I go to games and watch it on TV, too. I know the players names and can rattle off the different plays and positions and whatever else you want to know.
But that’s not because I love it. I’ve just lived it. Every day of my life for as long as I can remember. Through every new town and new school and new friends, football was the one thing that never changed. And when you spend that much time with something, you either love it or loathe it.
One guess which category I fall into.
I step inside the house behind Stella, and the manic grin she shoots me over her shoulder lets me know she’s just stepped into her own personal heaven. A dozen or so people near the entrance glance up, and their eyes slide right over us. My shoulders relax their stone posture just a smidge.
A roar rises up from the kitchen, and I glance over in time to see two lines of people, one held at gunpoint. Water-gunpoint, anyway. Though from the cheers that ring out when one side starts shooting, aiming for the open mouths of their partners, I’m guessing they’re spraying beer instead of water.
“We are so doing that!” Stella cries out over the thumping music.
Note to self: stay far, far away from the beer guns.
Knowing my luck, I’d take a shot to the eye.
A guy runs past us in a tutu and a deep red wig, hollering something unintelligible at the top of his lungs. Stella grins at me, her eyes shooting to my own red hair. “I found your long-lost twin. Tutu and all.”
“What a coincidence! I found your twin, too.” I cast my eyes in the direction of two girls carrying a third friend between them toward the door. “Messy drunk and all.”
“You take that back! I am not a messy drunk.”
“And I’m not a giant dude with probable back hair and an identity crisis.”
She throws up her hands. “You’re right. Sorry.” Cue her mischievous smile. “He had way bigger boobs.”
I thump her hard, but we’re both laughing. And it feels as easy as the parties we attended in high school, easier really, because Stella was right. No one here gives a damn about me.
“Big D! Heard you were on campus. I’m surprised to see you here, though.”
And . . . I spoke too soon.
There’s only one thing in the world I despise more than football, and he’s making his way down the stairs toward me.
My eyes flit around me like I’m scanning a battlefield instead of a blowout: fraternity banners, litter of red Solo cups, and a freshman pledge dragging around a trash bag playing reluctant maid. Part of me wants to keep doing that, to pretend like I didn’t hear him.
But I can’t. If I ignore him, it will only prove to him that he still bothers me.
I face him as he steps off the last stair, crossing his arms over his broad chest and grinning at me. Levi. My ex.
He leans his hip against the banister of the grand staircase, and I spy not one but two girls sitting halfway up the stairs, obviously upset that they’ve lost his attention.
Behind me I hear someone shout, “Ready. Aim. Fire!” and I know the beer guns are back in play.
“Alcohol and bad decisions, Levi? Can’t say I’m surprised to find you smack-dab in the middle of that.”
He kicks off from the banister, swaggering a few steps closer. His dark hair and eyes are as striking as always. I’d fallen for him so hard my freshman year of high school: doodling our names together in my spiral, watching him play from the bleachers, wearing that monstrous mum he gave me for homecoming, beaming on his elbow at his junior prom.
The memory of all that just makes me nauseated now. But as Stella always says, hindsight is a pretentious, know-it-all bitch.
“You come here to make some bad decisions?” He moves closer, his voice pitching lower. Intimate. His gaze drifts down my body with an arrogant familiarity. “Because you know I can help you with that.”
Levi Abrams has been the cause of enough bad decisions for a lifetime.
Stella steps in, her voice colder than I’ve ever heard it. “I’m fairly certain she’d rather sandpaper her own skin off.”
I nod and plaster on the fakest smile in my arsenal. “And then take a bath in lemon juice.”
Levi smiles back, and I’m pretty sure the bastard is enjoying this.
He’s bigger than when I last saw him. Bulked up. I guess that’s the difference between high school and college ball. But it’s not just muscles . . . he reaches out a hand like he’s going to touch my hair, and as I jerk back, even his hands seem bigger than I remember. A man’s hands, rather than those of the boy I knew. Or maybe his head got so big that his inflated ego overflowed to other parts of his body. Also a possibility.
I knew Levi was here when I chose Rusk University—hard not to when he’s the starting quarterback—but I didn’t think I’d ever have to see him. Since Dad wouldn’t let me leave Texas, and only a handful of universities here actually have a true dance major, Rusk was the best option out of the schools to which I was allowed to apply.
Levi lets his hand fall away and turns to leave, but then stops to say over his shoulder, “You don’t have to pretend to hate me so much, you know. I’m here. You’re here. We could start fresh, D.”
Why does no one get that it’s impossible to have a fresh start when nothing has really changed? God, I knew that better than anybody because no matter how many new coaching jobs Dad took, every school ended up the same.
Levi is still a douche-bag who only cares about himself.
Dad still approaches parenting like I’m a member of his team.
And I . . . I’m still stuck. In my father’s shadow. In Texas. In this lame state school with a joke of a dance program.