Page 36 of Game Face

Chapter Sixteen

Tasha has called me a nerd a dozen times. It’s her way of coping with all of this. Or maybe I am a nerd, what with this massive binder I’ve made with dated tabs and correlated research articles, and therapies mapping out every single step to get me not only on my feet again, but also on my hands and in the air.

Dr. K calls it a long shot. But he hasn’t seen what a Johnson girl can do.Watch and learn, buddy.

“My sister is not a nerd,” my younger sister Ellie says, lightly punching Tasha’s side.

She knows my friend is kidding, but since my injury, she’s started sticking up for me against everyone, literally everywhere. My mom said she had to wrangle Ellie out of the grocery store the other day because the local paper had a headline about me she didn’t like. QB STAR’S DAUGHTER HAS CLOSE CALL WITH DEATH. My sister started to tear them all in half, but my mom managed to herd her out of the store before she got them all.

“They are free to the public,” I said at the time. My mom wasn’t amused and quickly pointed out that most people take one copy, not thirty-four.

“Ellie, come here,” Tasha says, pulling my sister up on her lap. She wraps her arms around her and points toward my head, more precisely, the yellow highlighter I’ve stashed behind my ear.

“You see that marker?”

“Yeah,” my sister says, still putting on her tough-girl voice.

“You know who uses markers like that?” Tasha is a snot.

Ellie shakes her head.

Without warning, Tasha tickles my sister’s sides and hollers, “Nerd” over and over again until, somehow, my guess is through tickle-coercion, she drags my sweet sibling to her dark side.

“You know, positive reinforcement is supposed to be good for my recovery,” I say, flipping to the page I recently highlighted that proves my point. I hold my finger on it, and both Tasha and my sister sing the word “nerd” at me.

I roll my eyes, but when my sister slips from my friend’s lap and runs back to the visitor’s room where my way-more-fun Uncle Jason is, I mouth a, “Thank you,” to Tasha for making life feel normal.

Just when I think my room is about to sink into some quiet hours, a loud knock on my open door introduces my past, my present, and . . . well, Whiskey.

“I hear there’s a party in here. Who’s drinking?” Whiskey announces their entrance, Bryce and Wyatt trailing behind, his flair for dumbassery earns him a sharp look from Tasha. That look alone is worth the embarrassment he’s drawn to my little corner room.

“Sorry, babe. Was Itoo much?” He puckers his lips and squints at her as if this whole thing is some inside joke.Shit, they have inside jokes? And . . . did he call herbabe?

“Quite the opposite, dick hole. You’re not even close to enough,” Tasha says with a look of disgust.

Yeah, okay. He called her babe. She hated it.

Tasha gets up from her chair and leans over to give me a one-armed hug. I’m still stuck with only using the left arm for now. But hopefully, tomorrow’s surgery will change things.

“I’ll wait for your mom to text me. Don’t let her forget,” she says.

“Ha, as if Nolan Johnson forgets a single damn thing. Where do you think I got my type-A behavior?”

I pat the binder as a reminder, and once again, my friend mutters, “Nerd,” before taking off for the day.

“See you at home, honey,” Whiskey calls after her.

We can’t see it to confirm, but I guarantee Tasha gave him the middle finger just now.

“What?” Whiskey says when he meets my chiding look. “I’m wearing her down. You just wait. That girl, she’s in love with me.”

My gaze shifts to Bryce, then to Wyatt, and they could not be forcing a more similar wide-eyed smile onto their faces.

Wyatt takes over the chair that my mom has basically been living in since I got here. Grandma Rose has had her hands full while my mom’s been away, getting Ellie to and from school, keeping my grandpa from burning the house down, and forcing my dad to stop to eat once and a while. He just kicked off his seventh season as head coach in Coolidge, but between his daily trips to visit me and his evening practices, he hasn’t had much time for himself. It shows in his graying beard and baggy eyes.

“So, tomorrow’s the big day, huh?” Bryce asks.

I pull my lips in tight for the confident smile I’ve been rehearsing for days.

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