Page 52 of Hate the Game
He must’ve heard something in my voice because he sat up and stared back at me just as hard as I was staring at him. “Yeah.”
“My mom left, too. Also, courtesy of my dad. Although, I doubt it was all because of him. I don’t remember her being much of a mom when she was around but I was so young that I wouldn’t really know.” I shrugged. “I’m not as understanding as you seem to be. Our mom left us with the man she thought was so horrible she had to run off. She forced my brothers to grow up way too young.”
He rested his elbows on his knees and scowled. “What the hell is wrong with people?”
I scooted closer to him. “Do you want to know something I’ve never admitted out loud?”
His eyes flared with interest. “Yes.”
“I fucking hate her.” I whispered it, afraid of being judged if I said it too loud. “She tried to message me a few years ago. No one knows. Over a decade after leaving us and you want to know what she messaged me?”
“I’m terrified to ask.”
“She wanted me to join her fucking MLM.” Something about admitting it out loud made me cackle. “I don’t know why I’m laughing! When it happened I was angry enough to hunt her down and punch her lights out. I mean, I didn’t, but I wanted to. Now, though, it’s ridiculous. The kicker? It wasn’t even a personalized message. It was definitely a copy and paste piece of shit. She cold messaged the daughter she abandoned.”
Jax had to force his mouth shut. “What the fuck would she have done if you’d been game for the MLM? Can you imagine her introducing you to her team?”
I knew I had a crazed look in my eyes. “Imagine that reunion, Jax. Estranged mother and daughter brought together by essential oils. I can imagine the marketing now. We’d show up in facebook ads, holding hands over a bottle of peppermint oil.”
He grunted. “Why peppermint oil?”
“If I had to pick an oil to stick up my nose, it’d be peppermint oil.” I realized we’d moved closer and closer together until I was facing him between his spread legs, his thighs tight around me. I didn’t want to call it out and have to move away. “What was so awful about your dad?”
“Nothing so obvious. It’s just… He has this level of intensity about being the best that’s suffocating. There are days when I get our mom running. I know Blaire wants to at times. I… I just get it.” Jax ran his hands through the grass beside us. “He canbe amazing at times. And other times…I want to strangle him. I have some of the highest stats in the country and it’s never good enough. No matter how hard I play, there’s always more I could do.”
My chest ached for him. Ironically enough, I knew that reality from living with my brothers and watching our dad trash them. “Not just some of the highest stats in the country, Jax. You’ve been at the top week after week.”
His eyes practically sparkled as he grinned. “So you’ve noticed me, huh?”
I rolled my eyes. “Hardly.”
***Savannah***
“Wait. So why this tree? Does it not make you sad?”
Jax shook his head as he laid back and tugged me with him until I was curled into his side. “Nope. Those were some of my favorite days. Getting away from Dad for a while was fun.”
“Is it hard to play for him?” He was so warm around me and with my head on his chest I could hear his heartbeat, steady and deep. I wrapped my arm over his stomach and breathed in his unique, comforting scent.
“Some days it’s the best thing in the world. When he’s in a good mood, it’s fun. He’s still a fucking drill sergeant but he can laugh and joke. Other times he’s the biggest asshole and I seriously regret not accepting an offer from any other college.”
“Is it worse during games? I saw him the other day and it was painful to watch.”
He sighed and tightened his hold on me. “It’s especially bad during big games. He feels pressured to win, of course. I get it, to a degree, because he can be fired if we don’t play well. The pressure he puts out, though, is insane. It’s toxic. Wait until thebowl games and shit this year. You’ll see him show his ass. Last year was an especially fucked up time with him.”
“What do you mean?”
“During the Texas game he was riding us so bad that I could barely see straight. There was some new guy with the college who was making noise about getting new blood in the program. Dad’s been there for so long that he freaked. Football is his entire life and USC football is in his blood. Before that fucking Texas game that new asshole made some comment about replacing Dad if we didn’t bring home the championship.” If Jax noticed that I’d stopped breathing, he didn’t acknowledge it. “That entire game he was making calls that went against what I thought made sense. He pushed too hard and for no reason. By the end of the game we were all just fighting to get off the fucking field. I thought about walking away from football after it.”
I felt sick to my stomach and more than a little confused. I sat up and hugged my knees to my chest, unable to look at him. “What was he doing?”
“There were times when I wasn’t sure if he wanted to kill us or if he wanted us to kill Texas. We made mistakes that made me scream like a fucking lunatic at us. Worse, we made mistakes that got people hurt. On both sides. I’ve watched the game footage and it’s hard to recognize my dad. He looks like a serial killer losing his shit on the sidelines. He publicly ripped almost every member of staff a new asshole and then moved on to us and even people in the stands. It’s humiliating. I’ve never been happier for a game to end.”
My chest was going to cave in. I sucked in gurgling breaths as panic threatened to suffocate me. Hearing him talk about the Texas game was a mindfuck. I had the version of events that my family supported but Jax sounded sincere. He sounded guilty about people getting hurt.
“You okay?” He sat up next to me and wrapped his arm around me. “You’re freezing, Savannah. Why didn’t you say something?”
I was being so weird and I kept waiting for him to put things together but if he noticed how strange I was acting, he let it go.
