-inspired of course by Lesbian Jesus herself-

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PHAEDRA

A white volleyball sailed over the net in a high and decisive arc toward the center of the court, courtesy of Roshelle Dumas, setter of the Gear City High School girls' volleyball team. Phaedra swore and snapped out a hand signal for Stevie to intercept. Stevie was already there.

The middle setter launched herself in the air to block Roshelle's topspin overhand serve before it land on their side of the net. She slammed both hands against the ball and sent it flying back from whence it came.

The Gear City High middle setters scrambled to block her, setting the ball and passing it between them, once, twice, and only for the backrow player's shaky dig attempt to foul them up. Their point.

"Yes!" Phaedra roared as the bounced outside the lines of play. "That's what' I'm talking 'bout."

They high-fived real quick and fell back into their positions after a round of first bumps from the others on the field. The day was hot as it got this time of year and all the bodies packed into the stadium made it hard to think straight. Phaedra was on fire, sweat in her eyes, endorphins burning through her body. She was living and breathing for the game.

It was 15-12, in Webber's favor for the third set of the match.

Webber had taken the first set, 25-18, and then, to their surprise, the GC Thunderbirds had come pounding back in the second game to claim a victory of 25 points to the Wild Girls' 22. Phae's ears were still ringing from the explosion of shouting from the Thunderbirds' side of the stadium when they blew the Wild Girls out of the water. This wasn't just a game anymore. This wasn't about scouts, though she'd spotted a few here and there; this was a matter of pride.

Her girls had come to kill the game and here they were, on the verge of slaughter. Wild Girls were the queens of the court. Lessers need not apply.

Tré was pacing behind her like an agitated horse, ready to charge. Hunter was still on the backrow with Mickey, playing cool, each muscle tensed and ready, eyes peeled. There wasn't a single move the Gear City Thunderbirds could make on the court that they wouldn't see. They were primed and ready to scrabble tooth and nail back to the top.

Phae straightened up when the ref tossed her the ball from the sidelines. Their point, their serve.

She bounced the ball between her hands, eyeing her teammates. They were raring to go. They were all fight. None of them were giving in and none of them were giving up. She lifted her head and gave them a look. They knew the look.

"Who are we?"

Her girls dropped down low and bared their teeth, ready to fight. Ready to win.

"Wild Girls!"

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The Wild Girls played with no mercy. They'd been playing the game too long compared to the Thunderbirds who'd only formed their team a couple of season before. The Wild Girls knew each other like twins, in each other's heads and back pockets, anticipating each and every thought before it was complete.

Hunter through herself into a controlled slide, executing an underhand dig that sent the ball careening back toward the middle court where Tré was waiting in her loud libero jersey. The Thunderbirds instinctively bunched together in front of Tré, anticipating and roof spike over the net. Tré smirked, spun and executed a firm, perfectly timed underhand pass back to Phaedra. There was nobody waiting on her end of the court. She took deep, perverse pleasure in tipping the ball right over the net.

It impacted on the parquet floor in a neat slap. The sound was deafening as it bounced once and then rolled off-court.

Point to Webber.

Roshelle Dumas, flushed on the other side of the net and pushed her players back into position for the next play. Her hair was sticking to her face and neck, the same as Phae's was, but Phaedra had a funny feeling it wasn't because Roshelle was loving the game.

Any dream of Gear City blowing Webber High out the water in an upset were over, but it would take them another hour to declare victory.

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Xia threw her sign to the ground and threw her arms the second Phae launched herself into the stands. Phae picked her up and spun her around. Xia was burning hot after sitting high in the stands all game while Phae was even hotter from playing. Neither of them minded the heat. They definitely didn't mind the victory kissing. They were kind of sappy. They didn't mind that either.

"Hey, you."

"Hey." They exchanged goofy grins. Phae brushed Xia's hair out of her face. She never remembered to bring a hair tie.

"Having fun?"

Xia shrugged, shuffled them out of the aisle so other spectators could pass. "Watching my girlfriend smack a ball around is pretty cool." She still sounded surprised when the word girlfriend came out of her mouth. Phae intended to spend a long time helping her get used to it.

"Yeah, it's pretty boring." Phae had dated athletes; watching could be dull if you didn't love the game.

Xia cut her a disbelieving look. "Not that boring. You kept scoring." She realized she'd rhymed two seconds after she said the words. Her glare dared Phae to call attention to it.

"Was that a cheer?"

"Don't."

Phae tickled her sides just to feel her squirm. Xia had the best laugh. "Did my girlfriend write a cheer for me?"

"You're the worst, Phae. Leave it alone." Xia was turning red; cheeks, neck, ears. She always turned red when Phae teased her about how much she liked dating her, but Phae was just as bad—as Tré wouldn't stop telling her—because she liked dating Xia, too. Almost as much as she loved racing, driving, riding. Xia was her new thrill.

"Babe."

Xia rolled her eyes. She hated pet names, or so she claimed, as much as they made her smile. "Nope."

"Honey bunch."

They both made a disgusted face. It sounded like something her grandma would call her. "Gross."

"Babycakes?" It could be worse.

Xia rolled her eyes and propped her head on Phae's shoulder. "...I'll allow it."

Phae squeezed her around the middle. It was still hot as hell and sweltering in this stadium, but she could put up with it for Xia, if Xia could put up with the sweat. "Cutie," she murmured.

"That one, I like."

"Uh huh, I remember." They shared a twinkly smile and were about to share another kiss when a voice shouted up the stands from the court below.

"Phae! We gotta do handshakes. Hands off the girl till you do your job!" Mickey playing the team PA system, same as always.

"Get your head in the game, Barlowe!" Tré giving her shit as usual. I need quieter friends.

"It's like somebody's calling my name, but I don't know who."

"I don't hear anything." Xia went up on tiptoes to look over her shoulder. Her lips quirked in a half-smile. "You'd better go before they dump the cooler on your head."

"Can I get a kiss before I go?"

"You just got one!"

"They're like chips, you can't have just one."

"Way too many bad jokes, babe."

"I thought you hated babe."

"I get to call you babe." She stood up on her toes to give Phaedra another kiss. She looped her arms around Phaedra's sticky neck and pressed their lips together. Phae's heart beat fast. Her lips tingled. Xia tasted like a blueberry smoothie and smelled like black coffee. Phae could kiss her for hours.

Something hard and rounded bounced of the back of Phaedra's skull and broke their kiss. Xia covered her mouth, looking back and forth between Phae and whatever was happening on the court.

"Did they just?" she asked, because she needed to know had badly to maim her best friends in a minute.

Xia squeaked, the apples of her cheeks twitching as she tried not to laugh. "Oh my god."

"Be right back, I have to kill someone."

Xia shouted after her, "Don't get arrested, we have a date!"

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Phaedra didn't kill anyone, tempted though she was. Tré threatened to put her in a headlock and let Hunter tickle her until she peed on herself; that was enough of a threat to deter her. There was captain's business to conduct anyway. They had to post-game it before they broke down the court and headed out into the afternoon to celebrate.

Under the watchful eye of the game officials and the referee, Phae got her girls in line. "All right, Wild Girls. Time to play nice."

The Wild Girls and the Thunderbirds passed each other in glum, overheated lines, slapping hands and bumping fists like they were the good sports the game demanded and not athletes determined to hold a grudge till someone died. Calisto Day, libero for Gear City High, was salty as hell and not afraid to be heard mumbling about how dirty players played dirty.

It wasn't the first time the Wild Girls had been accused of cheating and if they had a few more seasons to go a few rounds, it wouldn't be the last, but this was their last season and Phae wasn't having it. Not with scouts out in the crowd with their ears to the ground.

"Yo, Day, you need to cool it with that cheating talk."

The girl in question stopped short, backing up the team reception line behind her as her wired teammates stumbled not to collide with her back. Her jersey was a burnt range to her team's silver and maroon, standard for a libero. Tré's was a black and white to the team's white and blue. "You talking to me?"

Phae stepped out of line to let her teammates get on with it. "Yup. Cool it."

Calisto tossed her French braids over her shoulder and looked Phae up and down. She didn't seem to like what she saw, if her sneer was anything to go by. "Don't cheat and you won't get called a cheat." Call Phae suspicious, but she didn't think Calisto was just talking about the game. Girl's got it out for me.

"You don't need to be bitter that we know the game better than you. When you know better, you'll play better." Phae was trying to be cool. She wasn't feeling cool, but she was trying act it. Her parents hated when she got into fights, Xia hated it; the scouts would sure as hell hate it. She was trying to change her reputation.

"I don't need lessons in a game I was born to play."

"Everybody needs lessons, and since you lost, you should take them while they're free."

Calisto stepped around the hands trying to hold her back, ignored the tired voices telling her to chill, girl, it ain't even worth it to get in Phaedra's face.

She wasn't even tall, Calisto Day. She reached about as high as Phae's chin. She had the temper of a bigger girl and the anger of one too. "You trying to say something?"

"I'm saying, you need to take this L and move along, like your captain's telling you." Phae inclined her head toward the other girl in the captain's jersey, sipping Gatorade and sighing like this wasn't a new occurrence. Mickey was the same way before she got into JROTC. Stevie hadn't really stopped being angry all the time, she'd just had Sable to focus on instead.

"I don't take orders from anybody, and certainly not from a nobody like you."

Phae raised an eyebrow. She'd be sharing a look with Tré if she wasn't sure this chick wouldn't jump her the minute she looked away. She didn't even know this girl—she couldn't have forgotten her—but she could read her intentions a mile away. She wanted Phae to give her a reason.

"Babe, if you wanna start throwing hands, I'm good for it, but you're gonna get suspended if you do it here. That's on you. Some free advice from a nobody."

"She's right," chimed in GC player #6. Her jersey said Ziegler on the back and she wore rainbow snapbands on each wrist. "Leave it, C."

Other players added their voices to the mix. Nobody but Calisto wanted a fight. Phae definitely didn't want one today. She had plans that didn't involve police stations or icing her hands while her parents shouted. She had a prom-posal to plan and a girlfriend to distract. No room for a brawl.

Phae was distracted from thoughts of Xia's blushing embarrassment at the life-size piñata of Scooby-Doo Phae had bought to surprise her with. It was filled with Valentine's Day cards and cherry lollipops Xia had left in her locker when she was trying to get Phae to look at her twice. Phae never looked at anybody else anymore.

"This is done, okay?" Roshelle had tossed her sports drink aside to stand between Calisto and Phae. She was easily as tall as Phae and of a similar build with deep brown skin and longer hair. She towered over Calisto and it was only under her close scrutiny that Calisto backed out of Phaedra's face. "Somebody needs to pack all the equipment and I think it's about to be you." Calisto started to talk back when Roshelle made a quick 'cut it out' gesture that couldn't be misread by anybody. "Done with. Deal with it. Go." Calisto went.

Phae let out a breath as the tension drained from her shoulders. "Thanks for coming through."

"Sorry about her. I don't know what got into her."

Phae shrugged. It was already ancient history, as far as she was concerned. "Don't worry about it. Nobody likes losing."

"It helps to lose to the best." Roshelle offered Phae a handshake, which she took. She had good strong hands and ready smile. Phaedra found herself smiling back. It wasn't like she didn't have plenty to smile about. She won the game, she didn't get arrested, and she had the cutest girl in Webber High School waiting to be asked to prom. What did she have to lose?

"Nice looking on the bright side. You didn't play that bad, you know. We're just been at it a long time. Got a few more seasons under our belt, is all."

"Better late than never?"

"Exactly. You'll get there. Your team will, too. Don't worry."

Roshelle ducked her head, cleared her throat. She looked nervous all of a sudden. Phae cocked her head.

"What's up?"

"Um." All that captain-like confidence was gone in a blink.

"Phae!"

Phaedra swung around to see that Xia had produced a bullhorn from who knew where to summon her over. From the smirk on Stevie's face she guessed that one of the refs was going to find themselves down a piece of equipment when they did post-game inventory. She wasn't sure there was anything scarier than her best friends liking her girlfriend as much as she did. They're going to be so much trouble this summer. She couldn't wait.

She turned back to Roshelle to apologize.

Roshelle was staring at Xia and Tré squabbling indistinctly over the bullhorn. Phae was pretty sure plausible deniability was the only way to go on this one.

"Who's that?"

Phae fanned herself, as much to obscure the grin on her face as to cool her down "My girl."

Roshelle's expression was hard to describe. "You got a girl?"

"Uh, yeah. What, I don't look like the type?"

"You do." She grinned a little. She had a great smile, the kind you see in magazines and fall in love with without ever learning her name. But Phaedra was already head over heels for somebody else. "Shame you're taken, though."

Phaedra shrugged, smiled over her shoulder a Xia waving her sign and beckoning her to hurry up. "You snooze you lose. See you on the court?" If the brackets fell out right, the Wild Girls and the Thunderbirds might just meet again. Volleyball was a small world.

"See ya."