Playing Defense (Corrigan Falls Raiders) (5 page)

I managed to pull myself out of the locker. Sure, it was odd to think of two hockey players—two
Raiders
—talking about me, but one of them was Chris, so somehow that made it feel okay. “No, she was fine. I think I like her.”

“And you guys are forming a Sisterhood of Awesomeness together.” He grinned.

Okay,
that
was embarrassing. I’d brushed it off when he mentioned it earlier, but now it was back. I crouched down and pretended to be looking for something in my backpack, which was, luckily, inside my locker. So my face was completely hidden when I said, “It’s not real. Is she taking it seriously?”

“Are you kidding? She was totally bragging about it. She’s pretty psyched for the whole thing. I don’t really understand what it
is
, but…whatever. She’s into it.”

It was only two days ago that I’d been sitting in the guidance office with Mrs. Davidson talking me into tutoring. And now, somehow, I was standing in the hallway of my school as everyone watched me, making casual conversation with a gorgeous Raider about how the Raider captain’s girlfriend and I were going to start something called the Sisterhood of Awesomeness. And I was supposed to be taking it all seriously. As if it was actually my life, and not some weird, feverish delusion.

I decided just to go along with the dream. “I’m into it, too. It’ll be—well, awesome.”

He nodded slowly, then said, “Cool. I want to see what you guys do.”

And then he walked me to chemistry class, and as we were heading for our respective seats he said, “Do you want to come sit with us? Or could I sit with you?” He must have seen something strange in my expression because he was quick to add, “So I can ask you questions when we’re working on stuff. You’re my tutor all the time, right, not just at lunch?”

“I’m not sitting back there.” I sounded like a stubborn little kid, but inside I was more like a
scared
little kid. There was no way I was just going to waltz back to the popular kids’ area, not with a classroom of other students who’d see them laugh at me.

Chris didn’t seem to understand my concern. “Is it cool if I sit up here, then?”

It wasn’t like I could say no. Wasn’t like I wanted to. “Is there an extra stool?”

“I’ll find one,” he promised. He grinned at me, set his books on the long table beside mine, and then turned to look for a free stool.

Oliver gave me a look. “What the hell?” he mouthed. Then Chris turned around, holding a heavy metal stool as if it weighed nothing, and Oliver gave his demented flight attendant smile and said, “Hi! Welcome to our seating area!”

“It’s nice to be here,” Chris said with nearly matching enthusiasm. “Thanks so much for having me!”

Well, Oliver was
not
going to be outperformed. “I really hope you enjoy your visit. If there’s anything I can do to make your time with us more pleasant, you be sure to let me know.”

Chris shook his head in amazement. “I thought it was just a stereotype,” he said to me. “But it’s
true
. Front-of-the-room people really
are
super friendly.”

Oliver had begun to bristle at the word “stereotype,” but by the time Chris was done talking Oliver was looking less offended, more intrigued. “Do you want to know what they say about
back
-of-the-room people?” he asked quietly, daring Chris to keep going with their strange game.

Chris shrugged. “Back is whack?” he suggested.

“Back’s off track?” I tried.

“Back will attack?”

“Back’s sharp as a tack?”

Oliver frowned at both of us. “Did I say it
rhymed
? Did I say anything about ‘do you want to hear the
rhyme
about back-of-the-room people?’”

“It doesn’t rhyme?” Chris said. “Damn.” He shook his head regretfully. “You know, if it doesn’t rhyme, I don’t think I
do
want to hear it. Sorry. I’ve got my standards.”

The class started then, Mr. Anderson circulating to check our homework. When he got to us he said, “New seat, Mr. Winslow?”

“I needed to be near my smart friends,” Chris said calmly. “The back don’t know jack.” Mr. Anderson just gave him a strange look and moved on.

Oliver was watching Chris with a wary sort of fascination that I could absolutely empathize with. Chris Winslow was a friendly, laughing, golden god, and it was kind of hard to figure out which of those attributes to focus on at any given time. He was like a playful lion…it was so tempting to wrestle and snuggle with him, but there was still a chance he could go bad and maul you with no warning. Or just roll over and crush you or something. With someone so unconsciously powerful, there wouldn’t need to be any malice in order for bystanders to get hurt.

Mr. Anderson called our attention back to the front of the room and started taking up the homework, and then he had a superlong slide show to go over with us, so we were all taking notes and trying to keep up. But through it all I caught Oliver sneaking peaks at Chris, and I admit it, I was doing the same thing. There was something almost hypnotic about Chris’s big, strong hand holding a pen, and the way the muscles in his forearm shifted just a little as he was writing. He kept his left hand spread out on his sheet of binder paper like he was holding it down, and I imagined that same hand spread out that same way, but touching
me
instead of the paper. If he touched my face with his fingers spread out like that, he’d be cradling half my head. If he touched my back, he’d reach from my shoulder blades to my waist. If he slid his hand around…

“Are you checking up on me?” Chris whispered with mock indignation. “I’m writing it down, boss! I promise.”

I stared up at him, mortified. I needed to pull myself together, deny that I’d been staring at his hand… No, that was no good, he had eyes, he
knew
where I’d been staring—oh God, did he know
why
I’d been staring? What I’d been thinking? If he hadn’t figured it out yet he soon would, because I was
not
playing this cool and seemed completely unable to recover. I could feel my face burning and wanted to slide right off my stool and hide under the table.

I started to say something, realized I had no idea what
to
say, and made a weird little “
heh
” sound that was absolutely wrong. I turned it into a sort of cough, which somehow morphed into a real cough, and then I couldn’t stop. So there I was, beet red and choking on my own spit, right next to a guy with the most gorgeous hands I’d ever seen in my entire life.

“You okay?” Chris said, his voice full volume, and I realized that he wasn’t whispering anymore because there was no need. The whole class had stopped and everyone was staring at me.

“Fine,” I gasped between disgusting hacks. “Just…”

“Water?” Chris asked, and he offered me his water bottle.

Before I knew it his hand—strong, perfect—was wrapping around mine, and then we were both holding the bottle and guiding it to my mouth. Chris had unscrewed the top so it wasn’t a squeeze-spout anymore, just a wide rim of plastic with the roughness of the threads against my bottom lip. “Sip,” he ordered, and I did as I was told.

The water helped. The coughing fit had actually helped, too, at least in taking attention away from where I’d been staring and what I was sure everyone could tell I’d been thinking. Of course, then I realized that Chris was standing next to me, one hand supporting me, and I could feel how right I’d been, his outstretched fingers easily spanning most of my back. And he was standing close enough that my shoulder was brushing his chest a little, and with his other hand still holding the water bottle near my face I was essentially surrounded by warm, muscular
Chris
. I choked again, a little, and Chris raised the bottle to my lips. “Another sip,” he said.

Mr. Anderson appeared in front of me. “You okay?” he asked. He sounded more impatient than concerned. I guess if he wanted to get through his whole slideshow in only seventy-five minutes he couldn’t stand for many interruptions.

I was pretty sure I’d start choking again if I spoke, so I just nodded. Chris moved away a little and all the parts of my body that had been touching him felt suddenly cold.

I was tempted to cough but controlled the impulse. When Chris returned to his seat he left his water bottle between us so I could reach it again, and I found myself fixating on it. He usually drank from the spout part, so his mouth hadn’t touched the same plastic mine had. But what about the water
inside
the bottle? Maybe some of it had flowed back after touching his lips? Not like a big gross backwash of spit or anything, but just the tiniest little fraction of a drop.
Just enough so I could imagine the connection between his lips and mine. And then of course think about ways for that connection to be deepened, and made more real. His strong arms around me, his big hands holding me tight, and his lips against mine—

“Hey,” Chris whispered sharply.

I stared at him, ashamed to be busted
again
.

But he just leaned over and tapped my sheet of binder paper. “Get writing,” he ordered. “You better not think you’re going to be copying my notes. No way, man. You carry
me
in this class, not the other way around.”

Mr. Anderson gave us a dirty look, but I grinned at Chris anyway. “Are you sure? Tutoring would look good on your university applications.”

He grinned back. And right there, right then, I didn’t care about what the other students in the class were thinking about us, didn’t even care what Mr. Anderson was thinking. All I cared about was Chris’s smile, and the way it made me feel like I was part of something. Part of
him.
I liked it, and for a little while I let myself forget about chemistry and university and everything else, and just enjoy that feeling.

Chapter Four

The morning workout was a bit shorter than usual the next day because we had a game the night after and couldn’t be sore for it. Some of the guys were going to the Tim Hortons near the arena for a second breakfast, and normally I would have gone with them. But on this day I didn’t really feel like it.

Instead, I went to school early. Weird as it might sound, I was thinking of seeing if the library was open so I could look over my math before the quiz.

But as I walked through the school doors I glanced into the cafeteria and saw Claudia and Karen sitting at one of the tables, laughing about something they seemed to think was absolutely hilarious. And that was all it took to kill my little amoeba of math interest before it had the chance to evolve into anything bigger.

I thought about trying to make Claudia feel guilty for distracting me from math, but since she’d been the one who’d gotten me interested in the first place it didn’t seem like she really had too much to feel bad about.

Karen saw me first as I approached their table, and made an over-the-top shushing gesture at Claudia. “Shhhh,” Karen hissed loudly. “Outsider approaching!”

“That’s nice,” I said as I got closer. “Way to make me feel welcome in a public space.” And then I almost tripped over my own feet, because I caught myself a half inch into a movement that would have ended with me bending down and kissing Claudia on the top of her head. What the hell?

Claudia looked up at me, and maybe there was something on my face that showed my confusion, because she seemed kind of unsure herself. But I made myself smile, and she smiled back, and then we were both okay. Brain under control again.

I pulled a chair around and straddled it, leaning my elbows on its back as I said, “Sorry, am I interrupting Sisterhood business?”

“You are,” Karen said firmly. “But it’s okay. We’re awesome enough to handle interruptions.”

“And has your awesomeness found a direction yet? Are you still just sitting around being excellent, or are you going to actually
do
something?”

“We’re going to do something,” Claudia said. Then she shrugged. “But we’re not quite sure what.”

“Something free-form, sort of?” Karen said as if she was thinking out loud. Still trying the ideas out even as she shared them with me. “It’s not the
sports
part we don’t like about team sports, it’s the
team
part. We want to be independently awesome in our own ways, we just want some support while we’re doing it.” She looked at Claudia. “Right?”

Claudia nodded. “We probably need more members, too.”

That seemed like my cue. “Can I play?”

Claudia and Karen exchanged a glance. “Did you catch the
Sister
hood part?” Claudia finally asked.

“Yeah, but…whatever. I figure I’m high enough on the ‘awesome’ to make up for being low on the ‘sister.’”

Another look between them. “What would you do if you were a member?” Karen asked. “How would you be awesome yourself, and how would you support the awesomeness of your sisters?”

It was weird how important this suddenly seemed to me. It felt like an interview for a job I really wanted. “Well, like you said, it might be sort of free-form awesomeness, for what I do myself. But to support my sisters? I guess…whatever they needed? I could…lift heavy things? I could go with them if their awesomeness took them to places where they wouldn’t be safe on their own. I could…” Damn, what else could I do? “I could drive people places. Like, safe places, but they need a ride?”
What else, what else?
“Oh! I’ve got a
good
fake ID. I could buy alcohol for my sisters. Or get the older guys on the team to buy it. Whichever.”

“Those are strong, practical ideas,” Karen said. “We could use some of those. But what about more
emotional
things?”

I stared at her. “Uh…emotional?”

She nodded and turned to Claudia for backup. “Karen said the guys on the hockey team always have each others’ back,” Claudia said softly. “You might fight with each other, but you’d stick up for each other if someone
else
tried to fight with one of you.”

“That’s kind of covered in the going with you to places you wouldn’t be safe on your own part, isn’t it?” They didn’t seem to think it was, so I said, “Yeah, for sure. I’d stand with the sisters. For sure.”

“What if we invited someone you didn’t like to join?” Claudia asked.

“Who are you going to invite?”

Karen shrugged. “We don’t know. Just, in theory. How would you handle that?”

“I guess if I
hated
them, I could quit. Right? This isn’t like a lifetime blood oath we’re talking about. But honestly? I don’t hate many people. Like, I don’t hate
any
people. I can’t think of anyone I dislike, even. Not really.”

Karen stared at me like she thought I was either lying or crazy, but Claudia smiled. “I can’t think of anyone I really dislike, either.” She frowned thoughtfully. “People who make me nervous, or creep me out? Yeah, I can think of those. But I don’t
dislike
them.”

“Ew,” Karen said. “You two are, like, hippies or something. Go sniff your patchouli somewhere else.”

“That’s not very supportive,” Claudia said mildly.

Karen made a face. “Damn. You’re right.” She shook her head. “This is not going to be easy for me. I mean, I want to do it, but it’s like, the
opposite
of usual me.”

“Nah,” I said. I’d only known Karen a couple months, but I knew her well enough to know she was wrong. “It’s more like the
secret
you. Like, you’re crusty on the surface, but underneath you’re a marshmallow.”

“
Shhhh!
” she said quickly. She didn’t seem to be joking. “Somebody might hear.”

“That’s it!” Claudia almost yelled. I don’t think I’d ever heard her raise her voice before. “That’s our awesomeness! It’s why we need support, because it’s going to be kind of scary, but it’ll be great.”

Karen and I exchanged confused looks. “What do you mean?” I asked.

“We should activate our secret selves,” Claudia said. She frowned as if realizing for the first time that
she
would be included in this project. “Maybe,” she said. “Maybe it’d be a bit too much. I mean, not our
secret
selves. Not completely. Not the negative parts, but the positive parts? Like, Karen, if you’re secretly nice, then you could activate your niceness and make it not a secret anymore.” She shrugged. “But, really, I don’t think it’s much of a secret. You’ve been super nice to me, and it’s not like you have some ulterior motive or anything.”

“I’m a spy!” Karen said indignantly. “I’m not nice at all! I’m tricking you! I’m crafty!”

“I don’t think a good spy would
admit
to being a spy,” I said.

“It’s part of my craftiness,” Karen insisted.

Claudia sighed. “Okay. It was just an idea. We’ll have to be awesome some other way.”

“So, wait,” I said. “Am I in? Like, if I say something now, is it…am I speaking as a sister?”

Karen squinted at me. “That doesn’t bother you at all? The gender issues?”

“No,” I said honestly. And then just to stir her up I added, “I kind of like it. It makes me feel pretty.”

“I say he’s in,” Claudia said, smiling in my direction.

Karen nodded her head. “Yeah, okay.”

“Excellent,” I said. “So, then, as a sister, and in the most supportive way possible…I like Dia’s plan. And you, Ren, are being a big chicken.”

Karen stared at me, then turned back to Claudia, who was watching her closely. Then Karen turned back to me. “A chicken?”

“Yeah. Like Dia said, it’d be scary to try something new. So you’re trying to avoid it. You can be more awesome than that.”

“Who
are
you?” Karen said. “You’re a small-town hockey player, Chris! You’re supposed to just grunt and talk about ‘scoring’ with as many different subtexts as you can find. You should go get in a fight with someone, not sit here talking like you’re auditioning to replace Oprah.”

“When we’re speaking as sisters, I’d prefer it if you called me Topher.” I tried to channel my inner princess to give the words a little more kick. This whole thing was a lot of fun.

“Let’s talk about
your
challenge,” Karen said. “What are
you
going to do to be awesome?”

“I have to think of it myself? That’s not fair. Dia
gave
you the niceness challenge.”

“Maybe that’s how it should work,” Claudia said thoughtfully. “It could be an extended version of truth or dare, without the truth. We could come up with challenges for each other, but they’d be based on, like, really trying to help the other person see their own awesomeness, not trying to embarrass them. And you can turn down a challenge, but you have to sleep on it or something. You have to give it real thought.”

“I love it,” I said.

“That’s just because we haven’t come up with a good challenge for you yet,” Karen growled. “See how much you like it once you have to actually
do
something.”

“What do you have to
do
for your niceness challenge?” I asked her. Then we both turned to Claudia, who was clearly the brains of this operation.

Claudia shrugged. “I don’t know. She could…volunteer somewhere? Do random acts of kindness? But, no, because she could do those
sneakily
, and that would defeat the purpose.” She turned to Karen. “We’re not challenging you to be nice, because you already
are
nice. We’re just challenging you to let people see that.”

“I’ll think about it,” Karen said. Then she smiled gleefully. “What’s Topher’s challenge?”

They both looked at me thoughtfully. I felt like something growing in a petri dish.

“He’s smart,” Claudia finally said. “Lazy, but smart. But he either thinks he isn’t, or he thinks it doesn’t matter. Or he’s
afraid
he isn’t, so he won’t try in case he fails.”

“Tyler says the same thing about hockey.” She saw my expression and made a quasi apologetic face that didn’t seem to stop her from continuing with the same train of thought. “He says Chris is big enough and has enough natural talent to be able to coast, and so he just does.” For the last part she at least looked at me and changed the pronouns around. “He says you’re a good player now, but you could be really great if you tried harder.”

This wasn’t quite as much fun anymore. “I’m not good at school.” I said it as firmly as I could. The hockey stuff was a conversation for another time, or maybe just a reason for me to not try too hard to defend MacDonald from the opposing team’s goons the next time we had a game.

“Yeah, okay, you’re not good at school
now
,” Claudia said, and the firmness in her voice made mine sound like jelly. “But you could be. Considering the classes you’re taking and the lack of effort on your part, the fact that you’re still close to passing shows you’ve got potential. You just need to
try
.”

“Oh my God,” Karen said, clearly delighted. “You’re totally a future guidance counselor. You’ve got it all down. Is
that
your hidden strength that we need to uncover?”

“It’s not hidden,” I said. “Being responsible and mature is Claudia’s
surface
. But what’s
Dia
up to?”

Karen leaned back and squinted at both of us. After a moment, she snapped her fingers and made a sort of
dzzzzt
sound while waving her hands back and forth between us. “Personality transfer! That’s what your challenges should be. Topher, you need to do something responsible and academic, and work harder. Dia, something impulsive and youthful, something that
isn’t
hard work.” She leaned back in her chair, clearly satisfied with herself. “You may each choose the task for the other,” she said regally, as if giving us a gift.

Claudia looked at me doubtfully, and I felt like I could actually
see
her thoughts. Should she give me something easy, hoping I’d be similarly merciful with her? Or hit me with the full blast of whatever she thought I should be doing differently? “Let’s start small,” I suggested. “Just one thing, something we can do in the next couple days and see how it feels. See if it makes us feel more awesome or not.”

She nodded, and squinted at me thoughtfully. But I already knew what I was going to challenge her to do. “Have you ever been to a Raiders game?” I asked her, sure I knew the answer.

Her eyes widened a little. “No. I don’t… It’s not really my thing. Hockey. Crowds. Violence.”

“It’s not that violent,” I said, hoping I was telling her the truth. The games weren’t
usually
too rough. I mean, it’s a physical game and there are lots of hard checks, but we weren’t a big fighting team. We didn’t have a designated goon like a lot of teams did, a player whose only skill was fighting. We were all expected to stand up for ourselves and for our teammates, sure, but if we could do it without getting penalties, everyone was happy. “And honestly, the fights aren’t as bad as they look. We’re wearing so much padding, and it’s hard to get your weight behind a hit when you’re on skates. You can’t really plant your feet, you know?”

One look at Claudia’s face showed me I’d made things worse. I turned to Karen for help.

“You can sit with me,” Karen told Claudia. “I don’t like the fights, either. We can ignore them together.” She looked at me. “You could get Dia a ticket next to me, right?”

Karen usually sat in the area reserved for players’ families and girlfriends, so having Claudia sit there would be a sort of proclamation. I didn’t mind the idea of having people think Claudia and I were dating. I didn’t mind it at all. But there was no way Claudia would know what sitting in that section meant, and it wasn’t fair to let her wander into that without warning. “I could get you both tickets somewhere else,” I said.

“Somewhere near the snack bar,” Karen said. “I
love
their hot dogs.”

Claudia looked a little dazed, but she finally gave a jerky nod. “Okay,” she said. “I can go to a hockey game. I’m vegetarian, though, so no hot dogs.”