SO sorry it's taken so long to get this out, blame it totally on school. However, Winter Break is coming up and I promise that I will try to update more then! So thanks everyone for your amazing reviews and for reading and everything, it really keeps me going!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next game was against Herndon. Madison noticed that the boys weren't playing with their usual intensity, especially Gerry. It was almost like the team was ripping apart at the seams. She knew that if they continued to play this way, they would never have a chance at the state title that everyone craved so much. The Titans still won with a score of 17 to 10, a little too close for comfort, especially since everyone knew they weren't playing to the best of their capabilities.
The following Monday at school was eventful to say the least. That morning, Madison was watching Sunshine do his morning Tai Chi through the window and laughing at some of the girls' comments.
"Oh he's so cute!"
"He's in my third period class."
Then Petey came by, "What y'all staring at old Sunshine for? I'm the one dominating on the field he aint played a minute all year."
"Who cares about the field."
Petey continued, "Well I don't want to be the one to break yawls hearts, but Sunshine is from California."
Madison had to hide her giggle.
"Yeah, a California dreamboat." replied one girl.
Madison laughed a little as Petey became frustrated, "No, Sunshine is from California, he's a Californian."
But then things took a turn for the worse and were no longer funny. One of the girl's boyfriend came over and hassled Petey for talking to her.
"You talking to my girl?" he asked Petey.
If he knows what's good for him, he'll just shut up and walk away. Madison thought to herself, knowing that with Petey, that would never happen.
"I don't see no livestock around here, so I don't know what you're talking about," Petey replied cooly.
Then some of that guy's friends grabbed Petey and slammed him into a locker, and that started an all out brawl. Madison ran to find Gerry or Julius, whomever she could get to first, so that they could break up the fight. She and Gerry got there around the same time as Julius.
"Maddie, stay back, you'll get hurt." Gerry said.
Madison just rolled her eyes, and didn't listen but jumped into the fight and tried to help break it up. When she was yanking on one guy to get him off of Petey, he threw his elbow back and it hit her in the lip, busting it. When everyone had cleared out, she tried to hide it from Gerry knowing that he would be mad.
"Come on Maddie, I'll walk you to class," he said, "I don't want you walking through the halls by yourself in case another riot like that breaks out."
"No, that's ok Gerry. I mean, it's kind of out of your way and I've got to go to my locker still…" she said with her back to him, wincing at the pain caused by talking.
"I don't want to hear it, I'll walk you to your locker and then to class," he said grabbing her by the shoulders to turn her around.
That's when he saw her lip, and the small amount of blood that was on her shirt from her trying to wipe it off.
"Madison, I told you to stay out of it!" he fussed at her.
She furrowed her eyebrows, "And since when have I ever really listened to you when I have made up my mind that I am going to do something?"
He sighed and lifted up her chin, "Well, whoever did that, they did a good job… let's get you to the nurse."
She rolled her eyes, "Oh come on, Gerry it's just a busted lip, not a huge deal."
"You're listening to me this time," he said, grabbing her arm and yanking her down the hall to the clinic.
Explaining her unfortunate lip injury to the nurse wasn't bad, but Madison knew that the hard part would be explaining it to her father and the rest of the football team.
That afternoon, after cheerleading practice was over, instead of getting a ride home with one oc the cheerleaders, Madison went out to the practice field to watch the remainder of football practice.
She walked over to her dad and Coach Boone. "Hey Daddy, Coach Boone" she said sweetly.
Her father took one look at her, "Madison Leigh Yoast what happened to your lip?"
She pouted her already swollen bottom lip, "Dad it's not that big of a deal."
"What happened?" he asked sternly.
"There was a fight and I tried to help break it up," she explained.
"Madison, I told you not to get in the middle of things like that. Some of those guys easily weigh twice as much as you," he said.
She rolled her eyes. "I know that Daddy, but I probably would have gotten hit either way because of where I was standing, so I figured that I should of at least tried to fix it a little."
"Well, I can't blame you for trying," he said pulling her into a hug.
After practice was over Alan came over to her, Gerry had told him what happened.
"Whoa there slugger," he joked "I should have seen the other guy, huh?"
She wrinkled her nose, "Don't make me smile, it kinda hurts when I do that."
"So Gerry flipped huh?" he asked.
"Yeah, he definitely pulled the 'papa bear' routine, he was worse than my dad actually," she said, raising an eyebrow.
"Well here comes Sunshine and Julius, I have a feeling they may have some words for you," he said.
She sighed and ran a hand through her hair, "Hey," she stated, unsure what their reaction would be.
"Madison, I thought Gerry told you to stay back," Julius scolded her.
She let out a frustrated sigh and glared at Sunshine, "Don't tell me you're going to lecture me too."
"You guys are being ridiculous, I'm fine. So my lip is busted, no biggie," she said angrily.
"But it could have been worse, those guys are a lot bigger than you, Maddie. We just don't want you to get hurt, I don't want you to get hurt," Sunshine stated calmly.
"I know, and I'm sorry that I didn't listen. But sometimes I need to make my own mistakes," she said.
Julius lifted up her chin, "Man, he really got you good, whoever it was."
"Well there's only one cure for it," she said with a slight grin.
"What?" Sunshine asked.
"Milkshakes! All of us are going for milkshakes," she said excitedly.
Julius and Sunshine laughed.
"How you keep so skinny with all the milkshakes and ice cream, I'll never know," Julius joked.
-------
Later in the week a team meeting was called, on his way to the gym, Alan picked up Maddie since he knew she was home alone.
When they got there, they saw Louie and Blue standing in the middle of the gym.
"Alan, if this is a football thing, maybe I should go…" she whispered.
"Don't be dumb, Maddie. You're a part of this team too," he said wrapping an arm around her shoulder.
Madison watched as some players tried to leave after finding out that this impromptu meeting was not being called by their coaches.
"Hey, how y'all gonna walk out on your teammate like that? He says he's got something to say, y'all gotta listen," Julius said walking to stand in front of the gym doors.
"Turn around, turn around," Gerry scolded.
Maddie grinned, "There's papa bear" she whispered to Alan.
Maddie listened silently as Blue and Louie gave their speech. Wow she thought this is really intense. They're right though. She had to suppress a giggle when Louie started singing.
When they all formed the huddle, Madison found herself being pushed into the middle. She was laughing and grinning. Then Gerry picked her up and set her on his shoulder and everyone hollered.
-----
The next day was the game. Madison was especially excited to see how the new warm-ups would go. She knew Grovetown would be tough, but if they beat them they were going to state. The boys were hungry for a state championship, so she just knew it would happen… no matter what. As the guys came out she started laughing hysterically. Her laughter only got worse when they started to warm up, and she had to sit down on the sidelines.
"Did you know they were planning this?" one of the cheerleaders asked her.
"Yeah, well, kind of. They told me they were going to do something different, but I didn't know it was going to be this different," she giggled. "Don't you love it though?"
"It sure is something," the other girl replied.
Things were going well for the Titans before tragedy struck. Ray let a lineman through and he his Rev, and he hit him hard. Madison just knew something was up. Rev wasn't getting up right away, either. Come on, come on Rev, get up. You're fine, get up. But he wasn't fine. He had hurt his wrist and he was stunned, laying there crying.
"What just happened?" Jessica asked.
Madison bit her lip, "I think he broke his wrist."
"Well what is going to happen now?" asked Jessica.
"They should take a timeout to figure out what to do, they could put in Sunshine, but he's not very good at throwing short passes."
She looked over at the sidelines and saw Coach Boone talking to Sunshine. He better tell him something good, he's got to believe he can do this.
As he ran out to the huddle Madison said a silent prayer that everything would turn out alright. When he got there, before putting his helmet on, he turned and glanced at her. She smiled at him and mouthed, "You can do it" and gave him a thumbs up before he turned back to the huddle.
Madison watched as he called the play, not realizing that she was holding her breath the whole time. He can do this, he can do this, he's got to do this. He can do this. She watched as the ball was snapped and chewed on her bottom lip, then she saw him run back and throw the ball. Just as he released the ball, Madison saw the lineman coming up to tackle him oh my God oh my God oh my God. But then Sunshine bend down and stood up just as the lineman got on his back, sending the lineman into the air doing a flip.
She screamed, "Oh my God, did you see that?"
Jessica laughed, "Yes, he can play. Your boyfriend can play!"
Madison looked at her, "He's not my boyfriend, we're just friends. But you're right, he can play."
The Titans went on to win the game, and Madison couldn't have been more proud of Sunshine. While the boys were still on the field celebrating, Madison ran to her spot in front of the locker room to wait and congratulate them on the win, especially Sunshine.
When they approached, they were all riled up, hooting and hollering. Madison couldn't fight the wide smile that crept up to her lips. Her father and the other coaches had already gone into the locker room when she ran up to Sunshine. She jumped on him, her arms around his neck and her legs wrapped around his waist. He hugged her tightly.
"You were amazing!" she exclaimed over the cheers of the rest of the boys.
"Thank you," he said, smiling.
She took her bottom lip between her teeth, then he put a hand on each side of Sunshine's sweaty face and kissed him. Hearing the catcalls of the team she pulled away, both of their cheeks red with embarrassment.
"I should probably go…" she said.
"Yeah, um I'll see you later?" he asked.
"You bet." she grinned.
Madison walked out to the locker room for the cheerleaders.
"Where were you?" Jessica asked.
"You know I always go and congratulate the boys," she said.
Jessica eyed her up and down, "You kissed Sunshine didn't you?" she whispered.
Madison's eyes grew wide, but she tried to play it cool, "Where would you get that idea?"
Jessica raised an eyebrow, "Your lips are that 'I just got kissed hard' swollen and I know that it wouldn't have been anyone else, so you kissed him didn't you?"
Madison grinned, "Yes."
"And?" Jessica asked.
"And what?" Madison said raising an eyebrow.
"Well, dish, how was it?" Jessica demanded.
"I don't really know what came over me, I just ran up to him and jumped on him, which isn't really a huge deal, and we hugged. Then I told him that I thought he was amazing and then I kissed him. I grabbed his face and I kissed him," she said, blushing.
"In front of everyone?" Jessica asked, eyes wide.
"Well, I mean, my dad wasn't out there. But in front of the whole team, yeah," Maddie said.
"Girl you are too much," Jessica laughed.
-----
That night the team went to Al's for milkshakes and dinner, as requested by Madison. When they got there, they were all sitting at a table on one side of the restaurant when Ray walked in. Sunshine watched as both Gerry and Madison visibly stiffened. He grabbed her hand under the table and stroked the top of it with his thumb, calming her. And she was calm, until Ray came over.
"So Maddie, are you going to give it up to the queer now?" Ray asked. "Maybe you should show him how good you are."
She felt Sunshine stiffen.
"Ray, you'd better leave now," said Gerry menacingly.
"Oh look who we have here, Coach Coon's son," Ray glared.
"Ray. Leave. Now." said Madison.
"Why you little whore, so you can come back with me later?"
Madison slapped his face hard, "I am not a whore, and I will never go anywhere with you."
Ray grabbed her arm and yanked her back to him.
"Ray let her go now," said Sunshine threateningly.
"And just what are you going to do about it if I don't, you're just a fairy anyway," he shot back.
Ronnie just punched him in the face, almost certainly breaking his nose.
"Leave. Now." said Julius, "Or you'll have to worry about more than just a broken nose."
With a final glare Ray left and Madison looked up at the guys, "Thanks."
"He had no right to talk to you like that," Sunshine said.
"He's right, you let us know if he ever bothers you again," Julius added.
"I'm not really hungry anymore, I think I'd like to go home, or something. I just want to get out of here," she whispered.
Gerry looked at Sunshine, telling him without words to take her somewhere but he better be good. Sunshine nodded.
"Come on Maddie, I'll take you home," he said placing an arm around her shoulders.
The ride to her house was silent, when they pulled up to the driveway he walked around to let her out.
"Do you want to come inside? Dad's probably in his office, and Cheryl's over at a friend's," she asked quietly.
"Ok, if you think your dad won't mind," he said, walking her to the door.
"He won't," she said leading him into the living room.
"I can't stay for very long, though," he said.
"It's fine, just for a little while, though,"
"Don't worry about anything that Ray said," he comforted her, pulling her in for a tight hug.
"I know, I know. I just can't believe that he would even say things like that, it was all so untrue."
"Hey, we all knew he was just saying that to make us mad, don't worry about it. We all know none of what he said was true," he said lifting her face to look him in the eyes.
He leaned in and planted a sweet kiss on her lips.
"I probably should go," he said.
"Yeah," she reluctantly agreed.
She walked him to the door and gave him a small kiss goodbye.
"Bye Ronnie," she said, using his name.
"Bye Maddie," he said before closing the door and heading outside to his car.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So what did you think? Hopefully it was worth the way too long wait. Let me know and click that little review button!
