The text from coach said only that someone had not shown. He sent a photo of a locker number and a key code. The hallway behind the bleachers smelled of cheap rubber and floor wax. You opened the locker and the uniform was hung the way someone wears it, not the way someone stores it. A blue ribbon was looped over the hook above.
You meant to take it to the team room. You touched the white top to fold it and the fabric was warmer than the air. The hem rolled itself up your forearm. Your sleeve began retreating to meet it. You felt your shoes lift off the floor by a half-inch. Your jaw shortened. Your jawline rose. The blue ribbon flicked once against the back of your hand and held—
You looked down. Your chest had filled the top. The skirt settled on hips that had not been there a moment before. Blue knee-highs climbed your shins on their own. The hair on the back of your neck went long and the ribbon caught it up. You stood holding a pom-pom in each hand and did not remember reaching for them.
You walked. The doors at the end of the hall pushed open before you touched them. Sunlight hit your face. Grass under cleats you were not wearing. The music came in late and you came in on the count. Your knees lifted. Your wrists turned. Your mouth shaped a word a thousand voices were already shouting.
A whistle blew. You were on your eight count. The pom-poms shook themselves at the ends of your arms. Heat sat low under the pleats and you did not look at it. You smiled at the crowd you could not see. The smile was a smile someone else had rehearsed.
***
The routine ended on a count you did not know you knew. The pom-poms came down on the eight. The crowd kept cheering and a hand caught your elbow from the sideline. A boy in a varsity jacket led you off the field without asking and without letting go. He took you down the ramp under the bleachers. Halftime was over above you. The pep band was starting back up.
He turned you against a steel beam. He said the missing girl's name and you knew it was yours. He kissed you and your mouth moved like it had practiced the angle. His hands gripped the new curves of your hips. The skirt came up. His fingers slid into the cotton. You were the same height as him.
He worked his belt open with the other hand. He lifted you a half inch off the concrete by the hips. He pressed in. Your knee-highs scraped against the steel beam behind you. The pep band was up to the chorus and the count was the same as the routine. You moved on it.
The weight of your chest hit his with every count. His fingers stayed on you. The rhythm was right. You counted. The thought arrived fully formed and not yours and then yours: this body knew the count, the old name was wrong, you would be back next Friday. He came. You came around him a beat later. The old you watched from somewhere small, then from nowhere.
He set you down and did up his belt. He kissed you and said he would see you Friday. You straightened your skirt. You pulled the knee-highs up. You went up the ramp toward the noise. The new name sat right in your mouth. On the field above, the second half was already three plays in.