Tasha said she was OK with messaging, talking on the phone, meeting up for coffee - those sorts of things. So that's what we did. She was on lockdown, though, in spite of our continued communication. It was almost worse than not being with her at all - the cool, casual tone of her messages, the way she gathered up her things in a businesslike manner after we met somewhere to talk. And she always left before I wanted her to.

By the time August rolled around I was thoroughly sick of it. Not sick of Tasha, but sick of the torture of not being able to be with her the way I wanted, the constant longing - a longing I sometimes saw reflected briefly in her own eyes before she looked away or changed the subject abruptly. One day, it hit me. Later than it should have. She was done with me. There wasn't anything else I could do. I went to sleep that night with an emptiness in my heart. When I woke up the first thing I did was go straight downstairs and inform my parents that I'd changed my mind about going to the State university.

My parents looked at me, and then at each other, realizing that this meant I was now open to going to Brooks - the top football university in the country and the place they'd always wanted me to go. "Are you - are you sure, son?" My father asked.

"Yes, I'm sure. It's a better program at Brooks. And, hey, it's in California! I don't know why I was so resistant." That was a lie because I did know why I'd been so resistant, but there was no need to tell my parents that. They had wanted me to go to Brooks ever since it became obvious that I had the real potential to go on to the NFL.

My mom looked down at her phone. "It's almost September, Kaden. Don't you think it's a little too late to be making this decision?"

"They'll take him." My dad replied before I could. "They've been trying to recruit him since he was in the tenth grade, we don't need to worry about timing." He looked up at me. "Do you want to call them or should I?"

And there it was. A thirty-second conversation that profoundly changed the course of my life. It took me a while to accept that things were never going to go back to the way they were with Tasha but I did manage it, eventually. And once I'd accepted it there was no reason not to go to Brooks. Within forty-eight hours of talking to my parents, my enrollment was confirmed. Classes started on September sixth and the first football practice was the very next day. I barely had any time to pack, let alone adjust to the new reality. And I didn't tell Tasha, either. Not until I arrived at Brooks, anyway. My parents took me out for dinner and then we said good-bye. My mom cried a little before they got in a cab to go back to the airport, but neither of them could conceal their pride.

The football players had much better dorms than the regular, non-football-playing students. For one thing, we got our own rooms. Mine was in one of the oldest buildings on campus, a Victorian stone mansion covered in ivy, just like all my mental images of college had led me to expect. My room had dark hardwood floors and eleven-foot ceilings. The communal area was huge and packed with leather sofas. Someone told me later that it used to be a ballroom.

After meeting a few of the other players that day, I finally went up to my room at about ten o'clock, not sleepy at all. All of my teammates so far had looked huge and fit in a way that those at Reinhardt High hadn't. I was no longer a big fish in a small pond. Was I going to be able to hold my own? I let the thought rattle around my head for a few minutes before calling Tasha.

"Hello?"

It was odd to hear her voice - so familiar - in such unfamiliar surroundings.

"Hey, Tasha. It's me."

"Kaden. What's up? Why are you calling this late?"

I looked down at my watch, confused, and then realized we were in different time zones now. It was after ten where she was, which meant her mom and her niece would be sleeping.

"Shit," I said. "I forgot about the time difference. I'm not calling from Little Falls."

"You're not? Where are you?"

"I'm at Brooks. In California."

There was a long pause from her end. Then she said a single word: "What?"

Her voice wobbled. It made my chest tighten with - with what? Sadness? I didn't know. I wanted to ask her what was wrong, but I knew she'd just blow me off.

"Brooks. Changed my mind at the last minute and just flew in today. I'm in my dorm room right now."

"Are you?" Tasha asked, and I could hear her taking one of those deep breaths she takes when she's trying to compose herself. When she spoke again, the wobble in her voice was gone. She was back to her usual assured self. "Wow, Kaden. You sure left that to the last second, didn't you? What made you change your mind?"

"I dunno," I lied. Surely she must have known? "It's the best program in the country - they've been trying to recruit me for years. My parents wanted me to go. There wasn't any reason not to, really."

"Yeah," she replied. "You're right. I guess I should say congratulations then? When's your first game?"

"I don't even know," I laughed. I just got here. First practice is tomorrow. Who knows if I'll even be playing? I'm not the king of the mountain anymore - not here, anyway."

"I doubt that, Kaden. There's a reason you had NFL scouts at all your high school games."

"Well," I replied. "I guess we'll see."

"I guess we will."

We chatted for a few more minutes but Tasha had to get to sleep - and so did I. After we hung up I turned out the light and lay in my bed in the darkness. The window was open and a warm, Californian summer breeze was blowing the curtain back and forth. I think I knew, on some level, that that was going to be the last time I spoke to Natasha Greeley for a long time.

She was right, too. About how busy college life was going to prove to be. And about how well I would do on the team. The coach made a gesture towards not immediately promoting me but within four games I was the starting quarterback. I was also a celebrity. Not the kind of celebrity I'd been in Little Falls, either. In Little Falls, sure, everyone knew who I was. Little kids would ask me for autographs. Girls would always be trying to hang out with me at parties or during class, and some of them were what I'd thought of as forward with their intentions.

Brooks was something else. It had one of the biggest student populations in the country and every single one of them seemed to be completely obsessed with football. I don't think I bought my own drinks once the entire time I was there. Professors went out of their way to give me extension after extension on assignments. And the girls, well. Let's just say if I thought Little Falls girls were forward, I didn't know a goddamned thing. Within the first week, everyone knew who I was.

Less than four days after arriving, I was standing outside my Introduction To English Literature class talking to a couple of my teammates who were also in it. Soon enough, a couple of girls from class joined us. I just assumed they must have been friends with the other two guys but when they left, the girls didn't. One of them, a blonde wearing booty shorts so short I was surprised she hadn't been arrested, smiled up at me, completely confident.

"I'm Ashley," she said, holding out her hand.

"And I'm Heather," said the other one, doing the same.

I smiled and shook their hands. They weren't unattractive girls. That wasn't why I wanted to get away from them. I wasn't exactly sure why that was what I wanted. When I tried to make my excuses and leave, after a short chit-chat session in which both girls did their best to spark my attention, Ashley - the blonde - reached out and took my phone out of my hand, entering her own number.

"There," she said, looking me right in the eye. "Now you know who to call if you ever need two pairs of lips on your cock. Nothing serious. We're just really good at sucking dick and you're cute as hell."

I barely suppressed laughter. Not because it was funny but because it was so goddamned bold. Neither of them betrayed a single ounce of embarrassment or shame. Not that they should have but, yeah. Brooks was a new world, is what I'm saying. And Ashley and Heather were the first among many, many women who seemed to be willing to do almost anything I wanted at the drop of a hat.

I chuckled and took my phone back. "Uh, sure, ladies. I think I'm good for tonight but I'll keep you in mind. You know, should the need arise."

Ashley and Heather never did get a call from me. Bad timing for them, I guess. Not even eight months previously and I would have been more than happy to give them what they wanted. But something was different by then. I wasn't that stupid, horny kid anymore. I mean, mostly, I was. But Tasha Greeley had changed something in me, and I was starting to realize that it wasn't going to go back to the way it was. There was also football. A lot of the other players lived typical lives - when they weren't practicing or playing they were partying or fucking the kind of hot, random, completely available girls that were literally everywhere at Brooks.

To my shock probably more than anyone else's, I knuckled down to work. Practice and homework. I started eating better, too, after the coach had a nutritionist come in and give a short lecture. Everyone else ignored her but I took the pamphlets she had and started eating things like sockeye salmon and kale.

Everyone approved of my new attitude - parents, coaches, even the other players, who all seemed to be in awe at my self-discipline. The only person who seemed to be aware that it was all just one big avoidance tactic was me. And even then I did a pretty good job of simply not thinking about it most of the time.