Chapter 20

Scooter

“This is crazy, right?” I asked Jeff.

It was a real question. I honestly didn’t know for sure if Coach had lost it.

We were in the locker room, sitting on the bench by our lockers.

He grunted. “You can say that again.”

“How do you think it’s going to work?” I asked. “Will we switch off every series, or every quarter, or . . . ?”

“I don’t know, Scooter. I’m still trying to figure out why Coach thought I’d be happy sharing carries.”

Jeff stood up. “I gotta get out of here.”

“Where you going?” I asked.

“Someplace where I don’t have to think about football.”

I was pretty sure I knew where that was. I almost asked if I could go with him, which I know sounds crazy. When he said he wanted to get away from football, he was saying he wanted to get away from me—or at least the situation I had caused.

But I hadn’t stopped thinking about Morgyn since the other night. She was a little weird, but in a good way. Here I was hoping Jeff would say everything was fine, that he’d be happy to share carries with me—but it was more complicated than that. All of the politics and pride wasn’t what I wanted. I liked football because it was the one place where I didn’t have to try to talk to people and explain myself. I didn’t even have to think. But Morgyn seemed to always do that. She did what she wanted to do without needing to give an explanation.

This is what I was thinking as Jeff left the locker room.