Chapter 1 Bad news

“Blue twenty, blue twenty.” I ignored the noise from half the stadium as I stood against the offensive line, my eyes scanning the defence.

The scoreboard showed twenty-four to twenty-one, and thirty seconds remained. One mistake could make us lose. My eyes quickly scanned players on the field, the coaches on the sidelines and the crowd in the stadium.

The defence rushed forward, I noticed there was a safety on the left and I saw where my receiver would be.

Finally, the ball landed in my hands, as the defence rushed forward, I threw it as hard as I could to the receiver. I held my breath as I watched the ball fly in the air before he caught it. Touchdown. A second later, the crowd went wild.

After the match, my teammates rushed to me. “We did it!!” I laughed as they pulled me into a hug. This was why I loved football, the noise, pressure and the adrenaline that came with it.

This was what I loved and I wanted to take this team to the championship. As the only female quarterback on an elite college football team, I knew that every decision I made could change the entire game.

As I walked away from my teammates to get my water bottle, I heard someone say, “How long are they going to keep putting her in as quarterback?”

The other person replied, “She's good for a girl.”

My fingers tightened around the bottle as I stopped for a second.

With a deep breath, I ignored them. I wasn’t going to let them get into my head because I had worked hard to get there.

I was still celebrating with my teammates when I heard my name.

“Aliya!” I turned around to see one of the assistant coaches standing a few feet from me. “Coach wants to see you.”

“Now?” I frowned, wondering what could be the reason for my presence.

“Immediately,” the assistant coach responded firmly, then he walked away. I grabbed my water bottle and walked down the hallway to the Coach's office.

The coach, Mr Aemond was sitting behind his desk, his arms crossed over his chest. “You wanted to see me?” I said, announcing my presence.

“Sit,” he commanded, and I slowly sat. For a few seconds, he didn’t say anything. This made me slightly uncomfortable.

“Was he going to take me off the team finally?” I thought, as my heart pounded slowly. As the only girl in the team, I was placed under a microscopic lens. Every missed pass, bad decision and mistake made people question if I truly deserved my position.

“You played well tonight,” Mr Aemond finally said. “Thank you.” I slowly nodded.

“You are improving,” he added with a smile. Hearing that come from the coach made me calm. I had been working on my throws, my footwork, and reading the defence because I wanted to be better.

“Starting tomorrow, you'll be moving out of your dorm. You’ll be staying in the team's off-campus house for the rest of the season”

Immediately my smile disappeared. “Excuse me?” I let out, trying to process what he just said. “Why? I have a room already,” I protested.

“The women’s dorm is undergoing renovations. There aren’t enough rooms available for the athletes, so we’ve had to make other arrangements,” he responded, taking a short look at me.

“You’d be staying in the team's house,” he added.

“You’re joking. I’m the only girl on the team and you know that,” I rebutted, rubbing my forehead slightly.

“I know that. You'd have your own room, Aliya. You'd be safe,” the coach responded.

“Such an easy thing to say as a man. Women are never safe around men,” I thought, staring at him as my mind began going through every possible problem I could encounter. What if someone enters my room and doesn’t respect my boundaries? What if something happened and the person blamed it on me?

I already had a lot of eyes on me in the football team and I didn’t want to become the girl who lived in the team house and gave everyone something else to talk about.

“Is there really no other option?”

“No,” he said firmly.

I sighed. Of course there wasn’t. I had already spent the season fighting for my spot and now I was being asked to change my entire routine because of the renovation.

“Fine.” I stood up and walked out of the office.

As I walked back to my dorm my mind tried to process everything. Moving to the team house was something I had dreaded. At least I needed a life and people outside sport.

Inside my room, I noticed my roommate Clara was packing up too.

“So where are you moving to?” I asked as I watched her pack.

“They moved me to the West Halls. What about you?”

“They moved me to the football house”

Clara paused and looked at me. “What? The football house? The one with the boys?”

“Unfortunately,” I replied with a shrug.

“How are you going to cope? I mean aside from privacy. Seeing their big dicks running around in sweat! Girl.. yours is a blessing and a curse,” Clara joked as she looked at me pitifully.

“Do you want that?” She asked. “No, I don't, but do I have a choice?” I stood up and went to pick my clothes out of the wardrobe.

There was nothing special about my room, it was just my personal space away from football now I had to leave.

“Proving to the team that I belonged there was hard, living in the team house could not be any harder” I muttered the following morning as I stood outside the team's off-campus house with two suitcases beside me, I stared at the large two-storey building in front of me.

Taking in deep breaths, I walked into the building. This was really going to be a long season for me.

“Hey. Are you staying here?” one of the players asked as I walked down the hallway.

“Apparently,” I replied, walking away.

As I stopped in front of my door, I knocked but no voice came out. Slowly, I walked inside. The first thing my eyes landed on was a condom on the table, and a pack of blunts.

“Great!” I rolled my eyes. A few seconds in and I was already seeing signs that I was in for trouble.

I walked further into the house and found myself in a spacious living room. The bathroom, living room and kitchen were shared but at least I had my own bedroom.

As I made my way into my room, I wondered who my roommate would be.

I had barely placed my suitcase on the bed when I heard the front door open. Loud voices filled the room with boys cackling and laughing.

I walked out of my room, and three boys looked up at me. I recognised one of them immediately.

My stomach dropped as I hoped he was not the one I was sharing with.