The Debt 9 (Club Alpha) (10 page)

Her fingers were poised above the
keyboard, and then she heard the sports radio hosts start talking about Chase
Winters again.

She turned toward her radio and listened.

“Look,” one of them said, “a lot of folks
are excited about what Chase Winters did in his first outing.
 
But tomorrow’s game is going to be
completely different.
 
New England
is going up against Green Bay, and let me tell you—Green Bay is scary
this year.
 
Their defense is full of
animals.”

“Oh, yeah,” the co-announcer
laughed.
 
“Their pass rush is
insane.
 
I think they sacked the QB
around fifteen times in their opening game, and they were brutal sacks.”

“Exactly.
 
So people like myself—and don’t
get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of Chase Winters—but I’m looking forward to
see how he performs against Green Bay.
 
Mark my words, people.
 
Green
Bay is going to show us the real Chase Winters and the real New England
Nationals, tomorrow.”

Faith suddenly got a feeling in her
stomach that was different from what she’d been feeling about Chase this past
week.
 
Mostly, she’d been worrying
about how badly their encounter had ended and whether or not he would ever want
to see her again.

But for the first time all week, she had
a feeling of concern—not about him, but
for him
.
 
Were those
sportscasters just trying to hype up the game on Sunday, or were they being
serious about how dangerous Green Bay was?

She closed out of her word document and
opened up her web browser, and searched for highlights from the opener that
Green Bay had played last weekend.

As she watched the clips, her stomach
sank and tightened into a tiny little knot.
 
She felt sick.

Granted, it was the highlights, which
meant that they’d packed only the most hard-hitting, cringe-inducing moments
into the short segment, but even so it was painful to watch.

Time after time, the Green Bay defense
was obliterating the offensive line of the opposing team, and then converging
upon the quarterback and crushing him to the ground with tackles that hurt just
to watch.

What the commentators in the radio show
had failed to mention was that Green Bay had even injured the QB and he’d been
forced to leave the game, limping off the field, looking like he didn’t know
where he even was.

When the highlights were over, Faith was
more afraid for Chase than she’d been beforehand, and this time she felt she
couldn’t stop herself from texting him.

“I have to,” she said, grabbing her cell
and pulling up their last conversation.

Her heart was beating fast and she was
anxious, wondering if this was really a bad idea.
 
She’d been so good about resisting the
impulse to text Chase so many times these last few days.
 
And now she was going to give into
temptation and bother him the night before a big game?

But she couldn’t help it.
 
She truly just wanted to say something
to him.

Hey,
I know we had a weird moment the other night. But I just wanted to say that I
know u r going to do great tomorrow against Green Bay!

She sent the text off, and then
immediately regretted it.

Was that stupid text really going to make
anything better?
 
Would it make
Chase perform any better, or want to talk to her more than he did previously?

Of course not.

It was just her way of giving into her
emotions and trying to jumpstart some contact between them.
 

“Stupid,” she muttered.

A few hours later, as she was readying
for bed, she looked over at her phone, which she’d left by her bedside, and saw
what looked like a text message on screen.
 
Faith ran over there, knowing it would be something from Krissi or
someone else equally disappointing.

But it wasn’t from Krissi—it was
from Chase after all.

Thanx
for the thoughts. Enjoy watching
.

That was it.
 
She debated sending something back, but
the wiser part of her reasoned that if he truly wanted to engage in a real
conversation, he would follow-up with a question or some other comment.

He never did.

***

By the time Chase Winters took the field
for the first time during Sunday’s game, Faith was well and truly freaking
out.
 

It was a night game, so it didn’t start
until 8:30 p.m.
 
Faith had invited
Krissi over to watch the game with her, and so the two of them were sitting in
front of the TV, eating snacks and chatting away.

Krissi had no idea that Faith was so
heavily invested in the game, it’s outcome, or Chase Winters in
particular.
 

So it was that when the New England
offense was readying to play their first down of the game, Faith was leaning
forward in her seat, her hand clenched around her glass of Diet Coke, as Krissi
chattered in the background, almost completely unheard.

On the first play, Chase handed the ball
off to one of the New England running backs, who got to about the line of
scrimmage before being tackled easily.

“Shit,” Faith said, shaking her head.

“What’s wrong?” her sister asked, looking
at Faith with a cocked head.

“Huh?”

“I said, what’s wrong?”

“Oh.
 
Nothing.”
 
Faith stared at
the screen as the offense lined up again.
 
She felt in her bones that Chase was going to throw the ball this
time.
 
Her leg jittered up and down
as she waited.

Chase did drop back for a pass, and the
Green Bay defense burst through the offensive line, at least three men were rushing
in on him.
 
Chase threw the ball
quickly so as to avoid being sacked, and it went out of bounds.

“He didn’t even get close to anyone!”
Krissi said, rolling her eyes.
 
“They’re going to call him for intentional grounding.”

“Shut up, Krissi.”

“Don’t tell me to shut up.”
 
She pointed at the TV.
 
“Ha!” she said, standing.
 
“Did you hear that?
 
Intentional grounding.”

Faith was starting to wish that she
hadn’t invited her sister over to watch the game.
 
She’d thought it might help alleviate
her nerves, distract her, but instead she was anxious and annoyed by Krissi’s
constant jibber jabber.

New England was on third down and now had
twenty yards to go for a first down, thanks to the penalty they’d received from
the previous play.

The announcers were talking about how
tough and rugged the Green Bay defense was, and how much pressure they could
exert on a young quarterback.

But
Chase isn’t just any young quarterback
,
Faith thought.
 
He’s going to be one of the best players the NFL has ever seen.

Still, even with her confidence in his
abilities, she was frightened for him.
 
There was tension in the air—she could see it even through the
television set.
 
As the camera
zoomed in on Chase’s eyes, she thought perhaps she even saw a little fear in
his eyes as well.

But it might have been her imagination.

The play started and Chase dropped back
yet again, and this time one of the Green Bay defensive linemen broke through
the offense, but Chase was turned away from him to throw a pass, and the Green
Bay player came charging at his blind side.

“No!” Faith cried out, standing up.

Chase was hit hard, just as he was
starting to throw the ball.
 
As he
was tackled hard to the turf, his pass wobbled end over end through the air,
and was intercepted by the opposing team.

A roar went through the crowd at Green
Bay, as their team ran the ball back for a touchdown.

Chase stood up, brushing himself off.

At
least he’s not hurt.

Faith was biting her lip, watching him,
knowing how angry and frustrated Chase must have been with himself at having
thrown an interception.
 
“It’s not
his fault,” Faith said, more to herself than anything.
 
“It’s his damn line, they’re not
protecting him.”

Faith’s sister was watching her with her
mouth open.
 
“Are you, like,
crushing on Chase Winters or something?”

“What?”
 
Faith looked at Krissi and gave a sour face.
 
“Why would you even say that?”

“Ummm…maybe because you never cared about
New England, in all the years Dad used to watch and talk about them.
 
In fact, you always said you hated
football.”

“So, I got interested this season after
going to the game.”

“Did you meet him in person?”

Faith didn’t respond.
 
She felt trapped.

Krissi giggled and started kicking her
feet on the floor.
 
“You did, you
met him and now you love him.
 
Admit
it!”

“Shut up.”

“Admit you’re madly in love with Chase
Winters.”

“I’m serious,” Faith told her.
 
“Stop saying that.”

Her sister didn’t stop, though.
 
She never had given up on anything if
she sensed it was getting a rise out of someone.
 
Krissi stood up, holding one of the
throw pillows at arm’s length and looking adoringly at it.
 
“Oh, Chase, baby.
 
I need to kiss your boo-boo from where
you fell down today.”
 
She brought
the pillow to her face and began fake kissing it, falling into the couch,
laughing hysterically at her own comedy.

Faith just sat there, angry with herself
for being dumb enough to have invited Krissi over for the game.
 
That had been just plain stupid.

Over the course of the first half of the
football game, Chase and The Nationals struggled to get any rhythm going
against the rugged and rough Green Bay team.
 
Over and over again, Chase would be run
out of the pocket, his passes short or inaccurate, as he was usually being
pursued by one or two giant opponents.

In the first game of the season, Chase had
been able to pass and run.
 
The
threat of his running ability had kept New York on its heels.
 
Today, however, even his running game
was failing.
 
He tried to scramble
for yardage a few times and was stopped cold, including being hit hard enough
that he flew out of bounds and looked shaken up afterwards.

It was difficult to watch and Faith was
squinting, anticipating the worst every time he touched the ball.

By halftime, Green Bay was up by ten
points, having scored a touchdown and a field goal.
 
The game was in reach, but Chase was not
playing well.

During halftime, Faith tried to relax and
goof around with Krissi, but the entire time, her mind was on Chase.
 
She imagined him sitting in the locker
room as the coach gave a pep talk, and she sent her thoughts out to him, wanting
him to know she was rooting for him.

I
wish I could have talked to him on the phone last night…or woken up in bed with
him this morning.

As she came out of her trance, she
realized Krissi was in the middle of a sentence.

“…Mom said that I should just go to
community college and commute from home,” Krissi was saying.
 
“But I don’t want to live at home.
 
What’s the point of going to college if
I can’t stay in the dorms like everyone else does?”

Faith tried to recover without showing
she’d been zoning out.
 
“You need to
keep your grades up, then,” she said.

Krissi rolled her eyes.
 
“Do you realize how many times a week
you say that to me?”

“Do you realize how many times a week you
need to hear it?”

“I fucking hate my life.”

“You’ll hate it a lot more if you keep
screwing up and lose your chance to get the hell out of there,” Faith said.
 
“I don’t want you to spend anymore time
than you have to, living at home.”

“I wish you were still living there.
 
Now it’s just me and Mom and Dad and
they’re always fighting and drunk.”

“I know,” Faith said softly.
 
Her gaze flicked to the TV screen and
noticed they were coming back from commercial.