“Grief is not a good excuse for lying and cheating.”
“It may not be an excuse, but it’s a fairly compelling reason. Besides, you know you didn’t actually cheat on me, right? We weren’t together and you didn’t have to tell me about Tori if you didn’t want to. Coming out is different for everyone. If you weren’t ready to tell me yet, you weren’t ready. That’s not something I should have been angry about.”
“But it’s not that I wasn’t ready to come out to you. Really. I think I was just scared.”
“Of what? Did you think I would be upset about you being bi? Because, you know, some of my best friends are bisexual.”
“Ha, ha.” Emma was quiet. Then she took an audible breath. “No, I was scared that you’d realize how I felt about you and, I don’t know, we wouldn’t be friends anymore. So instead I let you find out in the worst possible way and lost you anyway.”
Jamie lowered her voice. “How did you feel about me?” She had wanted to know the answer to this question for ten years and wasn’t about to let the chance to learn the answer slip away.
“Jamie…”
“Would you rather I go first? Because I’ll say it if you want me to.”
Emma’s voice was practically a whisper. “You know how I felt.”
“Do I?”
The words came out in a rush: “I was in love with you.”
Her throat tightened and Jamie closed her eyes, trying to block out everything but the sound of her heartbeat rushing in her ears. “I was in love with you too.”
“You were?”
She opened her eyes. “Oh my god, how could you not know that?”
“You weren’t exactly an open book,” Emma pointed out. “Besides, you cut me off and then never spoke to me again. For all I knew it was easy for you to walk away.”
“I honestly think it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.”
“Same.” She paused. “Did you know I got my first tattoo the week you stopped talking to me?”
“No.” Jamie frowned a little, picturing the tattoos she knew Emma had. There was the requisite bicep tat, which in Emma’s case was a tribal band with geometric markings. Her version of the always-popular script on the ribcage read RISE in flowing letters just below her heart. And then there was the field of flowers inked on her right shoulder blade, an artist’s rendition of a meadow near Mt. Rainier according to the article Jamie had read a few years ago.
Huh. She seemed to know a lot about Emma’s tattoos. “Which one?” she asked.
“You haven’t seen it before. Not many people have.”
Before she could ask why, her phone buzzed: Text message from Emma Blakeley. With attachment. “Did you send me a naked pic?” Her heart rate picked up again at the thought.
“You wish. Open it.”
The attachment was a close-up from an artist’s portfolio of a compass tattoo, and Jamie studied it. “That kind of looks like the necklace I gave you.”
“That’s because I asked the artist to use it as the basis of the design.”
Jamie felt a surge of strong emotion—was it relief? Gratitude? All those years she had worried that Emma had turned to Tori because she hadn’t cared about her enough, only to find out that she’d had a tattoo of the spiral sun Jamie had given her permanently inked into her skin.
She cleared her throat. “What about the compass?”
“Sailors used to believe that a compass tattoo would protect them in rough waters and make sure they returned home safely.”
A memory glimmered at the back of her mind. Emma’s dad had taught her how to sail when she was young, before his surgical work had taken over and he’d all but vanished from his kids’ lives. “You got it for your dad, didn’t you?”
“Yeah.” Jamie heard her swallow. “And for you.”
Jamie didn’t say anything, just stared up at the same ceiling she used to gaze at back in high school when she would talk to Emma for hours on end about classes and soccer and teammates and friends, everything except what she had wanted so badly to say: I love you. I miss you. I would give anything to be with you.
“Emma, what are we doing?” she asked, and then couldn’t breathe as the words hung between them like a row of Japanese lanterns that, given the slightest encouragement, would burst into flames.
“I don’t know. Being friends?”
“This isn’t how I am with my other friends.”
“Oh thank god.”
Jamie couldn’t prevent the short laugh that escaped. “Thank god?”
“I’m not like this with my friends either.”
“Okay, then.”
“Okay.”
They were both quiet, and then Emma said, “I have a question for you.”
Jamie waited, but the question didn’t come. Was she nervous? Should Jamie be nervous too? “I have an answer,” she tried joking, and then wanted to smack herself. That was what she had told Emma not to do.
“I don’t have to be in Texas until next Wednesday,” Emma said, her voice growing stronger as she spoke, “and I was thinking—I owe you a visit.”
“You do?” Jamie practically breathed into the phone, not even caring that she sounded nearly as delighted as she felt.
“I do. I never got a chance to see you before I left for North Carolina, so I was wondering—any chance you feel like having a visitor?”
“I would love a visitor,” Jamie said. “Like, a ridiculously insane amount.”
“All right then. I’ll look at flights tonight and call you?”
“Perfect.”
And it was. Even though Jamie was pretty sure how her day was going to go—the doctor would confirm her diagnosis of a moderate strain (or worse), and she would have to tell Craig and hear him explain why she wouldn’t be going anywhere with the national team anytime soon—even though the sky was gray and she was stuck in her parents’ house in the very definition of the phrase in limbo, Emma was planning to call her tonight to talk about when she could come see her. Even more, Jamie had finally asked the question repeating on loop through her mind, and Emma had sounded relieved when Jamie admitted her feelings went beyond friendship, too.
Soccer was certainly the be-all and end-all of her professional life, but as much as she had believed it constituted her entire life, she was starting to think she might have been a little bit, very much wrong.
Chapter Thirteen
Jamie scrolled through her phone as she sat on a bench outside Cal’s medical center waiting for a city bus. She had just met with the team physician for the university’s soccer program, a man who was normally booked up well in advance. But Becca’s parents, the Professors Thompson, had called in a favor last week and voila, an appointment had magically opened up. He had indeed confirmed what she already thought—the muscle strain was officially of the moderate variety. The good news was that with rest and physical therapy, it should heal completely in a few weeks. The bad news was—same.
Campus was only a mile and a half from home, and normally she would walk. But she was on strict instructions to rest her leg for the next forty-eight hours before beginning PT on Wednesday—“assuming you want it to heal,” the doctor had joked. She’d smiled back because he was doing her a favor and also because he had seemed excited to meet her. Apparently he’d Googled her and read an article on ESPN.com that claimed she might be the next greatest thing ever to happen to the national team.
She should probably read that article, she told herself, navigating to Google. Maybe even tweet the link to the national team coaching staff? That would totally help her chances at becoming an NT regular. Before the bitterness could take too deep a hold, she closed the browser window, opened her contacts, and pressed the call button.
Emma’s voice vibrated into her headphones: “I was just thinking about you. How did it go?”
Almost immediately Jamie felt herself relaxing. Emma sounded warm and caring. She also sounded too far away. “Not so great. I’m supposed to be calling Craig rig
ht now.”
“But you accidentally dialed me instead?”
“Something like that.”
Emma paused, and her voice lost its teasing lilt. “You won’t be ready in time for Texas, will you?”
“Probably not. They don’t even want me to start PT for another couple of days.”
“Shit. I’m so sorry, Jamie.”
“Melanie basically said I needed to be injury-free if I wanted to make the squad, so…”
“That’s ridiculous. It’s a contact sport! We’re bound to get injured.”
“Yeah, but some of us more than others, huh?”
Emma sighed but didn’t argue. “This sucks.”
“I agree.” She hesitated. “I miss you.”
“I miss you too. Like, a ridiculously insane amount.”
Sitting on a bench in Berkeley chatting with Emma up in Seattle was almost too familiar. Apparently she’d been more right than she realized when she told Clare she would always have feelings for Emma.
“Will you call me after you talk to Craig?” Emma asked. “Even if it isn’t good news?”
“Of course. But are you sure you want me to? I could text if you’d rather.”
“No—unless you’d rather?”
She stopped the of course not waiting to trip from her tongue. “Either one.”
“In that case I vote call. Then we can open ESPN3 and find something to watch together. You know, like maybe curling.”
“What the hell, Blake? We’re not Canadian.”
“No, but it’s really awesome. I swear. Give it a chance.”
Jamie smiled a little. “Wouldn’t you rather do something else with the rest of your day?”
“Seeing as I’m currently in my pajamas…”
A text alert sounded, and Jamie opened a photo attachment that showed Emma in plaid flannel pants and a battered UNC hoodie, her hair in a messy bun, glasses slipping down her nose.
“I feel like all that’s missing is your retainer,” she said.
“You think you’re joking and yet my retainer is literally sitting on the table by my bed.”
Jamie laughed. “Sounds like we have an ESPN3 date later.”
“Awesome. My favorite.”
“Thanks, Emma,” she added. “Seriously.”
“You don’t have to thank me.”
Which was becoming something of a recurring theme between them.
As a bus neared, Jamie checked the route on its digital sign. The winter afternoon was chilly but she was tempted to wave it past. After spending the last three years in a foreign city playing and working for one of the best football clubs in the world, she was going a little stir crazy watching Netflix and doing puzzles in her childhood bedroom. Still, she couldn’t delay calling Craig forever, and she’d rather not have that particular conversation in public. She stood up and flagged down the bus, fishing in her jacket pocket for her mother’s bus pass.
“Hey, I should probably hang up. I’m about to get on a bus.”
“Does that mean you’ll be home soon?”
“Fifteen minutes, tops.”
“Okay. Good luck. Call me after you talk to Craig?”
“I will. See you, Emma.”
“Later, James. And remember: Everything will work out, one way or another.”
“I know,” she said, and sighed. “It always does.”
They hung up and Jamie stepped aboard the bus, limping up the three steps to the seating level. She ran her pass through the correct slot and nodded at the driver before moving past and collapsing in the first seat she could find. Strange how much effort everything suddenly required when you were in pain. She wished she were still chatting with Emma as the bus meandered along the streets of her hometown and she tried not to think about the phone call she was about to make. Right now her national team dream was still alive. Somehow she had a feeling that it wouldn’t be for long.
Back at the house, Jamie struggled up the front steps. Once inside she shed her jacket and stepped out of her sneakers. Then she propelled herself across the main room to the couch, barely pausing to turn on a light. How could she be this exhausted? She hadn’t done anything. Apparently the more you slept the more tired you were. Good to know.
Phone in hand, she mentally ran through the now-imminent conversation about her future with the national team. There was really only one possible outcome. She tried telling herself she was okay with whatever happened, but that was a flat-out lie. Now that she knew the coaches had been planning to invite her on the road trip and, presumably, to Portugal, it was harder to accept the coming rejection than if she had never spoken with Ellie.
Stupid body. Three strikes and you’re out, right? Fortunately, soccer didn’t have a prescribed number of outs. Though it was possible Craig might feel differently.
She turned her phone back on and hit a button. Then she typed, “Do I have to do this? Can’t I wait until tomorrow?”
“Do it,” Emma typed back. “ESPN3 later, remember?”
“How could I forget? I mean, it’s curling.”
Emma sent her a kiss.
She touched the tiny red heart and sighed even though no one was there to appreciate her dramatics. “I’ll call you soon.”
Emma sent back a thumbs-up.
No more stalling. It was time to—huh, why did the only applicable clichés she could think of involve guns or toilets? Really, there should be… She forced her mind away from the tempting tangent, rubbed her palms against her Arsenal team sweats, and finally hit the call button.
Craig picked up on the second ring. “Maxwell. What’s the verdict?”
She gave him the news, forcing the words out of a throat that seemed determined to hold onto each syllable, and then tried not to bite a hole in her lip as Craig blabbed sort of generally about timing and fitness and the importance of building team chemistry before the Algarve.
Finally he worked himself up to the words she’d known were coming but that, even so, sucked the air out of her: “The thing is, this isn’t the first time an injury has set you back.”
He paused as if waiting for her to reply, but Jamie sat motionless, trying to ignore the impulse to hang up on him. She knew what he was going to say. She’d known before she called him. Why did she have to listen?
He spoke into the gap her silence left, his voice surprisingly gentle. “I’m sure you know you’re a wonderful player, Jamie. It’s been a real pleasure watching you play. The other coaches and I appreciate your work ethic and the effort you expend every time you get on the field, but we’ve talked and given this latest injury, we’ve decided to go in a different direction. It doesn’t mean you’re permanently out of contention. By all means, you should keep up your training and fitness not only for the NWSL but because you never know what can happen down the road.”
Or at least, that was what she thought he said. Her mind sort of went blank when she heard the part about going in another direction. After that, she focused mostly on trying to make sure she didn’t cry as she thanked him for the opportunity and wished him and the team luck. Then she sat silently again, waiting for him to hang up. Hitting the end button herself would feel too final, too much like saying a permanent goodbye even though he’d said the future wasn’t set in stone. Right now she felt like she knew exactly what her future held: a short career in the States for as long as the NWSL stayed in business and then a few years bouncing around Europe eking out her playing years until finally it came time to retire and figure out what she was going to do with the rest of her life.
So many women she knew—and more she didn’t—would have given anything for the chance to play on even the crappiest managed, least successful team in the NWSL. It was a privilege to serve both club and country, and she’d been lucky to ride the wave for as long and as far as she had. Now it appeared her luck had run out. She hadn’t made the team, and from the genuine sympathy in Craig’s voice, she had a feeling she wouldn’t be getting another chance. Not on his watch, anyway.
<
br /> He must have known she was waiting because with a final few words, he said goodbye and ended the call. She sat on the familiar couch in the living room of her childhood home and tried to accept that her childhood dream was over. Tried to accept that her stupid body had gotten her chucked from the stupid national team by a stupid bunch of coaches who surely would have put up with the groin and the ankle and the ACL if they only believed in her enough. They had to know that she had periods of perfect health that lasted MONTHS, for Christ’s sake, and that no professional athlete could guarantee their body’s functionality, especially not, as Emma had pointed out, when the career in question revolved around a contact fucking sport.
Emma. She almost wished now that she hadn’t promised to call her. It wasn’t that Emma had done anything wrong. If anything, it was the opposite. Somehow they had carried this dynamic over from teenage-hood, the one where Emma was older and more successful at nearly everything and Jamie was younger and still, somehow, floundering. She got that in the world she had chosen, in the profession she was lucky enough to claim as her own, she couldn’t always win. No matter how hard she worked, there was always the possibility that she would come up short; the chance that she simply wouldn’t be good enough to achieve the goal she had set for herself.
She knew all that, she really did. But still. Bottom line, she hadn’t made the national team. And honestly? She would rather not have to admit that fact to Emma.
But Emma apparently had no intention of letting her sulk in peace. As Jamie sat numbly watching the winter sky darken outside the living room window, her phone buzzed. Reluctantly she opened up the message, snorting a little at the picture of a laptop and a Seattle microbrew balanced on Emma’s fancy corkwood lap board.
“Hello, I was promised a date,” her message read.
“Right,” Jamie replied, smiling slightly in spite of herself. “Give me a minute, okay?”
“Did you reach Craig?”
“Yeah.” She sighed again. “I’ll call you in a sec. Gotta get my laptop.”
She was about to start up the stairs to her room when the doorbell rang. Great. Just what she didn’t need. Her parents had lived in this house forever and seemed to know everyone within a ten-block radius, which meant neighbors were always randomly dropping by. She thought about not answering, but instead she limped to the door and pulled it open. Then she froze as the person on the front stoop spun around, eyes wide, fingers playing with the tip of her ponytail.
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