“I’ll take that.” I tear my eyes off Masters’ butt, pluck my tray out of his hands, and settle into the seat Jack has saved for me.
Masters isn’t done with me. Jack’s eyes get wide as a child’s on Christmas when Masters whispers in my ear, “You can run, Eliot Campbell, but this campus is too small for you to hide.”
Gulp.
He leaves me without another word and ambles casually down toward the other open seats, as if he didn’t—I’m not certain whether it was a threat or a promise.
“What was that all about?” Jack mutters under his breath.
“I thanked him for carrying my tray,” I make up.
“And his ‘you’re welcome’ was a secret?”
I dig my fingernails into my palm under the table so I don’t blush. “I don’t know what’s in his head.”
That’s as truthful as any answer I can give.
“Then you aren’t looking hard enough,” Jack says wryly.
I look up to see Masters standing—looming really—across the table from us. All the seats are filled, but he sets the tray down anyway in a small sliver of space.
“Move down, Telly, will you?”
“Sure, Masters.”
Telly, the Warriors center, shoves his tray down one spot. Soon the entire right side of the table is shifting, one player by one player. Masters calmly takes his seat.
“Thought I’d sit with the offense tonight. See what secrets you all are cooking up.”
“Hell, man, you got to ease up during practice,” Telly jokes. “I thought you would tear Ace’s head off there a couple of times.”
Before Masters can say anything in his defense, Ace leans across the table and points his knife in Masters’ direction. “Don’t you ever ease up on me. You think Ohio will go easy on me, or Wisconsin? How about the teams from Michigan? Think they’ll go half speed because this is my first year as a starter? No fucking way. The minute Masters goes soft on me is the minute he’s given up on this team, this year.”
Telly raises his hands in surrender. “I got you, brother, just joking around with the big man here.”
He pounds Masters on the back a couple of times. Masters doesn’t even flinch. He calmly lifts his giant hamburger to his mouth, bites off half of it, and winks at me.
That’s the last interaction I have with him for about twenty minutes. His teammates unknowingly do all his dirty work to ferret out my information.
Telly asks me where I’m living.
“With a girl named Riley Jensen in the Maplewood Apartments.”
“Those are sweet.” He nods with approval. “You’ll have to have us over.”
“I can fit about four of you in the living room.”
“As long as one is me. I like chocolate chip cookies, if you’re taking baking orders.”
I wait for Masters to insert some remark about liking certain cookies, but he’s completely silent.
Ahmed Lowe, one of the two main running backs, asks me what my major is.
“It’s English Lit. I plan to write technical works for a living, like grants or instructional booklets or anything anyone wants written, but doesn’t write themselves.”
“Ellie proofs all my work. She does a great job,” Jack interjects.
“You can write my papers,” Telly says.
I somehow keep smiling as if his innocent—I hope—joke doesn’t stab me in the gut. “When you’re out of college, I’ll write whatever you want, but I wouldn’t want to affect your eligibility.”
You are an awful person, Eliot. Awful.
Clifton Knowles, the strong side offensive lineman, asks if Jack and I are twins because we’re both juniors.
Jack answers for me. “We’re ten months apart. I got held back a year and so we ended up being in the same grade.”
What Jack doesn’t say is that we’ve been taking care of each other for as long as we both remember, which is why I’m the only female sitting with the football team. There’s nearly a hundred guys who dress and seventy who travel, but in the sea of muscle and testosterone, I’m the only girl because this is my third night here and Jack doesn’t want me eating alone.
He takes care of me. I take care of him. No matter what.
“That’s cool,” Masters says. “I have a twin but he plays—”
“—Defensive end for MU,” I finish for him. It’s common knowledge. Again, they appeared on the same cover of Sports Illustrated.
“Ellie probably knows more about football than I do.” Jack ruffles my hair affectionately.