to join in the fun. It took every last drop she had to bring her this far.
“And open.” The dental tech pokes inside her mouth with his bitter rubber-gloved hand, scooping out the excess clay with his fingers and then checking the fit. “Okay, Luci, this looks good. Go ahead and close again. No talking for five minutes while the mold sets.”
The song ends but the girls continue the beat, drumming on desks and walls, stomping their feet on the floor. The tech rolls his eyes and flings his used gloves into the trash. No one notices or cares that he’s annoyed. The beat gets faster, building, blurring, until an impromptu cheer suddenly breaks out and nineteen teenage girls scream-sing the Wildcat fight song.
Luci hasn’t memorized the words yet. It didn’t feel particularly pressing. She wasn’t making the team.
What a difference an hour makes.
Luci threads some stray wisps of hair behind her ears. Lowers her chin to her chest. Listens close.
We are the Wildcats, the navy blue and white,
We are the Wildcats, always ready for a fight!
Luci needs to learn names, too. She’s picked up only a few. Not from any introductions or pleasantries but because the best players simply make themselves known.
One, a senior named Phoebe, breaks the horizon of bobbing heads by hopping up on a classroom chair. Phoebe’s knee is double wrapped—an Ace bandage under a compression sleeve—and by her euphoric grin, you’d think she’d reached the summit of Everest. Phoebe reaches down into the crowd and starts pulling another girl up with her.
Mel. The Wildcats’ varsity team captain.
Luci watches Mel try to gently wriggle free, but it is no use—Phoebe won’t let her go—so she relents. The two girls then deftly negotiate their small, shared platform, finding their balance, turning butt to butt so they both can fit, their toes cantilevered off the seat’s edge. Mel knots up her silky chestnut hair, lifts a fist, and punches the air with a cheerleader’s precision, her face beaming joy and hope and pride.
Don’t mess with the Wildcats, we won’t accept defeat,
For we are the Wildcats, and we just can’t be beat!
Arms are thrown over shoulders, zipping the cluster into a tight, impenetrable spiral. They sing the last verse to one another.
Three cheers for the Wildcats, your honor we’ll defend,
’Cause when you’re a Wildcat, you’re a Wildcat till the end!
The chant fades like a summer firework and everyone exhales a breath collectively held for an entire week. The girls slowly untangle themselves from one another, though not before one last bit of tenderness. Squeezing each other’s hands, patting each other on the head, swatting a whip of ponytail.
Even from across the classroom, Luci feels the warmth.
Coach enters the room a moment later. He signals for Mel to follow him with a crooked finger. The other girls get busy straightening desks, resuming order.
The dental tech checks his clipboard. “Grace Mosure! You’re up next!”
Luci recognizes the girl who walks over. During most of the scrimmages, Grace played defense to Luci’s offense. Grace operated at one speed—full-throttle charge—and she was relentless in trying to strip Luci of the ball. Most intimidating were Grace’s eyes, wide and desperately hungry behind the metal cage of her face mask, like a stray dog’s. Now that the mask is off, Grace exudes a cooler, more relaxed vibe, though a faint pink ring remains etched in her skin from its suction.
Grace hops up on a desk and pulls her mousy hair into a sprout of ponytail at the top of her head. After scribbling a signature down for the dental tech, she gently peels the tape back from the rims of her ears, exposing on each a ladder of tiny silver hoops climbing the cartilage.
Grace’s style is definitely edgy. Not what Luci has come to think of as the typical West Essex look. And yet Grace eagerly bites off the tag on a new Wildcat windbreaker and pulls it over her head. It is navy blue with a white zipper, a white paw print over the heart, and “Varsity Field Hockey” across the shoulder blades in blocky white letters. Grace cracks the entire length of her spine peering over her shoulder to admire it.
Grace becomes yet another piece of the puzzle Luci’s trying to solve on the fly. Despite her incongruence, Grace clearly fits here somehow. It gives Luci hope that she might too.
Behind them, navy-blue-and-white Wildcat gear is bricked in neat stacks, along with folders of permission slips to be taken home for signature. Lastly, twenty