Illustrations by Terra Brown

The hit, which Cale never saw coming, never saw period, knocked him out of the game, out of the season, and probably, given the way his mom reacted, out of football forever. Once he was back on his feet, crutches anyway, they did the whole hero routine back at school, everybody signing his cast, Brianna Jensen writing something on the back, at the very top, practically brushing his butt as she wrote, that left even Jaydon as close to speechless as he ever got, only one whispered, “Bloody hell.”

Cale twisted around, a vain hope, and Jaydon shook his head. “Oh, mate,” he said, and whistled. “What?” Cale said. “What?” But Jaydon swore he couldn’t talk like that, not to another guy anyway.

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