Page 46 of Anatomy of a Player

As I walked into McGuinn Hall, I gritted my teeth against the sharp pain that shot up my leg with every step. Sweat beaded on my forehead, and the bacon and Eggo Waffles I’d scarfed for breakfast threatened to make a reappearance. I just had to make it through my classes and then I’d be on a plane to Colorado so we could check into a hotel and get a good night’s sleep before tomorrow’s game. That’d give my ankle the rest it needed, and I was sure that by game time it’d be fine.

I settled into a desk in my most-hated class and sighed in relief. I dug out a few more ibuprofen and swallowed them dry. The taste lingered and I wished I’d risked the extra steps to the drinking fountain down the hall, throbbing ankle or not.

Professor Hummel began her lecture, and I forced myself to jot down what she said, even though it mostly sounded like a foreign language. Here I’d thought this class was going to end up benching me—as did McCaffrey, who’d been asking for a regular report and hounding me to get more tutoring help so that didn’t happen—but at least that gave me till December, when grades came out.

Except I wasn’t going to let it come to that, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to let a minor ankle injury take me down.

If I hadn’t been favoring my right leg, this never would’ve happened.My old MCL injury had been flaring up recently, so I’d been trying to keep my weight off my right knee as much as possible in practice. Because—get this—I didn’t want to be injured before our game against Denver. Rumor had it they’d recruited some major players. They were also 4 and 0, just like we were. I wanted to make sure that at the end of the game, they were the one to report a loss.

I readjusted my leg and rested my foot on the bottom rung of the chair in front of me so that my ankle would be elevated. The guy in front of me turned, looking like he was ready to say something.

I stared right back, conveyingGo ahead. Make my day,without actually having to say it, and he quickly spun around. I was so not in the mood for this class. Not that I usually was, but I’d been off all week. I could pinpoint the exact moment everything had gone to hell, too. A certain blond reporter had ripped me a new one in front of everyone. Anger rose up just thinking about it. There was another emotion, too, one I didn’t want to name, so I grabbed the anger and held on to it.

Even Dane had kept his mouth shut about it, not daring to mention Whitney or the bet. He’d forgone his usual harping on my subpar grade in this statistics class, too. After our tense phone call Sunday night, Mom hadn’t dared to call back to ask if I’d made a decision about walking her down the aisle yet, which was a miracle in and of itself.

If I didn’t feel like shit, I’d keep this chip on my shoulder for the rest of the semester.Damn Reporter Girl.

At first I’d thought we were playing our usual game in the locker room, going back and forth, trying to one up each other. But things got real quickly, and she’d gone out of her way to twist that knife she’d stabbed into my chest.

And still I’d almost texted her twice, which was ridiculous. I told myself it was for the bet, but lying to yourself never worked as well as it should, and the truth was, I missed talking to her. I wondered if she was stressed, if she was watching touching documentaries and fighting for causes across campus.

I’d told her things I never told anyone. She brought a sense of calm to my life even as she drove me crazy, and I’d thought things between us had shifted into new territory.

But Whitney had proved that I’d been right to stay away from dating and the inevitable damage that came along with letting someone in—with actually caring—and now I felt stupid for entertaining thoughts of more in the first place.Who needs her? Not me. I could find another girl in a heartbeat.

I readjusted, purposely knocking into the guy’s chair again as I did. Every nerve in my body was strung tight, just waiting for a fight. Craving it, honestly. Which was another reason I needed to play in that game tomorrow. If I didn’t get this pent-up aggression out soon, I’d explode.

On the way to my next class, one of my regular fangirls approached.

“Hey, Hudson!” She’d once offered to write any paper I needed, but I’d already made it through my English classes. I think a few of the guys on the team took her up on the offer, and I couldn’t help but wonder if her papers sounded as girly as she did, with as many “likes” thrown in, but I supposed paper filtered out the high-pitched jabber.

“What’s up, sweetheart?” Yeah, I admit it—I didn’t know her name. One blurred into the next, and I didn’t have enough room in my brain for the stuff I needed to know as it was. Honestly, I stayed away from girls like her, choosing to go outside the group of girls several of my teammates had slept with. No judgments on either side, but it was much easier when constant run-ins weren’t inevitable, which was another reason I should’ve never started talking to Whitney in the first place.

In the long run, we would’ve wanted different things anyway. It’s for the best that it ended before it really began.

“I’m sure you’ve heard there’s, like, this big Halloween party at the Quad on Saturday…”

Actually, I hadn’t. But you could count on there being a party there every weekend. Most holidays sucked at my house, but I’d always liked Halloween. Dress up as someone else and get candy? Count me in. Then, when I got older, Dane and I took it as an opportunity to wreak some havoc while costumed. Add the girls dressed up in their sexy little costumes, and again, count me in.

“I know the team’s, like, traveling,” she continued, wrapping a strand of dark hair around her finger. Not blond—not that that mattered or I was still obsessing about a certain girl with that hair color or anything. “But do you think you guys will, like, be back in time?”

“Unfortunately we’ll probably have to miss it.”

She sighed, putting her whole body into it. “Boo. I wish all the games were, like, home games.”

“Yeah, me too.” Keeping my weight on my right foot was starting to become a challenge, and with the limp walk I had to do right now, I was going to be late enough for my next class. “Catch you later.”

“I’ll hope for sooner,” she said, adding a wink before walking away. I stared after her and her short skirt for a moment, wondering if I should forget challenging and just go for easy and uncomplicated. With how on edge I’d been, maybe it would help.

Since the opportunity wasn’t going anywhere, I turned to limp toward my next class, swearing every single time I came down on my left foot.

Four more hours, four more hours…

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Whitney

I stormed into the apartment, glad to find Lyla on the couch. The pen stabbed through her bun must’ve broken at some point, because the tip was covered in black ink and she had a splatter on her cheek—she was obviously in study mode, and had probably been that way for hours.

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