No one answers for several long seconds, then Dad turns on Levi, who is kneeling right next to him, facing in my direction.
“How many games did your team win, Abrams?”
Levi’s jaw goes stone hard, and a little warmth of pleasure uncurls in my belly to see him so agitated.
“Three, sir.”
“Three,” my dad repeats. Then, a little quieter, he says the number a second time. It’s the second time that makes a few players drop their heads. Not Levi, though. He’s staring at Dad in an angry way that makes me dislike him even more. As if I needed another reason.
“You are better than three,” my dad says. “You were last year too, but there’s a gap between your potential and your playing. Every second you push yourself on this field, every weight you strain to lift, every time you sit down to study plays or film, we’re closing that gap. But we will only completely close that gap as a team. I can’t will it closed, and a team isn’t meant to be carried by one or two individuals. If even one of you doesn’t pull your weight, it won’t work.” Dad paused and looked around the circle of players. “Don’t be the gap on this team. Be the person who fills it.”
I know Dad’s talking about sports and training and all that stuff I don’t care about, but I can’t help but hear his words through the filter of our lives. There is a gap in our house. Maybe it’s the mom I never knew. Maybe it’s the words we never say. Or maybe it’s both of us. Maybe there’s a gap in each of us so big that we can’t get past it to fill the one between us. Maybe we’ll never fill it.
Well, isn’t that just depressing?
You know you’re growing up when you start to see more inevitabilities than possibilities.
Looking for a distraction, I scan the circle of players as Dad keeps talking. My eyes sweep over Silas, who looks at me with a carefully blank expression. I don’t let myself jerk my eyes away like I want to, and instead I keep looking past him like he’s any other player. I pull my gaze along, but I’m not really seeing much until . . .
I freeze.
Slowly, I let my gaze backtrack to find another pair of eyes on me.
Not Silas. Not Levi.
Carson.
His hair is dark with sweat and sticking up as though he’d run his hands through it. He’s kneeling, his body directed toward my father, but his eyes are fixed on me. His jaw clenches tight, and his blue eyes look like steel from here. His knuckles are curled tightly around the face mask on his helmet, and I can see the way he’s pushing down on the helmet, bearing it into the ground.
He’s angry.
And I feel all my earlier hope for the future, all my determination, just melt away. The gap in me stretches so big in that moment, flowing out from between my ribs and pushing up through my pores, that I forget to feel angry, too.
For a moment anyway.
Dad dismisses the team, and Carson stands. Then the fury rolls in like a storm, filling the empty with emotions too raw to put a name to. I don’t wait for Dad. I don’t wait for anything.
I turn and start walking off the field, wishing I could stomp my feet hard enough to make the earth shake as much as my hands. There is thunder in my chest, and I know a scream won’t release it. Not this time.
It’s stupid. So stupid.
He’s just a guy I spent one night with.
I should not be this upset.
I should not . . . I should not have been stupid enough to let him mean anything more than that. I mean, Jesus, the guy even ignored me all weekend! So why do I feel like my ribs are trying to curl in on themselves?
Stupid. I’m chanting the word in my head as I grind my teeth and escape out of the complex and into my little maroon sedan. I turn the key in the ignition, releasing a small sob only when I know the roar of the engine will cover it.
I slap the steering wheel, but that doesn’t do the trick, so I punch it instead. The car gives a small whine, in lieu of a honk, and my knuckles agree in silent misery.
Furious, I put the car in drive and take off, not knowing where I’m going. I just know that I’m on the verge of losing control in a way that I don’t ever let myself. I try to just shut it off like I normally do, like I promised myself only hours ago I was going to stop doing, but for whatever reason, I can’t.
Yell, always. Scream, usually. Throw something? Frequently.
Cry? Never.
I turn the music up so loud that it actually hurts my ears. I drive and drive too fast until I’m past the university bubble, past the city limits sign, and eventually . . . past the danger of crying.
Thirty minutes outside of town, I pull over at an empty rest stop. I sit in my chair, eyes closed, and I dance in my head. I imagine what it would feel like to put movement to this anger, this frustration so deep and black that it’s like a creature tearing through my bloodstream. Part of me is tempted to get out of the car and do it for real, right there in the sprawling Texas countryside. I choreograph a dance that’s hard, maybe too hard for me to actually perform, but when I see it in my mind, I leap higher than ever and throw myself across the dance floor with no thought to whether it will hurt. There are no pretty pointed toes or soft, arched arms. There’s no build, no highs and lows. I imagine someone like Dad screaming in my ear as I dance the whole thing at full speed, as I drag myself across the floor until I just can’t anymore. There is desperation and pain and when it’s over, I’m emptier than I’ve ever been.
And I didn’t even dance it for real.
I get out of the car then, not to dance but to sit on the hood of my car and stare up at the bruised night sky. They say Texas has a big sky. But I’ve always thought out here where there are no buildings and no people and you can see for miles in every direction, it actually feels like the sky isn’t big enough. Like it’s been stretched out over the land, and just barely reaches each horizon. At any minute it might peel back or tear right open having finally been stretched just a little too far.