Page 48 of Home Field Advantage

“Keep your voice down,” she whispers fiercely, stepping outside in her bare feet and closing the door nearly all the way behind her.

“Why?” I challenge her, even though my instincts betray me and I lower my voice. “To protect you from your ‘best friend’?” I use air quotes, because I’m pissed and she deserves me being an asshole. “Because it’s clearly not to protect Miguel, like you told me it was, and it’s not to protectme, like you toldhimit was. So, it looks like the only people you give a shit about are you, bitchy Minnie Mouse in there, and I guess the rest of your homophobic squad.”

“So I’m not allowed to have a say in this?” She folds her arms over her chest. “You and Miguel both suddenly decide you wanna come out and Ihaveto be on board and out myself, too?”

“No, Amber, you don’t,” I say on a sigh, and I’m not sure if I’m imagining it, but it looks like she might be flinching when I use her actual name. “You just have to be honest with thepeople you’resupposedto care about and not play us against each other because you’re too chickenshit to deal with the fact that you’re surrounded by assholes.”

She sucks in a sharp breath, like nobody’s ever talked to her like that before, and maybe they haven’t. Maybe she’s long overdue for a reality check that she can’t play the entire fucking world like puppets on strings. “Anyway,” I add before she can get a word in, if she’d even dare to open her mouth again with Cara in a fifty-foot radius, “looks like you got what you wanted after all—nobody left to care about but you.”

My parting shot doesn’t feel as good as I want it to, because I’m in the same boat. But it’s been a while since I’ve gotten to feel a shred of dignity in this town, and I’ll take it.

When my doorbell rings that night, I’m sure it’s Cheer Girl, come to apologize or at least talk shit out, but instead I get my second Miguel Santiago interaction of the day. “Something else you forgot to crush me with earlier?” I ask as I let him inside, watching him take in the small living space, the pull-out couch with my stuff piled next to it. Other than Amber, he’s the only person who’s been to my place in Atherton, and I wish I’d at least cleaned up a little or whatever.

But he doesn’t make any jokes about it being smaller than the locker room (which it is) or anything like that. There’s nosmile on his face at all. Which makes me think he had his own confrontation with Cheer Girl, until he says, “I didn’t know about it when we talked earlier. Which is why I’m here now.”

My brain is still so squarely in Amberland that I’m caught completely off guard when it turns out she has nothing to do with why he’s there. “The guys are gonna throw the game. Word spread around that Terry Lawrence is finally coming to a homecoming game, specifically to see you, and the guys are pissed. I’m sorry. I know this was important to you.”

I have to blink about a hundred times while I process what he’s saying, and it doesn’t help that he won’t meet my eyes. Even his hands are jammed in his pockets, like he wants to hide from me as much as possible when he tells me this. “Hold up. You’re telling me the team wants to throw thehomecominggame, of all games, just so they can fuck me over in front of a scout who isn’t even really coming to scout me? They wanna look like shit the year they’re finallynotshit just so a girl can’t get a chance at a future?”

He closes his eyes for a deep inhale, then slowly sighs it out. “Uh, yeah, that’s about the gist of it.”

There’s no use waiting for an “I tried to talk them out of it,” because of course he didn’t; what would the fucking point even be? “That’s the stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Yeah, well, Dan Sanchez isn’t planning to go to college on an academic scholarship, so.”

I might laugh if I weren’t so pissed. “It’s not like I’m the only one this screws over. If we blow the game,no oneis getting scouted.”

For the first time since he walked in, Miguel looks up at me, his expression managing to juggle looking tired, amused, and irritated. “No one was ever gonna get scouted other than you, Walsh. Everyone knows that. No one would be throwing this if they thought they had a chance in hell at a future in football.”

“Maybe they don’t have a chance in hell at a future in football because they’re too busy being misogynistic pricks to work on their game.”

“Maybe!” Miguel throws up his arms in frustration. “Look, I hate this too. I hate that I looked over my shoulder the whole ride here, and I hate that I just sat through that fucking ridiculous team meeting, and I hate that my boyfriend is mad at me andI’mmad at Loud and all of us are in a shitshow. All I ever wanted to do was play football and have a few people around to get me through my four years until I could go off to Miami, and now all of that’s in the toilet. And yeah,” he says, his dark eyes burning into mine, “I really hate the way they treat you and that I’m too chickenshit to stop it. It’s not even purely being chickenshit.”

“I know.”

“If I thought it’d make a difference—”

“I know.” And I do. But I don’t say that it’d make a difference tome. Because everything he’s saying, all this drama…it’s because of me. And I don’t have the right to ask for anything else.

Do I?

“No, you know what?” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. “That’s bullshit. You’ve never even tried to stand up for me. And maybe that’s because you don’t actually like me, but you’re here right now even though the team would fucking destroy you if they knew, and I don’t think that’s for Amber. So, what is it, man? Because I gotta tell you, it does not feel great to have you tell me you’re brave enough to come out to the team as gay but not as a Jack Walsh supporter. That kinda feels like your own brand of misogynistic bullshit right there.”

He opens his mouth and I can see he’s got a heated reply planned, but then he closes it. He blinks. “I… fuck. I don’t know what to say.”

“Say ‘You’re right, Jack.’ Maybe even ‘I’m sorry, Jack.’ I’ll definitely take ‘I should’ve stuck up for you sooner, Jack, but I’ll start right now, because you’ve been working your ass off, and having a scout watch you play may be your one shot at having a future in it after high school and becoming a fuckinglegend, and I’ll do anything to stop my friends from screwing it up for you.’”

At least he has the decency to look ashamed. But accompanied by his silence, it’s not good enough.

“Thanks for the info. You can leave.” I don’t wait to watch him go, instead heading to the bathroom and turning on theshower high enough to fill the room with steam fast, and to cover the sound of his retreating footsteps and the door shutting behind them.

I had two friends in this entire school—this entire town—and now I’m really and truly alone.

Chapter Ten

-AMBER-

Miguel isn’t answering my texts.

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