by Mike Lupica
“You know what the best thing about him is?” Alex’s dad said when they found their seats before kickoff. “He blocked out all the noise. He ignored the doubters. And it made him stronger and more determined to prove them all wrong.”
She poked him with an elbow. “I get it, Dad,” she said.
“Get what?” he said. “Just making an observation.”
“So you’re saying I’m the Lamar of seventh-grade football?” she said.
“How are all the ones who doubted you looking right now?”
“Long way to go,” she said.
He scratched his head and said, “I could swear I’ve heard that one before.”
The Steelers lost to the Ravens. Or, more accurately, they lost to Lamar Jackson. He ended up throwing for more than three hundred yards, and he ran for a hundred more, throwing one touchdown pass and running for another.
He did all that. He was all that.
On the way home Alex said to her dad, “I wish my teammates loved me the way the Ravens love Lamar.”
“They’ll come around.”
“You really believe that?” Alex said. “We’ve already played more than half the season.”
“I’ll level with you,” her dad said. “If a girl had made my team in high school, I probably would have initially reacted the same way as your teammates.”
“Because you would’ve thought a girl shouldn’t be playing with boys?”
“No,” he said. “I just think everybody is resistant to change, at least at first. But pretty soon they’ll realize you’re there for the same reason they are: to play. You’re on common ground.”
“So you would have gotten over it—is that what you’re saying?” Alex said.
“Part of maturing is becoming more open-minded,” he said. “The boys on your team have only ever known one way of playing football: without girls. Now that they’re playing with a girl, it’ll broaden their horizons a bit. “
“Put me down as a doubter on that,” Alex said.
“One more person you’ll have to prove wrong,” Jack Carlisle said to his daughter.
29
In her room later that evening, Alex did the last of her homework, then read a few more pages of the Aaron Rodgers biography her dad bought her. He was her original favorite quarterback, before Lamar Jackson came on the scene.
She’d smiled when she found her clean jersey and football pants neatly folded on her desk chair. When it came to laundry, Jack Carlisle didn’t mess around.
She was lying on the bed with Simba beside her. Just another reminder of how far she’d come since that day at the fair. At the time, she’d thought her three chances at the carnival game would be the only throws she’d get to make all year.
Or ever.
And that Simba would be the only football prize she’d ever win.
But now she was a quarterback on the Orville Owls, trying to win games and setting her sights on a much bigger prize: the league’s championship trophy.
“Sophie’s right,” Alex said to her lion. “We have come a long way, you and me.”
She still didn’t feel like part of the team the way you were supposed to. And that made her sad sometimes. Made her miss soccer, too, and almost regret quitting the team. Almost. She was the girl who’d done this because she’d wanted to prove that she could be great at something, better than she’d ever been at anything else. But she’d also wanted to be a part of something bigger than herself.
Maybe her mom was right.
Maybe you didn’t always get it all, no matter how much you wanted it. There would always be a stumbling block in the way.
But those blocks were fewer now. Every time she gave out the play in the huddle, or took it upon herself to make a play, the other guys saw what she was made of. They had to acknowledge her as part of the team.
When she was out there, she loved being a football player more than she ever thought she would.
It might not have turned out exactly the way she’d imagined. But for now, it would have to be enough. Because her heart was set on a much bigger prize: the championship. She wanted that in football more than in any other sport. And soon it became clear to her why. After all the hurdles she’d had to overcome just to be on the team, winning the championship would be like icing on the cake. The climax of her story. Like reaching the top of a mountain. She wanted to be out there, hoisting the championship trophy high in the air, surrounded by her teammates—the ones who accepted her and the ones who didn’t.
“It doesn’t mean I don’t think you were a prize, Simba,” she whispered in her room. “I’m just looking for one more.”
Then she rolled her eyes. I’m talking to a stuffed animal.
She hugged him tight to her chest. Some of her friends might say that stuffed animals were too babyish for a seventh grader. But Alex didn’t care. They comforted her. And comfort was what she needed right now.
Ordinarily, Alex put her phone on silent when she was studying or reading. But she’d forgotten tonight and heard a faint buzzing now, coming from her nightstand. She reached over and grabbed her phone, checking the screen.
Mom.
She’d made sure to call after every one of Alex’s games, whether they took place on Saturdays or Sundays.
“Hey, Mama,” Alex said.
“Hey, you,” her mom said. “I just spent about seventeen hours straight at the hospital and didn’t get the chance to call yesterday. Did we win or lose?”
“Won.”
“How’d you do?”
“Really well,” Alex said.
“No surprise there,” her mom said. “How much did you get to play?”
“A lot,” Alex said. “From the second quarter on.”
She told her mom what Coach said about not wanting to mess with success.
“Sounds like the success is you, hon,” her mom said. “Of course, I don’t know a lot about sports.”
“Oh, I think we’ve established that,” Alex said.
She heard her mom giggle. The more they had these postgame calls, the closer Alex felt to her. Not as close as some mothers and daughters, but one step at a time. Right now, her mom was like the big sister Alex never had.
“But even though I am no expert,” her mom said, “it seems to me that if you’re the best quarterback on the team, you’re the one who should be starting.”
“It’s not that big a deal to me,” Alex said. But even as the words left her mouth, she knew they were a lie.
“Are you sure about that?”
“Mom, it’s not like I could change Coach’s mind even if I tried,” she said. “Which I refuse to do.”
“Okaaaay,” her mom said in singsong, “but I bet there isn’t another position where the best person for the job isn’t the one starting.”
“So you think it’s because I’m a girl.”
“I don’t think. I know.”
“You’re not even here,” Alex said.
It came out harsher than she’d meant. It sounded like criticism even if all she was doing was stating a fact.
Long pause now from her mom’s end of the call.
“I know I’m not,” she said finally.
“I didn’t mean it to sound like a bad thing,” Alex said. “I promise. It’s just—”
“You don’t have to apologize for anything,” her mom said. “You’re my hero for doing this. And I want you to know that even though I’m not there, I’m still here for you. I’m just frustrated that my daughter has to suffer through the same double standards as I did all those years ago.”
“I know,” Alex said. “But all I can do is keep my head down and continue doing what I’m doing.”
“I hear you,” her mom said. “You’ve rocked their world. You don’t want to rock the boat.”
“Okay,” Alex said.
“Enough rocking for one night.”
“Roger that.”
“Hey, at least I’ve got the coach on my side,” Alex said. “I sure didn’t see that coming.”
“Well, he wants to win, doesn’t he?” Dr. Liza Borelli said. “Remind your father to send me some video. I think he forgot yesterday.”
Alex said she would.
“How are things going with your friend Gabe, by the way?”
“Great on the field,” Alex said. “But nothing’s changed between us off it.”
“So he’s still being a wimpball.”
“He’s not a wimpball,” Alex said. “Which isn’t even a word, pretty sure.”
“I know, I just made it up,” her mom said.
“He’s a good guy,” Alex said. “He didn’t sign up for being in the middle of all this.”
“So you’re not mad at him?”
“Not mad,” Alex said. “Maybe a little disappointed. But definitely not mad.”
Just then, Alex heard some voices in the background through the phone.
“Gotta go, babe. But I love you,” Alex’s mom said. “Whether I’m there or not.”
“I know,” Alex said. “Love you, too.”
She pressed END on her phone and plunked down in her desk chair. A framed photo of her and her mom sat on her window ledge. It was from when her mom had come to visit last fall. They were standing on a dock at Orville Lake, her mom with an arm wrapped around Alex’s shoulder, the multicolored leaves peppering the background.
They were both smiling.
Alex stared at the picture.
“Here for me,” she said to Simba. “But definitely not here.”
30
The regular season was set to end two Saturdays before Thanksgiving. If the Owls made the championship game, it would be scheduled for the Saturday after that, at the home field of the team with the best record in the league.
Three games left. Three teams tied with one loss. The Owls were one of them. The others—Carrolton and Washington Falls—were still on the schedule, so the Owls could either knock them both out or get knocked out themselves. To Alex, it felt as if the playoffs had already begun.
October now in Orville. Football weather almost every single day in western Pennsylvania. Sometimes when they’d practice, the temperature would be in the fifties.
Fine with Alex.
It was just cool enough to offer some relief when they worked up a sweat during practice. Way different than having to sit in the stands at Heinz Field mid-December in freezing temperatures. Before those frigid days arrived, she’d take advantage of the cool air, the changing leaves, and not having to bundle up in winter gear.
The Owls had a bye week before their game against the Carrolton Saints. But the Steelers were playing at home that weekend against the Packers. That meant seeing Aaron Rodgers in person. The Packers didn’t come to Pittsburgh every year the way Lamar Jackson and the Ravens did. So this was like a bonus for Alex, getting to see her two favorite quarterbacks in the same season.
The Packers didn’t beat the Steelers this time. But Aaron Rodgers still put on a show in the last minute of the game. Trailing 42–37, he refused to give up until the Steelers recovered an onside kick after Rodgers’s last touchdown pass.
The thing Alex loved most about watching the Packers was the way Rodgers’s receivers reacted when he had to make a break from the pocket and run for it.
“It’s like they all know where to be once he’s scrambling around,” Alex said to her dad as they headed into the parking lot after the game.
“Every action in football produces a reaction,” he replied.
“But that’s when it’s fun,” she said. “When you have to make things up as you go.”
“By the way,” he said, “what their receivers do? That’s what Gabe does when you’re in trouble. It’s why you two make a great combination.”
“On the field,” she said.
“You haven’t been talking much about him,” Jack Carlisle observed. Alex knew her dad would never pry into her personal life, and she could tell he was trying to be respectful of her privacy.
“Nothing much to talk about.”
“Maybe you need to talk about it with him.”
Alex scoffed. “Believe me, I’ve tried.”
“Lately?”
“No,” she said. “But it wouldn’t make any difference if I did.”
“Maybe it’s like when you scramble,” her dad said, grinning. “He’s just waiting for you to make the first move so he can make one of his own.”
They were almost to their car by then.
“What if I do and it doesn’t work?” Alex said.
“You won’t know until you try.”
The next day at school, it was Gabe who made the first move.
Just not in a way that Alex would ever have expected.
Especially not from him.
* * *
• • •
Sophie had a loose filling, and her mom was taking her to the dentist during lunch. Jabril was in the library, getting some extra studying in before his English test next period. So Alex sat alone. There was a time when that would have made her feel embarrassed or self-conscious or just plain weird. It didn’t now. If she’d learned anything from being on the football team, it was that being alone this way, even in a cafeteria full of her classmates, was far from the worst thing in the world.
She just wished she’d brought a book to read.
She was about halfway through her mac and cheese when Lindsey Stiles, Annie Burgess, Mallory Bidwill, and three other girls on the soccer team walked up to her table. Safety in numbers, Alex thought.
“Eating with all your friends?” Lindsey said.
Annie, Alex noticed, didn’t laugh. But Mallory reacted as if that were the funniest thing anybody had ever said at Orville Middle School.
“Good one, Lindsey,” Alex said. “Original. Didn’t see that one coming.”
There was nowhere for her to go. She wasn’t about to give Lindsey Stiles the satisfaction of getting up and walking away. Alex knew it would look as if Lindsey had the upper hand. Like what she said had an effect on Alex. Which it didn’t.
Not anymore.
“Sorry,” Lindsey said. “You actually do have one friend. Where is that loser Sophie?”
Lindsey was always loud, even when she wasn’t trying to be. She just had one of those annoying voices that carried from a distance. Alex thought if she weren’t so obnoxious, Lindsey would have made a good cheerleader. But one thing never changed with her: when she was talking—and she talked a lot—it sounded to Alex like a fingernail scraping across a blackboard.
Everyone in the cafeteria was watching now.
It had become a show, some free entertainment.
“Here’s a heads-up, Linds,” Alex said. “The loser isn’t Sophie.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’ll figure it out,” Alex said.
She saw Lindsey’s face redden slightly.
“At least I have friends,” Lindsey said, arms crossed. “Plural.”
“Sure,” Alex said. “Keep telling yourself that.”
Lindsey bristled. Clearly Alex had struck a nerve. She figured that would be the end of the conversation, but apparently Lindsey had more to say.
“Come on, Alex,” Lindsey coaxed. “You’re the least popular girl in our grade right now. You know who wanted you to go out for the boys’ football team? You and nobody else.”
Alex was preparing a retort when she heard a voice from behind her.
“I did, actually.”
She didn’t have to turn around to know who the voice belonged to. Even if she hadn’t heard it too much lately.
Gabe.
“I’m not talking to you,”
Lindsey said, scowling at him.
“But it sounded like you were talking on my behalf,” Gabe said. “Which you don’t get to do.”
Lindsey hadn’t moved. But her posture seemed to weaken, as if she were figuratively taking a step back.
“This is between Alex and me,” she said.
“Well, you and practically half the soccer team,” Gabe said, gesturing to the five girls behind her.
If there were kids in the cafeteria who hadn’t been watching before, they were now. Though they had to listen extra closely to hear Gabe, who spoke as quietly as he always did.
Alex looked back at Lindsey. It seemed the tables had turned. Now Lindsey was on the defensive. Trying to save face. Alex didn’t follow Lindsey Stiles on Instagram. She’d stopped following everybody except Sophie, pretty much. But Lindsey fancied herself the Instagram queen of Orville Middle. Sophie once remarked that Lindsey thought posting what she’d eaten for breakfast that day was fascinating to the rest of the world.
Surely, Alex thought, Lindsey didn’t think what was happening now was Insta-worthy. Nevertheless, the entire lunchroom was paying attention.
She wasn’t giving up without a fight, though.
“Let me get this straight,” Lindsey said. “You’re saying you do want Alex on the team? Because that’s not what my cousin says.”
Alex’s dad had always taught her that character was something you showed even when nobody was around to see it. But Gabe Hildreth was about to show his now, with most of the school watching.
“He’s right,” Gabe said. “I didn’t at first.”
Alex waited.
“But I do now,” he said, without a hint of hesitation. “Big-time.”
Lindsey opened her mouth. Then closed it. She turned to her teammates, rolling her eyes. “This is boring,” she said. “Let’s get out of here.”
The other girls followed her lead, but Annie slowed, glancing back at Alex until they locked eyes.
Something passed between them, but Alex couldn’t pin down exactly what. Then Annie turned and rejoined the group.
Alex watched them go, a mix of pride and relief settling in.
Though, just when she thought the curtain had fallen on their little show, Lindsey was back for an encore.
