I clicked my stopwatch four times in rapid succession as the girls crossed the finish line, storing each of their times and then, as quickly as I could, jotting down the names of the girls in the order they finished. Jessica Hale had finished in 4:45; not bad, but not good enough to get her anywhere near nationals and, more importantly, almost eight seconds slower than her pace from the year before. I'd have to look at the splits to see if I could figure out what was going wrong.
"That's it, ladies. Hit the showers."
The exhausted girls did a few last stretches and then collected their towels and warm-up gear before heading toward the door to their locker room. John Landry, the head track coach, who had hired me that summer, walked over.
"How did she look?"
Jessica had been right on the cusp of being a national contender the year before, her junior year. It was hoped that she'd be able to make the leap in this, her final year at Eastern State, to be the first middle distance runner from the school, male or female, to make nationals in a decade. But this time wasn't encouraging. I shook my head dolefully at John.
"4:45. I hope you're going to tell me that she always starts off slow ..."
"Huh. I really don't know how she's progressed through the season. You'll have to check Bill's records."
Bill Tate had been the middle distance coach at Eastern before me. We'd gone to high school and college together. When he'd been diagnosed with liver cancer the year before, he'd sounded me out about taking his place, and then promoted me shamelessly to the athletic director when I told him I'd do it. He passed away over the summer.
"All right. I'll see what I can do. I'd kind of been hoping she'd make me look good without really trying my first year here, though."
John laughed. "Well, you do what you can. Some of the kids are pretty broken up about Bill. You might be doing more babysitting than you'd hoped."
"Yeah," I sighed. "I'm a little broken up about Bill, too. He was a good friend."
"And a good man." John looked away for a moment. He really did know Bill, I thought to myself. John roused himself from his thoughts. "Anyway, are you finding everything you need, Earl?"
"Well, I thought I was supposed to have five girls today. Do you know anything about that?"
"Oh, yeah. Rebecca ... something."
"Rebecca Clark," I finished for him. "Freshman."
"Rebecca Clark," he agreed. "Her grandmother called. Car problems. She won't be here until tomorrow."
"Okay. Well, John, I guess I'd better see if I can find ten spare seconds in Jessica Hale's mile."
John laughed again and nudged my shoulder. "You do that, Earl. I'll see you this afternoon."
* * * * **
I had a small office with a crummy desk in the bowels of the stadium. I rifled through the drawers for a few minutes before finding Bill's file on Jessica Hale, which I folded open and set on the desk. There were a couple of penciled-in spreadsheets with her splits for the mile on various dates, with a few odd marks – circles, underscores, exclamation points – by some of the times. And there was a hand-written note stuck in at the back: "Bill, Looking forward to seeing you this weekend. Jess."
Hmmm ...
Bill had described Jessica Hale as a "queen bee" to me, with a disapproving, almost forewarning tone. Even in the little bit that I had seen of her, I could see what he'd been talking about: the other female runners followed her about like a posse; and at least two and probably three of the boys on the team obviously had the hots for her. There was no doubt that she was a very beautiful girl: a slim runner's build, with probably more curves and bumps than was good for her sport; glorious brunette hair that she wore loose and wavy when she wasn't running; blue eyes; clear, smooth skin; and fine, confident features. Had she made a pass at Bill?
Just then there was a knock at my door, and there she was in person. "Coach James?" She was demurely holding her books over her chest as she stepped into the office and quietly closed the door behind her. I quickly slid her note to Bill back into her folder behind the other papers.
"Uh ..." I supposed that the appropriate thing to do was to invite her in, but I was already too late for that. "What's up, Miss Hale?"
She had already made up her hair very nicely, and with one hand she swept it off of her face as she sat on the edge of my desk, her books still held to her chest. She was wearing a sheer white blouse, through which her lacey bra was easily made out, and a beige skirt that would have been very professional-looking if it had been cut about four inches longer. Her nails had clear lacquer on them, very well done, and she had light make-up on, particularly eye liner and perhaps a very little bit of mascara. Lip gloss rather than lip stick. She was close enough that I could make out that she was wearing a light scent, musk-and-vanilla of some sort, I thought. Even as my body was reacting to her, I reminded myself of Bill's "warning:" queen bee. Had I not stopped myself, I would have said "Buzz ..." out loud.
"I wonder if we could talk about my time today." She took her books away from her chest and set them beside her on the desk, straightening herself and throwing her shoulders back and her chest forward, almost imperceptibly, as she did. I couldn't help but sneak a look at her chest, but then I made myself look into her eyes, which didn't offer much relief. She smiled slightly when our eyes met, a smile of triumph rather than of kindness.
