“Good!” Bobby said when we were done. “Now push-ups, at least fifteen. Feel free to put your knees on the ground if that makes it a little easier.”
“It would be easier if you did them and we watched,” I heard Joanie Fox, a sophomore, say under her breath.
“What was that?” Bobby asked.
“I said, you got it,” Joanie said.
Push-ups were harder. Candace, next to me, was panting after doing three. I felt terrible for her. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. You should do extra, though,” she huffed. “You . . . might . . . grow . . . some . . . tits.” Her face was so red, she looked like the devil when she grinned.
After a few more, Candace sat back on her knees and adjusted her T-shirt, which had ridden up, before getting back into position to finish. Tina and I eked out our last push-ups—my arms felt like chewed gum by the end—then sat up. I was sweating, but I tried to look unfazed as I bent my legs up in front of me and looped my arms around them, like I was posing for Seventeen’s back-to-school issue. I wanted to be worthy of Bobby’s admiration, but not look like I was angling for it.
Some of the other girls were murmuring complaints to each other, deciding whether to stick around, and others were silent and sullen. None of us had talked about what we expected from tryouts, but that was probably because none of us had tried out for a sport before.
It was clear Bobby was just getting started, too, as he waited for us finish and consulted a clipboard. He stood in front of us; our eyes were level with his shorts. I forced myself to watch some kids playing on the swings instead of staring at his crotch.
“Good work,” he said. “We’ve got forty survivors, I see. Impressive. Okay. As your coach, I can teach you plays, but no one can teach you speed and endurance, which is what soccer is all about. Give me ten laps, from that tree to the fence to the bike path to the playground.”
A collective groan went up among us. “I’m not Rocky. I’m out of here,” Lynn Bandis said, getting to her feet and strutting away like she thought Bobby would beg her to stay. I was glad he didn’t. “You coming, Marie?” She turned around to look at her friend, and Marie gave Lynn a long look, as if by not bailing on tryouts, too, she’d be severing something. But then Marie shook her head, saying, “I think I want to stay.”
A flash of surprise crossed Lynn’s face, but she recovered quickly, tossing off a chipper “Okay, then,” before she sauntered off.
Though Marie stayed, a few other girls followed Lynn’s lead and left. Bobby did nothing to stop them, either. There were maybe thirty of us left now.
“Let’s see those laps,” Bobby said, and blew his whistle like nothing had happened.
I took an easy early lead, grateful that we didn’t have to do more push-ups. Running with the longest strides I could, I was the sleek-limbed creature in the Nova special and I wanted Bobby to watch me, like a hungry tiger—or at least nod to himself, like, “That’s who I’m looking for.” To do what, I didn’t care.
Behind me, some girls were chatting.
“Jesus, if he wasn’t so hot, I’d be out of here.”
“I know. I thought this was going to be kind of a joke.”
“How do you play soccer, anyway? Is there this much running?”
“Maybe he’ll stop us after one lap.”
But after the last person rounded the playground, Bobby yelled, “Nice! Nine more!” The chatter fell away and was replaced by a chorus of huffed breaths as we churned into the second lap. Several girls gave up and went to gather their stuff. I kept going. I was surprised that nothing so far had been too hard for me to do. As I ran, I focused on keeping my chest out and not looking too sweaty. I wasn’t even going as fast as I could, and I was at the front of the group.
Still, by the sixth lap, I felt a stitch in my side. I gritted my teeth and told myself I just had four more to go. Tina was a few paces behind me, and I could hear the footfalls of other girls farther back. Candace was so far behind that I was coming up on lapping her.
As I puffed by Bobby, he called out, “Looking good. Love the spirit!”
He loved my spirit. It gave me a fresh burst of energy, and I sprinted fast past him with my head thrown back.
The stitch went away, and Tina pulled up next to me. “Were you always this fast?” she said.
“I am now,” I huffed, wondering what would happen if I were the only one to finish. “You scared?”
“No, just thinking we could go faster.”
Playing anything with Tina was like a blood sport—we both liked to win. Still, I was surprised at how much I liked running out ahead of everyone like this. Each time I turned at the slides and saw Bobby waiting for us to make it back around, I liked it a little more.
Fifteen of us finished the laps without bailing. Well, Tina and I finished first, then a handful of other girls came in behind us, with Candace and Sharon Henderson at the end.
When they finally did, Bobby asked us all for our names, which he wrote down as we took turns waiting to take drinks from the park’s crusty-looking water fountain.
“Hmm, fifteen girls. Great,” he said.
“What do you mean, ‘great’?” Dana Miller asked, wiping a dribble of water from her mouth.
Bobby threw his hands out to gesture at all of us. “I mean, it looks like we have our team.”
Four
Practice wouldn’t start until next Monday, but the day after tryouts, Bobby made us each sign a contract for the season stating that we’d be on time and dressed to play, and we’d keep our grades up and take care of our bodies.
“I know you might have a beer at a party. I was your age once, too,” he said at the team meeting where he’d passed out the contracts. “But don’t overdo it. And no smoking or drugs.”
Normally, we’d have mocked a teacher for being so square. But it felt like Bobby really cared about us. Or maybe we just wanted to believe he did.
He also tacked up a sheet with all our names on the bulletin board in the lunchroom, and people actually looked at it. Paul Mahoney, who was the kind of guy who asked if you had your period for not saying hi to him, gathered a group of football players and lurched over to our lunch table. “Trillo, Klintock, Warner. You girls think you’re athletes now? Do you even know how to handle balls?” Some of the other guys laughed.
“It’s less about handling than kicking, which sounds okay to me,” I said.
“Nice, Suze,” Tina said. “What’s it to you, Paul?”
“I’m sure nothing,” Paul said. “Your pretty-boy coach doesn’t have the stamina to keep this going.”
“Funny, Arlene said the same thing about you,” Candace shot back. Arlene Swann was Paul’s recent ex, and had also made the team.
“Paul, you gonna take that?” asked his zitty sidekick jock whose name I didn’t know.
“You let chicks think they can play sports and this is what happens,” Paul said, shaking his head.
From down the table, Franchesa Rotini, who’d also survived tryouts, muttered, “Maybe we should tell Coach McMann how you feel.”
“Like I care what some soccer coach thinks of me,” he said, but he did walk away. I didn’t care what Paul Mahoney thought about me, but I guess I was a bit surprised that our team and Coach McMann rankled him enough that he felt compelled to share his shitty opinions with us. It seemed like a waste of the energy he could have expended leering at freshmen girls.