Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 122219 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122219 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
A male coach could have a meltdown for a whole season and be labeled as passionate, while a female coach could throw off their baseball hat after a bad play and be called overly emotional.
Was it right? No. Yet it was the world we lived in. And now, with more attention on our team, we had more attention on our Avery.
She glanced up at the bleachers, where her father was sitting. Matthew Kingsley showed up to every single home game, no matter what. I hadn’t officially met him, but he was clearly his daughter’s biggest fan.
Matthew smiled a sad grin toward her. Then he mouthed, “Breathe, baby.”
Avery grumbled and took a breathe before she stomped her feet off toward the building.
“Is it that time of the month for her?” Frank snickered with his assistant coaches who joined in the laughing.
“Fuck off, Frank,” I blurted out before walking off the field.
“Walk it off, Coach?!” Avery spat out as she stood on the baseball batting mound at my place, clearly still enraged with what went down. “Are you kidding me, Nathan?”
“That was me having your back.”
“Really? Because it felt like you were stabbing me in it.”
I slid my hands into my pockets and leaned back against the railing of my porch. “You’re pissed at me.”
“Thank you, Captain Obvious. It’s nothing like having a man tell a woman that when she’s pissed off. I almost didn’t notice without you informing me what I was feeling.”
Her sarcasm was at a new level. I watched as she took a ball from the bag beside her, tossed it into the air, and knocked it out of the park. I swore her swings became Incredible Hulk strength whenever she was mad.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Screw you,” she replied before hitting another ball. She then turned toward me. “Frank Stagg is a dick.”
“The biggest dick, yeah.”
She pointed the bat toward me. “But he’s not the only one who thinks that way. Do you know I spent all the years before being told that stuff? I worked under a misogynistic head coach for years, Erikson, who would’ve laughed it off with Frank. I’d been told countless times not to get my panties in a frenzy whenever some crap happened. I was told countless times by Coach Erikson to”—she made quotations with her fingers—“take a walk whenever I was being disrespected. Do you know how belittling that is? I was the only woman on the field and the only Black coach being told to take a walk because I was too much.”
I began walking in her direction when I heard her voice crack. “And then I went ahead and said the same bull as those assholes.”
She nodded slowly. “And I had the stupid idea that we were…partners.”
“We are, Coach. I’m in your corner through and through. I will never understand what it is that you go through, but I need you to understand that anything I do is to better our team and protect you. Nothing good was going to come out of that interaction with Frank Stagg. He’s a fucking clown who was trying to get under your skin because we whooped his team’s asses. I just didn’t want him to spoil our win with his ignorant commentary.”
She frowned and grumbled a little before biting her bottom lip. She looked back up toward me, the rage in her eyes from before somewhat simmering down. “Can you say anything other than ‘walk it off’ next time?”
I moved closer, took the bat from her hand, and placed it down. “What would you like me to say?”
“I don’t know. Anything but that.”
I took her hands and brought her left palm to my mouth. I kissed it lightly. “How about ‘leave it on the field, Coach’?”
“Oh gosh, no.” She shook her head as she inched a little closer. “Try again.”
I kissed her other palm. “Lap it out, Coach.”
“Nothing about walking or leaving the field,” she argued. “Something that wouldn’t feel so belittling but makes it clear that the other coaches are baiting me. Something that others wouldn’t understand. Something that’s just ours.”
I brought both of her palms to my mouth and kissed them. “Butterflies.”
“Butterflies?” she questioned, moving even closer. So close that I could easily step in and kiss her again.
“Yeah.” I nodded, leaning in and brushing my mouth against her soft lips. “Butterflies.”
Her eyes fluttered shut. “Why butterflies?”
“Because I’d have to be close to you whenever I said the word, and whenever I’m close to you, I get fucking butterflies.”
She reopened her eyes and shoved me away with a loud chuckle. “Okay, cornball.”
I gasped and tossed my hands to my chest. “Here I am, speaking from my heart, and you call me a cornball?”
“I’m sorry. If you didn’t say corny things, I couldn’t call you a cornball.”
“You know what? Take a walk, Coach,” I joked.