Page 77 of Spectacular Things

Other Plans

When the Rose Bowl security team radios in that a woman has collapsed, Sloane Jackson is standing next to a bearded guard in the players’ tunnel, signing a program for his daughter.

“Does Cricket Lowe have a sister?” he asks Sloane, forefinger pressing into his earpiece.

“Yeah,” Sloane says. “She lives in Maine.”

“They’re saying she’s here and she’s unconscious—they’re transporting her to the hospital now.”

Sloane doesn’t respond because she is already running, a slight limp in her gait but determination in every step as she sprints toward the locker room, scanning the sea of familiar faces for a boppy blond pouf, but Cricket isn’t in the locker room, or getting taped up by one of the team physios.

Instead, Sloane finds her in a bathroom stall and calls out her name.

“I’m surprised they let a civilian back here,” Cricket teases before flushing the toilet.

“You have to go to the hospital,” Sloane says, catching her breath. “Your sister passed out, I’ll tell Teague—”

The stall door flies open. “That’s not funny,” Cricket says, pushing past Sloane to wash her hands. “You always take jokes too fucking far.”

Undeterred, Sloane grabs Cricket by the shoulders and pins her against the wall. Her dark brown eyes are dilated with urgency. “You need to go. Right now.”

“What are you—” Cricket stops, recognizing the truth in Sloane’s face. “But I would have—they would have told me—”

“I don’t know anything except she was here,” Sloane says. “And now she’s not.”

“Where do I go?”

“This way,” Sloane says, grabbing her hand and guiding Cricket through a maze of hallways.

The Uber driver speeds through greens, yellows, and even one red light while Cricket hovers over his shoulder, ignoring the ding of the seatbelt reminder as she grips the neck of the headrests and tells him to go faster.

FASTER. She is fourteen years old again, playing well at a tournament in Massachusetts, when the ref calls a time-out and Mia appears to tell her in no uncertain terms that their mother is gone, even though she can’t be, because Cricket still needs her, and her mom still needs Cricket.

But Mia has never needed Cricket. Mia has never needed anyone.

For Cricket’s entire life, Mia has crunched the numbers, made the calls, and figured out the answers.

Mia has always been the adult in the room.

But now, on the way to the hospital, Cricket understands that acting as the adult in the room means just that—acting—and so she pretends that she is in control, that she is not too late.