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“Okay, one last thing,” vice principal Andrews says toward the end of the faculty meeting. “Chaperones, you received the email earlier today about the upcoming senior field trip,” she starts, meeting the gazes of the teachers who will be chaperoning—including me. “Busses are set to leave at nine A.M., right after first period ends. You have your assigned busses and lists of students that will be on them. Dress warmly—they might take you out on the field, so it’ll be cold.”
I take a breath as I listen to her go on, twiddling my thumbs in my lap. The senior trip this year, ironically enough, would be to the Chicago Rebels’ training facility, and no one was more surprised by this destination more than me. It would take a lot to get an entire senior class to meet with a top NFL team. But Mrs. Gonzalez, the teacher who is this year’s senior class’s advisor, happens to be cousins with Austin Scott, the head coach for the Rebels. She managed to pull some strings with him and,voilà, hence the trip that the whole school is talking about.
Of course, it’s for visiting the NFL team for the player that I happen to be friends with and am sleeping with, too. The trip isn’t until next week, but I didn’t know about it until this morning. I swear, the moment I read that email, and the fact that I’m chaperoning it, I almost choked on my coffee.
I mean, I’m not worried about going there or anything. It’s not like I spend every day telling people about my friendship with Caden Bennett, so pretending it doesn’t exist shouldn’t be a problem while at the facility. I just need to tell Caden about the trip, if he doesn’t know already, and call in a favor and tell him to act like he doesn’t know me. And ask the same of the few teammates I met at Leo’s daughter’s birthday party. I just hope they don’t get offended by it.
People would kill to brag about being friends with someone from the NFL. But if you ask me, that just opens up a can of worms I don’t think I’m ready to face. Because the second more people find out about how close I am with Caden, that’s when everyone starts pretending to be my best friend, wanting aninwith Caden Bennett. Nothing wrong with keeping a good thing private. The people I want to know about it, already know about it, like Cody, Bianca, and Tina. That’s all I need, because then at least I have people to talk about it with in a casual, friendly capacity.
When the meeting ends, I stand up and bid goodbye to my coworkers, seeing as it is the end of the day. As I’m walking down the hall, an arm hooks through mine, and there’s laughter in Tina’s voice as she whispers, “You think you and Caden will be able to keep the bedroom eyes on lockdown while we’re at the facility?”
I nearly trip in my steps at her words, throwing her an incredulous glance as we make our way towards the main doors. “We don’t give each otherbedroom eyes. What the hell?” I ask, trying to keep my own disbelieving laughter at bay.
“Really?” Tina asks, unconvinced. She hums as we step outside, our coats zipped up tightly as we head towards the parking lot. “If I looked like either of you, I’d sure as hell be giving bedroom eyes.”
I blink. “Do you and Bianca give each other bedroom eyes?” I ask slowly.
“You never noticed?” Tina asks, tilting her head to the side, considering. “Huh. We need to up our game.”
I shake my head, eyebrows rising at the ridiculousness of this entire conversation. “Whatever. We’re going to be around kids, Tina,” I point out.
She rolls her eyes. “I’m sure you two give each other looks when Elaine’s in the room.”
My cheeks instantly flush at her words. I don’t know about this bedroom eyes nonsense, but I would be lying if I said Caden hasn’t given me one of his looks when we’re around Elaine—or that I’ve done the same to him. Oh, God. Isthatwhatbedroom eyesmeans? It sounds so cringe worthy. “Shut up,” I grumble as I pull my keys out of my purse. “And I hate you.”
Tina laughs, her body shaking against mine as I press my lips together to bite back my own laughter, even if I’m a little mortified. She gives my arm a squeeze. “Can’t wait to finally meet the guy you’ve dubbed as thebest sex of your life.”
“Oh, God,” I say, squeezing my eyes shut as we stop in front of my car. Throwing Tina a look, I point a finger at her and warn, “You better not say anything to him.”
“I would never,” Tina denies with wave of her hand. “Besides—we’ll be around kids,” she adds teasingly, throwing my words back at me before she skips over to where her car is.
I shake my head, unlocking my car. “You’re the worst!” I call out to her.
She laughs in response. “And you love me anyway!”
8
CADEN
“That’s all for now, folks. I’m Willow Burke, and you’re watching Front Runner News.” Upon the cameraman’s signal, Willow lowers the microphone as we go off the air. Willow smiles at me and says, “Thanks for the interview, Caden.”
I throw her a small, lazy grin. “Part of the job description,” I say, and she rolls her eyes with a laugh. Her smile remains as her gaze catches on something, the grin on her face turning softer, and it doesn’t take a genius to find out what—or who—she is looking at. I follow her gaze to where Reed is, talking to Coach Scott, but he’s glancing our way, too. His eyes constantly finding Willow. I’ve never seen that guy look as in love as he is right now.
I look back at Willow, and when something tugs at my chest, I find myself asking her, “How’s it going with you two? Now that everything’s out in the public?”
I’ve talked to Reed about this a few times. For a while, Reed and Willow kept their relationship private, out of worry that Willow wouldn’t be able to remain on as head reporter for the sports channel she works for if it came out that she was in a relationship with one of the players she technically works with. The media and world, after all, is always harsher towards women than it is towards men. But Reed and Willow recently went public with their relationship after they found out it wouldn’t be a big deal—at least from Willow’s job. The rest of the world? Well, they will always have something to say, good or bad.
Reed tells me things with Willow are going great, perfectly even. But he also mentions some stupid shit people online like to spew, and how Willow’s the one that tells him to ignore it just like she does. But I don’t blame him for getting angry; if strangers online were making rude comments about the woman I love, I’d be pissy as hell, too.
“It’s going great, really,” Willow answers, dragging her gaze back to me. She lets out a breath, still smiling. “A lot less stressful than I thought it would be, if I’m being honest.”
That surprises me, my eyebrows rising. “Really? How come?”
Willow shrugs, handing Michael, the cameraman, the microphone before he goes off. To me, she says, “You just, I don’t know, learn to tune out any negative comments or tabloids. As long as we’re both happy, it’s easy not to give a fuck what anyone else thinks,” she adds with a small laugh that reflects the light in her eyes. “I mean, don’t get me wrong—sometimes it gets a little difficult, but at the end of the day, we’ve got each other. That trumps everything else.”
I nod slowly, her words sinking in and making a lot of sense. Public commentary is to be expected for people like us—it’s what we sign up for the moment we sign our contracts with the NFL. But that doesn’t mean we take it lightly when the spotlight is turned towards the people we care most about, highlighting their negative aspects. It’s the main reason why Daria and I keep our friendship to ourselves for the most part. Especially since she has a kid, and any kind of public attention on her—which could happen just if people know she’s a friend of mine—would be on Elaine as well, and neither Daria nor I want that.
The fact that my mind instantly wandered to Daria at the foot of this conversation with Willow—startles me but, truthfully, isn’t all that surprising. The more time I spend with Daria, the more and more I wish we could see each other outside of the walls of our apartments. Go out for coffee or just hang out outside of our building. It’s a foolish little desire, but it’s there, and it nags at me a little each day. I am fully aware that keeping things to ourselves is the right and easy thing to do. But sometimes it feels like a dirty little secret, even if that’s the last thing it is. She’s more than that, always has been.
