“It wasn’t,” Beck replies. “Ready?” He tosses the ball tucked under his arm down onto the grass. Rather than bouncing, it rests in place in the middle of one of the many puddles that have formed, and I eye it dubiously.

“Yeah. I’ve got to take my shoes off, though. They’re literally filled with water.” Beck watches me pull off my socks and sneakers with an unreadable expression. “What?” I finally ask.

He shakes his head once and yanks off his own. I head after the ball, and he follows me.

We start playing, and I’m fairly certain we must look ridiculous. Both of us were already soaked, and pretty soon we’re both splattered with mud as well.

We’re less evenly matched than we were earlier, and I know it’s because of me. I’m not fully focused. There’s no one watching us. Judging me.

I don’t think about technique or angles or strategy. I think about keeping the ball moving through and around the puddles dotting the ground. I watch ribbons of rain run out of Beck’s hair, I study the intensity in his blue eyes, and I don’t move away when his warm body jostles mine; the contact somehow searing through the waterlogged layers we’re both wearing.

Beck’s ahead by two goals when I finally collapse on the soggy ground. I’m sweating underneath my swamped clothes, but the rain washes the perspiration away immediately. Beck drops beside me, breathing heavily.

“Did you see the interview I did?” I ask, with no preamble.

“Yeah, I did.” Beck’s voice gives no indication of his thoughts on the topic.

“It just came out, and then I felt like he was judging me for being another one of your fangirls, and I felt obligated to explain.”

“It’s fine, Saylor.” After a couple minutes of silence, he adds, “It would have been nice if you’d ever told me that yourself.”

“Told you what? You know I’ve watched footage of you playing.”

“That’s different than knowing you watched that game. That it’s part of the reason you pursued football!”

“I watched your first championship game, along with approximately five hundred million other people. It made me feel like less of a nutcase for focusing on nothing but soccer. Happy now?”

Beck mutters what I would guess is a German profanity. It sounds like a word he’s said around me before. There’s a pregnant pause. “Otto hung a sign that says, ‘Saylor Scott’s Inspiration’ above my locker,” Beck states.

A reluctant grin tugs at my lips. “That’s kind of funny.” It’s also nice to know he didn’t totally erase me from his life the way I’ve tried to remove him from mine.

“I thought so, too,” Beck admits. “Not that I’ll ever tell him that.”