The Girl Who Fell Read online

  “Alec. He’s in my French class.”

  Her mood perks. “You met him? Any scoop there?”

  “I’m not trained in human observation the way you are, Lizzie.” I pop the top of my Sprite and it hisses with release.

  “Oh come on. There has to be something.”

  I take a short sip. “He’s friends with Gregg. Plays hockey. Moved here from a private school.”

  Her smile winks. “But you weren’t paying attention, right?”

  “I guess some might say he’s cute.”

  “ ‘Cute’ does not a headline make, Zee. Rumor has it he got expelled from his posh school for having a girl in his room.”

  “I met him for, like, two seconds. It didn’t really come up.”

  Lizzie stretches out along the table. I envy the way she’s always seemed so comfortable in her own skin. “But he’s nice?”

  “Like I said, our conversation wasn’t deep. He could be a total player for all I know.”

  “News flash: All guys are players. It’s called having a Y chromosome.” Lizzie arches her neck toward the sun in a way I never could. Not without feeling everyone’s eyes critiquing me. “Perhaps we should investigate. See if this boy is crush-worthy.”

  “Not interested.”

  “In him or any crush?”

  “Come on, Lizzie. I’ve got, like, zero time for any of that. All that matters is getting my ass to Boston next year.”

  She turns to narrow her eyes, study me. “Maybe. I mean, I get it. But we’re here now and he might be an attractive prospect. He could help keep your mind off some things.”

  I shoot her a look, one that warns she’s going too far.

  “I’m on your side, Zee.” She throws up her hands. “I just don’t want you to shut out opportunity now because you’re thinking a thousand steps ahead about how your heart might get hurt.”

  Lizzie’s been dating Jason since sophomore year. He’s a year older and attends NYU. He comes home a lot, or she goes to New York. Each time they meet up it’s like no time has passed between visits. I can’t imagine getting lucky enough to share that depth of trust with another person. “And how is Alec an opportunity?”

  “I’m not talking about Alec, Zee. I’m talking about taking chances. Making this year a little more than doing time.” Her voice softens. “It’s our senior year, our last chance to do whatever we want without consequences. Promise me you’ll at least be open to different. Whatever form it takes.”

  I cringe at the thread of pity I hear in Lizzie’s voice.

  And her words don’t leave me for the rest of the day. All through the grueling sprints of field hockey practice I can’t wrestle free of Lizzie’s advice: embrace different. But she doesn’t get how hard different has been without Dad. I’ve kind of had my fill of different for a while.

  Ugh. Maybe I have turned into a sad abandonment cliché.

  Chapter 2

  By the end of the week nothing matters except winning our game. There’s no room to think about crushes or Dad disappearing or Mom trying to hide how her world has detonated into a thousand shards.

  “Huddle up!” Coach’s sharpened-knife voice slices through the locker room, and we quickly round into one. I breathe in the scent of lemons and too much bleach, and the adrenaline skulking about, readying to be set free. The room smells like I feel. Bottled, reined in. I need air. And the space to run.

  And then Coach’s speech: “This is it, ladies. An entire season—an entire career for some of you—is waiting for its punctuation mark. Will it be a period? That small dot at the end of a sentence that the reader glazes over? Or will you leave this season with an exclamation mark? A long streak of ink that proclaims you as victors, unbeatable!” Coach doubles as Sudbury’s freshman English teacher.

  We bang the butts of our sticks against the concrete floor until Coach’s hands quiet us.

  “Focus hard. Feel your youth. Use it.”

  It’s her mantra. We all know it by heart and I am suddenly thankful for the things I can count on.

  As if she knows what I’m thinking, she scans the room and I watch her trying to stamp this moment into her memory, fix it there like a photograph. Or maybe that’s me.

  Coach’s face reddens then in the way I’m used to, all the blood rushing to her rallying call. “The word ‘lose’ does not exist! Not in your wheelhouse! Do you understand?” Her words ricochet off the cement walls, their echo washing away the bleach and the lemons. Leaving room only for the pulsing adrenaline. “Get out there and win!” My heart resets, beating with the pregame intensity I’ve known in all of my four years at Sudbury. When we raise a collective cheer, our pooled enthusiasm climbs into me, shares my skin. It feels familiar and safe.

  The room thunders with the beat of a thousand sticks smashing against the cement floor. I gather my gear and slam my locker, the sound of its tinny, hollow screech singular amid the noise. A sound I won’t hear again after tonight. Unless we win. Unless we make it to the playoffs. And in this moment I realize I’m not willing to let go of Sudbury. Not yet. No part of me wants tonight to be my last night in this uniform. I tuck my mouth guard under the strap of my sports bra, feel the weight of a hand patting me on the back. Then another. I grab my cleats and in a terrifying flash I realize I’m not even sure who I’ll be without my teammates—without field hockey. I draw that fear down, deep into my core.

  I’ll use that fear to win tonight.

  Prolong the season.

  Cool air sweeps over me as I exit the gym, the bright lights of the distant field marking our arena: a rectangle of cropped grass, regulation lines, and more hope than any space should be able to contain. It feels odd to realize I’ll miss even these lights, these electric eyes that have been watching over me for four years. My stomach dips with unexpected sentiment just as I hear Gregg’s call.

  “Wait up, Five!” I turn, even though my jersey says 23. When I was a freshman, five wasn’t available so Gregg suggested two numbers that add up to my lucky number. I’ve been 23 ever since.

  Gregg jogs to me, his smile moon-wide.

  “Hangin’ around the girls’ locker room, huh? It’s kind of a creeper move.”

  “Funny.” He bends into an almost-bow. “I’m here to carry your cleats.”

  “Come again?”

  “It’s an epic night, Zeph. I thought I might have the honors.” He reaches for my cleats and my game shoes look small in his palms. A wash of gratitude feathers over my skin.

  We head toward the field, my feet bare except for socks. It’s the only way I’ve ever walked to a game. Ever since the first time I played for Sudbury when I was running late and the Junior Varsity coach yelled me out of the locker room before I had all my gear on. I scored two goals that night. Got promoted to Varsity three games later. The cold pavement seeps through my socks and licks at my toes, but it only energizes me. Baseball players aren’t the only ones who hold on to their superstitions like lifelines.

  “You psyched?” Gregg asks.

  “Um, kind of petrified.”

  He thrusts out his arm, stops me short. “Why?”

  I stare into the washed blue of his eyes and my worry forces itself out of my rib cage. “This could be my last game for Sudbury. Or my last field hockey game ever. What if I fuck it up? What if we lose?” There are so many unknowns next year. What if I’m predisposed to bailing on all that’s important to me—like Dad? What if I let the team down? “What if—”

  Gregg pulls an imaginary zipper across his own lips and I quiet. “Remember our school talent show in second grade?”

  My voice almost left me that night, too scared to speak to an auditorium audience. “I remember.”

  “You wore that Groucho mustache and told a bunch of knock-knock jokes. Remember your closer? Knock-knock . . . ,” Gregg prompts.

  “Who’s there?”

  “Tanks.”

  “Tanks who?”

  “No, no, no,” he mimics. “Tank you!” He bows for an imagina
ry audience. “You had the crowd laughing their asses off.”

  The memory paddles up in me like a friend visiting.

  “You were a star that night, Zipper. You’ll be one tonight.”

  The eight-year-old me visits when she hears Gregg’s nickname. She tells me I’ve got this.

  Gregg bends his tree form to nudge my shoulder with his and we continue to the field. Our shadows march forward in front of us. Straight. Determined. Together. Just like our plan for Boston next year.

  A sudden flash of pom-poms and cheer cascade by us.

  “Cheerleaders?” Gregg says. I shrug.

  Lani Briggs, head cheerleader, sidles up to Gregg’s opposite side. “Hey Slice.”

  “Lani. What brings you and the crew out tonight?” I can hear Gregg flashing her that killer smile.

  “Football’s loaning us out since, you know, the field hockey team hasn’t gone to State in, like, forever.”

  “Jinx much?” I mutter under my breath, and Gregg elbows me.

  “That’s cool. Good to see so much support,” he tells her.

  “Maybe we can meet up after?” Lani asks, her full flirt dialed high.

  “Maybe.”

  “I hope so,” Lani coos just before she bounds forward to join her clan, her red and white pom-poms raised over her head.

  “Gross,” I tell Gregg.

  “Lani?” He laughs. “Please. I’m not man enough to handle her stimulating conversation.”

  “I’m not sure it’s conversation she’s looking to stimulate.”

  “Get your head out of the gutter, Doyle. You’ve got a game to win.” We reach the sidelines and Gregg hands me my cleats. “You’ll rock this, Zeph.”

  I lace up my cleats and watch the football cheerleaders line up on the opposite side of the field. I snug my mouth guard around my teeth and squat in a final stretch.

  Coach calls for us to take the field and I assume my position as right wing forward. Gregg’s unmistakably deep, “Bring ’em hell, Five!” reaches me from the crowd. Then the ref’s whistle blows a split second before I hear wood crack against the hard round ball. I run deep, open the face of my stick, ready for a pass. I bend low when the ball comes my way, trap it under my stick and snake it down the length of the field. I reach scoring position without a defender, no one blocking me, but it’s not my shot to take. Lyndsey is set in front of the goal and I flick the ball to her, where she instantly hammers it into the corner of the net, putting Sudbury on the scoreboard first. Lyndsey and I crash into each other with a full-body high-five, riding on our wave of adrenaline. The cheerleaders sing out a practiced chant, which makes tonight seem bigger than all of us. That surge carries me through the rest of the game, through the fatigue and frustration, until the ref  ’s whistle blows for the last time and he raises his arms in a win for Sudbury.

  The cheerleaders sound out a victory cheer as my team smashes together, bound as one in our exhaustion and elation. I feel grounded here in the middle of a hundred heartbeats. Cocaptain Karen nudges me and we call the team into a straight line to high-five the Clinton Colonials. With each hand I slap I wonder why I’ve always wanted to leave this town so badly. Has it really been that bad? Because right now, in this moment, the thought of leaving Sudbury sits uncomfortably upon my bones.

  Lizzie meets me at the end of the line, puts on her old-timey newsman voice. “You’re a star, Doyle. Front page news, see.”

  I laugh and pull out my mouth guard, jiggle it in my loose fist. “Front page, huh?”

  “The frontest.”

  Gregg joins us. “Way to go, Five. It’s playing like that that’ll get a Boston College scout scrambling for your number.”

  I scoff. “As if. I’ll be lucky if they let me sit on the sidelines to watch their games.”

  Lizzie knits her eyebrows. “Maybe it’s because I know exactly nothing about college sports, but why is it such an impossibility that you could play for Boston College?”

  “Because those girls are amazing. They are, like, the best of the best.”

  Lizzie bursts a short laugh and looks to Gregg.

  He shakes his head at me like I’m dense. “You’re a captain who just took her team to State, Five.”

  And that’s when it hits me that the girls playing for the Boston College Eagles were playing for high school teams before they got to college. Hope spikes in me and it’s almost too much to want.

  “Zephyr!” It’s my mom. At the bleachers, waving.

  Lizzie pulls up her notepad. “I should go see how the Clinton coach spins this loss. I’m hoping for lots of expletives, but we probably both can’t get that lucky tonight.”

  Gregg tosses his chin toward the corner of the field. “I’m gonna roll with Alec. Catch up with you later?”

  My eyes follow his nod, find Alec. He’s alone near the net, waiting for Gregg. Watching me. He gives me a shy wave and I raise my stick casually. Like him watching me is nothing.

  “Tell your moms I say hey.” Gregg pats me on the shoulder and jogs toward Alec.

  I go to Mom, her face too small to hold a wider smile. “Oh Zephyr! You were amazing! I’m so proud of you, honey!”

  “You should be,” Coach says from behind, catching me off-guard. “You played one hell of a game, Doyle.”

  “Thanks Coach.”

  She nods and asks Mom, “Does she get her athletic talents from you, Olivia?”

  Mom laughs. “I’m the definition of uncoordinated. Zephyr has her father to thank for her physical skill.”

  Mom hugs me to her. It’s odd how easy it seems for her to talk to Coach about Dad. Mention him in this offhanded way like he comes up casually in all our conversations lately.

  Coach raps on my stick, tells Mom, “You make sure she rests up, Olivia. Tonight is only the beginning.”

  Mom beams, pulls me tighter. “I will.”

  “I’m grateful,” Coach says before heading over to the other players, their parents. But I’m the one who’s grateful, for Coach including Mom in our team’s success. It’s a mission Mom doesn’t take lightly. After devouring an enormous banana split at Fernalds, we head home where she tells me to shower and head to bed. “Like Coach said, you need your rest.”

  I oblige her the shower, but I spend half the night texting Karen and some of the other players. We’re going to State and sleep is the last thing any of us seem capable of.

  Chapter 3

  The following night I go to my dresser and grab the woolen socks that are standard armor for a fall party in New Hampshire. Only days ago I would rage against the idea of attending yet another lame party at Ronnie Waxman’s, but tonight feels different.

  My full-color Boston College catalog sits on my desk. I trace my finger along its spine. Like always, I imagine I’m the girl on the cover, walking the brick path to the arched entrance of an academic hall, books rested on her hip, the photographer catching her on an up-step so that she looks like she’s floating. Soon, I think. Soon.

  Except . . . except . . .

  Lately I’ve had a harder time imagining I can really be that girl . . . self-doubt Lizzie would attribute to parental issues.

  When I sit on my bed to fasten my boots, a soft knock sounds on my bedroom door. For a dumb second I wonder whether it’s Mom or Dad.

  “Come in,” I tell Mom.

  She opens the door slowly, Finn forcing his wide doggie body through the crack before pushing his soft head into my shins. I feel for his ears, that sweet spot that makes his back leg flick quick as a jackrabbit.

  “Hey Sunshine. Do you want to join me for pizza before you leave?”

  Finn’s head lifts at the mention of pizza, and his enthusiasm tempts me down the hall.

  In the kitchen, Mom’s setting the table, still wearing her fitted navy suit. She’s a state prosecutor with meticulous grooming skills, never a hair or fact out of place. I wouldn’t want to go up against her in a courtroom. She’s fierce and forward in a way I could never own.

  She sets o
ut knives and forks, folded napkins. She’s even poured two glasses of milk. Dad’s the eccentric artist type—writes graphic novels for a living—and is way more relaxed. When he lived here, we’d stand around the island eating pizza right out of the box, sneaking Finn the crusts. I take a seat, slide a slice onto my too-formal plate. Finn drools at my side.

  “I noticed the Boston College catalog in your room.” Mom wrestles a slice onto her plate. “When’s the application deadline?”

  “Not till January.” I don’t tell her that I’ve applied early decision. Fact one: I can’t wait until spring to know my academic fate. Fact two: I can’t have Mom checking in every day to see if I’ve heard. I play with the crust of my pizza, knowing Mom’s approach. She knows the application deadline but wants to talk about something important, something more important than Boston College. I imagine this is how she warms up her witnesses, gets them comfortable with some safe, calming chitchat.

  She blows on her slice. “I talked to your father.”

  She doesn’t even try to camouflage these explosive words. The words I have longed for and dreaded since my eighteenth birthday, the day Dad left with a note as his explanation: “Zephyr’s an adult now and there are things I need to do besides being a parent.” That wasn’t his whole message, but it’s the part I remember, the part that hurt most.

  I stare at Mom, unable to conjure a simple and . . .

  “We’re going to meet for drinks. Tonight.”

  “You’re meeting him? As in seeing him?” I want to scream, Where is he? Where has he been? How can he all of a sudden be in a place that’s close enough for you two to meet up? In my brain four months spreads itself out like a distance. Four months means equator far away. Off-our-radar far away.

  Mom’s fingers move to the middle of the table and pick expertly at the yellow leaves on the centerpiece lipstick plant. She’s been vigilant about perfect houseplants lately, as if pinching away dead foliage will exert some sort of order in our Post Dad Universe. “I know it must seem out of the blue, but we have a lot to talk about, Zephyr.”