Page 103 of Sweat

So Xia is going around telling people she’s my mom now? And what the hell? I thought she and Matt had a girl scout thing to go to with Olive. Maybe Matt took Olive on his own and Xia came to watch the match?

Oh God, she saw the kiss. She’s never going to let me live it down. At least I know her exuberant gushing will be encouraging. That’s the thing about Xia. Her most annoying trait is how relentlessly encouraging she is.

Quickly, I put on a shirt and slip into my Converse. Tommy asks if we’re good, and I tell him of course. I want to say more. Iwant to make sure he’s really okay before I leave him, but there isn’t much I feel comfortable saying here in the lion’s den.

As I’m headed toward the exit, McDonough asks if my “mom” is giving me a lift home.

“Yeah, we usually get lunch or something after matches,” I answer.

“I don’t need to know your daily agenda, Hughes. Just if I can cross your name off the bus log.”

“Cross away.” I roll my eyes, hoist my bag higher on my shoulder, and dip.

The crowd in the stadium has dwindled. I walk part of the perimeter to get to the gates leading to the pavilion.

Expecting to see Xia, and maybe Lena and Bruno, it’s jarring when I don’t see any of them. If I don’t see them, I usually hear them. Xia’s got a cut-through-walls voice, but I don’t hear her through the milling crowd.

“Rowan?” An unfamiliar voice draws my attention to a petite woman clutching a purse strap across her chest. She looks older than Xia, but not by much. Short, pale, and the shadows under her eyes are even worse than Xia’s were when Bruno was just born. She smells weird too. Not bad, just weird. Makes my stomach turn a little, and I don’t know why.

I tip my chin. “Yeah?”

“Oh my gosh.” She looks me up and down like I’m a deity, shuffling in closer. “Look at you. You’re so handsome.”

“Uhh…” My lip curls, and I take a big step back. “Thanks, lady, but I’m actually waiting for—”

“Rowan.” She takes two steps forward, white knuckling that purse strap like there might be a weapon in it. “You don’t recognize me, do you?”

Am I about to get Lennon’ed? I’m featured on one ESPN weekend morning segment that no one saw, but it was enough to get me a stalker?Just my fucking luck.

Backing up the way I came, I start to tell her I’ve got to get back to my team, but she interrupts me again.

“I’m your mom,” she says, dripping earnestness from every line and freckle on her face and the tears in her grey eyes. “March twenty-second at five o’clock in the morning, I gave birth to you in the backseat of your daddy’s car on the way to the hospital. You looked just like a doll. Didn’t even cry none. Don’t think I heard you cry til you was a week old, and only after some trying. That’s how I knew you was an angel sent to me. Did you hear me? I’m your mom.”

My eyelids blink and my lungs take in air, but inside my head, I’m paralyzed. Might as well have been shot dead.

25

Tommy

The bus ride home from Davis is a half hour at most, but time moves like molasses. As far as I can tell, none of the bickering on the bus is about me or Rowan, but my ears aren’t working tip top right now. All I know is, I’ve finally humiliated myself enough to die in it, but the worst part is that I took Rowan down with me.

“Hey, man.” A few taps to my shoulder draw my attention up to Malik, standing and swaying slighting in the bus aisle. “Scoot over.”

I’m in the aisle seat. Same one I sat in on the way here so Rowan could have the window seat. Even though he went back with his family, I left his space vacant, mostly so I wouldn’t have to sit next to anyone else.

Since Malik’s been a buddy since high school, I push my bag to the floor and move over.

He takes a load off in my spot and sizes me up lazily. “‘Sup?”

Confused and anxious, I answer, “Uh, ‘sup with you?”

“Just wondering if you’re good.”

“I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine, and I’m wondering if you’re freaking out more over what the team thinks or what Cap thinks. ‘Cause if you’re worried about what the team thinks, you shouldn’t. No one cares. They’ll rib anyone for anything theleast bit unusual, but underneath the shits and giggles, no one cares if you’ve got a thing for Rowan.”

“But,” he continues, “if you’re worried about what Rowan thinks of your crush, that all depends on what y’all already got going on.”

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