Page 39 of Tumbling the Cornerback

I grinned at all three of them, shaking my head. "Y'all are awful, and I love you for it." I stared out at the empty space we used for our tumbling practices, a former warehouse converted to purpose, floor a sea of worn blue pads and chalk dust. Like everything else related to the squad, we had to pay for the privilege of using it. "Do you ever think maybe we should unionize or something?" I asked, stopping their conversation cold.

"What?"

Marisol's amused but pointed tone dragged my gaze away from the waiting pads and back to my friends. "Just thinking about how, with only a very few exceptions, we're all expected—league-wide—to take the scraps and be grateful."

"I don't know. I think we're pretty lucky," Liz murmured. "I mean, you remember that scandal a few years ago. Those cheerleaders forced to do shit like a twerk contest on a sponsor's yacht?"

"Or the ones who were basically pimped out to sponsors?" Tori added, shaking her head. "The Troopers have kept us safe, but when it comes to everything else? It's right in line with the rest of the league."

Marisol's brows crept up. "There's some workshops at Third Coast about how to organize," she said carefully. "I mean, if someone was interested..."

Gesturing with one of my poms, I huffed softly. "Let me just add that to my schedule," I muttered. "Queering Sports, teaching, cheering, and now unionizing."

"Ortiz! Get over here!"

Becca, Dani's assistant coach and a former Houston Oilers cheerleader who never learned to talk without cheer captain shouting, waved me over.

"Shit, it's like they're psychic," Tori whispered. "How'd she know we were organizing?"

"We're not organizing," Liz shot back. "Not yet anyway."

"Ortiz!"

"It's probably nothing," I protested, handing my poms off to Marisol. "Be back in a few."

I was not, in fact, back in a few. Not even close to a few. Becca sent me to the changing room, informing me Dani and Cass wanted a meeting now. I glanced back at my friends, staring after me with eyes so wide I could see the whites from yards away. "We're not done," I protested.

Becca shook her head, jabbing her finger towards the changing rooms. "Go. They're at Dani's office. You've got thirty minutes before this becomes a problem."

I hustled, barely bothering to clean up past a wet paper towel on my sweatiest areas and a dose of antiperspirant. The trip to Dani's office wasn't long, but it was hot and slow thanks to late afternoon traffic. I arrived with two minutes to spare and found Dani, Cass, and a frustrated Liesel waiting for me. "Er, if this is about the unionizing thing, I'd like to ask how the hell y'all move this fast but also point out that we're legally allowed to."

Dani's brows drew together, and her lip curled. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Nothing. Um. What's going on? I'm guessing I'm not suddenly being promoted to like president of the cheer squad or something?" I edged to sit in one of the chairs across from Dani's desk. I'm in pretty good shape, but can I have a heart attack from stress anyway? Under the regard of all three women, my pulse felt too fast and too hard at the same time.

Something bad was happening. I wanted to call Renata. No, I wanted to call Cooper. Wildly, I wondered if I could excuse myself for a minute and send him a text, beg him to come to Dani's office right the fuck now. Because whatever was happening, it was going to suck, and I was going to need someone.

No, just him.

"Your contract with the squad contains a morality clause," Dani said with a heavy tinge of tiredness in her voice. "That includes not dating players."

Shit. I had to make a split-second decision: come clean about Cooper or play dumb. Either way, I was fucked. But if I played dumb, maybe Cooper could have some wiggle room, a chance to deny things too. "Are you talking about that gossip bullshit? Me and Cooper Howard were just meeting to talk about the August fundraiser. He had some great ideas to loop in guys from special teams. The team itself can't sponsor anything at this point without a lot of paperwork and negotiations, but Coop wants to include access to the skybox for the kids who are interested, free of charge for the families. He'd arrange it and pay for amenities." He'd mentioned it the other night and had been very enthusiastically rewarded for being so good at ideas.

Twice.

Dani and Cass exchanged a bemused glance. "It's not Cooper," Cass said gently. "Here."

She grabbed the tablet from the corner of Dani's desk and handed it to me. On the screen was an article from Texas Sports News, an interview with Jameson Creel. I skimmed it, frowning when he boasted about throwing money at Queering Sports and spewed his usual nonsense about how queer athletes needed their own league. Something about it struck me the wrong way, not because we don't want safe spaces but because his big talking point was how straight players shouldn't have to put up with the bullshit that comes with having queer players on the team.

"So he's got a lot of internalized shit to work through," I said, glancing up at them.

"Keep reading," Liesel muttered. "It gets worse."

I read aloud, "Creel notes that he stayed closeted as long as he did due to pressure from his then-boyfriend. 'I dated a cheerleader for a rival team when he first went pro. Things were great till they weren't. He was very openly gay and would complain about how I hid him from everyone. Things came to a head when I was ready to finally come out to my team. I didn't need a stage-five clinger making me look bad, you know?'"

I set down the tablet and closed my eyes, taking a long, deep breath and letting it out slowly. "What does this have to do with me?" I asked, the words weak in my own ears.

Liesel grabbed the tablet from me. "He talks about how this cheerleader was a whiner, a," she paused, giving me an apologetic, frustrated glance, "too femme twink, and how this ex has become a crusader for queer rights, really politicizing things way too much."

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