Page 31 of Crossing the Lines for Love

Unfortunately, it was blocked, but Patrick recovered it. He was wide open for a shot and dashed toward the goalie. An opposing player was prepared to block him, so he fed the ball to me behind him. The goalie wasn’t ready, and my shot whipped past his right side as he dived toward the left.

“Yes! That’s what I’m talking about. Let’s close this out,” I shouted.

The clock was stopped with two minutes left. We got into position for the face-off and waited for the whistle. As soon as the play started, the opposing team passed the ball, which fell to the ground. I scooped it up, changed directions, and ran toward the goalie.

In front of me, the opposing team’s defensive players were prepared to block. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Reid and fed the ball to him. He caught the ball and shot it into the goal in one quick motion.

We were up by three with under a minute left. Coach Crawford subbed out me, Reid, and Patrick, and we headed to the sideline.

“Good job out there!” Coach Crawford shouted.

I exchanged high-fives with my teammates and headed to grab a water bottle. My eyes caught Aranda’s, and she wore a big smile. She casually gave me a thumbs-up, and I sent her a wink.

Game over! The first win was under our belt.

“I thoughtyou forgot you had parents,” my mother said jokingly.

“Don’t make me feel bad, Ma. You know how busy I am during the season.”

“I’m just teasing you. I looked up the team’s record, and you’ve only lost one game so far. That’s pretty good.”

“Thank you. The team is very talented, and I’m honored to be one of their coaches.”

It had been a month and a half since our first game, and we were over halfway through the season. Time was flying, but I have loved every minute of this experience thus far.

“They should be equally honored to have you. How is everything else going? Have you met any handsome professors on campus?”

I laughed. If my mother didn’t do anything else, she would worry about my love life.

“Umm, I don’t get around campus much, Ma.”

“I guess I’ll take that as a no. You’ll be twenty-seven at the end of this year, and I can’t remember the last time you brought a man home for us to meet.”

“I’m too busy to date.”

“Are you sure you and Montrell aren’t a thing? He seems very fond of you.”

“Montrell and I are very close, Ma, but we aren’t each other’s type.”

“You’re beautiful. How can he not?—”

“Ma, please. Trell and I are good friends. That’s it. Please don’t push the issue.”

“Okay. I’ll leave it alone. Maybe once your schedule frees up this summer, you’ll get out more and meet someone.”

My thoughts went to Niko as my mother rambled. She seemed quite fond of him when he was our server at Soulful Diner several weeks ago, and all he did was his job. If I told her we were dating, she’d be over the moon.

Since Niko and I decided to do whatever it was we were doing, I’d become very smitten with him. Our situation wasn’t ideal, and it was risky as hell. We didn’t spend as much time together as we wanted, but our time together was special.

The flowers and love notes he sent to my job made me feel giddy. The meals he sent to my apartment so that we could eat together on FaceTime were always what I needed. When it felt like a lifetime had passed since our last kiss, we connected our laptops to the big screen and watched each other masturbate. In a nutshell, we were making it work.

“Are you listening to me?” Ma questioned.

“What’d you say, Ma?”

She sighed. “Nothing, girl. Your father has to work late. Do you wanna go to dinner?”

“I’m on a fixed income, so if you’re paying, I’m going.”

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