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Sawyer had never had an ounce of fat on him, as far as I could tell. But the last time I’d seen him with his shirt off, after the Labor Day race, he’d looked drawn and sinewy, like he could kick anybody’s ass more through sheer force of will than bodily strength. In the two and a half weeks since then, he’d been working out with the football team, and I could tell. He’d gained muscle. Most guys going down that path would have gained confidence, too. Sawyer didn’t need any.
Grace grinned at him from the nearest seat. “Want me to zip you up?”
“Yeah,” Sawyer said with none of the teasing tone he usually took with Grace. After putting his arms into the feathered suit and flexing his bird gloves, he stood. Grace rose beside him and put her hands at the base of his spine, her fingertips probably brushing across his bare back. She moved the zipper all the way up to his neck. I wondered if he shivered at her touch.
Next she bent, flashing everybody her full butt in her boy shorts underneath her cheerleader skirt, and fumbled with his costume bag. She came up holding the huge pelican head. “Here, Sawyer,” she said, “I’m giving you head.”
Cathy and Ellen squealed with laughter. Sawyer, who normally would have shot her a sly grin and said something even dirtier in response, only turned bright red and looked straight at me.
Suddenly I realized I’d been staring at him the whole time, and he’d noticed.
“Aw, he’s blushing!” Cathy exclaimed.
“Sawyer, blushing?” Ellen echoed. “Grace and Sawyer, sitting in a tree.”
Ugh. I faced the front and dove under the seat for my bag.
A huge white shape filled my peripheral vision. The pelican stood beside me in the aisle, holding out his gloved hand. He carried my pompons in the crook of his other wing. I took his hand, and he pulled me up like a feathered gentleman.
The rush I’d felt when he singled me out and paid me romantic attention—bird suit or not—was doubled when he escorted me into the stadium, already loud with crowd noise and brightly lit even though the sun wouldn’t set for another hour. My mother might tell me being head cheerleader was the opposite of Most Likely to Succeed, but cheering at football games was the most fun I’d had in high school so far.
Thirty minutes later our team kicked off. The stadium was crazy with excitement. The opposing team had beat us last year, but this season Brody had led us to wins in our first three games. If he and the team could pull off a difficult victory tonight, our chances were good of making it all the way to the playoffs. Knowing this, our fans packed the smaller guest side of the stadium and overflowed into the home side. All the football parents and marching band parents were here, and every cheerleader’s parents except mine.
Most of the students from our school were here too. Aidan had driven to the game with a couple of other guys: our friend Quinn, whose boyfriend, Noah, was on the football team, and Kennedy Glass, the yearbook editor, who was self-important enough to think someone cared whether he attended the game or not. Come to think of it, Aidan had driven here for the same reason. He didn’t understand football, but he felt it was his duty to show up since he was student council president. That’s the way he’d explained the trip to me, anyway. He hadn’t said anything about wanting to support me personally or see me cheer.
So I didn’t scour the stands to spot him and wave. I just cheered. My fellow cheerleaders might annoy me with their weekend drinking and nonstop whining, but they were terrific athletes. We made pyramids—I was lightest, so I was on top—and I knew I wouldn’t fall, because they would hold me. We led the crowd in chants, and the students were great about playing along. We hadn’t come in third in the state cheer championships last winter for nothing.
For short stints I turned around with my hands on my hips and my back to the crowd, watching for Brody’s big plays. Dad loved football. I’d spent many weekends curled up on the couch with him while he explained the rules to me. Now, even from field level, I could watch our formations and warn the other cheerleaders that we needed to get ready to make some noise.
In short, I felt like a successful head cheerleader—way more of a success than I was as student council vice president. If only my mother thought this counted.
But my favorite parts of the night were the dances we’d choreographed. Whenever the opposing team had the ball and it looked like our team would slog through the next several plays without much movement, I pointed at Tia, who was drum captain, up in the sea of band uniforms in the stands. She consulted with Will about what jam to play next, then gave me a hand signal to tell me which one. I passed this along to the cheerleaders. The next thing we knew, we were dancing to a groove. I felt high. Little kids held on to the chain link fence separating the crowd from the field, shaking their bottoms, dreaming about being cheerleaders themselves one day.
And for the whole game, Sawyer acted like he always did with me on the field. He could flirt all he wanted and Aidan would never say a thing as long as Sawyer was in costume, because it was a big joke. He danced right behind me and missed the turns, bumping into me on purpose. Several times I slapped him away when he tried to look up my skirt (which wouldn’t have mattered anyway with my boy shorts underneath, but it was the principle of the thing). During halftime he always disappeared to take his suit off in the locker room and pour cold water over his head, but this time he returned a few minutes early. He sat beside me on the players’ bench, slipped his feathered arm around my waist, and watched the end of the opposing marching band’s show.
