Page 27 of The Perfect Pass
But then the porch light flickered, just like it used to do back in high school when a date was dropping her off mere minutes before her curfew—her dad’s secret signal to get inside. And just like that, the magic spell was broken.
“Good night, Jackson,” she said as she took a giant backward step and wrapped her arms around herself. It truly was like high school all over again, back before her entire world had slipped right off its axis.
She might be too old for a curfew, but that wasn’t about to stop her dad from making sure the head coach of the Bulldogs got a good night’s sleep before the big game.
Jackson’s smile went sad around the edges. If Calla didn’t know better, she would’ve thought it was because he didn’t want to tell her goodbye. “Good night, Calla.”
“This was nice,” she said before she could think better of it. Then she gave a little fist pump. “Good luck tomorrow. Go, Bulldogs!”
She’d meant it as a joke, but neither of them laughed. Then something unspoken passed between them—something that made a lump form in Calla’s throat as an undeniable ache burrowed its way beneath her prickly defenses.
“Go, Bulldogs,” Jackson echoed.
And as she watched him walk away with Bishop waddling at his side, a troublesome truth settled in Calla’s bones.
She hadn’t really been joking, after all.
* * *
“Are you feeling good about tonight?” Cade swung a glance toward Jackson as they walked to Huddle Up early Friday morning before work.
A loaded question, to be sure.
“I am. The team looks good, and I’ve been watching tapes of the Yellowjackets from last season. Unless something significant has changed since last season, I don’t think they stand a chance against our offense.” Jackson nodded and shifted Bishop in his arms.
The dog was approximately ten times heavier than he looked, but he was trying to think of hauling the beast around as a supplement to his strength training. In any case, carrying the lazy dog was easier than trying to get Bishop to walk half the time, and with the pressure of the season opener bearing down on him, Jackson couldn’t take coming home to another mess before the big game. So he’d declared today to be Unofficial Take Your Mascot to Work Day. If Principal Dean had a problem with that, so be it. Jackson would probably get an earful before the opening bell rang.
“I agree.” Cade zipped up the front of his Bulldogs jacket. By some autumn miracle, a cool front had blown in overnight, and they’d been blessed with honest-to-goodness fall weather.
Or football weather, as Jackson called it.
He scratched Bishop under the chin as they neared the coffee shop. “You think Watson is ready?”
Cade snort-laughed. “As you’ve no doubt noticed, no one thinks more highly of Watson Stokes than Watson himself. So yeah, I’d say he’s ready.”
Watson was the starting quarterback, and as Cade had just pointed out, the kid had an arrogant streak a mile wide. Jackson overlooked it for the most part, because at least the boy backed it up with talent. Plus he saw a lot of himself in Watson, so as a coach, his tolerance level for that kind of nonsense was pretty high. He’d only felt the need to call the boy out once for being mouthy, but after a round of bleacher sprints, the first-string quarterback had taken things down a notch.
Still, sometimes Jackson was glad the kid was more Cade’s problem than his, given Cade’s role as quarterbacks coach.
“You heard what Simmons is calling Stokes, Collier and Brown, right?” Cade opened the door to Huddle Up and held it for Jackson, who still had an armful of bulldog to contend with. “The Holy Triangle.”
Jackson ground his teeth. The assistant coach shouldn’t be feeding the egos of certain players above others—not even when those players were unquestionably the strongest on the team. In his experience, special treatment ultimately led to division, when what they really wanted—needed—was unity.
“I hadn’t heard that, actually,” he said.
“You want me to put a stop to it?” Cade asked as they approached the counter.
Jackson counted his blessings that they were in agreement about the favoritism. He really needed at least one of the other coaches on his side. But keeping Simmons inline was Jackson’s job, not Cade’s. “I appreciate the offer, but I’ll deal with it.”
He wasn’t ever going to fully fit in at Bishop Falls High School if he took the easy road and pawned off his responsibilities on others.
Is that really what you want? To fully fit in?
Jackson paused to let that question sink in as he placed Bishop on the floor and stared at the same coffee menu he’d pretty much committed to memory by then. Yes, fitting in was what he wanted…for now. Making the most of his time in Bishop Falls was the only way he was going to get back in the public’s good graces and earn his place back on the Cyclones roster once his knee had fully healed. His life here was simply the means to an end…
He wasn’t sure why that seemed to slip his mind so much lately.
“What can I get for you, Coach Knight?” Bailey greeted him with the warm smile she wore every morning when he and Cade stopped by. “Your usual?”
