Wicked Chemistry

The first time I saw Mace Wagner, he was standing on the sidelines next to Coach Fischer at the first football game of the season.

I took a seat behind the team’s bench, several rows up on the bleachers, with my friend Becca.

I had just moved to Texas to teach high school because Becca had gotten me a job alongside her.

Becca and I’d met our freshman year at college in Nebraska. I’d been raised in South Dakota, and she was from Texas. When we graduated, we both went home to where we’d grown up, but we missed each other like crazy.

Back in South Dakota, I didn’t have a boyfriend, most of my high school friends had moved away, and I only found a job as a substitute teacher. And, while I loved my parents, when Becca told me about a job opening at her high school, I jumped at the chance. I was only going to be young once and not tied down with a family. Now was the time in my life to explore different things and a different place.

I had moved into Becca’s rental just shy of a month ago. It was a house, but it was small, and I hoped to move into my own place soon. However, I’d gotten myself temporarily settled, and last week, the teachers had started school. I had met almost all of my new coworkers.

But the guy standing next to Coach Fischer was unfamiliar. He was tall and broad, bigger than Coach Fischer, and I was immediately drawn to him. He had his hands on his hips, and I couldn’t help but notice a line of text tattooed on the outside of each arm. I wanted to know what it said.

I could only see his profile, but he looked to be about my age, twenty-five, and he was very into the game. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted something at the players.

He was wearing very worn jeans and a football jersey that said Wagner on the back. But no pads or helmet.

I was just about to ask Becca who he was, but she was in the middle of a conversation with the woman next to her. And that was when I realized that this had to be the assistant coach. I had heard the name Connor Wagner said a few times in the halls at work, and since the football jersey displayed the same last name, it had to be him.

I had heard the other women at work, except for Becca, talk about how good-looking Coach Wagner was, but I was still practically knocked off my seat when he turned around.

He wasn’t good-looking.

He was gorgeous.

A living, breathing Adonis.

The Urban Dictionary one. The perfect man with a flawless body who made women’s hearts race and gave them butterflies in their stomachs. Not the Greek mythology one, although I’m sure Coach Wagner had women fight over him like Persephone and Aphrodite did over Adonis in the stories.

He had thick, dark brown hair that was a little long so that tendrils of it blew across his forehead. His eyes were a vivid blue that I could see, thanks to the blue in the jersey that made them stand out. He was lean in all the right places and big in others.

I quickly looked away but not before I saw the knowing smirk on his face. I’d been staring. He knew it, and I knew it.

I willed my face not to turn red and for me to pay attention to Becca’s conversation and forget Coach Wagner.

We might be grown professionals now, but I’d known guys like him my whole life. He was attractive. I was not. He knew he was attractive, and men that looked like him never went out with girls that looked like me.

I wouldn’t call myself ugly, but on a scale of one to ten, I was a solid six. Maybe a seven on a good day. But that was my face. My body? Well, that was more down in the four range. I had hips for days and no boobs. I couldn’t be what you would call voluptuous because God had accidentally forgotten to pack the top half of my body. Or maybe he’d put it all in the bottom. I was disproportionate, and it sucked.

But the good thing about being twenty-five and not fifteen was that I didn’t care so much anymore. Back then, I’d dreamed of getting myself breast implants while I starved myself and exercised until I passed out. These days, I still worked out but only to stay healthy. I’d come to terms with my huge hips and little pooch of a belly. If I wanted to eat cake, I was going to, damn it. I also knew there was much more to someone than what they looked like.

Yet, every once in a while, on nights like this, I was reminded that a guy like him wouldn’t date a girl like me. And that was okay. Really. I swear.

But, as a woman who was five feet ten inches, I was a sucker for tall men. When only fourteen and a half percent of men were six feet and over and barely four percent were over six-two, it was hard not to be attracted to someone I literally looked up to. I’d dated guys my height and some even a couple of inches shorter, but towering men were my kryptonite.

Let’s face it; I was attracted to the guy.

And, because of this, I took one more glance at his left ring finger. While I’d heard the other teachers talk, no one had ever mentioned if Coach Wagner was single or taken.

His hand was bare, but when I let my gaze travel up his body, his eyes were on mine. There was a little bit of laughter in them as he shook his head. He scanned me once before he raised an eyebrow and turned back to the game.

Caught again, but this time, I did turn red. Because I knew that look. He’d assessed me and found me lacking.

Story of my life.

What was different about this story was that I wasn’t attracted to the high school’s assistant football coach. I wasn’t attracted to a coworker, a fellow teacher.

I was attracted to one of the high school’s football players, one of my students.