Page 37 of The Backup Plan
The light in his eyes vindicated her. Behind the grit and frustration, the boy in the orange hat was an earnest student whose accent thickened when he was excited. He was comfortable.
“Stay here.”
Avery darted down the hall and ducked into one of the printmaking studios. Rifling through a supply drawer, she extracted a roll of masking tape.
Cam watched in silence as she tore nine sheets from his spiral sketchpad and taped them onto the wall of the lounge in a slightly overlapping three-by-three grid, with the middle of the center row approximately at his eye level. The top row required a jump to pat down the tape. She marked a spot on the floor with a line of tape about two feet away from the wall and beckoned him to stand with her.
“Touchback,” she said, handing him a pencil. “Close your eyes. The line of scrimmage is on the opponent’s twenty-five yard line on the right hash, and you just got the snap. You stand up to drop back. Pause. Look directly in front of you. What’s in the lower third of your line of sight?”
He spun the pencil in his right hand and tapped it with his left, and Avery allowed a smile since his eyes were still closed. He was twitching for the ball as his shoulders pivoted.
“Directly in front of me, it’s Zack Tucker, the center.”
“How big is he?”
“Six-four, about two-eighty.”
“I mean in front of you. Raise your hand.”
Rolling the pencil between his fingers, he lifted his right hand.
She wanted to touch him. It could be innocent, just guiding his pencil to the center of the paper, and even a boyfriend, if she had one, couldn’t be jealous of that. It could be innocent, but it wouldn’t be—not when her ankles wobbled the way they did when he stood so close she could kiss him.
Avery pinched the soft lead of the pencil and pulled it to the grid, then stepped back.
“Here’s the fun part,” she said. “Your pencil is in the center of the center sheet, so that should be the center of your field of vision. Eyes stay closed. Draw a light circle to be the center’s helmet.”
Cam leaned forward and propped himself on the wall with his left hand. He dragged the pencil up, over, and side-to-side, while feeling his way along the paper’s edge with his left hand.
She held her breath and waited.
“Can I open my eyes now, professor?”
“Not yet. Stand up straight again.”
He obliged.
“Now, do a five-step drop. Where’s your guy’s helmet?”
Cam took a step back without thinking.
“Gotcha.” She laughed. “Don’t you dare open your eyes.”
Justin looked at his friend, his sister, and back again. “You want me to do what?”
“Nothing,” Avery said. “We want you to do absolutely nothing besides play dumb.”
“Play dumb about you guys pretending to date so you can get Cam’s attention.”
Avery jabbed his shoulder. “Were you listening to anything I said? I have his attention. I just have to keep it in a… a neutral zone for a very short while.”
“Infraction,” Justin said, rolling his eyes. “And I hate neutral zone infractions.” He turned to Isaac. “You’re seriously okay with being used like this, Fields?”
“I don’t think of it as being used,” Isaac said. “It’s nice to have a friend with you at parties. This is mutually beneficial.”
Avery rubbed his back. Part of the agreement was that they would not tell Justin that Isaac’s social anxiety bordered on crippling sometimes, and that every party they attended together would come with safe words and a time limit.
“Four weeks, huh? And then you fake break up?”