Just like he was rejecting me now.
Tears pooled in my eyes, but no fucking way would I let them out here. I wouldn’t crumble no matter how fucked up Cut was being. I decided last night I’d tell Trisha never mind and hop on a plane tonight. Students started moving in over the past two days and they were mean humans. When I came into her office today to deliver the news about leaving, she tried to talk me out of it again. She even tried telling me to wait until after my workout with my new gym trainer, and maybe I’d feel better. Feel better my ass. Fuck the gym trainer, and the boxing trainer, and the nutritionist. Fuck BSU. This time, I didn’t let her convince me to stay. Fuck that. When she realized she had no wins, she picked up the phone and called my real trainer.
“I can figure it out,” I tried. “I’ll make it work. I just need to get the hell out of here so I can think of my next move. This place is suffocating me, Cut.”
And yesterday, just as I was walking here to the sports complex, some guy and his skinny ass, pretty ass girlfriend barked at me like I was a dog!
For a while, Uppercut didn’t say shit. The line hadn’t gone quiet since we started the call. Finally, I’d gotten through to him. He’d heard the pain and suffering in my voice. These past few weeks had been hell for me. I wasn’t built to move out of state. This shit was for the birds.
“Then fuckin’ suffocate, but try not to die before you get that piece of paper,” he advised. “That way, they’ll ship ya body back to ya momma with your diploma in the fuckin’ casket. You stay your ass out there, girl. And don’t call me ‘less you need something I can send or somebody put they fuckin’ hands on you. Grow the fuck up and smell the clean air, chile!”
He slammed the phone in my ear; being on speaker made its harshness clear. That shit hurt. It was beyond having it done in front of strangers. I’d just been abandoned by the only adult who, for years, I thought gave a real fuck about me. My knees bounced so high, they began hitting the bottom of the desk. Shaking all over, my lips trembled and fists balled. All movement in the office stopped, but I could feel Trisha’s panicky energy looming over me. I didn’t want her comfort or pity.
“Tori—”
I jumped to my feet, rejecting her touch, words—her everything. “I’m gonna work out with the new, stupid ass trainer.”
I was out the door without another word from anyone when a realization hit. Cut never referred to me by my name. He called me everything but Tori or Banger.
This must be how Raj feels, being invisible to his father…
As we came inside the gym from off the practice field, I studied the playbook. The guys were hyped, as usual, to be done with the repetitive plays and gruesome drills that went along with practice. Coach Green switched shit up on us, and I had to commit as much of it as possible to memory and help my team out with it, too. But, as always, I went first in the effort.
They were raucous. The horseplay, the singing, the cracking of the jokes, the bragging, and even the lying on their dicks…we did it all. Even me, from time to time—except lying on my dick. I hadn’t done that shit since I was eleven years old to my old head ass cousins when they asked why I hadn’t been getting pussy. But the sound of the Panthers as a collective was one I was so accustomed to, I could sleep through for hours. It was when their roistering ceased that I became distracted from the task at hand.
I glanced up to see we were at the two-way window of the main gym. The guys were gaping intently inside.
“Goddamn.” Willy, a cornerback, whistled.
“I know. Right?” Josh followed up with.
“That bitch is a fucking robot!” When I heard Rudy assert that shit, my head swung wildly, praying no women were around to hear that. We’d gotten a lot of shit about the lack of respect shown to women on the compound. It would be me at the face of getting disciplined, even if it didn’t come from my mouth.
Tony, a fullback, asked while scratching his sac. “She the boxer. Right?”
“Fuckin’ robo-dog!” Al’s laughing sparked my curiosity.
“I ain’t never seen no four-legged bitch with them headlights, bro!” Josh croaked.
I pushed through the beefy, shitty ass-smelling, sweaty bodies to gain a view. There were a few people working out, but several still, observant bodies surrounded one. She was in the middle of a drill. Busted weave tied into a ponytail at the back of her head, sports bra—loose sports bra—cropped leggings, and dingy-looking sneakers all held tight to her agile form.
She was performing hyper-extended, static holds while tossing a medicine ball back and forth to a trainer I wasn’t familiar with. I’d seen her around the sports complex a few times over the past week. I wondered if she might have been the weird girl I’d seen on the main campus yesterday when I was with Aivery. She held still and steady, using her abs and thigh muscles while receiving and throwing the big ass sand-filled ball. When the built girl was done, she breezed over to a bench and performed bench-hops, never breaking her stride. Each drop down, she landed on her ass to make contact with the pad in a manner of squats. Next, without a break, she moved on to weights and did push-presses without faltering. Her expression was a warrior’s wall. She didn’t pout, complain, moan, or speak. She only blinked and breathed.
The girl ended the drill with a pushup and power jumping jack combination until the trainer yelled time. She was handed a bottle of water as the people around her wrote on their writing pads and conferred with one another. Then she was cued to start at the top, and began without hesitation.
“I’ll still fuck her,” Al’s country accent trilled amongst the small crowd. “In the dark.”
They all hooted, slapping palms.
“Her name is Tori McNabb. Add that to your fantasy that wouldn’t likely last more than five seconds,” Collin, Trisha Gaskin’s assistant, appeared out of nowhere. “Why don’t you try out-working her instead. Bet nobody hi-fives to that.” He shook his head.
My attention went back to ol’ girl. This broad was a fucking beast. And suddenly, her lack of pride about her appearance and femininity made sense. What girl could keep up with manicures and ends-trimmings when she can perform athletically like this? And Tori McNabb was definitely a girl. Her globular tits were loud and fucking glaring in that tiny and flimsy sports bra. But she didn’t seem to have cared, moving with athleticism and not an ounce of vanity.
“Man.” Al waved Collin’s challenge off while getting ‘ooooooh’ed’ by the guys. “Ain’t nobody falling for no bet against no broad, man.”
Collin pointed toward the direction of the locker room. “Then knock off all the catcalling and ogling, and move it along.”
After defiant stares and sucking their teeth, my guys began to move. “She must be his girl or something,” someone—likely Josh’s dumb ass—mumbled, walking away.
“What?” Collin shouted, incensed. Naturally, all that was heard were snickers. Collin turned to me. “You better teach your boys gym-side manners, Spencer, or I’ll make sure Jones will. He’s not fucking around with making this compound a welcoming place for McNabb. I’ll have Trisha write up a report or do it for her, just to teach you guys what will no longer be tolerated.”