Page 17 of The Golden Receiver

Probably.

Before I had a chance to examine that possibility, I heard the snap of a twig. My head whipped up, and then I saw him walking towards me. This was it. It was time to put my plan into motion. I lifted my hand to wave at him, and he gave me a terse nod in reply. That was normal. He wasn’t a morning person, despite waking up early every day. (He’d talked about the early mornings with his roommates, and I’d overheard it. He woke up early on weekends too.)

We exchanged greetings. I gave him a few minutes to stretch, and then we started running. I wanted him to be in a good mood, and I remembered how annoyed he’d been when he realized that I held back. So, this time, I didn’t. I went at my full speed. I figured I’d probably leave him behind, and we’d catch up at the end, but every time I pushed myself harder, I heard him close by. Pushing himself harder. I was glad I’d chosen a shorter trail, which had to do with my master plan of getting a full conversation out of him. I didn’t know if he’d be able to sustain this speed if we’d run too far.

Or maybe he would have.

Because when we burst out at the other end of the trail, I doubled over to catch my breath with my hands resting on my knees while he stayed standing. He just put his hands behind his head. I angled my head to study him. His face was blotchy, and his chest was rising and falling heavily, but he wasn’t doubled over. He wasn’t acting like he’d gone too hard. I couldn’t lie to myself; I was impressed.

I didn’t say much as I got our bags out from behind a tree near where we’d gone in and handed him his. I fished out the bottle of blue sports drink from mine, step one of my elaborate plan, and passed it to him. “I noticed you drink these after working out, but you never bring them to⁠—”

“Thanks,” he grunted tersely.

I watched as he uncapped the bottle and poured it into his mouth. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, and I was absolutely mesmerized by it. It took me a moment to remember that I had a mission. That mission was not to watch his very distinct Adam’s apple bounce like a tennis ball. No, it was to have a conversation. I closed my eyes and counted to three in my mind.

It was time.

“Why don’t you ever drink one after our runs?” I asked him. That seemed like a safe entry point to a conversation.

Kieran shrugged. “Cuz they cost money?”

“Not that much money,” I pointed out. The way he looked at me told me that was the wrong thing to say. Well, shit. That wasn’t the way this conversation was supposed to go. This was supposed to be the entry point into something deeper that would last at least as long as it took to get across campus. Then I’d have won. I’d have officially had a longer conversation than he had with any of our teammates.

I had to get it back on track.

“But I guess if you’re trying not to spend too much money, limiting the number you drink probably isn’t a bad idea.”

“Sugar content, too.”

I nodded. I hadn’t thought about the sugar content. Maybe I should have thought about that. I knew there were some people on the team who watched their sugar intake and their nutrients closely. They made sure that they kept a high-performance diet or whatever. I should have figured that he was one of them, but I didn’t pick up on it yesterday. Maybe he wasn’t because I’d seen what he’d eaten for lunch the day before. It wasn’t exactly high performance. (I didn’t know if there was much on campus that could get that label.)

At least it opened up another potential thread of conversation. Was it the most scintillating conversation topic? No, but that was okay. I wasn’t determined to have the most interesting conversation he had with someone on the team. Just the longest. I’d aim for most interesting later, after I got to know him a little more. It shouldn’t be too hard. I didn’t think anything that the rookie had said could have been that interesting.

“Do you spend a lot of time watching your sugars?”

“Are you judging me for watching what I eat?” he asked.

That wasn’t the intention at all. Crap. I was trying to have a real conversation, and all I was doing was getting him to raise his hackles. I was saying all the wrong things. It was a good thing I wasn’t a quitter. “No,” I told him easily as we stepped between two buildings to get back to the main paths on campus. “You just seem like the type that would be into the high-performance diet thing.”

“Because I’m human?”

Was he just determined to feel attacked? I heaved a heavy sigh. “No, because you’re a serious athlete who wants to be a starter. It has nothing to do with being human.” He gave me a look I couldn’t really decipher, and I decided to take that as a good sign. He didn’t have a grumpy comeback at the very least. I barreled full steam ahead. “So, do you follow a high-performance diet?”

“No,” he answered. It sounded like the word was being forced out of him. I was about to ask why when he did the unthinkable: volunteered the information. This whole conversation thing was working. “A high-performance diet is like the sports drinks: expensive. I just eat what’s included in the meal plan.”

“So do I,” I told him with a grin. “But the night before a game, the coaches put out a full spread. Usually, it’s a lot of pasta and meat and stuff. It’s great.”

I thought I saw a flicker of interest in his eyes, but it was gone before I could be sure. Maybe it was just the reflection of one of the streetlights on the path across campus. I was torn. Should I keep poking? On one hand, we’d made it about a quarter of the way to the training facility and the goal was to keep him talking and conversing the entire way. On the other hand, talking about food was boring unless there was something to eat. And I wasn’t going to get to eat until after weight training when I grabbed a quick protein bar on my way to class.

Hardly satisfying.

But moving on to another topic didn’t guarantee that he’d keep talking and I really wanted him to keep talking. “Coach Shaw will probably talk about it before the first game. When he posts the list.”

I shouldn’t have mentioned the list. The moment I did, his back went rigid. It wasn’t like I could forget his reaction the week before. He’d stormed out of the locker room. He’d acted all kinds of pissed off.

“Fucking list,” he grumbled.

It was clearly still a tough topic for him.