SATURDAY, AUGUST 27

4:03 A.M.

PHOEBE

Phoebe’s not at all tired, even though she should be. Then again, Phoebe never sleeps great the night before a game. It doesn’t matter if they are playing a shitty team or one that could really give the Wildcats a run for their money. It’s always impossible to get comfortable in her bed, even with two Tylenol PMs and the new feather mattress topper she’d gotten as her big Hanukkah present. She’d spend the night flipping over from back to belly, kicking off her sheets, refluffing her pillow. The stress of knowing you aren’t sleeping when you need to be sleeping is its own particular kind of suck.

She’d think about the game all day too, which could be super unfortunate if she has a test or a project to present. This is one of the things Coach taught them. To visualize the game, how you are going to play it.

Right now Phoebe’s strategy is not to hold anything back.

Why would she, with nothing to lose?

Up until now, Phoebe has held on to her decision to play in the championship game as her own. It made her feel powerful. Strong. Even though she’d needed that little push from Coach. That’s why it was so hard for her to hear Mel talk the way she did tonight. Painting her like such an idiot for what she’d done. Reckless. Stupid.

How could Mel have it so twisted?

Phoebe wants every single one of her teammates to know it. She’s got the proof right here in Coach’s emails. That she was manipulated, played, lied to, her body sacrificed. And for what? So Coach could throw her under the bus and earn a good word for a new job he wanted?

Oh, she would fucking l o v e to call Coach out on what she’s discovered tonight in a one-on-one tomorrow. Stroll into his classroom before all her teammates arrive and watch him squirm as she sets down his laptop, already open to the Trident email exchange. She’ll play it totally cool, lay her cards out, tell him how it’s going to go. She’ll keep this “miscommunication” between the two of them, so long as Coach gets her recruited to play at a different college. Wait. Actually, fuck that. For all she’s sacrificed, Phoebe wants to play at a D1 school and have her happy ending with Mel. It shouldn’t be too hard to do, right? He has the contacts. He’s made so much happen for other girls. Now he needs to make it happen for her. Or else.

It’s kind of fucked-up but Phoebe totally would do it if not the fact that she reinjured her knee. The thought of enduring another ACL surgery, and then another grueling six months of rehab, is just too much for her to bear. Even if it went well, even if she worked just as hard as she had the first time, Phoebe would miss her entire varsity season. And even with Coach giving his network of scouts a full-court press, no college was going to offer her a spot on the roster after she blew out her ACL twice in a year.

There is no way out of this hell. It’s only fair that Coach get trapped in hell with her.

She got a glimpse of what this hell looks like tonight. She noticed, when she was in Coach’s classroom with Mel, how he’s made it into a weird museum celebrating his glory days. His collegiate team pictures professionally framed. His national jersey in a glass shadow box. His sticks, medals. All reminders of his unfulfilled potential. The life he imagined he’d have looming like a shadow over the here and now.

Coach has always given off the vibe that he’s too good for West Essex. He dresses like he is. He walks down the hall like he is. He teaches like he is, barely caring. What she interpreted as cockiness, Phoebe now sees is misery.

There’ve been so many times Phoebe has felt that same misery inside her. Pulling her down, making her unkind, ungenerous, competitive. She hates who she is becoming, and she sees her future in Coach. Her one hope for tonight is that by blowing him up, she’ll detonate those terrible parts of herself, too.

Phoebe parks Mel’s car in her driveway, rewraps her Ace bandage, and gathers her things. She digs her phone out of the pillowcase in Mel’s trunk. There are a million text messages and missed calls from Mel. Her voice mail is full.

MEL: Phoebe are you okay?

MEL: Please let me know you’re okay.

MEL: We will get through this together. I promise.

Phoebe shuts her phone off before she reads any more. She grabs Coach’s laptop, slides it underneath her arm, and limps around to the back of the house, where she knows the sliding glass door will have been left open for her.

Mel’s parents sleep like the dead. Memory foam, expensive sheets that stay cool and slip against your skin, tufted headboard, shades that block out all light, a sound machine emitting steady rolls of ocean waves. Not to mention their nightcaps, an Ativan for Mel’s mother and a tumbler of Scotch with a tennis-ball-sized ice cube for her father. For these reasons, Phoebe feels no need to be quiet as she moves through the kitchen toward the basement stairs.

But hobbling down the steps, her breathing turns shallow. The other girls are deeper in, talking, laughing, getting ready for bed. She freezes like an intruder when she hears someone coming; the instinct to turn and run before she’s discovered kicks up her pulse. Even if she could run, it’s too late. She’s caught.

“Phoebe!” It’s Mel, now changed into her pj’s. She rushes over, takes the handful of steps separating them in two long leaps. “Are you okay?”

“I … don’t know.”

A flash of panic. “Where’s Buddy?”

Phoebe says, “I took him back, let him loose in the front yard.”

Mel exhales. “I knew it.” She threads their hands together, tugging her down into the basement. “Everyone’s going to be so relieved to see you.”

“Wait.” Phoebe pulls herself free. The wind that filled her sails just moments ago has gone still. She came in here intending to blow up Coach’s spot in front of her entire team. But now she hesitates. “Can we talk for a second? Privately?”

“Phoebe … I’m sorry about everything I said.” Mel smothers Phoebe in a tight hug, as if Mel knows that if she lets go, there’s a good chance Phoebe will slip away again. Phoebe hugs Mel back the best she can, one arm trying to do the job of two because she’s also holding Coach’s laptop.

Mel pulls away and sees it. Fear comes over her. Her eyes widen. She forces down a swallow. Her voice is thin, shaky. “Did you find something?”

It’s hard for Phoebe to grab hold of how she got to this place. She’d wanted to prove that she was a good teammate. That she’d made the ultimate sacrifice. But she’s suddenly not sure if what she’s holding actually proves that.

Phoebe chose to play in the championship for two reasons, to help her team win, and so she and Mel would have their best shot at getting into Truman. One of those things happened. And before she read Coach’s emails, it was enough for Phoebe to feel like it had been worth it. Learning that Coach fucked her over afterward with the Trident recruiter is what set her on the warpath.

Phoebe doesn’t want Mel to feel guilty about her place at Truman. Doesn’t want her to think this was, in any way, her fault.

But of course Mel will. Phoebe already sucker punched Mel with her own poorly kept secret. That Mel has a close relationship with Coach. What if she feels culpable in this somehow?

Phoebe has known for years that Mel and Coach text. It never bothered her. In fact, Phoebe felt cool knowing her best friend was the one with this special relationship. She knew it was nothing more than a harmless crush, Mel idolizing Coach.

Mel had been so sad when she feared Coach wasn’t going to come back. Depressed. When she started hooking up with Gordy, Phoebe was happy that she’d finally moved on. But then Coach came back, and suddenly, Gordy was being dumped. Even though Phoebe knows Mel likes Gordy.

What Phoebe is about to tell Mel will shatter her.

Mel says it again. “Phoebe. Did you find something … ?”

Before Phoebe can answer, Luci stumbles on their hushed conversation.

“Phoebe!” Luci rushes over, hugs her, and runs back into the main part of the basement. Phoebe can hear the news of her arrival spread like wildfire.

It heartens her.

She loves these girls. If she could somehow be sure that revealing what Coach did to her wouldn’t come back to hurt the rest of the team, she’d do it in a heartbeat. But she doesn’t want to burn the house down, to take away everything from them just because she let herself get screwed.

So, to Mel she says, “No. Nothing. I was just freaking out, I guess.” And she gives up the laptop, hands it over to Mel, who Phoebe knows would never look inside. “Maybe you can get this back into his classroom before Coach sees it’s missing.” She shakes her head. “No. Wait. I want you to hand it to him. Tell him that I took it.”

That’s better. Then Coach will know that Phoebe knows. He’ll have to clean up his act. The threat that Phoebe could expose him as a lying, manipulative prick is a power she can wield to protect anyone else from getting screwed by Coach again. Suddenly she feels lighter. And now that the computer is out of her hands, she can hug Mel the right way.

“But he’ll throw you off the team.”

Phoebe releases her, limps into the basement, leaving Mel to find someplace to ditch the laptop. Mel calls out. “Phoebe! Hold on a second!”

The girls have gathered in the main room, happy to welcome Phoebe back. But something wrenching must show in Phoebe’s face, because their smiles take a huge collective dip.

Phoebe tries to remind herself that there was a time when she didn’t even know what field hockey was. That there is surely something out there in the world that will fill this enormous black hole.

“Okay,” she says, puffing a few breaths, cracking her neck, psyching herself up. “None of you are allowed to speak until I’ve said what I have to say. Otherwise I’m not going to be able to go through with this.”

“You don’t have to, Phoebe.” Kearson stands up, and for once, her bobblehead stays steady. “I quit.”