Hooked (Harlequin Teen)
Read Hooked (Harlequin Teen) Online
Authors: Liz Fichera
Get Hooked on a Girl Named Fred...
HE said:
Fred Oday is a girl? Puh-leeze. Why is a girl taking my best friend’s spot on the boys’ varsity golf team?
SHE said:
Can I seriously do this? Can I join the boys’ team? Everyone will hate me—especially Ryan Berenger.
HE said:
Coach expects me to partner with Fred on the green? That is crazy bad. Fred’s got to go—especially now that I can’t get her out of my head. So not happening.
SHE said:
Ryan can be nice, when he’s not being a jerk. Like the time he carried my golf bag. But the girl from the rez and the spoiled rich boy from the suburbs? So not happening.
But there’s no denying that things are happening as the girl with the killer swing takes on the boy with the killer smile....
Ryan
The anger behind Seth’s eyes got worse. The blood vessels around his forehead looked freakishly ready to explode. “Some girl named Fred Oday got my spot.”
“A
girl?
” I was speechless. My eyes narrowed.
“Here’s the best part,” Seth continued, his voice growing raspier. “Coach isn’t even making her try out.” He chuckled darkly. “He handed my spot right to her.” His glassy eyes stared back at me. “Sweet deal, huh?”
I shook my head. Hardly.
I didn’t even know this girl, but I already hated her.
Fred
I’d been in Ryan Berenger’s classes since freshman year, and he picked today to finally acknowledge my existence.
I’d seen him tons of times at the Ahwatukee Golf Club over the summer, too. He and his short stocky blond friend were always speeding by the driving range in a golf cart. Lucky them, they
didn’t have to wait till after five o’clock for the chance to play for free like I did. Ryan could play whenever he wanted.
And now we were teammates. As my brother would say, that was irony.
That would also explain why he’d glared at me in English class and gripped my book as if he wanted to shred it to pieces. Apparently he’d gotten the news that I was on the team, too. What else would make him so angry?
It’s game-on for Fred and Ryan!
For the memory of my mother and father,
Mildred and Joseph F. Fichera
Contents
When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced. Live your
life so that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice.
—Chief White Elk (Oto Nation)
Chapter 1
Fred
I BELIEVED
THAT
my ancestors lived among the stars. Whenever I struck a golf
ball, sometimes the ball soared so high that I thought they could touch it.
Crazy weird, I know.
But who else could have had a hand in this?
Coach Larry Lannon towered over Dad and me, his shoulders
shielding us from the afternoon sun. “So, what’s it gonna be?” he said, his head
tilted to one side with hair so blond that clear should be a color. “Are you
in?” He paused and then lowered his chin. “Or out?”
I drew in a breath. Even though Coach Lannon had said that I
could smack a ball straighter than any of his varsity players at Lone Butte High
School, his confidence still rocked me off my feet sometimes. He wanted me on
the team. Bad.
“Chances like this don’t happen every day,” he added, and I
ached to tell him that they never happened, not to my family. Not in
generations.
See, here’s the thing about Coach Lannon. I met him by accident
at the end of the summer as I waited for Dad at the Ahwatukee Golf Club driving
range. At first I thought he was some kind of golf-course stalker or something.
He kept gawking at me as I hit practice balls. It was kind of creepy. I figured
he’d never seen an Indian with a golf club.
Anyway, I pretended not to notice and concentrated on my swing.
I smacked two buckets of golf balls beside him with my mismatched clubs as if
breathing depended on it. After my last ball, Coach Lannon walked straight up
into my face and declared that I had the most natural swing he’d ever seen. The
compliment shocked me. And when I told him that I was going to be a junior at
Lone Butte, one of only a handful from the Gila River Indian Reservation, the
man practically leaped into a full-blown Grass Dance.
1
He’d been stalking me at the driving
range ever since.
Now that school had started, he was making his final pitch to
get me to join his team.
“Will you at least come to practice on Monday and give the team
a try? Please? If you don’t like it, you’re perfectly free to quit. No questions
asked.” Coach Lannon’s lips pressed together as he waited for my answer,
although the question was directed mostly at Dad.
From the knot in Dad’s forehead, I could tell he was
unconvinced. And the coach didn’t bother hiding his urgency, especially after
telling us that he was tired of coaching the worst 5A golf team in Maricopa
County. Another losing year and Principal Graser would send him back to teaching
high school history full-time, something he didn’t relish. I’d never had a
teacher confide something so personal to me like that, not even at the Rez
2
school.
Dad pulled his hand over the stubble on his chin, studying
Coach Lannon. Deep red-and-black dirt outlined each of his fingernails and
filled the crevices across his knuckles, one of the consequences of being the
golf club’s groundskeeper. “I don’t know,” Dad said in his lightly accented
tones.
Coach Lannon leaned down to hear him.
“Is it expensive?” Dad asked.
“Won’t cost you a thing,” the coach said quickly.
“But how will she get to the tournaments? We only have one
car.”
“A bus takes the team. There and back. I can drive her home, if
it’s a problem.”
“Are the tournaments local?”
“All except one, but don’t worry about that. I’ll have her back
the same day.”
Dad exhaled long enough for Coach Lannon’s eyes to widen with
fresh anxiety.
“I’d look after Fred like she was my own daughter,” the coach
blurted out. “I’ve got three of my own, so I know how you feel.”
I sucked in another breath as I waited for Dad’s answer. I knew
that he wasn’t fond of me traveling off the Rez. The daily trip to the high
school was far enough, and not just in miles. He’d agreed to Lone Butte only
because our tribe didn’t have a local high school.
After another excruciatingly long pause, Dad said, “I guess
when it comes right down to it, the decision isn’t mine. It belongs to her.” He
turned to me and placed a steadying hand on my shoulder.
I exhaled.
Dad’s forehead lowered, and he looked at me squarely with eyes
that were almond-shaped echoes of mine. “It’s time you made up your mind,
Fredricka. Is this what you want?”
I cringed at my old-lady name, but as quickly as it took me to
blink, I answered Dad with the lift of my chin. Coach Lannon had said that
there’d be a chance I could get a college scholarship if I played well for the
team. He said college recruiters from some of the biggest universities attended
high school golf tournaments flashing full tuition rides for the best players.
No one in my family had ever gone to college. No one even uttered the word. How
could I refuse? I only hoped Coach Lannon understood the power of his promises.
I wanted college as badly as he wanted me on his team, probably more.
Only a few silent seconds hung between us, but it seemed
another eternity. This was the moment I’d been waiting for these past few
weeks—my whole life, really. I’d been hoping for something different to happen,
something special.
There was only one answer.
“I’ll be there on Monday. I’ll join your team.”
Coach Lannon’s shoulders caved forward, and for a moment I
thought he’d collapse into Dad’s arms. He’d probably wondered whether I had the
courage to join an all-boys’ team, and why shouldn’t he? It wouldn’t be easy for
anybody, least of all a Native American girl from the other side of Pecos Road
and the first girl to join the Lone Butte High School golf team.
Before I could change my mind, Coach Lannon extended his beefy
hand.
I placed mine in his and watched my fingers disappear.
“We’ll all look forward to seeing you on Monday after school,
Fred. Don’t forget your clubs.” Coach Lannon turned to Dad. “Hank?” He extended
his hand, along with a relieved grin. “You’ve got quite a daughter. She’s got
one heck of a golf swing. She’ll make you proud.” He smiled at me, and my eyes
lowered at another compliment.
Dad nodded, but his smile was cautious. He was still
uncomfortable with me competing with boys, especially a bunch of white boys, the
kind who grew up in big fancy houses with parents who belonged to country clubs.
That was why it had taken me two weeks to mention it to him.
But Coach Lannon had explained that there wasn’t enough
interest in a girls’ golf team. “Maybe there’ll be a girls’ team next year,”
he’d said. “Or the next.” Except by that time I’d be long gone. It was the boys’
team for me or nothing.
And Dad knew me better than anyone. When I’d finally told him,
I hadn’t been able to hide my excitement. It would have been easier to hide the
moon. Truth be told, it had surprised him. He’d never dreamed that I’d love golf
like breathing; he’d never dreamed I’d become so good.
Neither had I.
Fortunately, Dad never had the heart to say no to his only
daughter.
“Happy?” he said after the coach disappeared down the cart
path, leaving the air a little easier to breathe.
I nodded, my eyes still soaking in the attention. I was
beginning to kind of like Coach Lannon. He was okay, for a teacher.
“Good,” he said. “Then I’m happy, too. For you.”
Still dizzy from my decision, I nodded.
Dad sighed at me and smiled. Then he picked up my golf bag, one
of his many garage-sale purchases last summer, along with my clubs. The red
plaid fabric was torn around the pockets and the rubber bottom was scuffed, but
it held all fourteen of my irons and drivers with room to spare. Dad had told me
yesterday that he’d try to buy me a new one, but between his job and Mom’s
waitressing, there wasn’t a lot of money for extras. And the plaid bag worked
just fine.
“Come on, Fred,” Dad said, threading the bag over his shoulder.
“Let’s go home and tell your mother. We’re late. She’ll be worried.”
“Uh-huh,” I replied absently as I smashed one last golf ball
across the range with my driver. The ball cracked against the club’s face and
made the perfect
ping.
It rose above us like a comet
before it sailed high into the clouds.
Thank you,
I said silently to the
sky, shielding my eyes from the setting sun with my left hand. I waited for the
sky to release the ball.
One one-thousand, two
one-thousand, three one-thousand,
I chanted to myself like a kid
gauging a thunderstorm. The ball hung in the air an extra second before it
dropped into the grass and rolled over a ridge.
And that’s when I knew.
My ancestors heard me. I imagined that they asked the wind to
whisper,
You are most welcome, Daughter of the River
People.
I was as certain of their loving hands on my destiny as I was
of my own name.
* * *
We drove south on the I-10 freeway to the Gila River
Indian Reservation in our gray van that was still a deep green in a few spots on
the hood. Despite the peeling paint, it ran most of the time. Somehow Dad always
found a way to make sure it got us to school and work and then back home.
Home was Pee-Posh, at the foot of the Estrella Mountains where
the earth was as dark as my skin. That’s where we lived; that’s where my
grandparents had lived and my great-grandparents before them. To reach it, we
had to drive for miles along narrow roads with no stoplights, over bumpy desert
washes dotted with towering saguaros and tumbleweeds that scattered across the
road whenever it got windy. Most days, I wished Dad would keep driving,
especially on the days when Mom started drinking.
“Maybe we shouldn’t tell her that I joined the team. Not yet
anyway,” I said to Dad without turning. My bare arm folded across the open
window as the air tickled my face. I closed my eyes and pretended that the wind
was a boy kissing my cheeks. When Dad didn’t answer, I opened my eyes and
sighed. “Let’s wait a while. A week, maybe.” Good news only stoked Mom’s
bitterness, especially after a few beers.
“You sure?” A frown fell over his voice.
“Positive. Please don’t say anything.”
He smacked his lips, considering this. “If that’s what you
want,” he said with a shrug. “Maybe waiting a week is wise. By then we’ll see if
you still like being on the team. You could always change your mind—”
“I won’t,” I interrupted him, turning. How could he even
suggest it? “Why? You think I’ll fail?”
“Hardly.” Dad turned his head a fraction. “That’s not what I
said.”
“You don’t think I’m good enough?”
He chuckled. “Now you’re being foolish. Of course I think
you’re good enough. I just don’t want...” His lips pressed together, holding in
his words.
“Don’t want
what?
”
He inhaled. “I don’t want you to get your hopes up and then be
disappointed. That’s all. You’ve never played on a team before. And that coach,
the boys you’ll play with—well, their ways are different than ours.”
I frowned at him.
Of course I know
that,
I wanted to tell him. But I hated when Dad talked about the old
ways. They sounded primitive. And hadn’t I already survived two years of high
school?
“Don’t doubt me, Fred. You’ll learn soon enough.”
I turned back to the open window and lowered my chin so that it
rested on my arm, considering this. It was true. He had a point. Sort of. I’d
never played team sports. I’d never played much of anything; that was part of my
problem. “Let’s just not tell Mom, yet. Okay?” I said without turning.
Dad sighed, just as tiredly. “Okay, my daughter. We’ll do as
you wish.”
My brow softened with an unspoken apology for being curt, but
there was no need. With Dad, forgiveness began the moment the wrong words left
my lips. So I smiled at him. But my happiness faded as soon as we drove up the
two narrow dirt grooves that led to the front of our double-wide trailer.
Our nearest neighbor lived a half mile away, which is to say
that most days it felt like we were the only ones on the planet.
Two black Labs circled the van and started barking as Dad
parked under a blue tarp alongside the house. The engine sputtered for a few
seconds after the ignition turned off, and then the desert was quiet again
except for the doves in the paloverde tree next to the trailer. They cooed like
chickens.
Mom sat outside in the front yard on a white plastic chair. Her
legs were crossed, and her right leg pumped up and down like it was keeping
time. She had a silver beer can in one hand and another crushed next to her
chair. “Where’ve you two been?” she yelled. Her words slurred, but there was
still enough of a smile in her voice for my shoulders to relax a fraction.
Mom was still in the happy stage of her inebriation. But the
happy stage usually morphed into the overly talkative stage, which then blended
into the argumentative stage where she brought up a laundry list of regrets,
like having gotten pregnant so young or earning a living waiting on stingy rich
white people at the Wild Horse Restaurant at the Rez casino. “You’d think a
five-star restaurant would attract a better class of people,” she’d complained a
thousand times. And that’s exactly when I’d wish that I could disappear into the
sky like one of my golf balls. I’d fly high into the clouds and never come
back.
“Had to work late,” Dad said. His tone was cautious, like slow
fingers checking the wires of a time bomb. “I brought dinner, though.” He raised
a box of fried chicken in the air.
“Good.” Mom grinned. “After the day I had, I don’t feel like
cooking.” She lifted her hands, spilling some of her beer, revealing splotchy
fingers that had spent most of the day juggling hot plates.
Dad bent over to kiss her cheek before turning for the front
door, and for a moment the corners of Mom’s eyes softened. “Just need to take a
quick shower.” He reached for the torn screen door. It creaked whenever it
opened. “I feel like I’m covered in golf course.”