Page 54 of Game Face

“So.” I stare at him, wearing my worry, I’m sure. My stomach rattles with butterflies, but the nervous kind.

“Oh man, I kind of hoped he’d say something, but I get why he didn’t. Why he won’t.” My dad rubs his palms into his eyes, then drops them to his lap while my stomach takes a trip on an invisible roller coaster.

I already know before the words leave his mouth. But hearing them . . . they still make me cry.

“Bryce is getting the start.”

“Fuck.”

I blink away the tears and stare out at the field where kids half my dad’s size—half Wyatt’s size—count down jumping jacks in unison. It sometimes feels so pointless.

My dad leans into me for a second.

“I won’t tell your mom about the F bomb.” He chuckles, and I roll my eyes.

“I mean, since you taught me, that makes sense.”

He feigns offense.

“Fuck that,” he jokes.

I laugh a little harder, but it dies out quickly.

“I hate that he didn’t tell me,” I say, even though I understand it.

My dad doesn’t have a response, so he simply sits quietly with me for a while, listening to the distant whistles and cracking voices of boys becoming men out on the field.

Chapter Twenty-Three

I’m taking it out on Bryce—though he clearly covered for me. It’s not his fault that Coach is following his instincts on this move. After my heartfelt chat with Coach in his office, a part of me gets his reasoning, though I don’t think this decision is totally for my benefit. He’s thinking about winning as much as he’s thinking about my mental wellbeing.

Maybe I’m jaded.

Part of what attracted me to this program was Coach’s no-nonsense, zero-tolerance-for-bullshit approach. I’m not sure why I expected anything else when it came to me.

“He feels like shit about this, you know?” Whiskey says as I stuff myself into pads I probably won’t even use tonight.

I don’t answer him. I’m not sure what to say. The best I can do is give him the look, the same expression I wore with Reed when I gave him the news—a face pulled in two directions, guilt and disappointment.

I had to let Reed know I wouldn’t be starting since he was planning to drive out for the game. He stopped in for a little pep talk with the team a few minutes ago. Part of me hoped he’d giveme some motivational speech that would amp me up enough to get my head in the game and to be the leader Bryce deserves. It’s not his fault. Hell, he hasn’t even played that well. A true team player would hype him up right now, but instead, I can’t even look at him.

“He’ll probably fumble the first play,” Whiskey says, and I chuckle, but shake my head.

“I hope he doesn’t. We need this win.” I need this game too, though. My stats are good, but I haven’t exactly had that showy breakout everyone’s been waiting for. I can’t seem to find my game. It went missing the second Peyton was loaded into that ambulance.

She’s my reason.

My phone buzzes deep inside my travel bag, and since there’s still a lot of time before I need to head out to the field, I fish it out to check the message. It’s a photo from my mom, of me on my dad’s shoulders, hoisting my Pee Wee football trophy. I must be seven or eight in this picture, but I remember the feeling like it was yesterday.

My phone buzzes with another message from her as I exit out of the image.

MOM: Remember who you are. You’re Todd Stone’s MVP!

Her words do enough to edge the corners of my mouth up.

ME: Thank you, Mom. I love you.

I’m about to put the phone away when it buzzes again. I wake my screen back up to a new photo from my mom, and it takes my brain a few seconds to realize what I’m seeing. Peyton is sitting on a horse. Her mom’s hand is on her thigh, and I’m sure it tookteamwork for her to get up there, but she’s doing it. She crossed one thing off her list.

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