Gimme Everything You Got - Iva-Marie Palmer Page 0,100

The words were there in my throat but stuck under my rib cage. My insides felt scraped and dry, as massive tears came to my eyes. I used the back of my hand to wipe them away, hoping no one would see.

The awareness that I was utterly useless to stand up for us against a team of naked boys made me want to sit in the middle of the field and curl into a ball. Had they been watching us as we practiced and waited? Of course they had, and they’d been laughing at us. That was the worst part.

I started to run toward the door where they’d gone. “Susan, no,” Bobby said, putting a hand on my shoulder.

“But those assholes,” I started, and I couldn’t keep the tears from falling. Bobby took one of the towels out of the equipment bag and handed it to me. I held it to my face, pressing it tight against my skin. “They can’t do this,” I sputtered.

I wasn’t being captain-like, I knew, but fury had started to spiral inside me, twisting around hurt. I blinked away more tears that were pushing at my eyes and spat more of the vinegary taste from my mouth. It smelled like soap and salad dressing.

Joanie, whose jersey was wet in places, smelled it. “Did they . . . douche us?”

Wendy sniffed the damp ends of her hair. “This is definitely Summer’s Eve.”

“And the underwear . . .” Marie started to say, gingerly plucking a pair that had caught in Franchesa’s ponytail. “They’re dirty.” She wrinkled her nose and whipped the tighty-whities away.

“Please let me go . . . do . . . something,” I said to Bobby, trying to think of what, if anything, I could possibly do. My mind was blank except for seeing the naked guys running at us over and over.

As angry as I was, the tears kept reappearing. It was my fault this had happened, and as captain, I had to fix it. My stomach churned, imagining what all those boys together would say to me if I confronted them. But if I let them get away with it, I wasn’t a good captain.

“Look,” Bobby said to me and the rest of us. “You have every right to be angry. But sometimes we bring our best selves and it’s not enough—”

Tina scowled at him. “So we’re supposed to be the bigger people? After that?”

I leaned my head on her shoulder in gratitude. It was like she had read my mind. I had no interest in hearing one of Bobby’s big speeches right now. He might be our coach, and under other circumstances, I would probably love hearing whatever calm, high-minded suggestion he was about to make, but today I didn’t want that Bobby.

I wanted St. Mark’s to pay.

“Here’s what we’re going to do. Or what I’m going to do,” he said. “We have all the area coaches’ numbers in the athletics office. Home numbers, too. I’m going to drive over right now and track their coach down.”

“But we weren’t even supposed to be playing this game. You’ll get in trouble,” I said.

“I promise, I won’t.” He patted my shoulder very gently. He looked from me to the team. “I still think it’s great that you came ready to play. It’s a shame your opponents couldn’t do the same.” He picked up his equipment bag and started for the gates. When we didn’t follow him right away, he turned and said, “Come on, let’s go. I’ll handle all this, and you all can go . . .” He seemed stumped for the right word for what we might do after getting sprayed with Summer’s Eve and pelted with dirty underwear. “. . . recuperate.”

We looked at one another like we had no choice but to trudge behind him toward the street. When he reached his car, he said, “I’ll let you know what their coach says at practice on Monday.”

After he’d driven off, my teammates and I stood there, and I knew no one wanted to go home. “Should we get something to eat?” Dana suggested.

Most of us shook our heads or mumbled, “Not hungry.”

“Me neither,” Dana said.

“We don’t have to let these guys get away with this,” Tina said, directing the comment at me, as if together, we’d find the right solution.

“Are you thinking . . . revenge?” I said.

“Not Carrie-at-the-prom revenge, but yeah. Light revenge?” She tossed the idea out but seemed nervous, like she thought the team might call her