Page 140 of Stick It
He exhales, some of the tension in his shoulders easing. “Yeah.”
With a tilt of my head, I lead him toward the kitchen. As we step over the threshold, my gaze lands on Finn, my footsteps slowing. He’s sitting at the table, dark circles staining the skin beneath his eyes, a scowl twisting his face. I didn’t even notice him sitting there when I came downstairs. Shows just how in my head I am. He’s not looking at me, though.
Finn’s glare is locked on Coach, his ire focused and burning. He doesn’t even acknowledge me as I move toward the coffeepot.
“What areyoudoing here?” he sneers, lip curled in obvious disgust.
It’s so unlike him—unlike anyone on the team. No one talks to Coach that way. Not only because he’d flay us alive but because we each respect him. At least, we used to. If that footage we saw yesterday is true, Finn’s respect isn’t the only one he’ll lose.
Coach arches a brow, his expression cooling into something sharp. “Mind your tone, O’Rourke.”
Finn doesn’t blink, doesn’t flinch at Coach’s uncompromising tone. If anything, his gaze only narrows further on the man we all unquestioningly obeyed—until today.
“So, it’s true then.” He doesn’t phrase it as a question. It’s a statement of fact. “You are sleeping with Dylan.”
Coach blanches so hard that I’m surprised he manages to stay on his feet. He physically recoils from Finn’s accusation, color draining from his face as his expression morphs into one of absolute horror. All thoughts of coffee are abandoned as I turn to face him fully, cataloging his reaction with interest and more than a few questions of my own.
In the next second, Coach’s face is red with fury, and he plants his feet before staring Finn down. “Are you drunk,O’Rourke?” He practically vibrates with rage. “How dare you so casually throw around such an accusation. Do you have any idea of the consequences of such lies?”
Unperturbed, Finn fires back, “Are they lies, though?”
Spluttering, Coach’s gaze flashes to mine. “Maddox, what is the meaning of this?”
“I think he’s talking about the fact you and Dylan seem particularly…comfortable with one another,” Jax explains, rubbing a hand over his face as he steps into the kitchen. Sweats hang low on his hips, and his hair is an absolute disaster. Behind him, I notice the mess of blankets on the sofa in the living room. Apparently he distracted himself with video games until he passed out last night. Better than Finn, I guess, who doesn’t look like he has had a wink of sleep all night. He went out with Kyle and the team after Griffin dragged Dylan out of the locker room, and I didn’t hear him come home, so it must have been super late—or early, I guess. “And the fact she’s been seen leaving your house late at night,” Jax tacks on, looking more awake now as he leans against the kitchen counter, eyeing Coach in the same shrewd way I am.
For the first time in as long as I’ve known him, Coach is speechless. His mouth opens and closes a number of times before he manages to spit anything out. When he does, what he says leaves all of us reeling.
“Dylan is like a daughter to me!”
Those words, along with the intensity behind them, nearly knock me off my feet. I’m not the only one blown back by his unexpected response. Jax rears back, and Finn’s mouth drops open in surprise.
“I’ve known that girl since she was little more than a baby,” he fumes, the words tumbling over one another. “Whoever is spreading such disgusting rumors, they are baseless, and frankly, they arewrong.”
My ears ring in the pursuing silence. My thoughts spin in a dozen different directions, trying to make sense of any of this and coming up empty.
“A daughter?” Finn asks, quizzical. Sounding just as confused as I feel, as Jax looks.
“I don’t understand,” I add, watching Coach’s shoulders rise and fall with his heavy breaths. “You knew Dylan before she came to BSU?”
He exhales sharply, dragging a hand down his face. I’d put Coach in his mid-fifties. Despite the lines that have started to appear on his face, his salt-and-pepper hair that becomes more abundant every season, I’ve never considered him asolduntil now. In the span of thirty seconds, he’s gone from being the strong coach I’ve known since freshman year to looking…old. Tired.Human.
Wrapping his hand around the back of a chair at the kitchen table, he sinks into it, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Her parents were college freshmen with a baby.”
“Her dad was a Steelhawk.” Even if I hadn’t figured out exactly who her dad was, his teammates said as much that night at the bar.
Coach nods. “He was a good man. Struggling to make it to practice and classes and be there for Lorraine and the baby. So, I stepped in sometimes. Helped out when they needed it. Looked after Dylan during practice when a sitter fell through. Kept her at my place when they both had to study for exams. By the time they both graduated, I was like an uncle to that kid. I was at every single one of her birthday parties, at her high school graduation.” He swallows, emotion overwhelming him. “After her dad died…” He falters for a split second before he clears his throat, pressing on. “She’s been to hell and back this past year. Between her dad, and the shit she was dealing with at NSU.” He shakes his head, and I’m pretty sure he’s talking mostly to himself when he mutters, “I hadn’t realized it was that bad. I should have… she wouldn’t have taken the out unless she was desperate. Unless she had no other choice. She’d been so adamant that she had to pave her own path that when she accepted my offer to come here, I didn’t question it.” He sighs heavily before the room falls silent.
I sense he’s lost in his own thoughts, in what he considers his own failures, but my mind spins with the nuggets of information he’s given us. Nuggets that, along with the tidbits we’ve gotten from Dylan, suggest she was being bullied, badly, by her own team. To the extent that she wasforcedto leave. That left her feeling, like Coach said, like she had no other choice. Dylan isstrong. She has more than proven that. Which begs the question, how fucking bad were things for her at NSU before she left? How fucking bad didLucasmake things for her?
Jax and I share a look, but it’s Finn who questions, “What happened at NSU?”
That seems to snap Coach from his thoughts, and he gives Finn a hard look. “Don’t think I don’t know there’s something going on between Dylan and each of you. If she hasn’t shared her past with you, then I certainly won’t.”
“You brought her to BSU because she was being bullied,” I interject.
Coach’s glare shifts to me. “That girl was a Steelhawk from the day and hour she was born. She’d have been here from freshman year if it wasn’t for her stubborn pride.” He pins each of us with a look. “Shedeservesto be here as much as anyone else. NSU couldn’t see that her potential was wasted sitting on the bench every game, butI knew.”
I’m not disputing that. I don’t believe any of us are. Dylan has more than proven herself on the ice. I’m beginning to think she’s proven herself off the ice, too, and we were the dumb shits who believed some pictures over her word.
