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Will inhaled. “Smells good. Maybe I should have gotten one.”
Gareth grinned. “No worries. We got extra, just in case.”
Once they had everything Gareth had ordered, the four of them headed back. Will chatted with Gareth as the pair led the way into the gym. Janessa glanced around again, checking on the angry man and Daphne to see if they were still around.
“Does Daphne have someone on the team or cheering?” Aria asked.
“Not that I’m aware of,” Janessa said, glancing to her right and spotting Daphne still there with her friends.
“I guess you don’t have to have a connection to the team to come to the games,” Aria mused.
“No, but most who come in support of the school’s teams are avid fans.” Janessa kept her voice low so that Will didn’t hear their conversation. “She doesn’t strike me as that. But I don’t know her well enough to say for sure, to be honest.”
“Considering how close Will is to all of you, I’m surprised you don’t know her better.”
“Well, you must have seen for yourself how little Will was around when you first arrived compared to now. That was Daphne’s doing. She didn’t like hanging out with us, so we never got to know her very well.”
“That’s a shame.”
“It is,” Janessa agreed. Or it was. Now, she didn’t really care that they hadn’t gotten to know her better. Daphne had hurt Will, and that would never endear her to Janessa or the rest of the Halversons.
Once they got to the stairs leading up to their seats, Gareth and Will waited to let Janessa and Aria go first. It took a couple of minutes to get the food handed out, then the four of them took their seats once again.
“Do you think that guy is going to continue to harass Jay for the second half of the game?” Janessa asked.
“I talked to Doug,” Gareth said, referring to the cop. “He said he’s going to stick close and keep an eye on him. I feel like this could become a problem.”
“Funny how he comes here because of Jay’s reputation as a coach, but then he won’t let Jay coach,” Aria said.
Will nodded. “I don’t think he realizes that he’s jeopardizing any chance his son has of remaining a member of this team. And the kid’s behavior isn’t a whole lot better, to be honest. They both need to wise up.”
“Definitely need to pray about the situation,” Janessa’s dad said. “I don’t think we’ve had a parent as obsessed about their child’s time on the team as this man.”
Janessa wondered where the kid’s mother was. So far, she’d only heard about the dad, and there didn’t appear to be a woman with him at the game. Though perhaps the woman was there incognito because she knew how her husband behaved.
If Janessa had married a man who acted like that, she definitely wouldn’t hang around him when he was being obnoxious. Of course, she wouldn’t marry a guy like that in the first place, because that angry aggressiveness wasn’t attractive to her.
Not that she planned to marry anyone.
Janessa couldn’t help but admire the patience both Will and Jay showed in dealing with the father-son duo. Though she could be patient, those two would push all her buttons. It was probably a good thing Cole wasn’t there, as he’d definitely pop off in defense of his brother and his coach.
When the ref blew his whistle to start the second half of the game, Janessa noticed that Jay wasn’t starting the new kid. She glanced over at his father, glad to see that for the moment, he was staying seated.
“I’m not sure if Cole would be happy or disappointed at how close this game is,” Will mused as the score continued to seesaw back and forth between the teams.
Janessa glanced at him. “What do you mean?”
“This was a team they never lost to last year,” Will said. “Cole might feel validated that he and the other seniors on the team were so good that now that they’re gone, the team isn’t as good. Or he might be disappointed that his former team isn’t doing as well.”
“Could be both.”
Will chuckled. “Could be.”
In the fourth quarter, Jay finally put Donny back in, and that seemed to be a signal for his dad to once again become vocal. This time, at least, it sounded like he was keeping his comments directed at his son, yelling instructions to him.
In the end, it wasn’t enough for the team to pull out a win, and they ended up losing by just four points.
“I think that dad holds the responsibility for this loss,” Janessa said.
