Page 39 of Campus Heat

We were busy with the red-zone reps. We had tight windows and zero margin. I took the snap and rolled right. The defensive pressure moved in fast, and Lucas broke across the middle. I planted hard to evade a rush and felt it. A sharp dragging pull shot through the back of my shoulder. It wasn’t catastrophic, but it was wrong. I threw the ball anyway, knowing it was a mistake. It sailed higher than it was supposed to.

Lucas caught it and shot me a look. “You’re off.”

“I know,” I said, pushing at my shoulder.

We reset. I rotated my arm once and tried to be subtle, but heat radiated all the way down toward my elbow. That couldn’t be good, but I couldn’t be the one to walk off with an injury either. I pushed through the snap and the roll, and then I planted. My eyes shot wide as the pain flared sharper. It was almost electric, and because of that my release lagged for a fraction too long.

Harris’s whistle pierced the air. “You’re late!”

“He’s injured,” Lucas said as he ran up to the coach.

“I’m fine,” I scoffed. “Let’s just go again.”

“Are you hurt?” Harris asked, stepping closer.

I swallowed hard. Actually, I needed to tell him Lucas was right, but I didn’t want to be that guy. Malik said that the guys looked up to me, so how would they react if I got sent to the medic station during the first few hours of hell week?

“No,” the lie came out automatically.

“Then throw like you aren’t,” Harris snapped before blowing his whistle.

With the next rep, I forced myself to push through the pain. Instead of getting anywhere useful, I over-corrected and the ball hit the turf. Frustration exploded in my chest.

“Again,” Harris shouted before I could.

We ran it until the timing hit, until the route landed clean and the pass snapped into Lucas’s hands like it was meant to. My shoulder started throbbing, and a red-hot ball of pain settled deep beneath my skin. I didn’t allow the practice to slow down though.

Conditioning came back around like it was a punishment for existing. There were bear crawls, panther carries, and even sled pulls with resistance bands. My muscles trembled violently under the strain. Sweat blurred my vision, and my lungs were scraped raw.

We were busy with a carry drill when someone shoved me from behind.

“Stay up,” Dylan barked, even though he could barely breathe.

“I am up,” I responded, shoving him much harder than I needed to.

The reaction lingered between us, causing tension and possibly a fracture. Dylan lunged for me, but Malik stepped between us before he could make it all the way. He said nothing, but he reset the drill.

When the final whistle blew a few hours later, my shirt was soaked through, stained with grass and clinging to my spine. My legs felt unstable beneath me, and Tara was waiting for me at the tunnel entrance.

“You’re compensating,” she said before I could get a word of protest out.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re favoring your right, which is unusual for you.”

I tried to argue, but as she pointed to the physio room, the burn returned. The second we stepped inside, everything became sharper. It was as if the lights were controlling what was happening inside my body. Then she pressed along the muscle, and I lost all control over my body. I locked my jaw, simply refusing to give her any kind of reaction.

“It’s just a mild strain,” she finally said. “But if you keep pushing it like you did today, it won’t stay mild.”

“We have a road game coming up. It’s not like I can afford to take it easy.”

“And what will happen if you tear it?”

I didn’t answer. She rolled her eyes at me and hooked me up to the stim machine. Ice followed in her terrible routine of torture. The cold bit deep into the muscle, numbing the pain temporarily but not erasing it.

“Rest tonight,” she said as she started packing up her things.

I gave her a noncommittal grunt. There was no way I could guarantee something like that. Heck, I didn’t even know what the morning had in store for me, not to mention the evening.