Disclaimer: I do not own Friday Night Lights, or any of its characters or plots. I just own my storyline and my OCs.
School finally started and María suddenly found herself with no free time at all. New teachers, new classmates and new subjects kept her busy throughout the week. She had not talked to Jack yet. They had just been speaking on the phone and María had gone to see his first game, hoping that after it she would have a chance to talk to him, but he wanted to go to a big party and she just congratulated him on their win and went back to Dillon. They had not seen each other again since that night.
As agreed with Mrs. Taylor, her father was giving her a round ride to the driving range at lunch time every weekday so she could train golf on a daily basis. She had to do that if she wanted to remain eligible for a full golf scholarship at a good college.
Then she had soccer practice after school on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, and games on Wednesday afternoon. As the team captain, Coach Roberts usually kept her in her office for a while after everyone had left to have a little chat about the team and the incoming game, so her time for homework was usually reduced to a minimum.
And she had started tutoring Tim the very first week school had begun. Tami called both of them to her office and told them that they were to work together, adding that she thought it was a going to be a very successful partnership for them and she was sure they would get the best out of it. Tim had been pleased to learn that he would be studying with María, they knew each other very well and he was positive she would make a great tutor for him, as she was generous and patient and they had already done some studying together at middle school. María, on the other side, had had conflicting emotions about it despite Mrs. Taylor´s enthusiasm. On one hand, she was happy with the fact that she would be tutoring someone she knew and not someone she would have to get to know first in order to help him/her in the best possible way, but, on the other, she had her reservations about Tim. She doubted Tim was now the same Tim she had spent most of her childhood and early teens with.
During the last two years her father, Miles, Alan, Jason and Jack had filled her in with disheartening details about Tim´s life, and some of those things did not sound like the Tim she knew at all. She herself had experienced it very much in person when he suddenly went MIA two years ago and never again heard from him until the sports meeting at school, despite being one of her closest friends. While growing up they had been together for almost everything: their first day at elementary and middle school, their first golf tournament, their first swim in the sea, their first party… they even shared what was the first kiss for both of them when María had just turned fourteen. They were curious about it and it was María who came up with the idea, claiming that they should try to find out if it was as good as all their friends were saying. In the end when Tim gave in and complied to her wishes it proved to be disastrous, as the two of them were so nervous that the outcome was anything but a kiss. But while it took María more than two years and a lot of persuasion from Jack to even think about kissing a boy again, it did not stop Tim from starting kissing girls soon enough, and he had not stopped since then, from what she had heard.
Furthermore, Mac and Sue were glad that María was tutoring a boy that they had known for so long. Certainly Tim had a reputation among parents in Dillon but somehow they trusted Tim with María. They just asked them to work together at their home, not at the library or Tim´s house, as they were worried about her tight schedule, and they wanted her to spend at home as much time as possible. They also told Tim that he was expected to have dinner with them anytime he would be studying there if it was ok with Billy. And Billy had no objections to that at all, as he thought the McGills would be good influence for Tim. He seemed to be doing better now and he wanted to help him in any way he could, so if that meant that most weekdays he would be eating dinner alone while Tim was with the McGills, so be it.
So Tim became a regular at the McGills´ dinner table, and somehow, María and Tim quickly found their way back to the kids and young teenagers they once were as though the last two years had never happened, and much to María's surprise they were comfortable spending time together. And tutoring was being a rewarding experience for both of them so far. Tim was an easy-going person if you knew him like María did and she was a really good tutor. He had reduced his drinking to the minimum (Tim knew Mac would kill him if he drank around his house and, more specifically, around his daughter), plus he was getting much needed family time with the McGills and he started getting good grades soon. Coach Taylor and his teachers were delighted.
So by early October María was fully immersed in a routine consisting in school, sport practice, tutoring, college applications and homework that did not leave her much time to think about something else. She really welcomed it as she did not know how to address the "Jack" issue. Her recently discovered feelings for Billy were not helping, either. She did not want to end things with Jack without talking to him as she somehow had started to feel guilty about the whole situation but he seemed comfortable with the way things were between then now, which she could not understand at all. And all this rally girl stuff was completely new for her despite having been raised in Texas by a football coach. She had been tempted to ask their parents about it, but finally she had decided against it as she knew they would start asking questions and eventually freak out if they found out about the reason. She did take into account Tyra´s and Julie´s intake about it, but she wondered if there could be something else that she was missing. Asking Mrs. Taylor was out of the question, as she wanted to prevent her parents from knowing. The truth was that nothing was like she had expected it to be when she had decided to return home for her senior year, and she was feeling a little bit lost.
It was a Monday afternoon and the still strong sun shone over the football field in Dillon High. As usual, María had soccer practice head of her, and then Tim would be waiting for her by his truck after football practice to go to her home to study as he did every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. This, together with the lack of any known love affairs in Tim´s life lately and the amount of time they were spending together had led to rumors involving the two of them. María, who was well aware of those rumors and had decided that there was no way to stop them no matter what they did, found it even more intriguing that Jack had not asked her about it at all.
Football practice had ended earlier than usual due to maintenance and repair works that were being carried out on the soccer field. Coach Roberts had finally convinced the school´s sport committee to allocate part of the sports annual budget to improve the condition of their field, and that meant that the soccer team would have to share the field with the football team for nearly two weeks, taking turns every afternoon. Tim was not dealing well with the cut in football practice time. His hard efforts to make a good impression on Lyla and win her back were unsuccessful so far, and frustration was starting to wear on him. He also had a lot of study to do as he was taking his S.A.T.s again the following month, and not drinking at all was not helping either. So instead of going to the library to try and use his extra free time to study while waiting for María, he decided he would wait for her sitting on the bleachers. He was really missing his time outdoors lately and, besides, he would get a real good view of the cheerleader team practicing from that location. Being able to watch Lyla without her Christian boyfriend by her side was something that he could not miss.
Therefore he went up the bleachers, sat down and made himself as comfortable as possible to watch the "show". Wearing his sunglasses, he was really enjoying the view. He kept his gaze fixed on the far end of the field, where the cheerleader team was, but soon enough one of the soccer players on the other side drew his attention. She was shooting from different positions encouraging her goalkeeper with every shot. The fact that she did not miss any of her shots was not what had struck him. It was the way she kept running and giving instructions to her goalkeeper what made him forget about Lyla and focus on this soccer player. While she kept shooting, now from further behind, still not missing any shot, he noticed that she was a little bit taller that the rest of the team, and she had a better body, too. Long tanned legs and well modeled curves made her the most attractive girl on the field, even more attractive than Lyla to his surprise. The direct sun light upon his sunglasses prevented him from discerning her facial features and she was wearing a sleeveless overall on her shirt, so he could not see her number. He was so absorbed in looking at her that he had not noticed that now most soccer players were looking at him and chatting.
"Hey, McGill", Coach Roberts called María approaching her before she shot for the umpteenth time. "Would you please go up there and tell Mr. Sunglasses to leave right away? He is distracting my players and we have an important game coming up in two days". And that was when she looked up and saw him sitting on the bleachers. "Of course, Coach", she said. "Great for the gossip", she thought while she started climbing up the stairs. As she did so, Tim could then see her number clearly under the overall, 33. "Mars?" he wondered. As she was climbing the last flight of stairs, her cleats making noise against the concrete, he did not waste the opportunity to check her out. "She is a soccer goddess!" he thought while grinning at her. She noticed his mischievous look and was about to convey Coach Roberts´s message when she was interrupted.
"Has Jack seen you in your soccer gear?" he blurted out.
"What?... No, he hasn´t". Everybody was too busy to come to her games, even Jack. "Hi, by the way".
"He should. You look really good down there". As soon as he said it, he realized how it sounded. "I mean, you didn´t miss a …".
"Thank you Timmy, but a compliment is not going to make me forget that you were checking me out a minute ago…. Listen, Coach Roberts wants you to leave, apparently you are distracting all the players….".
"Not all, you were pretty focused down there, McGill…" he was looking at her with his trademark grin. And he knew she hated it when he called her by her last name.
"Whatever. Please, Timmy, could you just leave? I know you are waiting for me but I don´t want…"
Right then Coach Roberts´s strong voice could be heard all over the field: "McGill, stop flirting and come down right now". Everyone started laughing, except the coaches, María and Lyla, who just glanced at them with a curious look in her face.
"Oh, great. Meet you in the parking lot, Timmy". She turned around and flew down the stairs. "The sooner everybody starts with the drills again, the better", she thought blushing. If she had looked back to him then, she would have noticed the way he was still checking her out, and how he started gathering his things the moment he noticed Lyla had seen him doing so and was moving her head with disappointment.
