Chapter Text
Megan loves the fall.
It’s been her favorite season for as long as she can remember, the colder nights and the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it smell of leaves turning, and the low hum of everything starting again. Summer is nice, it’s relaxing and warm and long, but something about the all-hands-on-deck, time to get going again feeling of wheels turning and people all across the city gearing up for the promise of colder weather gets her heart racing in a way that none of the other seasons do.
Eugene stays pretty alive year round, the pine trees and giant furs blanketing the entire coast in the kind of verdant green that Megan thinks she’d be drawn to in her sleep, but now that it’s October there are plenty of gold and yellow patches that will fade to red in a few weeks.
It’s not raining, but the air is misty, laced with minuscule droplets of water that remind her of home. It’s not that her school is a desert, but it’s just east enough to feel different from home, to be dryer than everything she grew up around. The mist feels like a good omen, like a little bit of home stopping by to give her a push in the right direction. Megan has the urge to race as far and fast as she can, around campus again and again and again, just to do something with all the energy pouring through her body.
But she won’t, because it’s only the midafternoon, and her favorite part of fall is the soccer season starting. She knows better than to waste her energy racing across the University of Oregon’s cement paths and half-mud fields.
She hadn’t realized how much she missed being here, walking across campus and being blanketed by the buildings around her. Her college feels sort of like a giant hug, but with more bricks and cold, and Megan thinks that her initial impulse might have been right, sophomore year is going to be great. Rachel had laughed at her on the drive down to school last month, because Rachel’s more of a let’s see what happens kind of person, the counterweight to Megan’s it’s going to be good I know so attitude. With their parents in the front seat of their old van and all of Megan’s and Rachel’s college stuff in the back, she had felt unexpectedly like a kid again, like when she and Rachel and the rest of their siblings used to crush together in the back of the car and yell at each other for moving too much or breathing loudly on trips up and down the coast.
Just like those trips, her mom had pulled out a stack of CDs and steadily worked her way through them, Rachel suggesting the next one in the list and their dad pulling it out from the pocket in the car door, songs older than her entire life carrying them away from home and onto what she’s convinced will be a really good year. And like, so far, she’s not wrong.
Last week’s match against one of the schools in LA had gone basically perfectly, and tonight is their first away game, which means a busload of girls piling on top of each other and filling the inside of the vehicle with a cacophony pure, distilled drive. Megan knows that the buses are sort of a hassle, objectively, but traveling with her team has always been one of her favorite things, even in high school. She loves the fun-cramp of it all, how everyone has to climb over each other to go anywhere, how feelings are magnified and multiplied and she can fall asleep to the rolling motion of the bus if it gets overwhelming.
If she wants to be great (and oh my god she really, really, really does) then this is the real start of it all, doing the best job she possibly can at this school, this year.
Freshman year is for learning the ropes but being a sophomore means she has to be actually good. It would be concerning except for the fact that she’s totally up to the challenge. So. It’s ten am on the first Friday morning of Megan’s sophomore year, which is going to be the best one yet, and she doesn’t have classes today which means that she’s hustling through the light, unusual mist to make it to the bus on time. She’s panting by the time she gets there, to one of the outer parking lots, and the familiar sound of her friends’ chatter, the quiet scrape of their bags against the cement under their feet, the almost-subconscious hum of gamedaygamedaygameday, all fill her with her favorite kind of excitement, fresh and clean and welcoming.
This is home too, just as much as the mist in her face this morning or Rachel’s elbow digging into her side in the van down from Washington, this is home.
She’s one of the last girls to arrive, hazards of sleeping in because of a class-free Friday, and her coach nods across the heads of her teammates, makes eye contact with Megan and marks her presence on a clipboard. Megan smiles in response, and then makes a beeline for a familiarly blonde girl leaning on the side of the bus. She crashes into Ali with her full weight, dropping her bag to the ground right before making contact, and this is why they’re best friends, because Ali smiles into Megan’s forehead and wraps her arms around Megan’s shoulders in a half hug, half don’t-knock-us-both-over motion.
Ali smells like kitchen spices, cardamom and cinnamon and vanilla, which is always nice but feels especially appropriate now that the air is suitably crisp, and Megan takes a deep breath of it before pulling back. Ash, shoulder tipped against the side of the bus next to Ali, grins at Megan and holds out a cup of coffee. Megan feels her eyes widen, feels every molecule in her body perk up and roll over at the sight of the steaming cup, and she steps away from Ali instantly, grabbing the cup from Ash and pulling her into a side hug as a thank you.
“You knew,” she doesn’t even try to keep the happiness out of her voice.
Ash winks. “It was Syd’s idea. She said that you were still asleep when she left for class this morning. Like, deep asleep.”
Megan turns to Syd, rounding out their little group of four by the front of the bus, and makes the most serious eye contact she can muster. “You. Are. The. Best. Roommate.”
Syd laughs, “Anything to avoid un-caffeinated Megan.”
Ali chimes in, “It’s basically a public service.”
Megan rolls her eyes and Ash reaches out, landing her fingers on Megan’s wrist. “Alex has food, I think. If you didn’t have time to get a full breakfast.”
Megan leans over and carefully places a loud, smacking kiss in the vicinity of Ash’s cheek. Syd whistles behind them while Ali catcalls, and Ash blushes under the weight of Ali’s gaze. “That’s why you’re my favorite.”
“You literally just said that about me! Ash, I will fight you for the title,” Syd complains, and Megan drops a kiss onto Syd’s forehead too before heading off in hopes of raiding Alex’s backpack for something crunchy and salty. Alex tosses her a bag of chips with a smile, and Megan spends the rest of the time until they’re allowed to get on the bus licking salt off her fingers and comparing their two sets of sore muscles.
When they all get onto the bus Ali shakes her hair dry like a dog at the beach, spraying everyone within three feet, and grinning devilishly at the squeals that follow as people try to dive out of the downpour.
The rest of the ride is pretty quiet, Syd plays music from her heart-shaped speaker and Ash sings along under her breath, their coach spends half an hour going over strategy for the night’s game and stresses the importance of warming up correctly at least seven different times. Two freshmen spend most of the time giggling in the very last row, Ali tries to remember all the facts she can about the UW players, and Megan listens to it all while she stares out the window, watching the terrain change from halfway-dry Eugene to the familiar muted fall colors of Seattle.
It’s not like Seattle is really that much closer to home than school is, her actual hometown is three hours away on the Washington coast, but there’s still something sweetly comforting about being back in the same state. Games at the University of Washington are her favorite, not just because of the state, but because she, like any good collegiate athlete, lives for the rivalry of it all. Long ago, somewhere, the college athletics gods waved their hands and decided that the U of O and UW would do their very best to hate each other (classic neighborhood beef) and Megan is happy to carry on her preordained mission.
She’s not the only one, the energy is higher, the teeth and claws sharper on her teammates than anyone would expect for a normal game, they’re all humming with anticipation of a really good fight. It’s not even who wins (like it is, but also not), it’s just that no matter what, tonight’s game is going to be exciting and loud and triumphant or tragic in equal measure. Megan forgets sometimes, how high drama games can be, but then the jostling, unstoppable energy of a good crowd full of enemies pours back into her veins and yeah.
She lives for this.
It’s not quite like a big game would have been in high school, by now they’re all a little bit older, a little bit better at not exhausting themselves too early and keeping the bulk of their nerves restrained, but she can still feel it, the sparking at the very edges of her consciousness. Ali grins at her and Megan sees the same awareness in her best friend’s eyes, it might be a bloodbath, but it’ll be awfully exciting first. The rest of the ride passes quickly, the low anticipatory rumble of what’s coming next keeping the mid-drive slump from hitting too hard, and Megan dozes off at the end, cheek against the hard metal of the window.
She wakes up to Syd’s hand on her shoulder, gently shaking her out of a dream about being an international spy with Rachel. “Up and at them, Rapinoe.”
“Thanks, Syd.” Megan squeezes her eyes tightly shut and shakes her head, trying to clear the last vestiges of sleep from her brain, to turn herself into a machine who’s job is to do one thing – win this game.
Syd smiles with the same kind of fierceness, and Megan tugs them both off the bus, bags in tow.
Outside, they’re all waiting for the next set of marching orders, and Megan breathes in the Seattle air, which isn’t really any different from Oregon air, but feels more familiar, somehow. Nearby, Ash is wrinkling her nose at the still-chilled air, even though it’s plenty sunny, but they’re going to Arizona in a few weeks, so Ash’ll get all the oppressive heat she needs soon. For now, Megan leans into Syd’s side and watches the universal college campus life float in front of her, kids in too-heavy backpacks rushing around, spread out across benches and ambling in groups of two and three.
Ignoring the whole sworn enemies thing, UW students seem nice, like Megan would like them. When everything’s fully unloaded off the bus, Coach Stevens turns to the group, the same bloodthirsty whisper in her smile that Megan can see on the rest of the team. “Alright! Listen up, ladies. First, Mr. Solomon here,” she gestures to a man standing nearby with a UW polo on, “is going to take us to the locker rooms. That’s where you can leave your things. Then” she checks her watch, frowning at the sunlight’s inconvenient reflection, “you have exactly two hours to do whatever you’d like before meeting back by the gym. We’ll warm up together, and the game starts at 7. Got it?”
Megan admittedly has the occasional problem with authority (mostly when the authority in question is being shortsighted and stupid) but she always gets a thrill when coaches talk like this. She loves hearing a plan and putting it into action (occasionally with her own spin on it). Around her, the we’re going to win hum is growing, passed on breath and the shifting of feet, and Megan feels the fire in her blood burning a little higher.
Just before Coach Stevens waves them into Solomon’s care, she stops, pins them all with a laser-beam eye. “And girls? I know we hate the Huskies, but remember: the rivalry is great to sell tickets.” A few of the girls snort at her exaggerated eyebrow wiggle, Megan among them. “Be respectful while we’re here. Please. Best guest behavior, and all that.” The team nods, and Coach Stevens smiles. “Enjoy stretching your legs. See you in a couple of hours.”
Megan heaves her bag back onto her shoulders and Ali does the same thing, faux-stumbling for effect, while Alex picks hers up without complaint. They trail off after their purple-shirted guide, and a few students toss mildly combative looks their way, signaled by the giant green “O”s emblazoned on their jackets and backpacks, but the glares always break out into a smile and Megan thinks that this is a good kind of rivalry, where everyone knows it’s supposed to be fun and stops before anything weird happens.
The UW sports facilities are slightly older than the ones back in Eugene, but they’re bigger, and in impressive shape. They all traipse past the football stadium, behind the student gym, and then Megan sees it, the soccer field spread out before them. She’d missed a couple of games last year for a could-have-been-worse knee injury, which had sucked, but now she just feels lucky, to be here at all.
Ali catches her hand and squeezes it, “Impressive, right?”
Megan nods, “Totally.”
Ali beams, “Told you,” and then they’re all half-running, half-stumbling down the hill, pouring across the field, and heading into the door that must lead to the locker rooms.
They must be in the back half of one of the fancier gyms, Megan realizes, because she can hear other people talking, catch the distinct smell of sweat and cleaning supplies that every gym smells like, plus what might be a pool, if she’s right about the scent of chlorine coming down one of the halls. Mr. Solomon is saying something to the group, but Megan only half listens, too busy taking in the novelty around her, giant purple “W”s everywhere that a donor might see and a surprisingly clean set of showers peeking out from behind one of the doors. A chorus of thank yous pull her out of investigation mode, and she repeats the phrase without totally knowing what’s going on.
Ash sees her confusion and leans in close to whisper, “We can leave all our things in here, and the door we can in won’t be locked, so that’s how we’ll get back.”
“Got it.” Ash smiles and Megan smiles back, and then Ali sticks her head between them.
“Ready to explore? I’m so hungry and there’s supposed to be a bunch of food right off campus by that museum.” Ash nods and Ali links their arms together, prompting a light blush to spread from Ash’s cheeks to her ears.
“I’ll be ready in a second,” Megan says. “Give me a minute to pee?”
Ali waves a nonchalant hand, ready to wait, and Ash points through a doorway to a part of the locker rooms that’s tucker further back, “Bathrooms are back there, he said.”
Megan silently thanks the universe for giving her friends who actually listen to instructions, and dashes off in the way Ash was pointing.
She runs her wet hands through her hair after she washes them, to give the longest part the tousle she wants instead of the limp early-2010s-Justin-Beiber thing it usually does on buses, and smiles at herself. She looks, feasibly, like someone who could win a soccer game tonight, even on enemy territory. She looks cool. She turns back to head out to her friends, walks through a doorway that looks like the one she came through, but apparently this locker-room-complex is a little more of a maze than she thought, because the sound of other voices, and the smell of chlorine is stronger.
She turns back, tries again, moves away from the speak of shoes in a gym and towards where she thinks her team is waiting, but second time isn’t the charm either, because she’s met with an entirely new wing of the locker room, except that this one actually has people in it. They don’t notice her right away, too caught up in some kind of joke that’s sending three of the girls into a simultaneous giggle-fit while the others chatter back and forth with impressive speed above them.
They’re all pretty, tall and clearly strong, hair flying around and skin shining softly in the dull gym-esque light. The girls basketball team, according to their uniforms, and Megan feels a twinge of jealousy at their height. They must have just finished practice, Megan can see a faint sheen of sweat across arms and shoulders, but she can tell that it must have been a good one because they’re all happy, leaning into each other with wide smiles and a teamwide spring in their step.
One girl in particular catches her eye, undoing a ponytail and releasing a cloud of long brown curls down her back. She’s at the end of a bench, leaning on it lightly for support, and then, as she pulls off her shirt, Megan realizes that she is, in fact, watching a bunch of girls she doesn’t know change, which is totally violating the almost sacred space of any good locker room. The basketball team must realize it too, like they all had the same notification sent directly to their brains, because the girl gets her shirt off, revealing a black sports bra that stands out from her freckled shoulders, and then she turns around, attention landing directly on Megan.
The rest of the people in the room turn too, the full force of an entire team asking about the interloper with their eyes, but Megan doesn’t really notice them, not really, because oh she was not expecting this.
And she should have, it should have been at the very top of her UW-visit-awareness-list, because Megan might not actually hate this school, might think that the rivalry is fun and ultimately not a big deal, but she does hate one person here.
And, because her life is just a nonstop awesome time, that person is standing right in front of her.
Sue Bird’s piercing, formidable, annoyingly deep brown eyes are focused squarely on Megan’s face.
They haven’t seen each other in a long time (which Megan is so completely okay with) after avoiding one anther for the entire summer, but Sue looks exactly how Megan remembers, long, nimble fingers and tense forearms and predatory smile. She’s mid-change when she spins around, still in her practice shorts but newly without a shirt, and in the back of her mind Megan notes all the skin she can see, the soft expanse of her stomach and the muscles trailing around her shoulders.
Megan tries very hard to not look at Sue’s boobs.
She only sort of succeeds.
Sue narrows her eyes, some old, animal instinct waking up in them, and Megan feels a matching impulse spread across her body. As much as she hates Sue, Sue hates her back. That’s how it’s been, as long as either of them can remember. Finally, after what feels like eons of looking at the flush on Sue’s cheeks and not being able to think of anything else, the girl next to Sue steps forward. “Who are you?”
Megan sucks in a breath. Sue crosses her arms and doesn’t say anything. (Megan is definitely, definitely, definitely not looking any lower than Sue’s eyeline.) “I’m lost.”
She doesn’t say anything else, even when the other girl raises an eyebrow, and Sue rolls her eyes before sighing so spectacularly that Megan is transported right back to middle school. “She’s with the visiting soccer team, D.”
“Oh,” the other girl nods, “turn left when you leave the bathroom. Away from the pool.”
No one moves to show Megan the way, which is fine because she’d really like to be done with this situation as soon as possible. “Cool! Thanks. Um. Bye.”
The girl, D, presses her lips together in a thin, half smile, and Megan leaves as fast as she can without actually running away. In her wake, she can hear the girls behind her start talking again, filling their little corner of the building with life, and she tries to not think about the heavy, too-familiar weight of Sue’s scathing eye contact. Turning left at the bathroom does, in fact, spit her back out into the first part of the locker room, the part piled high with familiar bags and Ali leaning against the wall, flicking through her phone. “There you are. I thought you got lost.”
“I did! A lot of times.” Megan’s eyes must be a little wild, she still feels a little wild.
Ali takes in her red ears and rushed breath and a crinkle appears between her eyebrows. “Are you okay?”
“Yup, yeah, just remembered that I hate it here.”
She heads out the door, back into the hallway that leads to the outside, and Ali jumps up from her perch, running to catch up. “In the past five minutes? Jesus, Megan. What happened?”
Megan heads straight for the door and flings it open, letting the crisp fall air flood across her face, and takes two long breaths. She turns to Ali, who has one eyebrow raised like the basketball player from before, and sighs. “You know that thing about not washing cartons of berries too soon? Like before you’re ready to eat them? Because if you do then the whole bunch might mold if one is already a little bit bad?” Her words come out in a rush, which is very not so cool, and Megan takes another breath, trying desperately to calm down.
“Hey,” Ali walks over and places her hands squarely on Megan’s shoulders, like she does before hard games. “Did you see a ghost? Is this some Moaning Myrtle/Harry Potter-type shit?” Megan snorts. Ali smiles, pleased with herself.
Megan sighs. “You know how I like most people?”
“Yeah,” Ali nods, then her eyes widen. “Wait, did you see-“
Megan cuts her off, “Yup.”
Ali’s mouth drops open, half for comedic effect, “Your nemesis?”
“Okay, nemesis is a strong word-“
“I’m literally quoting you.” Ali says.
Megan ducks her head. “Well, in that case.”
“Wait, so what’s the real story there? You’ve never told me the whole thing.” Ali asks as she tugs her arm through Megan’s and starts walking them both up the hill to a collection of trees.
Megan can vaguely make out the shape of Ash and Syd waiting underneath. Ash looks like she’s shivering and Ali speeds up, just slightly. “Ummm. It’s not that exciting of a story?”
Ali snorts. “You’re like, freaking out. That’s pretty exciting.”
“It’s not!” Megan protests, but Ali makes a skeptical noise in her throat. Megan huffs. “Well, you know we’re from the same place, right?”
Ali nods, “The place near Twilight.”
Megan groans, “It’s not that close to Forks,” and Ali starts shaking with silent laughter. “Do you want me to keep going?”
Ali takes a breath and the laughing stops. “Yes. I do.”
Megan chooses to ignore the edge of mocking in her voice, even if she can’t completely bite back a smile. “We’re from the same place. Grayland. Not Forks. Grayland, Washington. Like, halfway down the coast. It’s really nice, and really small, and you know how everyone makes rural beachside towns seem really cool and romantic and pretty?”
Ali nods, “Yeah.”
“Well they aren’t.” Megan bites her lip, not exactly sure where to go next, but Ali bumps their shoulders together and smiles encouragingly. Megan takes another breath. “They’re pretty if you visit, I guess, and they’re pretty when you live there too. And it’s not even the small thing that’s a problem, even though, like, it’s so small. The problem is just that no one ever leaves. No one really knows how to. Which isn’t bad! At all! Like lots of people – my parents and my neighbors and a bunch of my friends – they love the water and they love the trees and they choose to not think about the erosion, and it’s fine for them. They’re happy.”
“But?” Ali looks at Megan with a question, and Megan nods in response.
“I realized that I could leave and go somewhere else on my fifth birthday. It’s all I’ve wanted since then. I love home, but sand is like, sandy, and it’s so quiet, and I’ve just. I’ve always wanted to do stuff that you can’t do there.”
Ali tilts her head, “Crab catching doesn’t do it for you, huh.”
Megan laughs, “Crabs are so boring.”
Ali pulls up short, stopping them both in the middle of a step. “So what’s the problem?”
Megan grimaces, “Some people stay in Grayland because they love it, and some people stay because they don’t know how to leave. I can’t be the first thing, and the thought of the second makes me want to like, scream. To scream, and scream, and never stop.”
“But you did it, right” Ali’s face is quizzical. “You did it! You’re here. You’re here now.”
“Yes.” Megan agrees. “Now, I’m here. But for a long time I didn’t know if I would make it. In order for someone to care about you, for a college to care about some random girl in a tiny town on the very, very edge of the Pacific coast? You have to be so good for that to happen.”
Ali nods, she knows the stakes of what they do as well as Megan does, she’s had to deal with all the same things. “But you are!”
Megan looks up at the sky for a second, shivers when a breeze hits them, and leans in closer to Ali. “So is Sue. It’s like, a weird statistical anomaly, that we’d both be from the same middle-of-nowhere and both be good at all the same things, but it happened. Our birthdays are only two months apart. We were in the same everything, same classes, same teams, same neighborhood, all of it. For our whole lives.”
“And she sucks? She’s a terrible person?” Ali asks.
Megan shakes her head, “No. I think she actually might be nice. Like, to people who aren’t me. But there was only supposed to be one of us, you know? One of us gets the golden ticket to the life we both want. One of us had to be better. So we spent twelve years trying to win that competition. Not a great way to be best friends.”
“Well,” Ali says, “I’m your best friend, so she can’t have my spot.”
Megan smiles, and pokes Ali’s nose with her pointer finger, “No one does it better than you.”
They’re almost to the trees, Megan can see Ash pulling Sydney up and waving them both over, but Ali pauses and turns to face Megan. “So, did you win?”
“Did I win?”
Ali gestures to the O on Megan’s jacket, “You got the golden ticket?”
Megan laughs, but it sounds different than normal, hollow and a little helpless. “We were neck in neck for years. Like, the whole time. And then in 11th grade she got really good at basketball. And I got really good at soccer. So we were different, all of a sudden. No one considered us for the same anything. And we both got out.” She doesn’t like to tell that part of the story as much, it lacks all of the righteous indignation and vigor that her star-crossed-enemies schtick overflows with. It just makes the whole thing seem pointless, like she and Sue wasted their time. And Megan hates wasting her time. Probably even more than she hates Sue.
Besides, it still matters, matters in the way that any hard won instinct, anything you do for the entirety of your life matters. The hot, scared, itching pulse of discomfort that Megan gets in the pit of her stomach when she sees Sue is like, one of the foundations the rest of her everything balances on. It's impossible to let go of something like that. And the feeling, the full body, overwhelming, sharp, distracting buzz that she gets around Sue hasn't gone anywhere either, so. This is just the way they are, no matter how the ending actually turned out, and Megan decided to be okay with it a long time ago.
Ali hums softly, a listening sound, and she pulls Megan into a tight hug. “I’m really glad you made it here, for the record.”
Megan relaxes into Ali’s arms, lets the warmth envelop her and chase away the last remnants of Sue’s eyes and hair and lightly tanned skin. “Me too.”
They stay like that for five more seconds, before Syd and Ash start shouting at them to hurry up, we’re so hungry!! They run the rest of the way to their friends, and by the time they get to the top of the hill Megan really does feel better.
They win the game.
It’s a nail biter, anyone’s game, and Megan’s entire body buzzes with adrenaline the entire time, but her team is good and the crowd cheers for them almost as loudly as they do for the Huskies, and they win. This isn’t the only reason Megan loves to play, (she has at least a thousand) but it’s one of them, the hazy, limitless feeling she gets wrapped up in on nights like this. She feels other hearts beating in her chest, her teammates’ and the people in the stands’ and her own, pumping together, propelling them all forward.
The Huskies are good sports when they lose, smiling ruefully and without any real ire, and Megan talks to a few of them on the way back to the locker room. They’re funny, and congratulate her, and she thinks that they might actually be friends, in a weird way. The locker room is a jungle of shampoo and steam and spraying water and clothes tossed every which way, and Megan revels in it. The triumph is palpable, and she steals Alex’s conditioner. When they get back on the bus, Megan hangs back, gets on last.
She glances around the entire walk back across campus, but she’s not even sure what she’s looking for. Or who. The ride back is subdued and joyous, bubbling light across everyone’s skin, and Megan naps with her head on Syd’s legs. The orange leaves reflect the streetlights, like trees on fire, and Megan watches the autumn colors until they’re on the freeway, until the turning trees are lost to the distance.
////
twelve years ago
Megan toys with the end of her ponytail, tugging on the ends of her hair and feeling the accompanying pinch on her scalp. An hour ago her mom had sat her down in front of the bathroom mirror and painstakingly pulled a brush through two days’ worth of tangles before pulling it into a high ponytail.
Megan usually wouldn’t sit still for that (she really, really hates sitting still) but today is the first day of soccer, and she’s excited. She’s only six years old, but she already understands that sometimes you have to do bad things to get good stuff later, like when she gets ice cream after going to the grocery store. And brushed hair means getting to try soccer, which she’s been wanting to do forever since her older brother started, and secretly she thinks that she might even be able to be better than him.
There’s a small collection of other kids on the field with her, shivering in the biting ocean breeze, and Megan tugs her puffy jacket tighter around her body. Real soccer players probably don’t get puffy jackets, so she’s okay just learning, for now. Most of the other kids look unsure, nervous or bored or looking at their parents’ retreating backs like they’re waiting to be rescued, but one other girl, with dark hair in pigtails and bright eyes, looks just as focused as Megan feels.
She must realize that Megan’s staring, because she waves, and Megan waves back.
When the coach, who Megan’s pretty sure also works in the back of the fish market, gutting the catch that comes back on the smaller boats by hand, claps his hands and calls them all closer, into a circle, Megan makes sure to stand next to the pigtails girl. The wind blows cold in their faces again, and the girl shivers. When their new coach turns to look across the field, making a plan to avoid the muddiest parts, Megan pulls the hat she stole from Rachel before leaving out of her pocket, and hands it to the other girl.
She smiles, and pulls it down over her forehead, making the bumps of her hair stand out like little ears. Megan laughs, the girl laughs too, and that’s that.
It's only on the drive home, when Megan is muddy and cold and can’t wait to come back next week, that she realizes she forgot to get Rachel’s hat back.
When the same girl, Sue – she learns, shows up at her first basketball practice two days later, Megan thinks that she must be the luckiest person in the world. There’s no way they won’t be friends now, right?