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Some days are better than others. It's true of everybody who's ever lived; some days suck and you wish the ground would swallow you up whole, some days leave you beaming with pride and dancing across the earth you came from.
Those lines get blurrier the deeper you go into Daisy Cohen's mind. Sure, she remembers the elation of winning games, she remembers the heart-wrenching pull of high school love gone sour, remembers sadness and joy and all of the emotions that come between it.
But that was before. Back when her brain was only a little screwed up. Now it teeters on the verge of insanity every day.
Moving back into her dormitory was an event she hadn't planned for. Deep down, she knew couch surfing at Wymack's place wasn't going to last forever, but she assumed she had more time than this. Now she's sitting on a couch in a room she remembers all too well, staring at the spot on the carpet a slightly different colour to the rest.
The girl with white blonde hair and rainbow streaks is sitting next to her. One hand is twined between Daisy's fingers, the other taps away on her phone. Renee Walker has always been the sweetest of them all, and somebody Daisy is happy to let back into her life no matter what. Renee hasn't got it in her to judge. Renee's the best of everyone.
It's Dan and Allison she's worried about. The team captain has fight in her, and Daisy's little stunt in April really fucked with her team dynamic. Allison is loyal at the best of times, but deep down the only thing she thinks about is herself. While the four girls were close once, Daisy feels like that bond has been fractured.
"No," says Renee. "I know what you're thinking. They aren't mad at you, Daisy. Upset, maybe? Heartbroken, absolutely. But angry? Never."
"I'm sorry," replies Daisy. It's the only thing she can make come out of her mouth. Renee latches her arms around the girl in a loose embrace. Daisy takes a slow breath.
The front door to the suite bangs open, and chatter comes in from the outside.
"Hey!" a male voice calls into the room. "We got frozen pizza and The Usual Suspects!"
Renee leaves Daisy with a squeeze of the leg and stands to help the others with grocery bags. Her spot is soon filled by Dan Wilds. The two girls look at each other for a minute; Dan analysing Daisy's gaunt features and dead eyes, and Daisy just staring straight back at her, black hair in a frizz around her deep face, pink lips pursed. Then Dan hiccups down a sob and launches herself at the other girl, her arms wrapped tight around her shoulders.
"I missed you," she whispers into Daisy's ear. "We all did. We should have known something was going on, we should have intervened. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"
"It wasn't your fault," Daisy says after a moment of consideration. She doesn't have the energy to say anything else. A little fraction of her wants to take Dan back into her arms and cry on her shoulder, but the rest of her doesn't agree to that.
Dan says, "It wasn't yours either, Daisy," and then stands, wiping an angry fist across her eyes to rid all evidence of tears. "Coach said you haven't been eating that great, that's okay. We have pizza if you want it."
"We got you your special one!" Her boyfriend, Matt Boyd, chirps from the kitchenette. "We even got the one with that fake cheese shit you like, no meat and extra pineapple. It still grosses me out that it's your favourite, but, like, I gotta be nice about it since you almost kicked it."
Things have been coming back to her quicker since she moved back into Fox Tower. The sight of orange jerseys, the din of athletes in the dining hall, her bunk at the top with Renee on the mattress below hers... it's making her brain see through the haze and into her memory. This place means something to her. It was once her shot at a better life. Now it's just a reminder of wasted potential and a shattered future.
"Have you seen Allison? She said she'd be back for dinner," Renee asks. She tosses a blanket at Daisy, who pulls it over her legs and hugs the rest to her chest.
"Empty dorm," Matt replies. "I'm here, Neil's with them. Gotta make the most of it. Hey, don't pretend we don't do the same thing," he snaps at Dan when he sees her sour expression. She cackles a laugh at him and tosses a beer can. Quietly, he asks, "Wait, should we--?"
"It's okay," Daisy says. Her voice is gentle, but it cuts through the room. She's noticed that when she talks, everybody falls silent. It's like they're waiting for something, waiting for a crack in her marble exterior, waiting for her to break and go back to how she was before. She doesn't have the heart to tell them that the Daisy they knew never existed in the first place. "Alcohol has never been my vice."
She's trying her best. She really is. But sitting with the people who used to be her friends, watching a movie she couldn't care less about and staring at the pizza in front of her... maybe her best isn't good enough anymore.
"We brought all your things back for you," Dan eventually whispers to her, in a quiet part of the film. "We sort of divided it up to take home for summer, you know, in case anything went missing or the cleaners moved your stuff. It's all back where you left it. I think Renee slipped a few extra treats in their from her mom."
Daisy wants to smile, instead she just looks at Dan and tries to make her face look as soft as possible. "Thank you."
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The nights are the hardest. With three other girls sleeping peacefully in their beds, Allison snoring because of the botched rhinoplasty her mother paid for when she was sixteen, Dan murmuring nonsense about fighting a platypus on the moon.
Daisy stares at the ceiling. She caught a couple of hours on the couch this afternoon, and she wonders how long it'll keep her going for. Her limbs are itching, her mind is glassed over with thoughts about one thing. She wonders if her old dealer is back on campus yet.
Silently, she shifts her weight on her bunk and slides down the ladder. Her feet pat onto the soft carpet with ease, and she slips from the room without disturbing a soul. She feels an awful ache, a terrible guilt as she plods through the room, tucking her feet into her sneakers and pulling her hoodie tight around her face. It's easy to leave her suite; she remembers to twist the handle so that it doesn't click when the door closes. It feels so wrong to remember the sneaking around, the betrayal of her relationships and her promises. She remembers what shoes are the quietest better than she remembers the names of her teammates. It makes her feel sick.
The exy team lives on the top floor of Fox Tower, which is a contradiction in itself knowing their reputation for self-destruction. The girls are in the middle of the two boys' dorms, with Matt, Seth, and the new kid sleeping on one side, and the rest on the other. She sees that their light is on, a ray of artificial light shining from under their door and onto her toes. It must be coming up to midnight now, and she wonders what plagues their minds that they would be awake at the witching hour.
She soon finds out. Their door clicks open and a man with pale skin and dark hair steps out. Silently, Daisy slips into the shadowy stairwell across from their bedroom, and it's easy to blend in with the darkness in her black hoodie and leggings. The guy, followed by a shorter one with blonde hair and an obnoxious orange sweatshirt slung about his body, raps his knuckles on the door of the other dorm. The new kid steps out, sizes up the two before him, and the trio leave in silence, stepping into the elevator and going downstairs.
Interesting.
Daisy moves slowly so that she doesn't catch them on her way out, and she's halfway across campus before a thought crosses her mind.
One year. One year, and you can handle anything.
She didn't think her hunger could turn to guilt in her stomach so quickly. Could she handle a year? She's barely been out of the rehab centre for a week and she's already searching for her next hit.
She's already done a week. In fact, she's already done over four months. No drug besides her antidepressants has entered her body since April, and it's the middle of August now. Four months is a lot more than a week, and she's still alive and kicking.
Daisy looks up at where she's stopped. It's the campus gym, which boasts it's 24 hour status with a flashing neon sign. She can get access to the athlete floors with her badge, so that's what she does. It's two-thirty on the morning when Daisy discovers this: sprinting on the treadmill and lifting her bodyweight in dumbbells feels a hell of a lot better than sterilising the tip of a needle.
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She's the first at the court for training that morning. It's a good thing her training gear has already been dry-cleaned for the season, because nobody wanted to smell her after her hours in the gym. She's exhausted, but not in the way she's been feeling for weeks. Her limbs feel like lead, but not because her muscles are spasming for another hit. Her brain is blank, but not because it's been rewired to feel nothing else. It's refreshing to be so in touch with her body, so aware of every inch of sinew and bone under her skin.
Wymack arrives not long after she does. He stops when he sees her sitting on the couch, wearing all orange and her hair swept back into two neat braids either side of her head. She's watching game replays from the weekend. The way she sits, staring intently at the screen, unblinking like she'll miss something if she does, almost makes him feel like she never left. Like the hell she put her body through never happened, that it was all a horrible dream. He nods at her in passing, then lets a smile break out on his face when he shuts his office door. He can hear the TV going until eight-thirty, when the others start to arrive.
"I didn't hear you leave this morning," Allison says to the other girl from her perch on Seth's armchair. Her eyes are narrow; she's expecting the worst. And she has no reason not to.
"I went to the gym," Daisy replies. "I'm sorry. I should have left a note."
"Yeah, you should have," Allison snaps. Seth reaches up and touches her thigh.
"It's good to have you back, Cohen," he says, offering Daisy that genuine smile he reserves for few. They were friends, once, but only for all the wrong reasons. They enabled each other; Seth introduced Daisy to his dealer when her pills ran dry, and he got her hooked on the harder stuff. Daisy doesn't know that their friendship can work without a background of drug-induced mania, but she's going to try her hardest.
The rest of the upperclassmen arrive soon after. Renee takes a spot on Daisy's left side, effectively squashing her against the arm of the couch. Dan takes her other side, and Matt somehow jams himself onto the other end. It's slightly comical, really, but Daisy isn't in the mood for laughing.
Renee feels Daisy tense at her side when she hears the door open again. They both know who the next people through that door will be. And they both know that their reaction to Daisy's return isn't going to be pretty.
The new kid is first through the door. He takes a look around the room, then at the upperclassmen, then perches on the edge of the free armchair. They make eye contact for a second, and he's the one to look away from her unblinking stare. Daisy can read the kid like a book; he's nervous around new people, probably because he's had a shitty past. A fox is a fox is a fox.
Then the twins, Andrew and Aaron, and their cousin, Nicky, and then the man she really doesn't want to see. They squash themselves onto the other couch just like Daisy and her lot are, except they're a lot broader than the three girls are so it's harder to manoeuvre. Daisy focuses her attention on the screen in front of them all, playing muted sports news.
"He's staring at you," Dan leans across Renee's lap to whisper to her, as if Daisy isn't already hyperaware of the fact.
The screen flicks off as Coach walks into the room. Daisy's heart starts thumping in her chest, hard enough that Renee puts a reassuring hand on her leg.
"Okay," Coach starts, clapping his hands and rubbing them together. "Uh, so... today, Cohen's back for real now. Don't be weird about it," he says. Matt lets out a small whoop and from across the room, Nicky sends her a warm smile. "She's gonna be taking it slow on court to get back into the swing of things. Abby signed her out of the first game so there's no pressure."
Daisy's brow furrows into a small frown. Not playing the first game? She's more than capable of running circles around these losers-- well, she was, five months ago. How much has changed, she doesn't know. It makes her chest go into another frenzy thinking about how her skills have probably gotten so much worse, she's probably slow on court and her reflexes are that of a toddler. Renee pats her leg and gives her a concerned look, but Daisy ignores it to try and control her breathing. The pair of eyes that have been on her since they entered the room don't leave her figure for a second.
Wymack rattles off a few other housekeeping rules, and then the Foxes are sent off to change. Daisy, already in her training gear, stays on the couch looking at her feet. There's something odd about being back. She doesn't belong here; nobody wants her here. The girls are just making her feel better. There's no reason for the ex-junkie with a superiority complex to make a comeback, especially not with three perfectly fine backliners already.
"Hey," says a voice. She looks up to see Coach staring down at her. "You can join in for warm-ups and maybe a short scrimmage, but I want you to take notes. Write down everything you see. Extra notes on Neil's interactions with the rest of the team."
He tosses a clipboard and a pen into her lap. "Who's Neil?" she asks.
"The new kid," Wymack responds. She stands and follows him up the corridor towards the court. "He's lightning, faster than you. Kevin's been training him this summer, we recruited him just after you left. He's got a ways to go, but I can see the potential. He plays like you."
All Daisy can manage is a soft, "Hmm?"
"Like it's the only thing keeping him alive. Like stopping will kill him. I can't believe I've got three nut-jobs on my team now. I thought Kevin was the last straw for me."
The court twinkles before her. The plexiglass has been polished over the summer, clean of scuffs from hard balls and blood residue from violent tackles. The scoreboard overhead illuminates the dark area before Wymack has the chance to flick on the stadium lights, and Daisy takes a deep breath. She wants to capture this moment. She's back. Her heart truly believed she'd never be back, and here she is.
She guesses hope is harder to kill than she thought.
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Daisy finds her perch at the edge of the court on the subs bench. Clipboard in hand, she draws diagrams and makes notes on each player. She's particularly harsh on the new kid, who she names as '10' on her page because what the fuck is his name? It's just out of reach, always on the tip of her tongue, always disappears as she's about to write it. He's sloppy, his speed is the only thing gaining him points right now. But Coach was right: the kid plays like he's got everything to lose. She sees him wearing himself down, his feet dragging on the polished floor and his throws getting looser. But he powers on, because that's what he has to do. This is everything for him. If he loses this...
Well, Daisy sees a lot of herself in him. And being like Daisy Cohen is never a good thing.
When they break for lunch, she turns her notes over to Wymack. He scours over them and gives her a nod. "Thanks. Two sets of eyes are always better than one. Wanna jump on for a while after lunch?"
Abby delivers takeout for them, and they spend an hour eating, talking plays, making new bets for the season. Daisy finds herself on the sidelines, listening to conversations but never quite being involved. She used to be good at this, the whole being a friend thing. She'd gossip, chat, crack jokes... now, she's a ghost of her former self. It's something that she's so aware of all the time, that she can't get past it and join in. She knows everyone thinks of her differently now. She's not the Daisy Cohen they knew before. She doesn't know what or who she is now, but it definitely isn't that girl.
Her racquet feels strange in her hands. Sure, she worked out while in rehabilitation, and they let her use a janky old stick to practise shots against the garden walls. But that was child's play, and now she's tussling with the big kids. She spins the racquet, tossing it from palm to palm. It's heavier than she remembers. Longer, too. She supposes she'd been playing with striker's stick, something lighter and more agile. But she likes power in her shots, and she's always played with a racquet too big. The perks of learning the game with kids five years older than you, she guesses.
Before anybody else finishes their lunch, she heads up to the court alone. The inner court is so much larger than she can imagine. The cavernous plexiglass walls muffle any sound from outside, makes the fluorescents overhead look fuzzy and strange from within. She leaves the door open behind her, picks up a bucket of balls, and walks to the centre of the court. What is this strange game she once devoted her heart to? What's the point of it all? Shooting rock-hard tennis balls at a plastic wall to earn goals? To prove that you're better, fitter, stronger, faster than the athletes on the other side? Is this how her brain used to be wired to work?
She pushes her existentialism down as deep as she can, swallows the excess of saliva in her mouth, and reaches down. She drops the ball onto the ground and pops it back up into her net, feeling the familiar heave of the racquet over her shoulder. In one swift movement, she spins on her heel and slams the ball towards the opposite wall. It's way off from where she was aiming, but it's something. It makes connection with the wall with a loud crack, and ricochets back towards her. She finds herself falling into a natural rhythm, picking up motions that almost feel like second nature. She sidesteps to the ball's destination, picks it up and casts it off in a clean motion.
It's scary how quickly the game is coming back to her. It's almost like breathing.
When she hears the other Foxes arriving to investigate the noise, she stops. She catches a ball on the rebound and tosses it back into the bucket with the rest. She'd heard the chatter of her teammates, but hadn't heard the approach of one by themself.
Kevin Day is standing against the wall behind her, arms crossed tightly over his chest, staring at her with a heavy brow. Daisy stares straight back at him, trying her best to suss out the strange look upon his face. She unclips her helmet and grips onto the straps, slinging her racquet over her shoulder as she files off the court.
"We could hear you from the lounge," Dan says. "You've still got half a swing on you."
The new kid is looking at her with a strange curiosity as well. Daisy narrows her eyes at him and he looks away, instead motioning for Matt to follow him inside. One by one, the Foxes enter the court, leaving her alone once more. It takes another half an hour or so of them practising for Daisy to re-join them, and when she does, it's something else entirely.
The new kid has never seen her play. Sure, he caught the Foxes games sometimes on TV as reruns in Arizona. He'd never paid them much mind, not until he found out who was coaching them from the sidelines. But Daisy Cohen's name has always rung around NCAA conversations, somebody with so much talent and a bright future, who ended up on the laughing stock of Class I.
From what he's heard from the girls, Matt, and Seth, she was incredible. Now, he realises she still is.
Her aim is spectacular. Her first few throws were a little skewed but it only takes her a minute to get back into the swing of things. Soon she's pelting balls across the court with scary accuracy, catching anything thrown her way and firing it out with strength and speed.
Dan starts laughing when Daisy drops her shoulder and uses her body as a battering ram to smash Seth out of the way. The ball ends up in her net and she shoots it down to the other end of court, cracking violently against the opposite wall. Seth shouts something unintelligible, but it's clear he's not really mad. Most of the Foxes seem relieved that she's not... well, that she can still actually play.
Daisy, however, doesn't agree.
She's lost her spark. Her feet tangle around themselves and she stumbles often. Her aim is way off what it used to be, and she's relying on the power she can put into throws to save face. None of her shots land accurately, her players are having to stretch to catch balls when they should be flying straight into the net. And, God, she's exhausted. How she used to play almost full matches she'll never know, because she's been jogging on court for twenty-five minutes and she could pass out at any moment. Her insides feel sluggish. Her racquet feels ten pounds heavier. She needs to lie down.
So she turns on her heel mid-game and strides towards the bolted court door. Nobody comments, because she's not really supposed to be on court for long anyways, and Nicky subs in for her as she approaches the sidelines. But a yell of her name forces every player on court to a halt.
"COHEN!" the yell comes from the centre of the court, and thundering footsteps are coming her way.
Fuck.
She wheels around on her heel, racquet slung over her shoulder, and looks at the man stalking towards her. All six feet and three inches of Kevin Day seethes with rage, his racquet clenched tightly in the white-knuckled grip of his right hand. He stops inches from her, and grabs her by the grates of her helmet so that they're face to face.
"Where the fuck do you think you're going in the middle of a game?"
"To piss," she replies flatly, and it's the truth.
"Would you leave the court in the middle of the game if we were in the championships?"
"Yeah, it's called half time."
Allison, a few feet away, snickers. Kevin shoots her a murderous glance, and she pulls a face back at him. In her peripheral, Daisy can see Dan moving towards them.
He grabs her shoulder and pushes her violently back towards the rest of the team. "Get back on that court. You're not going anywhere."
Daisy swings her racquet from around her shoulders and into the back of Kevin's knee, breaking his stance and making him stumble. "Don't ever fucking touch me again," she replies in that flat, dead tone of hers, then drops her racquet in front of him. He watches her leave the court, sees her drop her helmet on the substitute bench and disappear down the hallway to the changing rooms.
"You're not going to get through to her," Dan says from behind him. "She's not the same as before. Her brain... it's been rewired. It's going to be a lot harder than you think."
"I didn't fucking ask," Kevin replies, then turns back to court and returns to his position. Every time he launches the ball through the air, he imagines he's sending it directly at Daisy's dumb fucking face.
And when Daisy is in the bathrooms, holding her hair away from the toilet as she empties her guts into it, she remembers Kevin Day timidly taking her hand in his own as they walked across campus, not knowing it would be the last day they spent together before Daisy fucked her life up for good.
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