“Beyond the painfully obvious fact that we couldn’t establish our run,” he said, “we just missed a lot of opportunities. What were we in the red zone?”
“O for three.”
“You can’t win many football games when you’re O for three in the red zone.”
I murmured in agreement, surprised that Coach was discussing the game with me, when he typically didn’t even talk to his staff immediately after poor performances.
“So what are you doing?” he asked suddenly.
“Right now?” I asked.
“Yeah. Now.”
“Nothing. Why? What are you doing?” I asked, wondering why I was so nervous.
“About to go for a run,” he said.
“At eight-thirty?”
“If that’s what time it is … then yes. Wanna join me?”
Stunned by the invite, I said okay, my heart beginning to race.
“Good enough. Meet you at the track over at school in fifteen?”
“Okay,” I said again, marveling that I could feel this good, this happy, so soon after a bad game.
Fifteen minutes later, I pulled into the lot closest to the track, adjacent to the tennis courts and our original field house. I was wearing gray sweats, a standard issue from the equipment room, and an ancient Walker baseball cap, my long ponytail threaded through the back. A pale light shone on the track, a mix of moonlight and halogen, but a fog had rolled in, and at first I didn’t see the lone figure stretching near a high stack of pole-vault mats. It was Coach, and my heart stopped for a second as I stood at the top of the brick staircase and watched him. When I finally descended the steps toward the entrance, he looked up through a curtain of mist and gave me a half wave, half salute. I took a few deep breaths, trying to calm myself down as I entered the security code and unlatched the squeaky metal gate. Then I slowly crossed the spongy red track, walking onto the turf. I stopped a few yards away from Coach, overcome with a rush of pure joy. We were completely alone on a beautiful night, and I simply couldn’t imagine anything more exhilarating.
“Hi, girl,” he said, giving me a half smile.
“Hi, Coach,” I said, wishing I could read his mind. There was no way to tell what he was thinking, his face expressionless.
“Little chilly,” he said, pulling the drawstring on his gray sweatshirt, a hooded version of mine.
“I know. I like it,” I said, nervously bending over to tighten my laces.
“Me, too,” he said, lightly jogging in place and stretching.
“Do you always run after games?” I asked, thinking it was easier to speak when he wasn’t looking at me.
“When we play like shit,” he said, sitting down to stretch more thoroughly.
I nodded, watching him.
“So did you get your story in?” he said, glancing up at me.
“Yeah,” I said.
“And?”
I wasn’t sure what he was asking so I said, “And … it’s done.”
“You happy with it?”
“As happy as I can be when I’m writing about a game … like that one,” I said.
Coach nodded, only his eyes smiling at me. “Don’t you need to stretch?”
I shrugged and reluctantly sat next to him, spreading my legs in a V-shape, imitating his form. I touched my toes a couple of times in a jerking, bouncing motion—the way they always tell you not to stretch—then stood up, murmuring that I was good to go.
“Youth,” Coach said. “If I stretched like that, I’d tear something.”
“We’re only, like, twenty years apart,” I said, feeling myself tense inside.
“Only twenty? That’s not the best reference tonight.”
I looked at him, confused, then remembered that was how many points our defense gave up.
“Oops,” I said. I waited for him to smile, and, when he did, I followed suit, as we walked a few steps over to the track, then began a slow counterclockwise jog. Coach started out on the inside but then moved to my right shoulder, two lanes over from me. The adjustment felt chivalrous, almost romantic, but I told myself to stop thinking such crazy, delusional thoughts. He probably just preferred an outside lane.
After one straightaway and two curves of the track, not quite a quarter-mile warm-up, I was already sucking wind, my thighs burning. Coach clearly was in better shape than I was, and I vowed to start hitting the gym with some regularity. You’d think dating a professional football player would have motivated me, but there was actually something about Ryan’s ridiculous physique that made me want to blow it off altogether. Running with Coach was a different matter.
After another couple of silent laps, Coach said, “Warmed up? Ready to go?”