Pep Talks (Pepper Jones #4)

by Ali Dean

  “Then why should anyone think we are?” I ask in response.

  Jace leans toward me. “They shouldn’t. I was drunk. For just one night. One night,” he emphasizes. “It’s the first time I’ve ever been drunk in college, and girls thought it meant I wanted more. I didn’t.”

  My eyes narrow and I cross my arms. I don’t like this. Just the idea of girls being all over him makes me feel physically ill.

  “I don’t and I won’t. We will never be an open relationship, Pepper,” he says sternly.

  His reassurances are enough for me. I trust him. But that doesn’t mean I’m okay with this kind of situation repeating itself. “I’m not going to tell you not to drink or not to go out and party like your teammates do. But you’re different from them. You’re stronger but you’re also more vulnerable. Because everyone is watching you, and wants to be a part of your life.”

  Jace is watching me speak, standing close, but not touching me. He knows what I mean. It’s always been this way.

  “You have to be careful.” I’m about to talk to him about his mom, to tell him that no matter how much it hurts, he can’t do anything to destroy what he’s built – his position on the team, his relationship with me, the respect this campus has for him. But despite how different he’s been today, I don’t think he’s ready to talk about her yet.

  “I will be careful,” Jace promises, wrapping his hands around my waist and pulling me into his chest. “For you, I will be.”

  “For us,” I clarify. “And for yourself.”

  Chapter 10

  Over the next few days, we each have an individual meeting with Coach Harding. Mine is one of the last, on Friday following a tempo workout that gave us all a chance to redeem ourselves after the torturous hill sprints.

  The women’s assistant coach, Susan, is also in the office when I knock lightly on the glass door. I’ve already showered and changed in the locker room while I waited for the other freshmen to have their meetings. No one really talks about their meetings, and I find myself incredibly nervous when I finally sit in the chair across from his desk.

  Susan sits in a chair beside me, legs crossed, notebook in her lap, and she smiles reassuringly. Now in her forties, she’s a former collegiate runner who was probably in my shoes at one point.

  “How are things going so far, Pepper?” Coach Harding asks.

  There are a lot of ways to interpret the question. “Good, I think? I mean, the girls on the team are great.”

  Coach nods. “It’s a fine group of women. How do you feel you’ve been handling the workouts?”

  I sit up straighter in my chair. Isn’t he supposed to tell me how he feels I’ve been handling them? “I love doing them with girls instead of the boys’ team,” I answer honestly, and both coaches laugh. “It’s a lot more mileage than I’m used to, but so far I’m feeling pretty good.”

  This is the answer Coach wanted, I can tell by the way his face relaxes and he eases forward in his chair. “No aches or pains?” he clarifies.

  I shake my head, understanding his concern. “No, I think the base mileage I did this summer helped prepare me.” Instead of ramping up my mileage all of a sudden, Coach Harding worked with me as soon as I graduated high school to slowly increase the length of my runs without putting my body under too much stress.

  “Our annual scrimmage is coming up in a couple of weeks, and I’d like to reevaluate where you’re at after that.”

  “What do you mean?” I wonder. The scrimmage – an odd title for a cross meet – is an unofficial race.

  “I don’t want to talk specific goals yet. You’ve still got a lot of adjusting to do, and we need to see how you hold up before putting too many expectations on you.”

  I can’t help a deep frown. I was hoping for more positive feedback than this. He’s not telling me anything about my role on this team. I need goals. I need to know what he expects from me. What the team expects. I thought I’d shown over the past few weeks of workouts that I was worthy of being someone who mattered to this team. I might be a freshman, but I want to make a mark on the UC running program.

  Coach Harding still isn’t sure if I will. Does he think I already reached my peak in high school? Is he wary because of my shin injuries last year?

  Susan interrupts my thoughts. “We usually don’t talk much about specific season goals with the freshmen until late September. There are so few meets in a college season, and it’s hard to tell who will be at those meets this early on.”

  “You mean I might not race this season?” I don’t understand. I’ve given them no reason to think I might not be ready to race. Seven runners can get points for the team at a meet, and they bring twelve runners to most meets except for the last couple. I’m consistently one of the top seven in the workouts.

  “I’m quite confident you’ll be one of our top runners at the championship meets, Pepper,” Coach Harding reassures me. “You’ll find your goals are closely tied with the team’s goals and how everyone does. As you pointed out, you’re not on your own here like you were at Brockton Public.”

  “Yeah, okay. So, just keep doing what I’m doing?”

  “Keep doing exactly what you’re doing.” That’s all he says. And the meeting’s over.

  I don’t know why I leave feeling confused and disappointed. I wanted something more concrete. Even if he told me I needed to pick it up, that he expected me to be the number one runner and lead the team to Nationals, it would have been better to hear than nothing.

  I didn’t do a ton of research on college coaches before I came to UC, because I was always pretty sure this is where I’d go to college. Now I’m wondering if Coach Harding has a reputation for having a hands-off approach. It doesn’t seem that way, aside from the meeting today. He stayed in close contact with me all summer, and he’s always right there at our workouts, watching, calling out splits, encouraging.

  He’s the kind of person you want to impress, and that’s an important attribute for a coach. I want him to trust me too. And I can tell he doesn’t yet. Maybe he’s afraid I’m too fragile. Maybe he doesn’t think I have as much potential as he hoped I would. He was positive but vague about where I stood.

  It’s unsettling.

  The campus is buzzing with energy as I make my way over to Chapman Hall. The first week of classes is over, and though it seems to me like people have been out partying every night already, there’s anticipation for the first weekend of the year with the entire student body, not just the athletes, on campus. And most of the athletes don’t have games or meets yet. We have a long run tomorrow, but that doesn’t seem to be holding back some of my teammates, who tried to get me to join them going out tonight. I haven’t decided yet. I have more homework than I’ve ever had before, but it seems like everyone else still has time to get it done and go out, so I don’t want to be the odd one out.

  I’m surprised to find Chapman Hall almost empty when I arrive. Glancing at my watch, I realize it’s almost eight, and the cafeteria is about to close. My teammates have already left, and I manage to scrounge a decent meal from what’s left at the salad bar.

  I’m eating alone, and feeling a little depressed about it, when Gina places a tray across from mine.

  “Hi,” she says in her no-nonsense voice.

  “Hey, you’re running late from practice too, huh?”

  She shrugs. “Stayed to do a few drills.”

  Drills? I’m about to ask more when I notice the salad on her plate. It’s full of vegetables but has no cheese, bacon, or croutons. None of the good stuff. Most noticeable, though, it has no dressing. I know there were slim pickings because most of the food has been put away already. But it’s weird, for sure – I mean really, a salad without dressing? Yuck.

  Before she can register me scrutinizing her plate, I ask, “Are you going out with the team tonight?”

  She nods. “Yeah, we all try to get our partying in before the season picks up, you know? Because once we’re racing and traveling, we hardl
y have time to keep up with schoolwork.”

  “Makes sense,” I agree, knowing Jace’s team follows a similar approach.

  I notice her watching something over my shoulder and I glance behind me. Clayton Dennison is walking toward us, flashing a smile which is surely responsible for catching Gina’s attention.

  “Hi ladies,” he greets us smoothly before sliding in beside me. “Have we met?” he asks Gina.

  She shakes her head and introduces herself in an uncharacteristically quiet voice.

  “I’m Clayton. Pepper and I went to the same high school,” he explains. “Are you all coming to my party tonight?”

  “You’re having a party?” I ask.

  Before he can respond, Gina says, “Yeah, I think a bunch of us were going to head over there later. You’re at the old Sig Beta house now, right?”

  “Yeah. The former frat brothers are doing all the organizing and shit, but it’s our place now, so they’re just helping us out.”

  It’s news to me that the baseball team took over the fraternity house. If my teammates plan to party there tonight, I’m probably better off staying in and getting homework done.

  My cell phone buzzes from my backpack and I smile when I see who it is.

  Jace: Can we go on a date?

  Me: Yes, please.

  Jace: Second dinner?

  Me: Perfect

  Jace has been in denial all week that Annie is gone. Or he’s convinced himself she’s on vacation and will be back soon. I don’t know because he hasn’t said a thing. And I’m afraid to ask. Cold, angry, hurt Jace sucks. Emotionless remote Jace is even worse. So even though I know the bubble of denial is going to burst at some point here, I’m rolling with it.

  When Gina and I get back to our dorm, Lexi and Caroline are already dressed and ready to go out, along with half the cross team. Someone has brought over loads of cheap liquor, and our common area smells like a party has been going on for hours. How this all went down in the short period of time between the tempo run and now is a mystery to me. Most of the girls had their meetings with Coach earlier in the week. Though mine wasn’t very long, Coach had three meetings before me that were each over thirty minutes, but the rest of the girls couldn’t have been at it for too long if they showered and ate before this. I truly hope they took the time to eat.

  Music is blaring and a rowdy side of my teammates is coming out in full force. It’s not even nine yet and a few of them are well on their way to wasted. It still perplexes me that some of these girls are the fastest college runners in the nation. It’s not what I expected of my college teammates, and I think I like it this way. The excitement in the room is contagious, and by the time I’m changed and back out the door to meet Jace, I’m giddy from the overdose of girl-craziness.

  Jace has dressed up for our date, wearing dark jeans and a button-down shirt that’s not wrinkled. He’s usually in workout clothes or sweats, and I grin when I find him leaning against the hood of his Jeep outside my building. Damn, he looks good. I snap a memory shot of him like this, hands in pockets, gazing up at the sky.

  “What are you thinking about?” I ask when I approach, taking his hand in mine.

  He tilts his head to the side and regards me like he’s seeing me for the first time. “You’re like an oasis to me. Do you know that, Pepper Jones?” Jace remains still, letting me hold his hand, when he speaks. The line is borderline cheesy, and Jace doesn’t do cheesy. Judging by the earnestness in his voice and written all over his face, he means it. “College is crazy. My friends, my teammates, they’re all about fun. I love them, but it’s like they’re trying to escape on nights like tonight, you know?”

  “You would know better than I would,” I remind him. It wasn’t too long ago he sought refuge in drugs, women, parties.

  He nods and looks back up at the sky with a heavy breath. “Yeah, I do know. But that was before I knew what you and I could be. That this could work.” He pulls me into him, so my body is nestled between his legs. “And not just work, but be better than our friendship. Friendships last, and I didn’t want to risk ruining it, but now I know that what we have, it’s gonna last too.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s you, Pep, it always has been. Football is fun and it might be my career someday, but you? You’re it for me. Being a quarterback, leading this team, I love that. But after practice, after games, it’s you who I need. None of it really matters without you in my life.”

  I suck in a breath. Jace has never bared it all quite like this before. And seemingly out of the blue. He tells me he loves me, but this is more than love that he’s declaring. I’m at a loss for words, and all I can do is get closer, pushing up on my toes and tilting my head to find his lips. And when I do, I feel the weight of that truth slide into me and warm my body, my bones. It’s a truth I don’t ever want to question. In this embrace, we are home.

  That is, until Annie decides to burst Jace’s bubble of denial in the worst possible way.

  Chapter 11

  Jace

  Pepper’s been in the passenger seat of my Jeep thousands of times, but I’ll always have trouble keeping my eyes on the road when she’s sitting beside me. Her presence is warm and bright and my eyes just can’t seem to look anywhere but in her direction when they know she’s nearby. And shit, Pepper is beautiful. The kind of beauty that never gets old and never wears off. She has no idea, and that only makes her so much more appealing.

  When I got back to my apartment after practice, Pepper was on my mind. Nothing unusual there. I’m always thinking about the next time I’ll see her, and wondering what she’s doing, how her day is going. It’s been that way for as long as I can remember. Sometimes I get this crazy feeling like Pepper might not have any idea how much she matters to me. It seems so obvious from my perspective that I often don’t vocalize it. But tonight I really wanted to make sure she gets how it is for me.

  When I saw her come out of the building, those long-ass legs trying to distract me from her gorgeous smile as they always do, I fell in love all over again. How many times can you fall in love with the same person? It happens to me every fucking time I see her. I go deeper and deeper and I wonder if there’s a bottom or if it will always be like this.

  I probably sounded like a lovesick asshole when I started telling her how special she is, but when it comes to Pepper Jones, I always have been a total idiot. And seriously, I tried to tone it down, but once I started saying shit, and she looked so blown away, it all poured out. The girl is my light, my center. Like gravity, she keeps me grounded.

  When we get to the restaurant, I run around to the passenger door, eager to have her touching me and at my side. I’m not oblivious to the dudes at the bar checking her out, but she remains clueless as I give them my most intimidating glare. She just leans into me, her happiness pure and transparent. Pepper doesn’t play games with me; she’s always made her emotions and thoughts perfectly clear. I love that about her.

  She’s telling me about her teammates throwing a party in her dorm room, and her innocence is endearing. She wants everyone to be happy and safe, and the constant drinking and partying in college gets to her. She worries. It’s cute. Her capacity to love amazes me. She already feels it for her new teammates, and I’m sure if one of them called her with a crisis right now, she’d do all she could to fix it.

  But it’s my phone that rings. The number is unknown, and I’d normally hit the “decline call” button, since it’s most likely a reporter, but there’s a chance it’s Annie, so I accept the call and bring it to my ear.

  “Jace? Hi baby, it’s your mom.”

  I don’t respond. Her voice is different and I know immediately what that means.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch,” she says, not sounding sorry at all. “I got your messages, it’s just been crazy. Listen, I need your help.”

  Those words hit me like a hammer straight through my ribcage. Fuck, it’s painful. She doesn’t care two shits about me. She just need
s money. I wait for it. I can’t speak as I do. Instead, I throw up the shield I’ve been working on taking down for years. The instinct to protect myself is just too strong, and I couldn’t hold back my armor if I tried. Fucking hammering on your chest is hard to ignore.

  “See, an old girlfriend was driving out west and wanted some company. But we were going over the speed limit when we got to California, and she got pulled over. And then she had some drugs in her car, and now we’re at the police station.”

  She pauses, probably waiting for me to ask what I can do to help. Annie doesn’t know me at all if she thinks I’m coming to her rescue now. “You’re in California?” I ask, just to clarify and to let her know I’m still on the line, though I’m about to hang up. She’s going to ask me for money to bail her out, and I want to confirm that she is capable of stooping that low before I shut her out of my life forever.

  “Yeah, somewhere in Orange County. Look, the drugs weren’t mine. I didn’t even know she had them in there.”

  There’s another long pause. She’s got about twenty more seconds before I’m done.

  “I can’t make my bail, do you think I could borrow some money?”

  “No. I can’t do that.”

  And that’s when I hit the red “end” button. It feels so final, it’s almost a relief. The all-too-familiar sense of rejection and self-pity threatens to pierce through me, but there’s no way I’m letting it. Instead, a coldness washes over me, and I feel nothing at all.

  Pepper’s warmth beside me is suddenly suffocating, and I can’t bring myself to look at her; the brightness and love always emanating from her is blinding and if my eyes adjust, I’m afraid of what will happen. I’d probably destroy this entire restaurant, and those assholes at the bar who blatantly checked out my girlfriend when we walked in. I don’t trust myself with her right now.