Chapter 12: Van

VAN

Chapter

Twelve

"We look cute together, don't we?" Bubbles coos as she leans toward me. Someone snaps a photo. Another person pours a bottle of Gatorade on my head. "Playoffs, here we come." Tucker claps.

It's chaos inside the locker room. It's packed with reporters, scouts, parents, cheerleaders, and equipment, and I can barely move. Bubbles is attempting to take advantage of the lack of space by clinging to me. I pull my arm away from her and step behind Tucker.

"Do some blocking for me," I mutter in his ear.

Quick on the uptake, he directs a killer smile at Bubbles. "Sweetheart, is that for me?" He taps her pursed lips.

As Bubbles is momentarily distracted, I reach over and grab the phone out of Tessa's hand.

"What are you doing?" she yelps. "Give that back."

I ignore her, tap over to the photos section, and delete the photo that makes it look like Bubbles and I are posing for some kind of couple pic.

"Go to the trash bin, too," Tucker advises.

"That's personal property. It's against the law to delete someone else's photos," Bubbles declares. Her dad is a lawyer, so she would know. I ignore her and go to trash and empty it.

"Can't have you taking photos of me. Fleur's feelings might get hurt if she saw something like that." I return the phone to Tessa.

The two girls gape at me. "Are you really dating her?" Bubbles finally asks.

"As opposed to what? Fantasy dating her?"

"I—we—" she points to Tessa and then kind of makes a circle with her finger to include the whole room "—thought it was some kind of joke."

"Why would it be a joke?"

"Because you're you, a star football player being scouted by all the top ten college teams in the country, and she's?—"

"Great?" I interject before Bubbles can shove her foot into her mouth. I'm not pro-violence toward women, so I figure I better cut things off before it gets messy.

"Um…" Tessa hums.

"You're right. Great is a fucking bland term. Gorgeous? Funny? Smart? Like I run fast to keep up with her." I clap the two smaller girls on their shoulders and squeeze. "Glad we are all part of the Fleur cheer squad. Don't forget I'm first in line. Tucker, you ready?"

"As a turkey on Thanksgiving," he chirps.

"But you won me." Bubbles tries to stop us.

"Nah, Bubbles, you aren't doing the math right. See that guy over there?" I point to our quarterback.

"Roman?" she says.

"Yes, Roman Park. He hands the ball off. He throws the football. He's the captain of our ship, and so really, all the points scored are because of him. He won you. You need to reward him."

Bubbles frowns as she takes in this new information, but when the lines on her forehead smooth out, I know she's accepted this football math of mine.

"Right. The quarterback." She nods. "Come on, Tessa. Let's go tell the big boy his prize."

As the two girls push through the crowded locker room toward Roman, I grab Tucker's arm and head for the parking lot.

"What the hell does ‘ready as a turkey on Thanksgiving' mean?" I ask when we reach my car.

"No idea. It was the first thing that popped into my head. Why'd you send Bubbles to Roman? He's a strict observer of the no-nut November policy."

I gun the engine. "That's not my problem."

"Are you really serious about Fleur? Because I kinda thought it was something you made up so that people would stop thinking you and your sister were a thing." Why are we back on this again?

"I think Dunc is doing a good job of convincing everyone that my sister and I aren't a couple."

Tucker thinks about this for a second and then nods. "True. I mean, Fleur is hot with the red hair and shit, so I could see?—"

"Friend, if you want to keep your balls attached to your body, you best stop right there."

Tucker makes a zipping gesture across his mouth and stays quiet for the rest of the ride.

The after-party is in full swing when we arrive. An older man wearing a camel-colored V-neck sweater and sporting a pair of thick glasses holds out a bowl when we arrive. "Keys. You get them back as long as you blow a 0.0 on this." He jerks his head toward a machine which I assume is a Breathalyzer.

Tucker plucks the keys out of my hand and tosses them in the bowl. "No problem, Mr. Severs. This here is our new wide receiver. Scored multiple times tonight."

"Nice. I thought I recognized you. Welcome to the Severs' house. Don't get drunk. Don't kill any of the plants and have fun."

"We will!" Tucker salutes the man and then leads me farther into the house. "Old man Severs owns the car dealerships in town, which is why they have all this money. His kid, Matty Severs, is only a sophomore, but they've held the after-parties for the last two years because he wants Matty to start next year."

"I don't know him."

"Matty still plays JV. He's not that good, which is the reason for the parties. There's your girl." He points to Fleur. She's standing behind someone sitting at a table trying to bounce a ping pong ball into a cup. I cross over to her and place an arm around her shoulder.

"Sorry for being late."

She twists around. "Van?"

"Now, who else is putting their arm around your shoulders?" I scan the nearby crowd for offenders.

"No one. I'm just surprised you're alone."

"Tucker is here." I jerk my head toward the bar where he is chatting up some girl I don't know.

"But what about the girl?"

"What girl?"

"Bubbles?"

This whole line of questioning confuses me. "Are you and Bubbles friends? I wasn't aware the two of you even hung out."

"We don't, but she said that?—"

"Ah, I get it." Fleur must have heard about Bubbles' prize and thought that I was the winner. It strikes me kind of funny, in a bad way, that Fleur thinks that I'd take Bubbles up on her offer. "I'm not that type of guy, Fleur."

"But you and me, we're fa?—"

I drop my mouth on hers because right now, I'm not interested in hearing that Fleur doesn't think this relationship is real. I'm going to prove to her it is.