Page 72 of Spectacular Things

Up the Wall

As she does every night before a match, Cricket dumps two cups of Epsom salt into the tub before filling it to the brim with hot water.

On the edge of the bath, she has lined up a glass of mint-infused water and a bottle of electrolytes to maintain her hydration levels while she soaks.

Next to Cricket’s drinks, the delicate flame of a travel-size candle glows steadily, and next to the sink, a portable speaker plays meditation music.

It’s taken some time—more than two years of living on the road—but Cricket has learned how to make a hotel room feel like home.

And now she is in her second home, back in Southern California.

This is the place where her life began, twice: first as a college freshman and then again in the eighty-third minute of the Gold Medal match.

This afternoon, Cricket succumbed to nostalgia and walked through UCLA’s sculpture garden, grieving the fact that Yaz would only ever be her ex-girlfriend.

Cricket’s wife—demanding, fickle, and often cruel—is soccer.

Adding a few drops of jojoba oil to the bath, Cricket undresses, turns out the lights, steps in, and lowers herself down.

These next twenty minutes are as integral to playing well against Mexico tomorrow as sleeping and eating properly.

She has already stretched and reviewed the defensive set plays on her iPad.

Each piece of her preparation is equally vital.

Every ritual is sacred. The heat pulls Cricket inward and helps consolidate her thoughts while the steam opens her pores, melts her anxiety.

The bath is part of the process, and everyone knows to trust the process.

When she feels ready, Cricket begins her nightly visualization practice. She is fully present in the future as she watches herself emerge from the players’ tunnel, sees herself dive for the first save of the game before clearing the ball to the midfield.

Cricket sees all of this with almost a three-dimensional clarity, but the only thing she hears is that all-too-familiar mosquito buzzing in her ear—the grating vibration of her phone on the marble vanity.

She tries to ignore it, but only a select few are able to call through her do-not-disturb setting.

“You have a visitor,” Paula says by way of hello. Cricket’s manager prides herself on efficiency, word count included. “Visiting hours are over, but I checked with Teague and she has deemed this an exception to the rule.”

“Who is it?” Cricket asks, trying to remain calm, but if Teague is making an exception, it must be Mia.

“She said she wants to surprise you,” Paula says. “So it’s okay to send her up? She’s been waiting in the lobby.”

“Okay,” Cricket says, tasting the spaghetti squash from dinner. Mia is here. Finally.

The impatient knock on the door surprises Cricket—she expected more of a gentle rap, not the forceful pounding of a SWAT team bust. But maybe Mia isn’t coming to make amends at all, Cricket thinks, wishing she had time to put on a bra, or at least take out her nighttime retainer.

More powerful knocking.

Cricket opens the door and steels herself.

“Hi.”

Sloane Jackson stands in the hallway, arms crossed, lips taut, expression inscrutable.

They haven’t spoken in ten months, by far the longest they’ve ever gone, and just the sight of her makes Cricket smile because that’s her friend.

That is her goddamn pal of the last ten years, and only now, face-to-face, does she realize just how much she’s missed her.

She has missed feeling seen by someone who views so much of the world the same way that Cricket does: on her toes, with her head on a swivel, from the goal line.

Before she even considers stopping herself, Cricket envelops Sloane in a hug so tight they are both claughing by the time they separate, Sloane’s left dimple on full display.

“What are you doing here?” Cricket asks, trying to comprehend the moment, ground herself in some context she must have missed. She’s devastated not to see Mia but beyond thrilled—and more than a little relieved—that it’s just Sloane.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Sloane asks, sticking out her left leg to showcase the puckered-pink scar that runs down the side of her quadriceps, from the top of her thigh to the middle of her knee.

“You’re done with rehab?” Cricket asks, even though she knows Sloane can’t be. Everyone said it would take at least a year before she could even entertain the idea of training.

“Yep,” Sloane deadpans. “And I’m starting tomorrow.”

“Hilarious.”

“Pretty soon it won’t be a joke,” Sloane says, crossing the room to investigate a large black gift bag. Cricket watches her, impressed with the fluidity in Sloane’s movements. She expected a dramatic limp, or at least a hitch, but Sloane has returned to her panther-on-the-prowl silken gait.

“You’re moving well,” Cricket acknowledges with genuine awe.

“I miss this,” Sloane says in response, rooting around the gift bag until she comes up with a box of truffles from Mignon Chocolates. “Being on the team and playing, obviously, but also swag bags.”

Cricket stares as Sloane helps herself to a truffle.

She hasn’t allowed herself to consume simple sugars for over a year now, since before she went Terminator over winter break in Victory.

A lifetime ago. When Oliver and Mia were still on her team.

Before she’d let them down, and they’d stopped speaking.

Cricket shakes the thought from her head and focuses on Sloane, who is now opening a bottle of Perrier she’s plucked from the minibar.

“So what are you actually doing here?” Cricket asks.

“I saw your interview on YouTube,” Sloane says, lifting her shoulders. “The one with the little kids, and when you got that last question, I knew you were lying.”

“No, I wasn’t.” Cricket watches Sloane pop another truffle into her mouth.

“Yes, you were,” Sloane says while chewing. “But I wanted to come see you even before that because—gah, I practiced this so many times and it’s still hard.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry,” Sloane says. “I’m really sorry.”

Cricket stares at her as twenty different alarms go off in her head. This is a prank. Sloane is once again messing with her, the night before a match, after ten months of not speaking.

“This isn’t—I’m not—this is real,” Sloane says, reading her thoughts. “I’m sorry for all the times I said one thing and did another.”

“What do you mean?” Cricket asks coldly as she flashes back to Primo Bistro the night of her high school graduation and the sad twin mattress on Sloane’s trophy room floor. The five-hundred-dollar clean sheets.

Sloane lets out a long sigh. “Upon deep reflection—and after many sessions with a surprisingly militant therapist named Barbara—I can now see how I used our friendship as a smoke screen for some pretty bad behavior over the years.”

Cricket stares at the carpet near Sloane’s left foot.

Is this really happening? Right now? She feels simultaneously vindicated and insane.

So it hadn’t just been in her head. All this time, Sloane had known what she was doing.

“And the thing is,” Cricket says, forcing herself to meet Sloane’s gaze, “you were punching down.”

Sloane nods. “I can see that now, and I’m—look, this whole injury”—she gestures to her scar—“it put a lot of stuff into perspective. I thought I’d miss soccer, and I do, but I’ve missed talking to you so much more than the sport itself, you know?”

Cricket glances at Sloane, expecting to see her eyes twinkling facetiously, but Sloane has never looked more serious.

“I got so depressed—like, so depressed—and everyone assumed it was the lack of exercise, but it wasn’t just—and I was so mad at you last summer, for saying those things about my parents and me, but it’s also true.

I came from a lot, and achieved a lot, but you came from a little and still managed to do a lot, and then I felt threatened enough to really mess with you, like some gross bully shit while disguised as your friend, and I’m really, really, sorry. ”

They stand there for several moments before Sloane whips her head up and scans the hotel room, clearly looking for something. When she spots the dresser, she approaches it like it’s offended her. Bending her knees and using all her strength, Sloane shoves the dresser into the corner.

“What are you doing?” Cricket asks as Sloane performs a deep squat to lift the hotel desk and its accompanying chair on top of the dresser in the corner, creating a small tower of industrial furniture.

“We need the space,” Sloane answers, sliding down the exposed wall, where the dresser and desk had been, their heavy outlines still imprinted in the carpet. She kicks off her slides and spins around. Now Cricket getsit.

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.” Sloane pats the vacant patch of carpet next to her. “Also, I brought contraband.” She pulls a packet of pumpkin seeds out of her sweatshirt’s kangaroo pocket and dangles it in front of her face, wriggling her eyebrows. “Ready to get into it?”

“I’m sorry, too,” Cricket says, feet grounded in place. “I could’ve handled it better, especially right before your Olympic debut.”

“Thank you,” Sloane says. “But what else?”

“What else?”

“I broke my leg and you never reached out.”

“We were in a fight!” Cricket says, far too loudly.

“Who cares!” Sloane yells, meeting her volume. “If something bad happens to someone you love, you check in. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a fight, you set aside your ego and you fucking check in.”

“Well, then, I’ve blown it twice,” Cricket mumbles. “With you and my sister.”

“Mia?” Sloane asks. “What’s up with Mia?” Just hearing her sister’s name spoken out loud brings Mia to the forefront of Cricket’s consciousness in a way she hasn’t allowed in almost a year. And Sloane has met Mia. Sloane knows Mia, which means Sloane knows Mia has never asked for anything.

“It’s a long story,” Cricket says.