Page 15 of French Kiss

6

Loser

Later That Afternoon

Crissy Field

The second halfof the game didn’t go much better for us.

By the time the drubbing ended, we’d narrowed the loss to a tidy two points, but that still left us down, twelve to fourteen. “You know, this barely qualifies as a sport,” Josh said, still huffing as he packed his water bottles and a couple of towels into a sports bag.

“Actually, I think there are semipro leagues that play Ultimate,” I said.

“Semipro? I don’t think so. Maybe there are leagues, but—” He stopped and looked at me. The wheels were turning in my head.

“Maybe we could join a league and get secretly good and blow Maddox’s team away.”

“No. We’re not joining a league.”

“It might be fun…”

“It would be all former soccer and lacrosse players who're pretending to be recreational athletes by playing a nonsport when really, they're competitive assholes who measure their biceps and eat keto. That would not be fun,”he said.

“Wow, have an opinion about it?”

“I’m just saying it just sounds like a fresh chance at humiliation."

“Maybe it wouldn’t be if the teams were more evenly balanced.”

“You mean, the two of us on separate teams because we’re the weak link among jocks who will offer to carry your bag just so they have the chance to flex? No thanks. I don’t need to be the token lame players on a team full of superstars just to win a game occasionally.”

“I was merely suggesting we could play in a more organized way,” I said. Josh’s cynicism was part of his appeal, but he sometimes took it too far. “Your attitude sucks.”

“Yes, you tell me that all the time.”

“We’re gonna beat them one of these days. I’ll bring my A game next time.”

“Why didn’t you bring your A game this time?” he asked.

“It confuses them. Just when they think we’re easy to beat, we’ll come out swinging.”

“You sound confident for a person who tripped over her own feet earlier.”

I slugged him. “There was a gopher hole in the grass. That’s why I tripped.”

Josh laughed and shook his head, not buying it for a minute. I didn’t blame him. Even I couldn’t have said for sure why I’d tripped, but it did manage to lose us a point, so the reason didn’t really matter. Maddox came over holding his red athletic bag over his shoulder and wearing a baseball cap. I studied him while he talked to Josh about whether to call another resident, Jeremiah, to meet us for a beer.

“He’s probably asleep,” Josh said. “He had an eighteen-hour call yesterday, and he doesn’t do well after those.”

“Still,” Maddox said, “we should at least give him the option.” His cockiness was balanced by a thoughtful side, always wanting to include everyone in whatever plans he made and make sure no one felt left out.

Heidi made her way over to us slowly, a slight hitch in her step. She’d subbed out with ten minutes left in the game and laid down on the grass on the other side of the field, which wasn’t unusual for any of us after running around for an hour.

“You okay?” I asked. “Looks like you’re limping.”

“I tweaked something when I picked up my bag.”

“Jesus, we’re old. It’s not even this sport that causes injury anymore. It’s the simple things, like getting out of bed or bending down to pick up a bag,” I said.

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