Ellison Michaels was an incredibly bright young woman. She'd started reading The New York Times religiously at the age of eleven, and by middle school, she'd demonstrated a prodigious talent for ripping stories apart and piecing them back together again. She was the first female editor-in-chief of the Daily had ever had, the recipient of a full-ride tuition to Garland University, and had the height and shampoo-commercial-shiny hair of a Victoria's Secret Angel.

She was also out of her fucking mind.

"I want you to cover Gamedays."

I tried to hold back a laugh and ended up snorting like a baby elephant.

Ellison turned from the windowsill, where she'd been watering a potted purple orchid that did little to brighten up the dingy and outdated room, and regarded me with a frown. It was Wednesday afternoon. The student union was pretty quiet, save for the incessant laughter of a group of boys who were trying to play hacky sack with one of the bean bag chairs out on the floor of the media center.

"I'm serious," Ellison said. "I want you on the field."

"Pfft—why would—I mean," I sputtered, then laughed a bit disbelievingly. "Aren't there already people covering football? I wouldn't want to, like, step on anybody's toes—"

I fidgeted with the button on the sleeve of my denim jacket.

She didn't honestly think that sticking me on a glorified lawn with eighty-five very large, adrenaline-drunk boys who hated my guts could end well, did she?

"Joey Aldridge is the lead reporter," Ellison said, naming the blonde kid I'd had so many of my journalism classes but had only learned my name during our celebratory pizza party. "He's been hounding me about switching to student performance art groups. And if I have the two of you on the field together doing post-game interviews, Joey can just do photography and you can handle the writing."

"I really don't think—" I trailed off.

Ellison sighed and plopped down into her university-issued desk chair. She'd pimped it out with a white faux-sheepskin cover, but I could tell it was old and sort of janky by the way it creaked under her weight.

"Laurel," she said, "you can handle this."

"But they're not going to talk to me," I argued. "How am I supposed to do a post-game report when the team won't answer any of my questions?"

"You're a chameleon, Cates. Once you're out there on the field, the players aren't going to recognize you. They'll see Joey's camera in their faces and they'll go on autopilot. They're used to answering questions. And if your interview with St. James is anything to go by, you're pretty damn good at asking them."

"That was—"

Ellison beat me to the punch. "It was not luck. You have good instincts. You knew the right questions to ask, and you went off-script when you needed to."

I narrowed my eyes.

"This is because my name's attached to the Vaughn article," I accused. "If I get enough material to write something, it'll get a ton of hits on the website. If I get decked by a linebacker, then Joey takes a picture of my lifeless body and you still get a ton of hits on the website."

"You're not going to—" Ellison began, then huffed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Oh my god, Cates. Worst case scenario, you get snubbed and you have to write a recap of the game without any quotes. But whatever you write next is going to get attention—whether it's about Vaughn or not. People are interested in what you have to say. And I know you don't like attention, but what are you going to do? Just stop writing?"

I ran my tongue over my front teeth, embarrassed to admit that I had thought about that.

I loved writing. But I sort of missed my life before the Vaughn article. I missed the comfort of knowing that nobody would be reading my work. Sure, I hadn't been winning any awards, but I also hadn't been getting coffee dumped on me in petty retribution.

"You know the details of the Vaughn case better than anyone else at the Daily," Ellison continued, her voice gentle. Borderline sisterly. "Joey's great. He's really good at sports writing. But I need someone who's sensitive to the underlying issues here, and you're my girl."

You're my girl.

What a cheap shot.

"Fine," I grumbled, like the sucker I was. "I'll cover Gamedays."

Ellison tipped her chin up and smiled triumphantly.

"Perfect! I took the liberty of ordering your field pass for you last week, so it should be ready for you to pick up whenever. Just show them your student ID in the communications office at the athletics center. I want you to start this Saturday. I gave Joey your number so he can fill you in on the protocol for getting into the stadium through the media entrance. I'll draft a couple questions for you to ask the players, too, just so you know where to start."

I knew, then, that Ellison asking me to cover Gamedays had been a formality.

She'd made up her mind. The rest was inevitable.

"Thanks," I said. "I'll have you a first draft by Monday."

Ellison beamed at me.

I stood, saluted her, and turned to leave.

"And Cates?"

I stopped with one hand on the doorknob.

"Your makeup is amazing today," Ellison said. "Seriously. Your eyebrows are so symmetrical it's unreal."

I reached up unthinkingly, then remembered Hanna had told me not to put my grubby little fingers anywhere near her masterpiece because I'd inevitably smudge something. The eyeliner, the eyeshadow, the contour, the brows.

There was a lot to be smudged.

"Thanks," I said sheepishly. "My friend did it for me."

Ellison hummed thoughtfully.

"Special occasion?" she asked.

"Uh, nope. No occasion."

❖ ❖ ❖

The second floor of Buchanan reeked of permanent markers, energy drinks, and despair. At the far end of the sprawling space, separated from the elevators by a maze of study cubbies and tables strewn with books and empty coffee cups, were the study rooms. These were nothing more than glorified closets with glass doors (a feature meant to discourage students from using the rooms for activities that were decidedly not academic in nature).

The one Olivia had reserved for our group meeting was barely large enough to house a circular table and a couple of chairs.

She sat to my left, her dirty blond hair pulled back in a choppy ponytail and her bushy eyebrows furrowed as she glared down at the screen of her phone. The stacks of delicate rings on her fingers winked under the fluorescent lights as she typed out a monologue of a text message to someone who's contact name was CAN GO TO HELL.

On my right was Ryan, who'd worn a floral patterned silk bomber jacket and white suede Chelsea boots to an entirely casual afternoon meeting.

I had no room to judge.

I'd asked Hanna to do my makeup like I was competing in Miss Universe at four.

And so it was with winged eyeliner, glittery champagne and chocolate brown eyeshadow, and a set of false lashes (a strange and alien weight Hanna had promised I'd get used to eventually) that I glared at the empty chair on the opposite side of the table.

"It's three nineteen," Olivia murmured, setting her phone face-down on the table.

Bodie wasn't coming.

I didn't have to say it. We were all thinking it.

This was why he hadn't asked to switch groups. He was trying to get back at me. He was going to sabotage our group project by leaving us a man down and forcing us to drag his apathetic ass across the finish line for a passing grade. For an idiot jock, he was pretty fucking crafty.

To be clear, I was upset because he'd slighted our whole group.

Not because I'd wasted the day's makeup.

"He probably got caught up with team stuff," Ryan said with an easy shrug.

It was Ryan giving Bodie the benefit of the doubt that really set me off. What was it about St. James that made everyone want to forgive him?

He showed up fifteen minutes late to lecture and Nick was ready to burn the entire attendance sheet to erase any evidence of his tardiness. He stood up our group project meeting and Ryan was happy to shrug it off. He accused me of fabricating accusations to destroy a man's life and then (accidentally) approved two girls' plan to dump coffee on me, and all I could think about was how I hoped the wrist he'd had wrapped up didn't hurt (because the poor guy was having a hard enough time as it was).

Was it the air of athletic prestige? The boyish, charming smile that made you feel like he could read you with one look and liked you from opening line to closing chapter?

"Whatever," I snapped. "Let's just go over the rubric and divide up the work without him."

If my project teammates noticed that I slammed my notebook down with a bit too much force and immediately snapped the lead on my mechanical pencil when I went to jot down the date, they didn't comment on it.

But Olivia did murmur, "I like your eyeliner, Laurel."

❖ ❖ ❖

After we were done in Buchanan, I ended up wandering towards the athletics center. I figured I might as well pick up the field pass Ellison had so kindly ordered for me while I was on campus. Besides. My makeup was nice. I needed to maximize the number of people who saw me.

The athletics center was a palatial shrine of overrated prestige.

The whole compound was made up of three floors of administrative offices, two practice fields, and one brand-new training facility (while the rest of us had to wait in lines to use squeaky treadmills and exercise bikes that reeked of body odors, student athletes had access to their own freshly-renovated gyms packed with brand new equipment that I didn't have the first clue how you were supposed to use.)

And, somewhere in the building, there was a soft serve machine.

I stormed across the lobby, my sneakers squeaking on white marble as I passed gilded portraits of old white men and glass cases of assorted trophies and ribbons and medals. The guy behind the front desk told me to head up the grand staircase, turn left, and then I stopped listening and just said thank you several times while scooting very slowly towards the elevator.

I regretted my hubris a few minutes later when I discovered taking the elevator to the second floor spit me out right at the metaphorical welcome mat of Truman Vaughn's office.

Through a pair of glass doors was a plush seating area and an empty reception desk.

I turned on my heel and took off down the hallway to my left, not sure where I was going but positive I didn't want to stick around the exiled head coach's office. Eventually the hall branched off into two more. I stop at the juncture, next to an alcove with a pair of water fountains tucked in it, and wondered why there weren't maps posted all over this maze of a building.

A man's voice carried through the walls of the office next to the water fountains.

The plaque on the door read GORDON. The interim head coach. Still not the communications office, so I wasn't all that interested.

But then I heard a second voice.

Bodie's voice.

"Well, obviously, you don't think so."

I knew that, ethically speaking, I shouldn't eavesdrop on a conversation that was so clearly personal and contentious. And then there was the matter of expectation of privacy, which meant that I couldn't legally report on anything I overheard Gordon talking about in his private office with the door shut. There was really no reason for me to linger.

It would be best if I walked away.

At the very least, I should've turned on the water fountain or dropped my backpack or something, so they knew someone was within earshot (and that Gordon should really get a thicker door or learn to use his inside voice).

But I've never exactly been a shining example of great decision making.

I ducked into the alcove with the water fountains, so I'd at least be kind of hidden if someone came out of the office, and leaned one shoulder against the wall of his office.

"That's not what I'm saying," came Gordon's voice again. "I just think you're spreading yourself too thin, alright? And it's hurting the team. They need you. But you're all over the place in practice, you couldn't throw a pass to save your life against the University of fucking Washington—"

"I had a bad day," Bodie interjected. "Since when am I not allowed to have a bad day?"

"—and it'll be a miracle if you keep your GPA above a 3.0 this semester."

Silence. Drawn-out, horribly uncomfortable silence.

It was almost a relief when Gordon continued the admonishing.

"You're failing that general ed class Vaughn managed to get you into. The professor emailed the entire coaching staff about it because he's concerned you might land yourself on academic probation. You got a zero on a reading quiz. A zero."

"I didn't want to take that class," Bodie said.

"Then why the hell are you in it?"

"Vaughn heard the professor graded easy."

Gordon sighed. Something rustled—it sounded like that stiff, water-resistant material the team jackets were made out of—as he shifted in his seat. His desk chair was definitely nicer than Ellison's, because instead of the terrible groaning of rusty metal, there was just a muted creak of leather against leather.

"If you're serious about changing your major," Gordon said, voice more gentle now, "you've gotta get your grades up. Look, I'm not gonna ask you to find a tutor. But I really think you should consider getting—"

"I'm not changing my major," Bodie interrupted.

A pause.

"Really?" Gordon sounded surprised.

"I talked about it with Vaughn. He thinks it's a bad idea."

"And what do you think?"

There was another pause, this time much longer.

"I think he's right. You're both right. I don't have the GPA."

"Oh, come on. Don't be stupid, St. James."

This was, on Gordon's part, a horrible choice of words.

"I am not stupid," Bodie snapped.

"I know you aren't. That's why I'm saying you should get—"

"You can't bench me because I failed one fucking reading quiz. I'm having trouble focusing, alright? But I'm fine. I've got this."

I wished I hadn't stopped to eavesdrop. I wanted to give it all back—to somehow rewind and un-hear the frustration and embarrassment and desperate insistence that everything was fine.

It was so much easier being mad at Bodie.

Finally Gordon conceded an inch.

"I'll play you one quarter a game," he said.

Bodie stormed out of Gordon's office and slammed the door behind himself so hard that the wall I was leaning against shuddered. I held my breath, listening closely for any indication that he might come around the corner to use the water fountain.

There was an outraged grunt of frustration.

Then, so quiet I almost didn't catch it, a solitary sniffle.

I waited for a long time after the sound of his stomping footsteps had disappeared before I scurried out of the alcove and resumed my search for the communications office.

_________________

Your friendly author,

Kate