He blinked at me.
“My contract says I can’t play any type of regulation soccer on a team, but it doesn’t say anything about any other sport,” I explained.
He seemed to mull the thought over for a minute, and I was pretty convinced that he was going to tell me to screw off, but out of the blue he nodded. “Fine. Text me the address and the time.”
Was this for real? “I don’t have your phone number,” I kind of croaked out.