Page 10 of The Golden Receiver

I chose the latter.

I gathered my stuff and moved to an empty seat in the back of the classroom. An empty seat that had people sitting on all sides, so there was no chance that Evander could follow me.

After my classes ended for the day, I had just enough time to make it back to Karloff Hall to drop my school bag and grab my gym bag. I was one of the last people to make it to practice, and I didn’t like that. I was going to have to find a way to fix that, because I didn’t like the fact that everyone turned to look at me when I slipped into the conference room where we were doing video review. It only lasted a second before my teammates resumed their conversations, but it was a second too long for my comfort.

I didn’t even know why we were bothering with tape review. It wasn’t like we had a game to prep for. We didn’t even have any recent video of the teams we’d be playing, but I had to put some faith in the coaching staff.

At three-thirty on the dot, Coach Shaw came to the front of the room. All the chat in the room fell away, replaced by silence. “Normally, our Monday tape review would be going over what we could improve from the week before,” he started. “Starting this week, we will be recording parts of practice. Especially when we’re doing game drills. This will last until our first game. Today, we’re going to watch some highlights from last season, just so we can all get in the mood. After each clip, we’ll talk through the plays. We’ve done some of them already in summer training, but there’s a difference between practice and seeing them against our opponents.”

At least that told me what the plan was.

“Bernt, can you dim the lights?”

Coach Erikkson hit the lights, and we spent the next hour going over plays from the previous season. When the tape ended, the lights came back up. “We will continue going over this stuff all week. When the season officially starts, we’ll spend the rest of the week studying our opponent’s tape and reworking our playbook to best optimize our offense and defense against theirs. Everyone has fifteen minutes until we meet on the field. Full pads!”

He clapped his hands once, and conversation resumed around me. Everyone started gathering their bags and filtering out of the room. I followed a few paces behind. Our full pads were all waiting for us at our lockers, and I took a moment to savor it before pulling on my pads and making my way to the field. I was somehow one of the first people on the field. Hell, I even beat Coach Erikkson down there. Coach Shaw gave me an appreciative smile when he saw me though, so I was going to take that as a good sign.

I needed to make a good impression on him.

Fifteen minutes later, the whole team was on the field running through warm up drills. I kept my focus on the drills and less on my teammates. Except sometimes, things they were doing would filter in. I couldn’t bend the same way some of my teammates could. I sure as hell couldn’t jump as high. I could see the differences, and I knew I was fighting an uphill battle.

That became even more obvious when we started the football drills.

I was with the other wide receivers for most of the first part of practice, and I could see the physical differences. I might have been built the same as a lot of the guys I was competing with. I had the same height and build, at least within a few inches and no more than twenty pounds than most of them. There was one giant of a player who stood more than a head taller than me. He had to be at least seven feet tall, but he didn’t have great hands. I’d watched him fumble an easy ball.

I had a feeling his place on the team was for blocking purposes.

I spent a good part of practice sizing up my competition. Evander was high on the list. I knew from summer practices that he was a good player, but once he had full pads on, he was an absolute beast. He could run. He could jump. He made some catches that would be on a highlight reel for a professional team. He would be the one to beat if I wanted a starting spot, even if there were other people on the team that would be easier.

Maybe it was a pride thing, but I wanted to be the best. To do that, I had to beat the best.

I put all my focus into making more impressive catches than he did. I’d like to say that it worked well for me, but when Coach Shaw called out who was on what team for the mock game we’d be playing, I noticed which one I was on. I wasn’t on the team with the players that were pretty much guaranteed starting roles. Evander was. I was on the team with the guys who would probably be riding the bench.

I was not okay with it.

The worst part of being with that team was that I didn’t have the chance to prove myself the way I would if I’d been playing with the starting quarterback. I tried, but there was only so much you could do when you weren’t getting the targets. Evander was getting the targets. I watched him from the bench when his team was on the field against our defense, and I would admit to being green with envy.

He moved like poetry on the field. He made catches I could only dream of, and he scored three of the team’s five touchdowns. He was going to get one of the starting positions. He would probably be wide receiver one when the season started, and I hated him for it. I would be lucky if I even saw the field if today’s practice was any indication.

Needless to say, I was not in a great mood when the practice ended.

I didn’t say anything to anyone as I changed out, and I went straight to my room once I hit the dorm. I was going to have to figure out how to push myself harder, because I did not transfer to Creelin University to ride the bench.

It just was not an option.

Chapter Four

Evander

“When do you sleep?” Preston asked as I entered the suite. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor with that same thick textbook open in front of him. His laptop was to his left, and the now familiar array of highlighters was spread out to his right. He looked up at me through the strands of light brown hair that always fell across his forehead.

I grinned and kicked off my shoes, letting them fall into the messy pile of shoes that had started to build up by our door. “At night,” I chirped. “I don’t sleep much.”

“Werewolf thing?”

There was a hint of intrigue in his voice, and I kind of wanted to egg him on. I wanted to make him think that this was definitely a werewolf thing, something that was just a characteristic of my species. Except it wasn’t, and I wasn’t a good liar. I always started laughing about two sentences into a lie. “Nope. Just an Evander thing. I’ve got a few pack members who could be Olympic sleepers. If sleeping was an Olympic event, I mean.”

“Were you working out?”