Caine stood at the island with a container of prepped chicken and rice open in front of him, a fork in one hand, his bag on the counter behind him with his keys beside it. He ate standing, his weight settled into the tile, one hand resting on the edge of the counter, working through the container in steady bites, the fork scraping the bottom of the tray where the rice had pressed flat against the plastic.
Sara sat across from him with her coffee held in both hands, her thumb resting on the handle of the mug, her eyes on him over the rim. She brought the mug to her lips, took a sip, and set it back down, the ceramic tapping once against the stone.
Down the hall Mireya’s voice carried from the bedroom, low and soft, the words in Spanish aimed at Micaela. Camila’s voice cut over it, louder, asking Mireya something about the TV. Mireya answered both of them, her voice splitting between the two conversations and holding each one.
Caine scraped the last of the rice from the container with the side of the fork, put it in his mouth, and chewed. He picked the tray up off the counter and crossed to the garbage can, dropping it in, the plastic hitting the liner. He came back to the island and picked up his phone, checked the screen, and set it back down on the marble.
Sara watched him for a moment, her thumb still on the handle of the mug. She set it down and slid her hands off it, folding them on the counter in front of her.
“¿Qué pasa, mijo?”
Caine turned around and leaned against the edge of the island next to her. “You think I’m fucking up by having Autumn and Mireya both in the suite today?”
Sara picked her mug back up and brought it to her lips. She took a sip before she lowered it back to the marble. “Did you think about that before you made the decision?”
He shrugged. “I thought about it.”
“¿Cuánto cuesta?”
“Suficiente.”
Sara reached up and ran her hand over his hair,. “Then why are you asking me, mijo?”
Caine looked across the kitchen toward the hallway where Mireya’s voice still carried, lower now. “I ain’t never had to manage this before. That’s why.”
Sara turned the mug on the marble with one hand, the base scraping in a slow quarter circle. “Are you planning to keep this thing with Autumn going? Getting serious?”
Caine nodded.
Sara took a sip of her coffee and held the mug low against her chest, both hands wrapped around itl. “Then she is going to have to learn to be around Mireya and Mireya is going to have to learn to be around her. Like you have to learn to be around Sena.”
“I ain’t got no beef with Sena, though. She cool.”
Sara snorted a laugh. “Because you’re a man and you can’t see a woman as a threat.”
He shrugged. “Nah, I’m serious. I’m just trying to get them to dead all this shit. If Mireya gonna go out here and fuck women then what I’m doing shouldn’t even matter to her.”
Sara’s eyes came up to his face. “Es egoísta cuando se trata de las personas que quiere. Ya lo sabes. She’s afraid of being replaced, by having someone you see as better than her.”
“She’s the mother of my children. Autumn and her don’t even exist in the same shit.”
“No one said it was logical, mijo.” Sara set the mug back down on the marble, her thumb finding the handle again. “And all it takes is you getting Autumn pregnant for that to change.”
Caine sucked his teeth. “That shit wouldn’t happen.”
Sara held her hands up. “Again, I’m telling you where Mireya is coming from. But I’ll play referee today for you.”
Caine shook his head. He leaned down and pressed his lips to Sara’s cheek. “Me tengo que ir. I’ll see y’all after the game.”
He straightened and grabbed his bag off the counter, slinging it over his shoulder. His keys came off the marble and he crossed the kitchen to the front door. He pulled it open and walked out, the door swinging shut behind him.
Sara watched it close. She sat there for a beat, her hands flat on the counter, the mug between them with the coffee still warm inside it. Then she shook her head, picked it up, and brought it to her lips.
~~~
Autumn stepped off the elevator with Jade beside her and Simone and Brooke behind them, the four of them moving into the corridor at the Founders Suite level. The hallway stretched in both directions, carpet under their heels, the doors numbered along the wall, attendants in black polos passing in and out of the open suite doors along the wall. The muffled noise of the crowd came through the concrete from somewhere below them, a low vibration that sat in the floor.
Jade walked with her bag over one shoulder, her head turning to glance into a suite as they passed it, the door propped open, a group of men standing around a counter with drinks in their hands and the field visible through the glass behind them. She looked back at Autumn.
“Bitch, why that nigga Caine just getting around to getting you a suite?”
Autumn sucked her teeth. “Don’t do too much in there. I’m not trying to make his mama think I’m some kind of ghetto bitch just chasing behind his money.”
“I ain’t even say nothing about that.”
Brooke leaned forward between them, her hand catching Autumn’s shoulder. “I thought you said you met his mama when you went to New Orleans?”
“I did. This is different though. She wasn’t in the state of mind to really judge anyone considering her grandchild was still in the NICU.”
Simone shifted her bag to her other arm. “Do his baby mama know how to fight is the question we need to be asking? Because I need to know if I gotta jump in for you, bitch.”
Jade looked over her shoulder at Simone. “Caine a hood nigga from dirty ass New Orleans. You think he was fucking with a bitch who can’t fight before?”
Autumn’s eyebrow rose. “I feel like I should feel a little insulted by what that suggests.”
Brooke’s laugh came quick behind them. “That you upgrading that nigga to not be a hood nigga from dirty ass New Orleans.”
Autumn shook her head and turned toward a door on the left side of the corridor. An attendant standing beside it pulled it open, nodding as they passed through the frame into the suite.
The room opened wide enough to hold twenty-five, thirty people. A raised countertop with four chairs ran along the far end near the glass, and past the glass twelve seats sat in two rows outside, all of them overlooking the field where the turf stretched green and white under the sun. Chairs filled the middle of the room in loose clusters. More seating lined the counters along the side walls, trays of catered food spread along the surfaces between them, the foil pulled back on some, lids off others, the smell of it mixing with the recirculated air in the room. A man leaned against a counter in the far corner with his phone to his ear, his free hand in his pocket, a woman beside him with blonde hair that fell straight past her shoulders, her eyes on her own phone, her thumb scrolling in long swipes.
Sara and Mireya sat outside in the first row of seats with Camila between them, Camila’s legs swinging above the concrete. Mireya had her feet up on the seat in front of her, a baby carrier on the chair beside, a blanket folded over the top of it.
Jade stopped inside the door and looked around the room, her eyes moving across the counters, the food, the field through the glass, the seats outside. “I ain’t gonna lie. I’m kinda mad your daddy ain’t got us some shit like this before.”
Autumn rolled her eyes.
Outside, Mireya stood up from her seat and leaned over the carrier, her hands reaching down for Micaela. She lifted her, one hand under her head, the other sliding beneath her body, and brought her up against her chest. As she straightened, she looked over her shoulder through the glass and saw Autumn standing inside the suite with the three women around her. Her eyebrow rose, held for a beat, then dropped. Then she turned her attention back to Micaela, her hand coming up to steady the back of her head, her chin dipping as she settled the baby against her collarbone.
Simone stood beside Autumn with her arms crossed, her eyes locked on Mireya through the glass. She took in the jacket, the corset top underneath it, the leggings. “Is that bitch wearing Balmain?”
Brooke tilted her head, squinting. “It might be Temu.”
Autumn looked at Mireya through the glass, her eyes moving once over the outfit. “Nah, it’s real.”
Jade sucked her teeth. “Damn, that nigga Caine like fancy bitches, huh?”
Autumn walked past them toward the glass doors that opened onto the outdoor seats. She stepped outside and crossed to where Sara sat with Camila, her bag hanging from the crook of her elbow.
Sara looked up then stood from her chair and opened her arms, pulling Autumn into a hug, her hands pressing flat against Autumn’s back. Autumn’s arms went around her and they held it for a beat, Sara’s chin near her shoulder.
Mireya watched them from where she stood with Micaela against her chest, her hand on the back of the baby’s head, her eyes on Autumn’s hands where they rested against Sara’s back.
~~~
Mireya sat in the outdoor seats with the rain coming down steady over the Coliseum, the drops hitting the concrete around the seats below them. The field below was slick under the lights, Iowa’s offense lined up near midfield, the quarterback barking something at the line that got swallowed by the noise from the stands.
The glass door behind her opened and the blonde who’d been standing with Tatum came out of the suite, the air from inside pushing warm against the back of Mireya’s neck before the door swung shut. She crossed to the seat next to Mireya and sat down, settling into the chair =. She held her other hand out.
“I don’t think I introduced myself. I’m Skye.”
Mireya took her hand and shook it once. “Mireya.”
Skye nodded toward the field. “So, Tatum told me your man plays for SC?”
“We ain’t together. But yeah, that’s why I’m here.” Mireya gestured over her shoulder through the glass toward the suite where Sara sat with Camila in her lap and the carrier on the chair beside her. “That’s his mama and our daughters.”
Skye’s eyebrows lifted a fraction. “Sounds like your man to me.”
Mireya’s mouth pulled at one corner. On the field Iowa broke the huddle and came to the line again, the offensive line settling into their stances, the rain running off their helmets.
Skye gestured over her shoulder toward the suite where Autumn, Jade, Simone and Brooke sat at the counter near the food. “And you don’t know them?”
“The tall one is his girlfriend. Caine, my children’s father.”
Skye shrugged and took a sip of her drink, the ice shifting in the cup as she tipped it. “You seem fine with it.”
“It is what it is.”
She looked at Skye, her eyes moving once across her face, her hair, the drink in her hand. She waved her hand in a small circle toward the suite. “Are you with whatever his name is?”
Skye smiled. “Tatum. And something like that.”
“You don’t look like a pro, so I’m thinking sugar baby.”
Skye laughed, her head tipping back against the chair. “You’ve been around enough escorts to know what they look like?”
“First hand knowledge some would say.”
Skye’s laugh cut short. Her eyes came to Mireya’s face, reading her, the cup held still in her hand halfway between her lap and her mouth. After a beat Skye leaned over toward her, closing the distance between the armrests, her voice dropping under the noise of the crowd. “I was thinking you were a sugar baby yourself with all this designer on.”
“Some would say I was that, too.”
Skye laughed again, harder this time, her shoulders pressing into the back of the chair. “She says as she’s sitting in a suite for her children’s father who she isn’t with. Baby, you’re still one now.”
Mireya snorted a laugh then turned her head toward Skye. “What does Tatum pay for you?”
Skye brought the cup to her lips and took a sip before she answered, the ice settling against the bottom. “Everything. My tuition at Stanford, for my car, my apartment, trips, clothes, food. I haven’t spent a dime since I met him.”
“Sounds like a good set up. Especially because he ain’t bad looking.”
Skye tilted her cup toward Mireya, the ice clinking against the sides. “He probably got enough to take care of you, too.”
Mireya laughed, her head shaking once. “I don’t think I should start fucking Caine’s agent.”
Skye shrugged, her lips pressing together around the rim of her cup as she took another sip. “Probably not.”
They sat there for a stretch without talking, the rain running off the overhang above them and falling in a thin curtain past the edge of the seats. On the field Iowa’s quarterback dropped back, stepped up in the pocket and threw toward the sideline. The ball sailed past the receiver’s hands and hit the turf, skipping once on the wet grass before it rolled dead. The crowd reacted in a low cheer that rose from the student section and thinned as it reached the upper decks.
Skye leaned over again, her arm resting on the armrest between them, her chin tilting toward Mireya. “What are you doing after the game?”
Mireya glanced over at her out of the corner of her eye, the corner of her lip tilting up.
~~~
Tatum crossed the suite with his drink in one hand, weaving past the chairs in the middle of the room to where Sara sat in one of the cushioned seats, Micaela asleep against her chest, the blanket tucked around her body and pulled up to the base of her neck. Sara’s hand rested on Micaela’s back, her fingers spread wide enough to cover most of it, her thumb moving in a slow stroke along the edge of the blanket. Tatum sat down in the chair across from her and set his drink on the armrest, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.
“Ms. Guerra, I feel like we haven’t had a lot of time to get to know each other since I started working with Caine.”
Sara snorted a laugh, her hand shifting on Micaela’s back. “My son has developed a habit of keeping business and family separate. I don’t take any offense to it because I don’t understand any of this shit anyway.”
Tatum held his hands out. “Well, I’d be happy to answer any questions you have for me. Caine’s one of my better clients so making sure you’re comfortable with how we’re working together is just as important as anything happening out on the field.”
Micaela made a sound against Sara’s chest, a small noise that pressed through the blanket and into the air between them. Sara shifted her on her chest, her hand sliding up to adjust the blanket where it had slipped from Micaela’s shoulder, folding the edge back over and pressing it flat with her palm. She looked back at Tatum, her body settling deeper into the chair.
“All I’m worried about is making sure that you’re not taking advantage of my son.”
Tatum’s mouth pulled at one. “Ms. Guerra.”
“Sara is fine.”
Tatum nodded, his hands coming together between his knees. “Sara, I think we both know that Caine is far, far, far too street smart to let some agent in Los Angeles take advantage of him. He runs everything contract wise by some lawyer in New Orleans. Hasn’t even told me his name.”
Sara smiled. “Markus Shaw. He was Caine’s defense attorney.”
Tatum laughed, his head dipping forward, his hands opening between his knees before they came back together. “The fact the kid has a defense attorney when most of the kids out there on that field right now don’t have any kind of lawyer looking over their contracts tells you everything you need to know about how he’s approaching this.”
Sara shrugged, one shoulder lifting beneath Micaela’s weight. “Fair enough.”
Tatum leaned back in his chair, one ankle crossing over his knee, his arm going to the armrest. He picked his drink up and took a sip, the ice shifting in the cup, then set it back down. His eyes moved to the glass wall for a beat, the field visible beyond it, the players small against the turf from this height, the yard lines visible even from up here. His eyes came back to Sara.
“Have the two of you talked about his plans at the end of the season?”
Sara’s hand kept its rhythm on Micaela’s back, her fingers moving in slow circles over the blanket. “What about them?”
“Caine’s probably a fringe first, second round guy. There are some concerns about most of his tape being against Sun Belt teams. I’m wondering if he’s said anything about declaring at the end of the season.”
Sara shook her head. “He hasn’t mentioned it. He’s been caught up with everything and is still playing catch up.”
Tatum’s eyes dropped to Micaela in Sara’s arms, the blanket rising and falling with each breath, her face turned into Sara’s chest. He nodded, his voice coming softer. “Of course, with our new addition here.”
Sara’s hand stilled on Micaela’s back. “I want him to get his degree. Now. Not in 30 years. He’s the first one to graduate from high school in our family. I want him to be the first one to graduate from college, too.”
Tatum nodded slowly. “You know most people will say that’s foolish considering how much money he could get from going to the NFL now.”
“Caine’s a millionaire. He’ll get more money next year if he stays, right?”
Tatum nodded.
“Then it doesn’t make a difference. He’ll have more than enough to take care of his family.” Sara’s chin lifted a fraction. “I want to see him walk across the stage to get his degree before he walks across a stage to shake some man’s hand because he got drafted.”
Tatum’s eyebrows lifted and his mouth opened for a beat before the words came. “You know the draft is before graduation season?”
Sara’s eyebrow rose.
Tatum held his hand up, his body leaning back in the chair. “I was just saying.”
~~~
Autumn stood at one of the counters along the wall of the suite with a charcuterie spread laid out on a wooden board in front of her, crackers fanned along the edges, cured meats folded into loose rows beside small bowls of mustard and fig jam. The third quarter was running on the field outside the glass, the noise from the crowd pushing into the suite in waves that rose and fell with each play. She picked up a cracker and laid a slice of meat across it, looked at it for a moment, then brought it to her mouth. She chewed, her eyes moving to the field through the glass.
She was still chewing when Mireya walked up beside her, close enough that their shoulders brushed, the contact brief and deliberate. Mireya reached past her and picked a grape from the board, popping it into her mouth, her eyes on Autumn.
Autumn looked over at her, the cracker still between her teeth. “You ever watch a football game from a suite before?”
Mireya shook her head, her jaw working through the grape. “I could’ve, but ex wasn’t big into sports. I think it was some inferiority shit because he ain’t make it playing college basketball.”
“And that’s the one that you said got killed?”
Mireya nodded. Then she turned toward Autumn and put her hand on the small of Autumn’s back, her palm settling flat against the fabric. Autumn’s body went stiff under the touch, her shoulders drawing tight, the cracker pausing halfway to the counter where she’d been setting it down.
“How are you and Caine doing?”
Autumn set the cracker down on the counter and turned slightly toward Mireya, keeping her body angled away from the hand on her back. “We’re good. He’s met my family. I’ve met his. Things are going well.”
Mireya smiled, her hand still flat on Autumn’s back. “His family.”
“Yeah, his family.”
Mireya nodded toward where Jade, Simone and Brooke sat near the glass with plates balanced on their knees, Simone talking with her hands, Brooke watching the field. “How much shit have y’all been talking about me?”
Autumn’s eyebrow rose. “None. I don’t keke behind people’s backs. If I have something to say to you, I’ll say it to you.”
“Do you?”
“Do I what?”
Mireya’s hand moved up Autumn’s back, her fingers trailing along her spine through the fabric of her top, the pressure light, climbing from the small of her back toward the space between her shoulder blades. Autumn’s jaw set but she held her ground, her eyes on Mireya’s face. Mireya’s voice came close. “Do you have something to say to me?”
“Nothing other than wondering why you’re touching me.”
Mireya snorted a laugh, her hand resting between Autumn’s shoulder blades. “You probably like it. I’m good with my hands.”
“I’m not into bitches.”
“No one’s into anything they ain’t never tried before, but you’re in a sorority. I know you bitches be eating each other’s pussies at your meetings.”
Autumn rolled her eyes, her arms crossing over her chest.
Mireya dropped her hand from Autumn’s back. “You’re not in competition with me.”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re not in competition with me.”
Autumn’s chin lifted a fraction, her eyes steady on Mireya’s face. “I know I’m not in competition with you. I’m with Caine. He’s here with me. I know you’re important in his life, but I don’t do that ghetto shit of fighting with someone’s baby mama.”
Mireya smiled then she reached over and took Autumn’s wrists, her fingers wrapping around them, and turned toward her, pulling Autumn so they faced one another. Mireya stepped in and put her arms around her, pulling her into a hug, her chin coming near Autumn’s shoulder, the smell of her perfume pressing into the space between them. Autumn stood inside of it with her arms at her sides, her body rigid, her jaw set.
Mireya pulled back. Her hand came up and her fingers touched Autumn’s cheek, her thumb resting against her jaw. “I’m glad we both understand that you’re not in competition with me.”
Autumn’s eyebrow rose.
The smile dropped from Mireya’s face. She stepped back, her hand falling from Autumn’s cheek, her expression going flat. She turned to the counter, grabbed a handful of crackers off the board and walked toward the glass doors. She pushed through them and crossed to where Camila, Sara and Micaela sat outside, the doors easing shut behind her.
Autumn shook her head. She picked up the cracker she’d set down on the counter, put it in her mouth, and chewed.
~~~
Caine sat at the long table on the dais with Ta’mere to his left and Coach Riley to his right, three microphones spaced along the surface in front of them, the USC Athletics backdrop stretched behind their chairs. The press room held about forty seats and most of them were filled, reporters with notebooks and recorders and phones held at angles that caught the overhead lights. Two camera crews flanked the room on either side, the red recording indicators glowing steady on the bodies of the cameras. A bottle of water sat in front of each of them on the table, the condensation already running down the sides and pooling against the cloth. Caine’s was untouched. Ta’mere had already opened his, the cap sitting loose beside it. The overhead lights threw a flat white wash across the table and the backdrop, the wash flattening everything it touched and pressing the room in tight around the three of them at the table.
Riley leaned into his microphone, his hands folded on the table in front of him. “I think we played well with the weather against a tough opponent that knows how to grind a game down and make it difficult for you. We could’ve done a little better on third down, both offensively and defensively but at the end of the day, we got a win in with a lot of big games coming up here soon.”
He sat back in his chair and scanned the room, one hand coming to the armrest, the other resting flat on the table near his water bottle. A hand went up in the second row. Malachi Sanders from the Los Angeles Times, his press badge hanging from a lanyard around his neck, a notebook open on his knee with the spine cracked wide enough that the pages fanned to either side. Riley pointed toward him with his chin, his body settling back against the chair.
Sanders looked past Riley to Caine. “Caine, that’s five games down for your time at USC and five wins for the program. Are you beginning to feel the weight of expectations grow with each week?”
Caine shook his head, his hand coming up and running through his dreads, pulling them back from his face before his hand came back down to the table. “I ain’t done too much losing in my football career whether that was at Carver, Karr, Georgia Southern or here so the expectations don’t bother me. We got a good football team and we keep showing that on the field every week. Sooner or later, everyone gonna have to give us our respect.”
Sanders nodded and his pen moved across the page in quick strokes. A few of the reporters in the rows behind him wrote something down at the same time, pens scratching against paper in the gap before the next question. Erica Rogers from ESPN sat one row back with a recorder in her hand, the red light on its face running, the display showing the counter climbing. She raised it a fraction higher, her elbow tucked against her side.
“Next week, you guys have Northwestern. A lot of people are saying that’s your last easy game before a murderers’ row of six straight games against teams who are top 25 right now. How do you make sure that you aren’t looking ahead?”
Riley leaned forward again, his forearms flat on the table, his fingers laced together over the cloth. “We’re trying to go 1-0 every week. That’s always been the mantra and will always be the goal. Those other six teams will be there when we get to them. Northwestern is next.”
Rogers tilted her recorder toward the other end of the table. “Caine, Ta’mere?”
Ta’mere leaned toward his microphone, the base of it scraping a half inch across the table as his arm came forward. He adjusted it once, angling the head toward his chin. “I think we just have to play like we been playing all season and we’ll get the results we want. Next week and going forward.”
Caine nodded then shrugged, one shoulder lifting and dropping. “We’re trying to win a national championship and the easiest way to do that is to win every game, win the conference, get a bye and go into the CFP at number one. That means beating Northwestern.”
The room shifted. A few heads came up from their notebooks. The cameraman on the left side of the room adjusted his angle, the lens tracking toward Caine, the tripod squeaking once on the floor as the head swiveled. Mark Goldschmidt from KTLA sat in the front row with a pen pressed flat against the spine of his notebook, his eyes moving between Caine and Riley. He leaned forward in his seat, his pen coming off the notebook.
“Is that the expectation now then? A national championship?”
Riley looked at Caine. His hands stayed laced on the table, his body still in the chair, his expression giving nothing. The room waited with him.
Caine leaned into the microphone, his eyes on Goldschmidt. “What you putting on that Trojan jersey for if you ain’t trying to win national championships? This ain’t UCLA.”
