by Emma Kress
“She looks like Spider-Man,” I whisper to Liv.
“Spider-Woman,” Liv corrects.
We applaud when she finishes, and she does a few aerials to rejoin us.
“My turn.” Ava grins. She takes off right away, making it a whole new course. Instead of leaping up the crossed planks, she uses her arms to swing herself up. When she reaches the top of one of the crates, she backs up, runs at the edge, kicks her leg out, and twist-flips down to the crate below. We cheer and holler. Cristina cartwheels across the boards and then tries to take the wall of the crate at a run but she only makes it halfway, so Ava reaches out and grabs her hand and pulls her up.
After they hop down, smiles wide, Bella goes. Instead of starting with the beams, she uses the wall and crates to climb to the second-story window. She’s not elegant, exactly, but she’s fast. She slips and falls to the crate below and struggles to heave herself up, all elbows and knees. Finally, she reaches the open window, and even though she’s standing silhouetted against the late-afternoon sky, I can tell she’s grinning. She lets out a howl and front flips onto the top crate, flipping from the higher to the lower blocks until she gets to the ground. We cheer and scream, and when she’s finally standing, she’s still smiling.
“Try to go fast,” she says. “Don’t think too much.”
Liv goes next, fast and sure, leaping from one board to the next like she’s a pebble skipping across the lake. Then Dylan. She’s upside down when I expect her to be right-side up, she’s flying when I expect her to climb. At school, she always seems so weighed down—her wallet chain low and thick against her thigh, but here she’s different. She skips across the beams and lands light and quick on the planks. And she’s laughing. Even when she falls. Even when she gets a long scrape on her shin. She’s laughing the whole damned time.
And it hits me—the thing I’ve hated about parkour all this time. It’s the opposite of field hockey with its rules, lines, and whistle-ready refs. Fockey is a firefly in a jar. The containment is what makes it so bright. But parkour. Parkour is setting the firefly free. It’s conjuring a field of fireflies out of air. It’s making magic in a hollowed, broken nothing of a building.
Dylan and Liv are laughing together, chugging water, their bodies coated in a film of grime and red dust from the bricks they scaled.
I look down at this body that’s run miles, lifted weights, beat defenders, won games.
I jump to the first plank, wobble, sway, and fall.
“You got this, Capitán!” Cristina shouts.
“Be fierce!” Liv calls.
I hop back up and look ahead, forcing myself to trust my feet. I cartwheel onto the next beam. They cheer. I stand, looking at my feet, my solid, strong feet that have run thousands of miles, and wonder if maybe they want a break, a taste of air and weightlessness. I close my eyes for a breath and remember what it felt like to be little, when twisting and flipping in gymnastics class was as regular as running. When swinging in Dad’s arms was just how we danced. I bend my knees, swing my arms down, and whoosh.
Backflip.
I land on both feet with a scream and a laugh and look back at Liv, whose hands are on her cheeks. She’s screaming herself hoarse.
I flew.
I spin back to the beam and I flip over it again, and again. Because I can. And then I remember there’s a whole playground of planks and crates and I sprint hard at the corner, using my hands and feet to bounce off the wall and I am flying I am flying I am flying.
I bound up the boxes to the windowsill and look out over this worn shell of a building and I think that it’s never seen so much life and beauty as it has today.
Nikki was right. The architect who designed it and the poor guys who slogged here had no vision of all the possibilities waiting to be discovered between these walls.
Coach said it’s about drawing boundaries. But maybe it’s about erasing them.
I’m coated in dust, my knuckles are raw, the smell of dirt and metal’s in my nose, and my cheeks hurt from smiling. I howl up at the sky, the setting sun warm on my back, the cars screaming past the roofless hole. And I think there’s nothing better than howling at their wheels and the sky and this broken city from this broken building.
I feel like a secret. Strong. Invincible.
The whole world is infinite, open—ours.
SEVENTEEN
LATER THAT NIGHT, WE COME back together for a sleepover in the triplets’ furnished basement—complete with seventies wallpaper, a wooden bar, cheesy nautical accents, and a giant wraparound blue velour couch. I arrive with two gallons of Big Bob’s ice cream. Ava brings a ton of soda thanks to her employee discount at Jake’s Beverages. Nikki hooks us up with pies from her uncle’s place, Pecora’s Pizza. Cristina brings Doritos and Cheetos Puffs, mostly for Ava. Michaela tries to health us up with carrots, but they stay as untouched as Sasha’s vegan cheeseless pizza. And the triplets’ mom makes Rice Krispies Treats the size of my head.
“I’m glad you’re back.” Ava throws her arm around me while she’s putting the sodas in the fridge and I’m loading the ice cream into the freezer.
“Thanks for knowing what I needed today.”
She nods at me. “I need you.” Ava’s eyes hold mine. “I can’t captain out there by myself.”
“Sorry, I—”
She shakes her head. “It’s okay. Whatever it was, I’m just glad you’re back.”
I’ve missed her. I’ve missed this. “Absofockinglutely, Cap’n.”
She grins. “Aye, aye, Cap’n.”
When we get downstairs, there’s a cheesy movie on TV and the others are talking about our game on Monday against Lymesburg. Liv scooches over on the big couch and I squeeze between her and Nikki.
“I say we don’t focus on the last few games,” Ava says. “Instead, let’s—”
“—focus on States,” I say, the words lifting my chin.
“Yaaaaas,” and “Absofockinglutely,” and “Sticks Chicks,” they chorus.
“Can we still qualify?” Sasha asks, her face a nervous question. “I mean, given—”
“We can take one more loss. That’s it.” Ava is 100 percent business. And I feel the weight of all she’s been carrying on her own since … Before.
“Okay, then.” Kiara claps. “Then we win. Because my dad made it to States for basketball—but he didn’t win. We’re gonna win.”
“Fock yeah.” Dylan throws her arm across Kiara’s shoulders. “I want to see your dad’s face when we take it.”
“He’s still bitter about it too.” Kiara shakes her head, smiling. “As if he would have been a better baller than a lawyer.”
“What kind of lawyer is he?” Michaela asks.
“Social justice stuff mainly.”
“He’s saving the world,” Dylan says, a proud note in her voice, “one case at a time.”
“Yeah yeah,” Kiara says. “But did he win States?”
“Nope!” we chorus.
“My dad—I don’t even know.” Michaela shakes her head. “The powers of speech might just leave him completely. But I’m not doing it for him.” Her voice is quiet, sure.
“Why then? For college?”
“No,” Michaela says.
Kiara grins. “That’s because Harvard goes to sleep with her picture on their bedroom wall.”
We laugh, and Michaela swats Kiara.
“Noooo. I want to prove to myself that I can win here too, outside of school. Plus”—she wiggles her eyebrows—“it would be so cool to be valedictorian and state champ.”
We whistle and clap. Michaela’s smile widens.
“At least you’ll have another shot next year, but not us. Right, Nikki?” Cristina slaps Nikki’s knee.
“Screw that,” Ava says. “We all have to bring it this year. Cap’n and I have scholarships riding on this.”
“Yeah.” Bella sighs. “Let’s put it this way: Scholarships would make college hella better for our parents.”
“Triplets,
” Liv whispers. “That’s like—”
“Don’t do the math,” Quinn says. “It ain’t pretty.” She preens. “But I am!”
Bella and Sasha yell, “We’re prettier!”
They do this goofy dance to “Three Is a Magic Number.” It’s so choreographed you know they’ve done it a thousand times, and we holler as they fall onto the couch.
When I finally slip into bed that night, I know that even though I’ll be sore, we’ll win Monday against Lymesburg.
And we do.
* * *
I ride the high of it all—the warehouse, the sleepover, the win. Of how it feels to have life grow beyond one awful night.
The rush fires my muscles at practice. I want it to push us to another victory on Friday.
The last time we played East Ridge, we lost. Their cleats kicked our three wins in a row to the ground. So the night before, I do everything right: I work out without overdoing it; I eat my pasta; I go to bed early. We can’t afford another loss if we’re going to make it to sectionals.
But in the first half, their orange socks are everywhere and my stick can’t escape theirs. They intercept every pass. They’re at every turn. They snatch the ball mid-dribble.
It’s 1 to 0 at the half. We cannot let them take this from us.
At the start of the second, the sweat pools in my goggles, the stick slips in my hands. I grip it tighter. Quinn takes the ball. She passes to Sasha, but number 14 steals it. Number 14 runs past me, and I snap my stick out and grab the ball. I drive it down, but they intercept again. Kiara takes it back, passes to Bella, but they steal it. Again. It’s back and forth, back and forth, no goal.
Finally, we tie it up: 1 to 1.
Neither side gives up, neither side gains. In the final minute, we get a corner shot. I look at Quinn. I crouch, my knees graze the turf. I nod at Sasha and she passes the ball right to me. I stop it fast and nudge it just as Quinn flies in from my left. She drives the ball hard into the corner—just out of reach of the goalie.
I’ve never screamed so loud in my life. The ref has to blow her whistle twice to get us back to the center.
We hold it for a few seconds before the final buzzer sounds. We win.
* * *
It’s Friday and we slammed two teams into the ground and we won we won we won finally. So I say yes when the team asks me to go to the party at Declan’s farm. We’ll stick together, and I won’t drink. What really sways me, though, is that I hear Reilly is in NYC for the weekend.
Bonfire smoke rises against the cold October night sky, and the smells from the farm are as sharp as the breeze. Our boots crunch across the hay and hardened mud as we make our way toward the groups gathered around the fire.
I’m maybe there thirty seconds before I spot Grove. He leans in to hear something Hannah Scarlotta says. Then he pulls back and laughs, and I imagine I hear the sound of it and see the dimple in his cheek and then I feel the choke of Reilly’s arm against my throat and—
“Are you okay, Zo?” Liv’s voice is soft, but it pulls me out. She rubs my back. “Come on.”
I follow her away from the fire to the side of a barn. I focus on the ground, on my boots avoiding the divots. I wonder how many tractors they have. I wonder what Hannah said to make him laugh. We round the corner of the barn and I start to cry.
“Oh, Zo.” She overturns some crates leaning against the side of the barn so we can sit next to each other. “What’s going on?”
And the words tumble out because I can’t keep them in anymore. I tell the whole thing from lying in the bottom of the canoe when the whole world was just stars and fireflies to being trapped against the wall by Reilly.
Then words that were caught beneath the broken glass get free, and I know why I waited so long to tell her. Why I didn’t want to. But I push through and say them anyway.
“I was so weak, Liv. I can’t tell you how—”
“Nothing”—she squeezes my hands—“nothing about you is weak.”
The tears come fast, but she holds me. I don’t know why I didn’t tell her before.
“Is that why you ignored Grove?” Her voice is soft.
I nod.
“Oh, Zo. I get it, I really do. But you know he had nothing to do with it, right?”
“He was kind of an asshole after.”
She shrugs gently, trying to catch my eye. “He probably thought you were an asshole.”
I cry even more. “I’m fucked up, Liv. I think I’m really fucked up. I just can’t look at him without thinking about what Reilly did.”
She wraps her arm around my shoulders and squeezes me toward her. “You aren’t fucked up, Zo. The world is, but not you.”
“I can’t even imagine how messed up I’d be if Reilly actually—” And I think of Nikki just walking through her days, doing trigonometry and French and push-ups with the rest of us. Though she’s never been to a party with us. Not once. “It’s just that … for a moment, there was this future, and in it I was raped.”
“Oh, Zo. That’s so scary.”
“But he didn’t.”
“Just because he didn’t finish the job doesn’t mean he didn’t start it, or that he didn’t hurt you.” The cold cuts right through my jacket, my sweater, my skin, finds my bones. She squeezes my hand. “I’m really glad that future didn’t happen. I’m so glad you got away.”
“Me too.” I feel calmer, but tears still run hot tracks down my cold cheeks. I lean my head against the rough wood of the barn. “See? This is why I shall return to hiding from boys. It’s much safer. All around.”
“You are amazing, Zoe Alamandar. A goddess. And Reilly is…” She shakes her head, searching for the words. “Well, lumps of shit. Like he doesn’t even have the decency to pull himself together into one lump.” She weighs her hands in the air like a balance. “Lumps of shit.” She lowers one hand. “Goddess.” She lifts her other hand high in the air. “I know you don’t feel goddess-like just now. But she’s in you.” She leans her head on my shoulder.
I tilt my head against hers and we stay there for a moment. The breeze whips against the barn but I feel sheltered there, with Liv. “Anywhere in the World?”
I feel her smile against my shoulder. “Right here, sister. You?”
“What’s the exact opposite of here? Southern Hemisphere, city, on maybe a girls-only island. As long as you’re with me.”
She laughs. “Absofockinglutely.”
Across the dirt drive, two figures stumble toward another barn, gripping each other and laughing. Liv follows my gaze. “Ah.” She sighs. “Drunk love. The stuff of dreams.”
I elbow her. “Speaking of … where’s Jake tonight?”
She cocks her head back at the party. “Over there somewhere.” She smiles at me. “You’re more important.”
I rest my head against her shoulder. “Thanks, Livvy. Thanks for knowing I’m all kinds of fucked but loving me anyway.”
“I do love you anyway.”
“I love you anyway too.”
We pick our way across the field back to the party. I don’t see Grove, though I see Hannah talking to Cynthia Wilson. I’m not proud of the relief I feel, but it’s there all the same.
We link up with the girls. “See?” Ava throws her arm around my shoulder. “I knew we’d get our season back.” She leans her head against mine. “Sticks Chicks forever.”
I smile. “Sticks Chicks forever.”
“Fock yeah,” Dylan says, and Kiara winks at me.
I clap my hands. “Okay. I’ve been out of it. Give me some gossip.”
“Yes.” Liv tightens her arm around me. “She needs some serious distracting.”
“Dyl’s debating whether to hook up with Callie Bircham.” Kiara shoulder bumps her.
“Thanks, Ki,” Dylan says sarcastically. “I like her but she always wants to talk.”
Kiara laughs. “That’s called a relationship, Dyl.”
“Ugh,” Dylan says. “Who wants that?”
We laugh.
“This isn’t The Dylan Gossip Hour,” Dylan says. “Pick a new target.”
Cristina leans in. “I did see Breanna Culbert slink off with Jeremy Halker.”
“Ew. Jeremy Halker?” Bella says. “Bre can do way better than him.”
“Well, she was wasted,” Cristina says. “Those beer goggles might be thick.”
And right there. There’s this sinking inside me, where somehow my throat and stomach and feet all tangle together.
“Do you think,” I start, “it would be weird to check on them? To make sure—”
Cristina makes a face. “Awkward much?”
“I’d rather be embarrassed than raped,” Liv says. And we all just look at one another. Because it’s true.
We go where Liv and I saw the drunk couple earlier. As we move away from the party, we hear new noises. Noises that sound an awful lot like sex. Or almost sex.
Half of me wants to run back to the party. It’s going to be mad awful if they’re getting into it and we stumble in.
We hesitate at the edge of the barn, maybe to come up with some plan, or excuse, or to put off what we might see inside. But Dylan throws the doors open, laughing big, as though we’re in the middle of some loud joke, and then puts her hands on her mouth when she sees them in the hay. “Oh!” Dylan acts all surprised.
I half smile at her, but then look at them. Jeremy’s belt is unbuckled, and Bre’s beneath him. She’s super out of it. Her long hair’s a mess, knotted with hay. Her arms cross her chest. Her jeans are still done up.
“Were you”—my voice shakes—“what were—”
“Rape,” says Dylan. “You were trying to rape her, you piece of shit.” She steps forward.
“What?!” His hands move fast to buckle his belt. “That’s twisted. She wanted to.”
Kiara nods at Bre. “It doesn’t look like she wants anything right now.”
“Except maybe a cup of coffee,” Quinn says.
“I’m pretty damned sure she doesn’t want your dick.” Ava steps toward him. “I mean really, Jeremy. You have to get a girl wasted to have sex? I can’t imagine the sex is very good like that. Unless”—she cocks her head—“you can’t do it any other way?”
