Chapter 1: Susan

"All right, ladies, bring it in," I shouted. A moment later I was surrounded by seventeen dirty, sweaty, teenage girls. It was the end of a strenuous hour and a half practice session on a hot day. I had deliberately pushed them hard, determined to establish myself right from the start as a hard-nosed no-nonsense coach. It also gave me a chance to see what I had to work with. This was my first experience at coaching a soccer team, and I had jumped into the deep end of the pool right away, by volunteering to coach one of the best girls' teams in the state. "Not bad for a first practice, but we've got a long way to go to meet our fitness levels for this year. We'll pick up the pace a little bit on Wednesday. See you then." I waited for groans of protest, but there weren't as many as I expected. They appeared to be as serious about soccer as Jim had told me they would be when he recruited me.

It had started in cafeteria at work one morning. I was pouring that all-important first cup of coffee when Jim Hines approached, with a big smile on his face. "Kevin, how you doin', pal?"

Jim had been my first boss when I had started working at Delaney Industries right out of college three years earlier. Even though I had been moved to a different department recently, we were still friends. But for him to call me 'Pal', was totally out of character, and when he bought me a Danish, I knew something was up. I knew Jim made a heck of a lot more than I did, so I knew he wasn't going to hit me up for a loan.

"I'm doing OK Jim. How's everything in accounts payable?"

Neither one of us is very good at chit-chat, so I wasn't surprised when he ignored my response to his rhetorical question and got right into what was on his mind. "Kev, have you ever thought about coaching a youth soccer team?"

"Not really," I replied suspiciously, "why are you asking?" Jim knew that soccer was a big part of my life. My parents had signed me up for my first team when I was six, and I played all the way through college, partially paid for by a soccer scholarship. After I graduated, I thought my soccer days were behind me. That only lasted about a year, before I got the itch to play again. I found an adult recreational league and started playing once a week. Jim had even kidded about coming out and playing with me. But coaching? I guess somewhere in the back of my mind I had the idea that I might give it a try if and when I ever had any kids. But at twenty-five, I really didn't feel the urge to babysit other people's kids for a couple hours a week.

"You know my daughter plays soccer and I've been coaching her team, right?" How could I help but know. For three years Jim and I had talked almost every day about his daughter Keri's exploits as she had moved up from recreational leagues to better teams. And he had been right there with her, volunteering to coach her first team when no one else was available, and staying with her as she advanced.

"Uh-huh." Now I had an idea where he was headed.

"Well, I think I'm finally getting in over my head. You know I never played soccer when I was growing up. Everything I know about the game I've learned from coaching clinics, videos, and watching games on TV. That's worked OK so far, when the kids were younger and their game wasn't as sophisticated. But last year I hit a wall. We've got a good team, but we kept getting beat by teams with players that aren't as talented as our girls. I have some of the best players in the area, so it has to be a coaching problem, right? I've been looking for someone who really knows what they're doing to help me this year. We have a real chance at a state championship, and we're entered in some major tournaments to help the girls be seen by college coaches. Whaddy'a say buddy, how would you like to help me?"

When I worked for Jim I used to joke that he should have been in Sales, not Accounting, and I knew he was about to demonstrate his persuasive skills on me. As he told me more about his team, my reticence slowly started to fade away. "This isn't a rec team, just a bunch of kids fooling around. These girls are all high school seniors and juniors, and have been playing soccer for several years. They love the sport, so motivation and commitment won't be a problem. They expect to be pushed hard, and are ready to accept the challenge. And the parents all know that a team like this requires a serious commitment to make sure their daughters always make it to practice and games. They also know that there are additional expenses involved, such as paying for expert coaching."

"You'd pay me?"

"Of course, that's part of the deal. You don't think I would expect you to do this just out of friendship, do you? And look, my assistant Steve and I will take care of all the administrative details of running the team. We'll also run interference between you and the parents. All you have to do is improve their individual skills and tactical play as a team."

As Jim had been talking it brought back memories of how enjoyable soccer had been for me at that age, and I gradually began to picture myself back in that atmosphere, but as a coach this time. In the time it took to finish my Danish, I decided to give it a try. Just that easily, I became a coach for the Heart of Florida Soccer Club's under-18 girls' select team, the Strikers.

A few days later I met with Jim and Steve to find out what their expectations were. I thought Steve might resent my presence, but he seemed as relieved as Jim to turn over the day-to-day coaching duties to someone else. They told me that their main goal for the upcoming year was to get their players noticed by as many college coaches as they could. It was a good time to be a female athlete in high school. The full effect of Title IX of the Civil Rights Act was beginning to kick in. Colleges and universities all over the country were scrambling to add women's sports, and soccer was usually one of the first they looked at. All those new programs needed players, and college coaches tended to look at high-level club teams like the Strikers to find players more than they did high school teams.

Jim and Steve had so much enthusiasm about the team that by the time our first meeting ended I was pumped up too. It was shaping up to be a very exciting year, and I was pleased and excited to be part of the process. It wasn't until a day or two later that I even thought about some of the special problems and pressures that might arise from being a young man coaching a team of teenage girls. But I quickly dismissed those concerns, promising myself that nothing bad could happen as long as I only allowed myself to think of them as soccer players. Getting involved with high school girls just wasn't part of my agenda. At twenty-five, I considered myself way too old for them anyway - practically another generation. And, as I was soon reminded at a clinic that all new coaches were required to attend, any contact between coaches and players was at least inappropriate, if not downright illegal.

But as I watched them taking off their gear after that first practice, I realized that it wasn't going to be as easy as I had hoped to ignore the fact that many of them were very attractive young ladies, even when they were sweaty and dirty. I have always liked athletic girls. I dated two soccer players and a swimmer when I was in college, so I should have known that it would be hard for me to treat these girls like I would a boys team. And as much as I regret it, things happened, things that I hadn't planned on, some of which I am not particularly proud of now, but I can't change history.

One thing I hadn't anticipated was how uninhibited they were. Maybe it came from being serious athletes, or perhaps from the fact that the other coaches they had been around had been a lot older than I was, but none of the girls seemed to be at all shy around me. Even though I had tried to come across as a stern task master, most of the girls started treating me like one of their friends instead of their coach. None of them were reticent about such things as changing their shirts in front of me at the start of practice or after a pregame warm-up. Sure, they all wore sports bras, but I still found it a little uncomfortable to be surrounded by a gaggle of giggly high-school girls with their shirts off. It sometimes made it hard to keep my eyes where they should be and my mind on soccer.

But the hardest test of my resolve came during the first time I tried to lecture the team on some tactical aspect of the game. I saved my talk for a water break halfway during practice. I got out my whiteboard and pen, and started diagramming plays. Like any group of tired players, they had flopped down on the grass in front of me. Some of them stretched out, almost as if they weren't paying attention, while others sat with their legs folded Indian-style. But most of them adopted what I think of as the typical soccer-player-at-rest pose, sitting with their knees up leaning forward, with their arms wrapped around their legs. As I player I know I had adopted that pose often, but I had never realized what it looked like from the coaches' point of view. Putting their knees up like that caused some of those loose-fitting soccer shorts to slide down, exposing a lot of thigh - to the point where catching a glimpse of panties here and there was impossible to avoid. I tried to maintain eye contact as much as I could, but sometimes my gaze would drift toward one young crotch or another, and I found it difficult to stay on topic. That became a frequent happening, and I almost got to the point where I wanted to tell them to remain standing during my talks.

After a couple of weeks of working with the team, my resolve to not think of them as sex objects began to weaken. I had to accept the reality - for several hours each week, I was going to be working with a group of self-confident, outgoing, athletic young girls. Some of them occasionally seemed to be openly flirting with me, and I can't say that I was too upset by that, even though I tried to keep my distance and not encourage them. I began to think that maybe the age difference between us wasn't as big an issue as I had assumed. Oh, I wasn't about to ask any of them out on a date, but my conscience stopped bothering me so much whenever I took a peek at a young body. Sometimes the young lady in question would catch me looking, and instead of being angry or embarrassed, she usually would give me a smile or wink. All I had to do, I kept telling myself, was to avoid becoming attracted to any one of them in particular. As long as I was just enjoying being in the midst of all that young femininity, I would be okay.

But that plan didn't last long. As hard as I tried to resist temtation, I found myself paying particular attention to one of the players, Susan Lawson. It took me awhile to even notice her. She wasn't one of the best players, just a good solid backup, valuable because she could play almost any position. But after a few practices, she became one of my favorites because of her attitude. She was very serious about soccer, and determined to give everything she had, at practice and in games. She was very coachable, absorbing and applying every tactical idea I gave her, and somehow always knowing the right place to be on the field at all times. She seemed to be more mature than most of the other players. Talking to her was more like talking to one of my former college girl friends than a giggly high school girl.

But it was more than just her attitude and personality that attracted me. There was definitely a physical aspect to her appeal also. Unlike some of the girls on the team, she wasn't overtly beautiful, but had an air about her that expressed a classic femininity without needing makeup or fancy clothes. She had a serene calmness about her that complemented her outer appearance. Call it an inner beauty if you will. I was forced to realize that I was becoming too interested in her for my own good in a sudden and unexpected way.

It was a hot Saturday, and the team was resting between two scrimmages we were playing that day. The girls were lying around a shady spot beside the field, hydrating and recharging their batteries. I walked around as they sprawled on the grass, checking to see how everyone was doing. I noticed that Susan was rubbing the back of her calf where she had been kicked during the first game. "How's it feel?" I asked.

"Still a little stiff, but I think I'll be all right after I stretch it."

"Let me rub it and see if I can loosen those muscles up."

"OK."

I didn't even think twice about it. Working with injuries is part of coaching, and the fact that I was a guy and they were young women honestly didn't enter into it, or at least it hadn't up to that point. I had already put my hands in what in any other situation would have been considered inappropriate places more than once in the last few weeks, but no one had complained. As I said, it's part of working with athletes. I sat down in front of her, and she put her injured leg on my lap. I quickly located the knot and started kneading it. While I was doing that, I continued to talk to the rest of the team, telling them about the line-up changes we were going to use, and what players to watch out for on the other team. But my attention kept returning to the sight of Susan's legs stretched out in front of me. I couldn't help noticing how smooth her skin was. There didn't seem to be any blemishes on her legs at all. Normally when you get that close to someone you can see those little imperfections that everyone has, dimples, bruises, maybe even some stubble from their last shaving, but Susan's legs and thighs were so smooth and perfect that I got the strangest urge to let my hands wander higher than her calf. I soon realized I was spending way too much time massaging her leg, and quickly stopped. I moved on to check on a couple other players with slight injuries, hoping that no one had noticed how much attention I had given Susan.

After that day I found myself sneaking glances at her whenever I thought I could get away with it. I became especially obsessed by the sight of her legs. The ripple of muscle under the sleek skin of her well-toned thighs when she ran seemed to touch a nerve and stimulate my libido in a way I hadn't experienced before. I started sitting next to her on the bench when she wasn't playing, just to be close to her. I knew I was entering dangerous territory, but I thought it was just a little infatuation that would fade as time went by. And that's what happened, almost. I gradually began to think of her as just another player. It helped that she didn't show any interest in me. If I had thought she was developing some kind of schoolgirl crush on her coach, it might have been difficult for me to just laugh it off.

But just when I thought my inappropriate interest in her was dead and buried, something occurred which reignited the embers, and led to a three-alarm fire of lust. It happened at a tournament in Miami. This was one of the most important tournaments we had scheduled for the year. There were going to be dozens of college coaches prowling the sidelines, clipboards in hand, taking names and numbers. It was a three-day tournament, and Miami was far enough away that commuting back and forth each day wasn't possible. The team was going to stay in a hotel for the weekend. Nothing unusual about that; that's why these teams are sometimes called travel teams. Our first game was scheduled at two o'clock on a Friday afternoon. That was late enough that everybody could drive down that morning, and only have to stay overnight on Friday and Saturday. Well, everybody but me. There was a mandatory coaches' meeting Thursday night. Since I didn't have a family to worry about, I volunteered to represent the team, as long as they paid for my extra night in the hotel. It meant spending one lonely night in a hotel night, but I was OK with that.

As I was leaving the practice field on the Tuesday before the tournament, Susan stopped me. She looked at me, not smiling as usual, and said, "Coach, I have a problem."

As focused and self-confident as Susan was, I knew that if she had something serious enough that she felt the need to talk to me, it had to be a real problem. She wasn't a drama queen, or one of those players who obsessed over playing time or what position she would be playing. "What's up?"

"My mom has to work this weekend, so I'm going to be an orphan again." We had a few players on the team whose parents couldn't afford to travel out of town for every tournament. Those were our 'orphans'. They usually shared a room, and the other parents cooperated to watch over them during the weekend. "I don't have anyway of getting there, and I'm hoping I can catch a ride to Miami with you."

Nothing unusual about that, I had already provided transportation for her a couple of times before. "I don't think I can this time. I wouldn't mind taking you, but I have to go down Thursday afternoon for a coaches' meeting. Isn't there somebody else on the team you can ride with?"

"Well, you know I really don't have a lot of friends on the team." That was true. Most of the players on our team came from three high schools in the area. Susan was the only player from her school. That made her a bit of an outsider, and even though there was a generally friendly attitude on the team, the girls tended to hang out with their buddies from high school. It probably didn't add to her popularity that her attitude was more serious than most of the players. All in all, Susan was a bit of a loner.

I told her I would try and find her a ride. Even though she was not a starter, we definitely needed her, especially since we might be playing as many as five games in three days. After I got home and had a bite to eat, I got ready to call Jim and drop Susan's situation in his lap. This was the kind of thing he said he was going to take care of anyway. But before I could pick up the phone, Susan called. "Coach, my mom and I have been talking, and we have an idea."

"What's that?"

"If you don't mind, can ride down with you on Thursday? My mom said she doesn't mind paying for me to have the orphan room for an extra night. Actually, I think she feels bad that she can't come, and wants to make it up to me."

"Well, if it's all right with her, then I guess it's OK. Can I talk to her?"

"Sure. Mom, Coach Myers wants to talk to you." Susan shouted.

I talked to Mrs. Lawson for a few minutes, and she assured me that it was all right with her if Susan left school a little early on Thursday. We agreed that I would pick Susan up at their apartment on my way out of town, like I usually did. She told me that Susan had been instructed to not leave her room after we got there, unless it was with me. I reassured her that I would take care of her daughter. Yeah, those are the words I used, "take care of". In retrospect, that promise seems so strange now, but at the time, it was all very innocent.

Thursday afternoon I picked Susan up and we hit the road. It was about a four-hour drive, but it went by quickly. We had formed a friendship on our previous trips together, and we found it easy to spend time together. She had told me a lot about herself and her family, and I had shared some of my background with her. We even knew each other's musical tastes, and took turns playing our favorite CDs. We ran into some traffic and arrived a little later than I had planned. We just barely had time to check into our rooms before it was time for the meeting. I told Susan to stay in her room, and that we could go get something to eat after the meeting.

"Can I go with you?" she begged. "I don't like sitting alone in a hotel room "

"Well, these things can be boring, but if you want to give it a try, come on."

Fortunately, the meeting was well organized and didn't take as long as usual. I got our roster and player cards approved, listened to the greetings from the tournament committee, checked for schedule changes, and we were out of there in less than two hours. I had seen a Denny's next door to our hotel, and we ducked in there for a late supper. By the time we got back to our rooms, it was after nine o'clock. I told Susan that I would call her at seven the next morning, because there was a nine o'clock game between two teams we would be playing later in the tournament that I wanted to scout. I went to my room and settled in for the night.

I was going over my strategy notes when the room phone rang. I wasn't too surprised to hear Susan's voice when I answered. Everyone else was still at home, and if they had wanted to get in touch they would have called my cell phone. "Coach, this is Susan," she announced unnecessarily. "I have a favor to ask of you."

"What?"

"Can I come over and hang out with you? I really hate being in a hotel room all by myself. I promise I'll be quiet, and let you watch whatever you want to. I just really want to be around somebody for awhile."

All of that came out in one long breath, like she wanted to get it all out before I had a chance to object. And I should have, but at the time I didn't see anything terribly wrong with what she had asked. Being alone in a hotel room can be uncomfortable and a little scary, especially for an attractive seventeen-year-old girl. When I had played in college, we usually had a couple of road trips each season where the mens' and womens' teams traveled together, to hold down expenses. That meant times when there were a lot of guys and girls sitting around in each other's hotel rooms, killing time. Nothing improper had ever happened on those trips, at least as far as I knew. I considered this to be something like that. After all, I was an adult, Susan was more mature than a lot of people I had known in college, and the room was certainly big enough, with two queen-sized beds.

"Sure, come on over. You can keep me company for awhile."

"Thank, coach." I could hear the relief in her voice. It only took her about thirty seconds to make her way down the hall. I opened the door when I heard her coming, and she bounced through it enthusiastically. She seemed to be very glad to not be alone. I had selected the bed closest to the bathroom as the one I was going to sleep in, and had all my stuff spread out on the other one. I quickly cleared it off, and she sprawled out, arranging the pillows so she could lie back and watch TV. It was at that moment, seeing her lying on a bed in my room, that it began to dawn on me that this really wasn't anything like hanging out with my college buddies had been. This was me - someone supposedly in a position of authority and responsibility letting a teenaged girl lounge around in my room. If it had been anyone other than Susan, it might have been okay, but because I knew I already had feelings toward her, somehow it had to be wrong.

Susan was good to her word. She seemed content to watch whatever was on the TV, and didn't say a word. The only reason I even had the TV on was because of that reflex that everyone feels to turn the boob tube on as soon as you enter a hotel room, especially when you are by yourself. I was more interested in working on my preparations for the tournament. I tossed the remote to Susan and told her to watch whatever she wanted, as long as she kept the sound low. It took her about five minutes of channel surfing to decide that there really wasn't anything worth watching. Only then did she break her silence. "Coach, how old are you?"

"I'm twenty-five. I told you that before, remember?"

"Yeah, but it's just hard to believe. You're eight years older than I am, but you look even younger than some of the guys at my school."

"Eight years is a lot," I laughed "I'm probably more like your dad than I am you."

"You wouldn't say that if you'd ever met my dad. You are nothing like him at all."

I regretted making that reference. Susan had told me that her parents had divorced about five years earlier. She only saw her dad for a couple of weeks each summer, and that was more than enough for her. They didn't get along very well.

'You aren't married, right?"

"Nope." I didn't know what she was up to. She was asking me questions that she already knew the answers to, as if she was trying to catch me in some inconsistency.

"Never?"

"Never. I think I would have remembered. Why all the personal questions?"

"Oh, just curious. Nobody on the team knows much about you. Any girlfriends?"

"Nothing serious just now."

"You aren't gay, are you?"

I smiled at her. "Why do you care?"

I knew she was flirting with me a little bit, but I was still surprised by her answer. "Well, maybe I've got a little crush on you."

"I should send you back to your room right now for that remark."

"You should, but you aren't, are you?" She was looking at me with what she probably hoped was a sexy, inviting expression. If that was her intent, she was getting pretty close. And she was right, I wasn't about to kick her out. The attraction I had felt toward her a few months earlier had been a lot easier to handle when we only saw each other on a soccer pitch. I knew I was at a moral crossroad, and my turn signal for "bad move" was blinking. She decided to take advantage of my hesitation. "Do you think I'm pretty?"

"Yes, Susan. You are an attractive young lady, with the emphasis on young. I'm sure there are lots of boys in your high school who think you are very nice. But you are way too young for me, so let's just tone it down a bit, OK?"

"OK, Kevin. Sorry if I embarrassed you."

That was the first time she had called me Kevin, and not coach or Mr. Myers. She sat back against the headboard and resumed her feigned interest in whatever was on TV, but I could tell from the slight grin on her face that she wasn't finished with whatever game she was playing. She had one knee raised, and from my viewpoint sitting on the foot of the other bed, it looked like she wasn't wearing anything under her soccer shorts. If I still had any doubts about her real reason for wanting to hang out with me, they were gone now. It wasn't her fear of being alone that had brought her here; any more than it had been my concern for her safety that had caused me to agree to let her in. I let myself enjoy the leg show for a few seconds, then some of my common sense kicked back in. "OK, we've got to get up early tomorrow, so I think it's time to hit the sack. Do you want me to walk you back to your room?"

She smiled at me, and I had to admit that my feelings toward her had gone past the playful stage, and she knew it. I felt myself being drawn in by her beautiful eyes and confident smile. "Coach," she whispered in what she mush have thought was her sexy voice, "I have a big favor to ask. I really don't want to sleep alone tonight. Can I stay here?"

"No!" I shouted, almost as if I was trying to convince myself as much as her. Inside I wanted to say yes, but I knew how absolutely insane that idea was.

"Hey, it's no big deal," she pled her case. "There's plenty of room for two people in this room. You've got two big beds. It's really not that different than if we were a father and daughter sharing a room."

"Whoa, stop right there. It's a whole lot different, and you know it. If you need something or you get scared, I'm fifty feet and a phone call away from your room. Just make sure you bolt the door behind you and you'll be perfectly safe."

She tried one more time. "Please, Kevin. I promise, no funny business. When you turn out the lights, I'll go to sleep. You won't even know I'm here."

"What if you're mom calls to see how you are? Won't she panic when you don't answer?" Even the fact that I was asking that question showed that I was coming dangerously close to letting her stay. I was desperately looking for something that would help me avoid the obvious mistake I was very close to making.

"No problem. I talked to her just before I called you and told her I was going to sleep. And if she does need to call me again, she'll call my cell," she countered, patting the small bag she had brought with her.

I looked at that sweet face, with it's mixture of innocence and allure, and felt the last of my resolve melting away. "Oh, okay. But you can't tell anybody about this, right? You don't want to get me in trouble, do you?"

"I can be discreet, don't worry. And thank you very much."

I knew I had made a bad decision, but my conscience had lost the battle to my heart. I liked her way too much to say no. The thought flashed through my mind that I was probably going to make a lousy parent some day, a real pushover, especially if I had a daughter. Susan grabbed her bag and headed for the bathroom. A few seconds later I heard her brushing her teeth. Apparently she had brought her toothbrush with her. That made it painfully obvious that she had been confident that I would agree to let her stay. She knew me a lot better than I wanted to admit.

When she finished we traded places. I took longer than usual do to brush and floss, to give Susan plenty of time to get settled in before I emerged from the bathroom. By the time I came out she had turned off the TV and the lights, and had already snuggled under the covers. The top of her head was just barely sticking out of the blanket, so her voice was muffled as she said, "Why don't you keep the bathroom light on. It can be kind of a nightlight."