Scoring The Coach ✔️

chapter twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-Two

Finishing high school came with a hell of a lot of confliction. One the one hand, the timing felt just right. I was ready for the next stage of my life. On the other, it seemed like it had come so quickly, and moving out into the real world was a terrifying thought. Somehow, I found it in me to be okay with it. This was it. I'd made it.

The diploma was tremendously overhyped. It was a glorified piece of paper in my hand that felt meaningless now. It was just another box checked off. When I imagined my graduation day, I expected there would be so much more than this.

Really, I just wanted Jared. I couldn't care less about anything else.

I smiled for all the pictures, forcing my mouth to form a permanent, ingenuine grin as camera after camera captured this moment in time. Mom was crying, Dad was trying not to, and both of them were congratulating me on being a valedictorian on her way to an Ivy League.

Risa looped her arm across my shoulders and threw a triumphant fist in the air. "We did it, Laura!"

Shea wasn't too far behind, grabbing both of us in a bear hug. "We're graduates!"

We took pictures with everyone, including Gen, before heading back to our respective families. There was a sober grad party that most of my friends seemed to be attending. The soccer girls were pestering me, urging me to come with them.

"Maybe," I finally said. "Just give me a second to take it in."

I wanted to be alone because the real thing I wanted, who I wanted, wasn't there by my side.

The field was mostly clear just twenty minutes later. Students were driving to their events, parents were going home. My mom and dad had both left for their shifts, so I was alone in the middle of the end zone with my cap in one hand and my diploma in the other.

As the crowd grew thinner, I saw him.

He was standing at the other end of the football field wearing a crisp button-down the color of his eyes. There was a bouquet in his hands and he had this look on his face as if he didn't know what to say to me. I did know that he was sorry for the break, happy it was over. It was written all over him.

Above all, I knew he was just as happy to see me as I was.

Suddenly, I was running. I was running the way I did at the Championship game to hug Risa after she made the winning shot. I was running like he was my oxygen and I was drowning on dry land without him. I was running so fast my high heels flew off my feet and my diploma and cap hit the ground.

I was in front of him now, chest heaving, gasping for breath. He took a look at me, in my dress and a full face of makeup, absent of my letterman or a soccer uniform. I didn't look like me. My blonde hair was falling in perfect curls past my shoulders. All of it made me look like a different person.

And there I was, madly in love and making a spectacle. I didn't care who was watching. There was nothing anyone could do about us now. We could be together, and that was the end of it.

He had the same tawny hair and deep blue eyes, his cuffs undone on his shirt. He hadn't shaved in a few days, which wasn't unusual. The flowers in his hand dropped to the grass below us. My heart was pounding as I waited for him to do something, make a move.

"Laura," he whispered, like the word held every thought he doesn't know how to express.

That's all it took.

His hands hooked around my thighs, my dress riding up as I wrapped my legs around his hips and my arms around his neck. His mouth was on mine instantly, the collision of his all too familiar lips welcomed by me. Our bodies fit against each other perfectly, like we were made to be that way. I was kissing him with everything I was.