Page 12 of Coach Me

Finally, practice came to a close.

“Good job, ladies,” Simon announced. “Well done, you lot, very well done. I’m impressed. You’re wrapped for the day, go home and get some rest.”

The girls nodded, too out of breath to even respond.

“I’ll see you on the field tomorrow,” he finished.

Without any further ado, the team turned around, began grabbing their stuff and moving to the door.

“Catya,” Simon said, just loud enough for me to hear. The rest of the team was already near the doors and ignored his voice. “Can you stick around for a minute?”

Even if they had heard, they would’ve let this pass. I used to talk with Alan after nearly every practice.

So why did this request feel so different?

The girls had all left, headed off to the locker rooms or straight home. I moved up to Simon, his body drawing me in like a powerful magnet.

“Yes, Coach?” I asked, an innocent lilt in my tone.

We were alone and I was hyper-aware of that fact. I wondered if he was, too.

“You did excellently,” he said. “Seriously, you’re a stellar player.”

“Just doing my job. As Captain.”

He nodded. “Job or not, you’ve got big talent and the work ethic to match it.”

Widely speaking, I could take a compliment. To me, responding to compliments with a wide, earnest ‘thank you’ and a polite smile told people they were right to acknowledge your achievements. Plus, I was confident in my athletic abilities. They were, in my estimation, well worth complimenting.

But somehow, coming from him, the praise was heightened, amplified, painted in brighter colors. It was like the photo, I suppose — as though he’d seen a side of me I didn’t always see in myself. And the words felt like they weren’t coming from an adult, or someone who saw himself as superior to me, but from an equal. ‘Game sees game,’ as the kids say.

“Thanks,” I said at last. “I want to make this the team’s best season yet.”

“Winning championships?” he inquired.

“Yeah.”

He nodded thoughtfully. “Let’s make that happen then. I promise I’ll give you my bloody all.”

“Same.”

Simon held out a long hand. I noticed his fingernails were clean, the nail beds pink in an almost childlike way.

“Let’s shake on it,” he said.

I extended my hand to meet his, and grasped it. His palms were rough and warm, the hands of an athlete. My grip was strong — Dad had raised me to have a firm handshake — but his was light, unexpectedly gentle. As if he were being careful to not assert his physical dominance. Was I imagining it, or was he too walking the line between professionalism and attraction? If so, which side of the line was he leaning on? Mental calculations tallied in my brain.

He ended the handshake first, and I felt a pang of disappointment. It’s just a handshake, Catya, I scolded myself. Shit. I rarely got crushes, but when they hit, they hit hard. And I could feel one coming on.

Simon went on, “Well, that’s all settled. I can’t wait to spend more time together.”

Oh, I was good and screwed now.

He cleared his throat. “As your coach, obviously.”

“Right. Obviously.”

Did he just move closer? No, no of course not. I was hallucinating. My throat seemed to be tightening, the vocal cords straining.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said.

“Looking forward to it.” The stark light of the gym reflected off the hollows of his cheeks.

With zero cool, I nearly ran out of the gym. Frankly, I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I didn’t stop running until the building was behind me in the rearview. My heart was strangled by how badly it yearned for Simon, a deep, primal hunger, while my brain attempted to reason that there was no way in hell I could even entertain the thought. I was in the No Man’s Land of my mind and soul. The strain between them bordered on the painful.

Had he felt the electricity? Did it matter, since there was nothing either of us could do about it?

Simon was my coach. I was the team captain. In no universe could we be something more than those two roles.

Or… could we?

Chapter 6

Simon

The only thing I knew for a certainty about my living situation was that my bed was abhorrent.

ULA had posted me up in a slightly off-campus housing facility that was comped for single faculty and staff, of which I was the latter. Saying it was ‘off-campus’ was a bit of a misnomer. The town was so built around the college, and the college so very much in the middle of nowhere, that everything was, relatively speaking, on-campus. I digress.

Was I grateful that they’d put me up, free of charge? Sure. The apartment was crap, about the size of a grownup dorm room, but I’d lived my whole life in crappy apartments. The familiarity was, in fact, comforting. But the bed — God.

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