Page 67 of The Game Plan

No, it doesn’t, but I appreciate him for agreeing to it all the same. We can’t spend all of our time holed up with his roommates. I have a life outside of the football team. It’s time for him to spend time on my side of the world.

Girls’ Night starts with a shot of vodka, because why not?

We’re all exhausted after a tough practice. My hamstrings are so tight I can hardly walk. I need a session with the team physical therapist, stat.

It’s an hour and a half drive to UNH, longer with traffic. Miles hasn’t texted. I know he’s with the guys, I know he needs to focus, but I also know he’s going through some shit right now. I’ve never been benched before, not for outside misconduct. The few times I’ve sat on the sidelines have been due to my poor play the day before at practice—or during the middle of the game.

I feel for him, I really do. I don’t know what O’Rourke said that set him off. He spews the same disgusting bullshit towards everyone who’s not part of his special little circle of friends. He really seemed to target Miles. He doesn’t deserve that, nobody does.

Lex, Aleesha, Tamar, and I haven’t hung out in a group since the football game a few weeks ago. Admittedly, my life has gotten a lot busier in the last week. Although I don’t regret Miles, I do wish I was able to balance spending time with him and my friends a little better.

I’ll work harder at it. I’ll get better at it. I’m out of practice; I haven’t had a boyfriend since that frat boy freshman year, and I wouldn’t call that six week dalliance a particularly successful relationship. Mostly we just had sex in my dorm room, and he ignored me in public. Yeah, he was a real winner.

Miles has the rare quality of wanting to hang out with me fully dressed as much as he wants to get me naked. And we do indulge in some quality naked time. But sometimes it’s nice to just walk through campus hand in hand or curl up under a blanket and watch Jeopardy! together.

I’ll do better. I’ll be a better friend.

Aleesha turns on Clueless and we drink our way through the movie. We’ve all memorized it, of course. It’s a classic.

Lex paints all of our toes, even though it’s winter and we’re not taking off our socks for anyone. We do face masks and eat popcorn and just hang out.

It’s nice. I didn’t know how much I needed time with my girls.

Around ten, we get dressed up to head to the swim team’s party. Well, they get dressed up. I wear leggings and a t-shirt I pilfered from Miles’ closet. It has his name and number on it. It’s so big, it’s nearly a dress on me, which suits me just fine.

I like the feeling of being wrapped up in his clothes. It’s the second best thing to being wrapped up in his hug. If I can’t have him here in person, I can have the scent of him enveloping me in an embrace of Old Spice and something else uniquely Miles.

Tamar and I take a few selfies, and I pick out the best ones to send him. His shirt is blatantly on display. I have no interest in any of the guys who will be at this party, and I want himandthem to recognize that.

Lex’s swimmer crush is a tall, broad, tanned dude with a goatee and overly plucked eyebrows that make him look constantly surprised. He gives her a nod when she walks in and goes back to his conversation with Josh Sinclair.

Shit.

Josh is on the volleyball team with O’Rourke. Does that mean O’Rourke is loitering about here?

Tamar and I make drinks in the cramped galley kitchen. The house is laid out inverse to ours, with the kitchen on the left instead of the right. Everything is a little bit backwards. I feel off balance, off kilter.

“Hey, Sam,” Josh says, propping his arm on the cabinet above me. He’s tall, nearly as tall as Miles, and lanky like a piece of taffy that’s been stretched a few times. “Haven’t seen you around lately.”

“Why would you?”

Josh and I aren’t friends. We had a class together. We’ve never really spoken. There’s never been a need to.

He nods to my shirt. “So you and Cavanaugh…”

“What about it?”

“You’re a thing?”

“Yeah, we’re a thing,” I confirm, taking a sip of my drink. Tamar was a little heavy on the vodka, light on the orange juice. Oh well. I take another greedy sip.

“O’Rourke’s going to be pissed,” he says.

“Why should I care?”

“Because he’s had a thing for you for, like, ever,” he says.

My eyebrows go up. “That’s news to me.”

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