Page 56 of Spectacular Things
“I have the best soaking tub in the house,” Sloane says, nodding at the modern whirlpool.
“And I know how nuts you are about your baths.” Over the years, as part of her pre- and postgame routine, Cricket has developed an elaborate bath ritual that requires more ingredients than most cocktails.
In her suitcase is a bath-designated toiletry bag that tends to raise eyebrows at airport security: Epsom salt, lavender oil, jojoba oil, olive oil, a travel candle, and an eye mask.
“Is this a joke?” Cricket asks. Her jaw isn’t the only thing unhinged on this tour. Tucked on the other side of the sauna is a cold plunge pool that she knows costs north of fifteen thousand dollars.
“No, but hold on, because this is your room,” Sloane says, opening a connecting door. “Ta-da!”
Cricket squints, her eyes adjusting to the sharp spike in sunlight as she steps inside.
Only it’s not sunlight. Or rather, it’s not just sunlight.
It’s the afternoon sun refracting off glass and gold, silver and bronze.
Four-foot-tall display cases line the walls and are filled with medals, trophies, and cups.
Above the cases hang frame after frame of memorabilia—gloves, soccer jerseys, American flags, rally towels, and photographs of Sloane standing with famous figures, from former National Team keepers Briana Scurry and Hope Solo to former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
“You’re staying in my trophy room,” Sloane says, barely suppressing her mirth. “So to answer your question, yes, this is a joke.” She nods to the twin-size mattress shoved in the corner. A single prison pillow serves as the cherry on top of this well-executed stunt.
Cricket looks at Sloane. Sloane stares back. It’s not clear who cracks first, who lets out that initial burst of devilish delight, but they don’t stop laughing for a long time.
That night, however, as Cricket tries to get comfortable, she wonders if she’s really in on the joke. Because in this moment, and by the light of the moon bouncing off Sloane’s medals, it feels more like the joke is on her. Why did she agree to this? What is she doing here?
“Good morning, sunshine!” Sloane says, jumping on top of Cricket the next morning. “How’d you sleep?”
“Terrible,” Cricket says, squinting in the sunlight. Once she started questioning Sloane’s motives, and if they were actually on the same team or just pretending to be, she couldn’t stop. Now Sloane is ready to go and Cricket is exhausted.
“Oh no.” Sloane frowns. “Do you want to sleep in the actual guest room? I liked the idea of you being so close by, but not if it compromises your rest and recovery.”
Cricket nods, confused but grateful for the sympathy.
Sometimes Sloane felt like two different people with two sets of competing motives, but maybe Cricket had just been paranoid last night.
She shakes off her groggy concerns, gathers her stuff, and together they carry her things down the long hallway to the guest room.
After that first restless night, Cricket sleeps soundly in the creamy linen oasis that is the Jackson family’s guest room.
She chalks up her suspicions to Sloane just being Sloane and taking a prank too far.
Luxuriating in a privacy she’s never experienced, Cricket cannot believe she has her own bathroom, or that the hamper she assumed was for dirty clothes is actually designed to warm her towels.
Training with Sloane is so much better than being home alone in Maine or cramped at the Airbnb with Mia and Oliver and all their expecting-parents anxiety.
As Cricket and Sloane fall into an intense training routine and equally strict recovery program, the days pass quickly.
They are determined to crush January Camp, and here at Sloane’s house, they have all the tools and resources they need to do just that.
“Who has two pairs of these?” Cricket asks, sitting next to Sloane in the family den on a decadently oversize leather couch. Their legs are elevated and encased in cutting-edge compression boots.
Sloane shrugs. “My dad kept stealing mine so I told him to get his own.”
Bruce Jackson is a burly man with thick black hair on his forearms and oil-funded privilege in his blood.
Cricket has never seen him not smiling. At four p.m. each day, Bruce arrives home.
Like clockwork, he collapses on the leather couch between Sloane and Cricket, offers his take on the weather, the Dow, his swing if he played golf that afternoon, and then asks to hear about their day of training.
“You two are going to go all the way,” he says, delivering each of them a tall glass of his signature ginger-and-lemon restorative iced tea. “Mark my words: No one works harder, plays better, or deserves to wear the crest more than you two.”
Bruce is so supportive, so enthusiastic, that his presence underscores everything Cricket’s father was not.
Each day spent with the Jacksons reminds Cricket that she must counterbalance her dad’s sins with her own greatness to honor her mother’s legacy.
She has so much more to prove on and off the field than someone like Sloane, who has a mom who’s still alive and a dad like Bruce, who’s always had everything.
Not that Sloane considers any of this, or would ever agree if she did.
And so, as usual, an electric current of competition buzzes between them at all times: in goal, in Sloane’s basement gym, at the Jacksons’ dining room table.
When Cricket and Sloane elbow each other while loading the dishwasher, Bonnie tells Bruce, “They’re more like brothers than sisters. ”
“More like prizefighters than brothers,” Bruce says, chuckling.
Despite their rapid-fire trash talk during their thirty-minute skin care routines, Cricket and Sloane benefit from the constructive criticism and hard-won compliments they offer each other.
A mutual respect toggles between them in equal measure for ten days straight.
Thriving on each other’s determination, they drive to camp feeling confident and prepared.
And thanks to the Jacksons’ Costco membership, they also arrive with a ten-pound bag of pumpkin seeds.
“Sloanie!” someone shouts from across the field as soon as Cricket and Sloane arrive.
Because Sloane already plays for the Washington Spirit in the NWSL, she knows nearly everyone at camp.
Teague teases Sloane incessantly and Anders constantly pulls Sloane aside to share his observations on her performance.
They do not do this with Cricket, who feels the frost even in the debilitating humidity.
When Yaz calls from her grandmother’s house, Cricket tells her it’s going well. But when Mia calls from the Airbnb in Key Largo, she sounds concerned, as if she already knows how camp has panned out, how Cricket is once again wilting in Sloane’s shadow.
“You doing okay?” Mia asks.
“Yeah,” Cricket says, her own voice faltering. “It’s just—hard, you know? With everyone already obsessed with Sloane and joking around with her all the time. Like the roster is already set.”
“Just be patient,” Mia says, her tone tight, almost sharp. “Just try to be patient.”
“Are you okay?” Cricket asks, sensing something else. Mia remains quiet for so long that Cricket assumes the line has gone dead. “Mia?”
“I’m here,” she whispers. “But I lost it.”
“Lost what?”
“The baby,” Mia confides, her voice breaking. “I lost the baby.”
“Where are you?” Cricket leans forward, determined to fix the unfixable, because Mia has already been through enough, they have both been through enough. “Send me the address and I’ll borrow Sloane’s car, I’ll leave—I’ll come to wherever you are right now.”
“No, stay there,” Mia says firmly. “None of us can do anything. We just have to be patient, too.” She sounds hollowed out, and Cricket yearns to be with her. She should have gone to Key Largo. Her presence would have prevented the jinx of a babymoon and this devastating loss.
“I want to be there for you,” Cricket tells her, an all-too-familiar grief tightening its grip around her neck. “Tell me where to go—”
“Cricket,” Mia says in her stern professional voice. “There’s nothing you can do. Just focus on soccer.”
It lands like a slap.
Mia doesn’t need her.
Mia has never needed her.
“Okay,” Cricket says slowly, trying to eliminate the hurt from her voice.
She tells herself this isn’t about her, but Mia has just made it abundantly clear what she values in Cricket, and it’s the same thing their mother valued, and what Yaz values, and what UCLA values.
It’s what Sloane and Bonnie and Bruce Jackson value, why she was invited into their home, and why she was invited to this camp.
Her worth begins and ends with the ball at her feet, so Cricket hangs up and gets dressed for afternoon practice.
That day she plays with such ruthlessness that the coaches exchange looks and crack jokes about what she ate for breakfast. They call her fearless and out of her mind and gunning for Alyssa’s starting spot.
Cricket ignores their cheers as she adjusts her gloves.
If she’s only good at soccer, then she damn well better be great.