Cover

Prologue

Colt

Seven Years Ago

May was supposed to be in the barn, where her quinceañera was still in full swing. The drinking and dancing were turned up to a hundred-and-ten, but the birthday girl was nowhere to be found.

I was unfortunately too self-absorbed to notice. I was busy being a dramatic fifteen-year-old guy and moping because May hadn’t chosen me to be a chambelan in her court of honour. She’d chosen Dylan Wright as one of them, though. I guess it made sense. Dylan was starting quarterback on the football team and worshipped the ground May walked on. Great guy.

To be fair, even if she had chosen me, I was self-aware enough to know I wasn’t the party-planning type. But I’d have got my shit together for May Velasco.

At the end of the day, I didn’t care if Dylan was a better waltzer than me. It was the sentiment that mattered. Dylan Wright 1. CJ Bradley 0.

I had just left the barn and hit the dirt path, kicking rocks with my dress shoes, all angsty teenage main character. I’d headed out of the party through the back of the ranch after Ma and Pop announced they’d bring the car around because my kid sister, Savannah, was getting cranky. I was alone in the field.

Or at least I thought so, until I realized that May was out there, too.

I guess she hadn’t let anyone know, just dipped out on a whim from her own party. She had escaped to the lacrosse field her dad made her a couple years back in the fields behind the Velasco family ranch, lines spray-painted in the trimmed grass, goals on either end. She still wore her surprise dance outfit, a tight white blouse with frilly straps and bootcut jeans, paired with her shiny gold county barrel-race champion belt-buckle. She hadn’t bothered to change out of her boots, brown ones with butterflies across the front. Her black hair was perched precariously on her head in a very curly half-up, her crown and makeup and fake eyelashes still in place. The lacrosse stick in her hands, completely ignoring the long bedazzled acrylic nails she must have had done not too long ago, May swung. The ball went flying from the head of her crosse with a swoosh, and then the satisfying whack when it hit the back of the net. She turned to me slowly, cognac-coloured eyes probing, crossing her arms as if to say, ‘Well?’

‘Wanna join?’ she asked.

‘Sure.’

Hesitantly, I stepped forward on Oxford wingtip-covered feet that were not nearly as agile as hers, adjusting my tie awkwardly. She tossed her stick my way, and I grabbed it as she rifled through her bag for another. My hands were literally clammy with nerves, and the slick metal of the stick threatened to launch itself right out of my slippery grip. Yeah, I feared this girl. We’d been at each other’s throats since we started playing in the same town. But fear was definitely not the explanation for my state at the moment.

‘I’ll probably go in there again in a minute. Just needed to … clear my head, I guess.’ She nodded, a nervous little head-bob, fidgeting with the brand-new gold pendant she’d just got earlier that day at the start of the party: an elaborate cursive M in a heart with scalloped filigree edges. ‘I’ve never been much of a dancer.’ And then she did something entirely weird, and she said, ‘Do you think I binned that zapateado? My baile sorpresa?’

For my part, I tried and failed to do my darnedest to hide my shock, and I replied totally honestly. ‘You care what I think?’

May looked about as shocked as I was. ‘That’s a question?’

‘What’s that mean?’

‘Whatever,’ she said with a scrunch of her nose. ‘Guys never get it.’

I opened my mouth to say something – anything, at that point – but then immediately closed it again. Instead of some witty comeback, I answered her question.

‘Even if you binned the dance,’ I said, ‘you looked really good doing it.’

Her response was a ball thrown at me. I moved my stick to catch it.

‘You suck.’

‘Thanks.’

I could’ve sworn she smiled, a spark of light dancing across her glossy lips, even if it was just a little. ‘I appreciate it. But I think I’m better at this.’

‘Good thing I can agree.’

‘Oh, for sure. Because I’m glad I got out here before your parents made you join the open dancefloor.’

‘Come on, that’s mean.’

‘Best of five. Winner gets to shit on the other one’s dance skills.’

‘God, clear your head, May.’

‘Shut up!’ She threw another ball at me, and I caught that one in hand, an eyebrow raised.

‘You suck,’ I retorted. ‘Stop chucking those at me, I have two now.’

‘Or what?’ She mirrored my expression, planting her stick in the grass, a hand on her hip. At that time, at least, we were literally eye to eye. Her stare bored right into my head, and I realized we’d moved much closer to one another. I could smell her expensive perfume, make out the little lacelike edges of her pendant. ‘What’ll you do about it, Colt?’

Man. I look back and think that things would be so different if I’d put my fear aside and done exactly what we should’ve about it. But I was a dumb teenage boy. So I did the only thing I knew, instead.

I reached around May blind, my eyes still on her, flicked my stick towards the goal, and sent one of the two balls she’d launched at me flying straight into the net. The sound echoed in the night, the kind you could hear even over the party raging on in the barn.

‘I’ll have you play that best of five, probably.’ I cleared my throat, holding the second ball out to her.

Something in her face flickered for a moment. It could’ve been the terrible floodlights going out for a millisecond, or May trying to blink a hair out of her face. But I swear, I saw something.

‘Let’s do it.’

Chapter One

Heard Round the World

Colt

Major League Lacrosse Playoffs, October 2024

‘WE GET IT DONE, YOU HEAR ME? WE GET THIS DONE, IT’S FINALS, BABY!’

Arms linked to form a huddle, my teammates reply by way of whoops and shouts. I feel a hand clutch my stick and give it a good shake, and another tap the back of my helmet. The energy is electric, and we’re all at the point of the night where we’re just itching to hit the turf. Heavy bass pours through the speakers mounted all around Mill River Stadium, but I hear nothing but the guys’ roars.

‘WE GET THIS DONE, WE INVADE NATE’S!’ adds Drew, earning excited yelps at the mention of the New Haven Woodchucks’ unofficial team bar.

‘WE GET THIS DONE, I MOVE OUT OF MOM’S!’

I’d groan and grumble at that one from Connor, but we’re too hyped up on adrenaline to make a joke about Connor’s home in his mother’s basement. We’re also too broke to make a joke about it, for the record. No one ever warns you that all pro athletes are made very, very unequal.

‘GOOD FOR YOUR MOM!’ JJ beats me to the punch.

Chaotic laughter and jersey-tugging ensue, at least till I get the boys back on track.

‘Listen, guys.’

Their voices fall, the huddle tightening when they hear the dead serious undertone. We’ve never been a serious team. In fact, we’re the most unserious in the league. We’re also the youngest, on average. But when it comes to it, as captain, I refuse to drop the ball if our season depends on it. We’ll switch up when we need to.

‘We’ve had shit seasons before.’ Nods and grumbles of acknowledgement all around. ‘Maybe I only saw one of ’em. But I saw enough this year to know that no matter what people have to say, no matter how many times they tell us we’re too young, too hopeful, this team has proven them wrong. This team was made for the championship.’

Team dad Rodney ‘Rod’ Wilson is the stern voice that joins mine in encouragement; nothing new from my best friend on the East Coast. ‘Picture us with that trophy. Out there under the lights with the hardware. Top of the league. Top of the damn sport.’

Rod gives me a nudge. Keep it going. I nod, picking up his energy. ‘We are four games away, boys. Four. Three, after this, and we’ll be on top of the world. Does “national champion” sound fuckin’ good enough?’

Gloved hands slap padded shoulders, as every single one of us howls in agreement. We’ve always been close – you have to, to play a sport that involves so much trust – but we’re never closer than we are right before a match. Especially the most important one we’ve played to date.

‘ALRIGHT, BRING IT ON! ONE, TWO, THREE, BREAK!’

We scatter and jog onto the field on autopilot as we take positions, cleats crunching in the grass. I can’t help looking up at the stands. It’s a bigger crowd than we’re used to pulling in, the usual New Haven Woodchucks lacrosse fanatics sitting front row, but new faces packing the upper bleachers in anticipation of tonight’s underdog event. I tug at the strap of my helmet, relish the bit of peace we get before the game starts and all hell breaks loose for four quarters of chaos and stress.

Way more so than usual, Mill River Stadium is all Woodchucks today, fans toting banners and posters for our first playoff ever as a Major League Lacrosse team. Granted, we’re as young as the league – only about ten years old – but history is history. If we can break this playoff game, we can prove we’ve got a good shot at it all: the championship title.

JJ smacks me in the back with the butt of his stick as I start my trek towards the centre of the field, wrinkling my crisp blue jersey. Technically, I can’t see him, because he’s behind me the entire time, but the insufferable snicker that follows the blow tells me everything I need to know about my attacker.

‘Chucks’ve never gotten this far. Get it done,’ he hums, quoting my words and wagging his stick off to my left.

‘Yeah, yeah.’ With a roll of my eyes and a chuckle, I take my midfield position just behind the site of the face-off, marked by a midline and a circle at its direct centre. The ball is placed on an X in the middle of the circle, at which the face-off specialist from Boulder and our specialist, Andy, are each crouched in what’s best described as a lopsided squat, crosses parallel to the ground. Andy’s like me, never been the biggest player on the roster – medium height; doesn’t carry some crazy quantity of muscle. The Boulder guy is the picture of his team’s home city, about the size of a small lighthouse. Dull eyes the colour of steel glare past Andy and shoot lasers at me from behind his helmet grille. If this man stick checked me, he might take my entire arm off while he’s at it. I pray he’s a FOGO – face-off, get off, meaning he’ll be subbed off once he’s done his thing – because if he isn’t, and he stays on to play, I’d consider it a miracle if all my appendages were still attached to my body by the end of this game.

The whistle blows, and Boulder and Andy are arm to arm. He pushes, Andy skirts around, knees scrabbling against the turf, trying his best to counter the massive opponent in the bid for the ball that sits between the both of them. Andy, thankfully, is just barely able to flick upward and get the ball in the air. I pluck it right up, look hard for an attacker, and then I hear a reliable, ‘BALL!’ I don’t give it a second thought before launching the ball his way.

Hot Rod Wilson zooms away with the goods, cradling it to keep it from falling out of the net on his way up to the goal. His stick moves in an arc of silver and pink owing to the Peppa Pig stickers his kid’s put all over the crosse. As much as we give him shit about it, he’s fast – he whips the ball straight towards the goal mere seconds into the game. Unfortunately, it’s just short of the goal by maybe an inch.

One of Boulder’s attackers makes his way towards our crease in the tenth minute, but our defender JJ is fast to sneak in a stick slap, causing the ball to fly out towards Drew. He snaps it out of the air and feeds it to Connor on midfield.

‘OPEN!’ I yell.

Swinging his stick around to avoid an opposing attacker, Connor thrusts the ball at me, and from there, it’s muscle memory. As a midfielder, it’s not my primary job to score, but when my team slides me the ball, it’s clear they’re placing trust in my judgement. I bolt down the field, all the while deciding my next move. I can pass this ball, or I take it all the way. At least two attackers are covered. The final Boulder defender is heading my way.

SHIT. He darts left, I go right, he mimics me, I spin the other way, and with a whip of my stick, it’s in the air, and then …

The lights go out like they always do when New Haven scores, crowd whooping as strobes streak across the field and my teammates rejoice. But when they turn back on, a distraught ‘ooh’ ripples through the first couple of rows, yelps of shock from the guys.

Turf pricks at my bare arms. The Boulder defenceman nearest to me – the one who’d covered me – mutters a shaky expletive. I immediately wonder why I’m not in more agony, and as the adrenaline wears off, it hits me like a ton of bricks to the face.

‘FUCK!’ I nearly scream. Tears well up in my eyes, sweat beading on my brow. I claw at the ground. My teeth saw at the mouthguard as they try in vain to bite away the pain.

A whistle blows in the distance, and the red fabric of the first-aid bag appears in the corner of my blurry field of vision. ‘Okay, okay. Take a deep breath,’ the team medic tries to calm me. ‘Take—’

‘My knee, my fucking knee.’ The energy trickles right out of my body like something’s sucked it all from me. I whimper as I try to clutch my right knee, but it won’t move, I can’t move, and it’s my worst nightmare. I run. I hustle. I’m a midfielder, it’s what I do, and now I can’t move.

‘Colt! Colt, bro … bro, hang in there.’ JJ’s voice joins our medic. He tosses his stick off to the side and kneels beside me. Even through the grille, I can see the fear in his eyes.

‘What happened? How does it look?’

It’s a dumb question. When you play lacrosse, you know exactly what different kinds of injuries feel like. We’ve been taking knocks to the head since we were ten. We grow up thinking we’re indestructible. Usually, I get back up right away. My mom used to call it one of my best qualities. This time around, I can’t manage it.

‘You gotta shut up, man.’ JJ, usually loud and boisterous, is mumbling, stringing his words together. ‘You gotta shut up so they can help you. Don’t look.’

I couldn’t if I tried; my eyes can barely stay open. It feels like someone’s wrenched my ligaments apart fibre by fibre, and while that pain should be all I’m able to concentrate on, I cling to desperate pleas instead, stuff that I pretend will be able to erase the injury as quickly as it happened.

‘Call my parents, man,’ I croak out, clutching JJ’s arm. ‘My mom.’

‘Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ll call ’em. Colt, they’re far, dude, you know they’re far. Won’t be here till tomorrow—’

‘Shut up.’ I grit my teeth against the now free-flowing tears streaking my cheeks. I just want my mom. I really just want my mom.

And as I grip my knee for dear life, the pleas of a desperate man weave their way through the tears. I want May. ‘May,’ I manage through waves of pain that send dark spots into my vision.

‘Who?’ Rod’s voice now, the thump of his knees against the grass as he presses a hand to my shoulder. One of the medics protests, and he says something I don’t catch in reply. ‘Who – Colt, I’ll call your mom,’ he assures me, voice wavering.

I blink away the floaters in my vision, and one more time, I barely manage to move my lips to form her name. No sound comes out.

Despite feeling like I’m going to pass out, I vividly recall every second when they load me onto a backboard to take me off the field and to the ambulance. The humiliation of not even being able to walk off the field on my own is almost as painful as the injury itself. Because it’s all crowds see now.

The paramedics buzz around me, asking me dozens of questions about scales from one to ten. Somewhere between it all, the realization dawns on me that it’s not just now. This is all anyone will see for the rest of my career.

‘You’re more than your injury,’ the doctors and therapists will tell me for weeks afterwards. I heard it enough times when Rod had his ACL injury the season I joined the team, and I’d love to believe it all.

I’d love to believe I’m still unbreakable, but I know that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Chapter Two

Southern Hospitality

May

Three Months Later

I pull at the laces of my cleats, shifting on the turf to get the optimal angle to free my feet from the snug shoes. Somehow, even after a practice straight from hell, the knots I made at the beginning of the afternoon haven’t budged a bit. I bob my head in tune with the Mt. Joy song thrumming from someone’s portable speaker as the first lace slides loose.

Jordan is already packing her stuff up, having a wrestling match with her duffel bag to get the overflowing thing to close. ‘Chores?’ she grunts between shoves, a simple one-word question.

‘Yep,’ I reply. I pop my right cleat off my foot and toss it to the side, getting to work on the left. ‘Cattle.’

‘Same.’ She finally manages to get the zipper all the way around her bag and turns to me. ‘How are you feeling about this season?’

I make a dismissive psshh sound, to which my best friend raises an inquisitive eyebrow. ‘May. Be nice. I’m asking as a concerned citizen.’

I stop in my tracks and give her a look. ‘You sure about that?’

‘Asking as a concerned citizen who’s going to be playing alongside you this year and doesn’t want to be tanked for senior season,’ she adds with a snort.

‘Jordan!’

‘You asked!’

I got to know a lot of the girls through lacrosse, and I know all of them well now, but it’s different with Jordan. She’s the only one I’d allow to talk shit about my terrible junior year. We’ve been joined at the hip since we started playing in elementary, when Jordan Gutierrez-Hawkins walked up to me one day, tapped her stick against mine, gave me a partial-toothed grin, and told me we were going to be friends. We were the only two girls of colour on the team – we still are – but our connection went way deeper from the first game we played together. People confuse us not only because we look the same from the back (wavy black hair, exactly five foot six), but also because we’re more often found side by side than we are apart. They’re partially right, considering one word, sometimes even one look, is all we need to get our points across.

We grew up together in Eagle Rock, just outside Prosperity, bought our first crosses together, broke our first bones in the same game. When it came time to join the local branch of 4-H, affectionately ‘farm kid club’, meant to teach us the importance of agriculture and rearing animals, Jordan and I did every single cattle show right beside one another in the line-up. We match hairstyles every game, our braids so identical it looks like someone has copied and pasted them. In our freshman year of high school, when Tuck Decker called Jordan a disgusting slur in the middle of the hallway, we were totally ready to pummel his face in – together.

‘Fine,’ I give in with a hard roll of my eyes. ‘I feel … better. I was drilling alright today. It’s not gonna be like last year. I promise. I guess now we just have to see how far we go this time.’

The Story Continues on BooksBarbecue!

Enjoyed this preview? ❤️ Do not stop here!

Read the complete book free online → 🔗

Continue reading now on BooksBarbecue and discover every page!

Love reading? Bookmark BooksBarbecue.com for more amazing books!

Happy Reading!