Work Text:
i. Dan
David Wymack does not know how to say I love to the woman he knows needs to hear it more than anyone else.
It doesn’t take a genius for anyone to figure out that Dan looks up to David. Hell, even Josten could figure that out if you gave him enough time.
David knew he made the right decision to make her captain when she joined because he could recognize that fire in her eyes, that need to prove herself. He doesn’t regret his decision when news pours out speculation that the team is failing under her leadership. He doesn’t regret his decision when the foxes, yet again, fail to place any higher than the bottom of their division that year. He doesn’t regret his decision when the team splinters instead of heals; cracks instead of fuses together. Somethings don’t happen easily, and he trusts in Dan that she’ll make it happen if given time and effort.
He lets a hint of a smile tug at the edges of his mouth as he watches her yell at her team on the court during practice. He watches her pull Seth and Kevin apart again after their fight has gone physical and feels proud of her when she keeps on going.
She doesn’t fall under the pressure of having to keep together a team of broken people. Instead, she stands tall on her feet and refuses to let anyone push her down again.
She drags a broken, fractured team together to the championships and fuses them together enough to win a championship.
He sits in the middle of the seats during her graduation, but her eyes still manage to find his when she walks herself across the stage to accept a diploma that she never could have expected five years prior.
“I wish you could have been my father.” She tells him one night when they’re going over plays at the court, long after everyone has already gone home.
She follows up with, “When I was growing up, I never wanted a father. I thought I could make it on my own, you know? But when I got to Palmetto…When I got to the foxes, I wanted to be able to call you dad.”
David thinks of how furious she had been when she had stormed into his office after Kevin’s declaration. How she had begged him to say it wasn’t true, that he wasn’t Kevin’s dad as if he had known this whole time too. She had looked so angry at…something. Maybe the world, for making her hopes into someone’s reality. Maybe at Kevin, for waiting so long to say something. Maybe at him, inadvertently, for getting to be someone else’s father instead of hers.
He wants to tell her that it’s okay, that he won’t care for her any less just because of what Kevin told him.
“Kevin is your child.” She spits angrily when she walks in.
He wants to say I love you.
“You are too.” He says instead.
ii. Kevin
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to a son he’s known for both four months and two years.
He knows how to be a coach to Kevin. He knows how to be clinical in the way only Kevin appreciates, and he knows when to tell him to get his ass off the court and go to bed already.
He does not know how to be a father to him. He does not know how to tell him that he is so proud of him all the time, and not just on the court.
He does not know how to tell his son that he loves him.
Instead, he slides a flyer to him for an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting atop the pile of new recruits Kevin had asked for. He watches the way his son’s gaze slides over the words, watches as he understands the words and what it means for him, watches the slight flinch of his shoulders that he must have desperately tried to stop.
David almost regrets giving him the paper, but he knows that if he doesn’t do it now, it might be too late later. He doesn’t want to ever be too late again.
“Abby’s been on my ass about trying to get sober,” He offers after the silence between them teeters just enough towards the edge of uncomfortable. He hadn’t thought this through, had he? Was he overstepping his place as his coach? As his father? “I thought maybe you’d like to come with me. Show your old man some support or something.”
He does not say that he is afraid of how his son can outdrink even him somedays. He does not say that he is worried that he can down a fifth of vodka in ten seconds when he’s scared. He does not say that the bottle of bottom-shelf bourbon he bought two days ago is down to almost two-fifths full, but he hasn’t even had a drop of it himself. He does not say that he knows he’s been enabling his bad habits by sharing them and he wants it to stop. He does not say that is concerned because every mention of Riko or the Moriyama’s sends him clinging to the neck of a bottle of Vodka instead of to Betsy.
“I’d like it if you could come with me, Kevin. It’s just outside of Columbia, and it’s on Sunday so you won’t miss practice.” After a pause, he adds, “We can stop by Exites on the way back if you want.”
He does not say that he is afraid of how the only things he and his son have in common is a sport they learned from the same person and a need for a bottle of poison to cure them of long gone ghosts, even for just a couple hours.
He does not say ‘I love you too much to let you kill yourself like this,’ but he hopes his words are clear anyway.
iii. Andrew
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to someone he knows has never been loved before.
Andrew Minyard is a ticking time bomb and David signs him anyways. The whole team agrees to let him on the team in spite of the time spent in juvie and the drugs the court has him on for his assault charges. The whole team regrets that decision within the first week of him being there.
The kid is five feet even and his smile is unnerving. He pulls knives out on anyone and everyone, ranging from a stranger who touches his shoulder to his cousin. He speaks German on the daily and every time he leaves with Renee, they both come back with bruises.
David knows nothing about Andrew.
Rather, he knows that Andrew Minyard, formerly Andrew Doe, was one hell of a goalie and that everything else about him was above his paygrade.
He’s learned that he’s fiercely protective of everything that’s ‘him and his’ to the point of physical threats if anyone gets close to his family.
He’s learned that he’s taking the worst antipsychotics a doctor could give you and get away with.
He’s learned that he apparently trusts Betsy and David doesn’t even pretend to hide his sigh of relief when he realizes that the kid is at least getting help and talking to someone. He may not show it well, but even he cares for the kid.
It’s the small things that David does to let the kid know he loves him.
“I don’t want to take them during games.” He bargains as his pen taps against the contract in front of him. “They ruin my focus.” He argues, fingers messing with the edge of black armbands that show flashes of slivers when his wrists flex just right.
If David looks the other way when the other is supposed to take his medication, then he was none the wiser.
“Give me a number between one and ten and a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue,” he tells Wymack and proceeds to shut down the goal for most of the night.
If David makes sure to keep a bottle or two of the whiskey in his cupboards for days when Andrew will break into his apartment, it’s because he just so happened to buy it and he hates the taste of whiskey.
“Coach, we need you in Columbia. Something happened with Andrew—” Kevin says shakily into the phone.
If David’s heart races a little bit faster as he speeds down the highway with a bag for Andrew in his passenger seat, his mind a constant of ‘please be okay, please be okay, please be—,’ no one has to know.
David knows, better than most, that Andrew has never had someone truly love him for him. He wishes he could be the one to tell him, but he watches as Neil fits himself against the broken pieces and thinks that he won’t have to.
iv. Matt
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to the man he has watched go through hell and come back smiling.
He had been far too willing to turn a blind eye to his player's drug habits that he hadn’t even noticed how bad Matt had been. He thought he was recovered. He played well on the court, he got along with his teammates, but David should have expected something to happen.
Nothing good lasts forever.
Speedballs. Andrew gave him speedballs in Columbia and dumped him on Abby’s couch without even trying to seem regretful.
Matt, who typically towered over everyone on the court at his height of six foot four, seemed even shorter than the twins were with the way he was slouched into Abby’s couch with glazed eyes and arms scratched red from withdrawal.
Just from the way he looked, David wouldn’t wish this upon his worst enemy. He wants to grab Andrew by the collar and shake him until he could figure out why he would ever do such a thing to his teammate. He wants to hurt someone, anyone at this point, because not only was Matt their strongest player on the court by far, he wasn't someone who deserves this.
Nobody deserves this.
He loved the sophomore and wanted to damn anyone to hell who could ever hurt him like this.
Instead of telling him that, he sat with Abby and a bottle of vodka and wondered just how he could let something like this happen to his team. He wondered how he could let his team shatter under his nose and not even notice.
But if there was ever a reason to love Matthew Boyd, it was because he was a fighter.
It was the little things that helped him to know that he was getting better. He was more responsive, he’d joke around with the girls whenever they’d come to visit. He’d get up every so often to get water or got to the bathroom, but he was getting better and that’s all that had mattered.
He’d go through hell and he’d do it again in a heartbeat because he knew he could make it. Watching him walk back onto his court with a smile on his face was enough for David.
He wants to tell him I love you, but instead, he lets him help others.
He wants to tell him I love you, but instead, he gives him Neil Josten as a roommate because he knows that, if anyone could help that kid, it would be Matt.
He wants to tell him I love you, but instead, he lets him help Allison after Seth’s death because he trusts him enough with his team to know that he could do no harm.
He wants to tell him I love you, but instead, he just smiles at him, more of a twitch of the lips, and thanks him gruffly even when he gets the same ‘it’s no big deal’ in response.
v. Aaron
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to someone he knows has never been allowed to before.
Aaron is the most put together of the foxes.
He spends his freshman year juggling through the beginning of a pre-med degree and staying out of the way of anyone else. He doesn’t talk to anyone other than his brother or his cousin, but David chalks it up to him being shy or closed off.
Of course, David is wrong, like he is on most things when it comes to his kids.
The first day he walks in on Andrew and Aaron arguing with each other in German, he is tempted to walk out. Of course, it wouldn’t be that simple, would it?
Aaron is spiteful and angry and in love with a cheerleader in secret.
David catches him sneaking glances to her out of the corner of his eye when he thinks his brother isn’t looking and resolutely promises himself to not mess this up for the kid. There’s no reason to stop this when he just wants to be happy, right?
Who would he be to stop the kid from being loved?
Of course, David knows that his heart pours out love for the kid who can’t take it.
He wonders if Aaron knows how much people care for him or if he thinks that hating everything around him will ensure that everyone will hate him too.
David shows him his love in the little ways he can, offering him the help that he wouldn’t know or wouldn’t take.
He offers him help by distracting Andrew when the Vixens are close enough for him to talk to.
He offers him help for his classes even though he knew that he wouldn’t take it or that he couldn’t even give it anyways.
He offers him help in the form of a shoulder to cry on or an ear to talk into if he needs it when he’s charged with the murder of Drake Spear.
David offers him everything he possibly could to show him that he’s loved, even if he can’t see it.
It’s the small things that show David he’s listening. It’s in the way that he looks at David before shooting the Vixen smile when he’s sure Andrew is distracted. It’s in the way that he quietly asks for help in his math class and then had to explain half of the work to him anyways. It’s in the way that his voice shakes when he says, “Is it bad that I would do it again if someone hurt him like that again?”
David wants to tell him that he loves him, but he knows he won’t take the words. He knows that Aaron is certainly not the most put together fox he’s had the pleasure of knowing, but he knows that he tries so hard to be.
He just hopes that it’s enough when he says, “I think it would be worse if you didn’t.”
vi. Seth
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to someone he’s already lost.
Seth Gordon was the only fox to have made it to his fifth year at Palmetto State University.
Seth Gordon was so close to a success story, was so close to getting out with more than he could have ever bargained for, but he just couldn’t make it.
On days where David can’t stop himself from grabbing the bottle of poison to raise to his lips, his first toast is always to Seth. His first toast is always to the boy who could have been, who had almost made it but had fallen too fast.
A modern-day Icarus, if you will, with wings made of hopes and tied together with drugs and sun in the form of a lighter.
There had been no funeral for him. They had shipped his belongings to his mother who had only sent the box back. Unopened.
He hears whispers throughout the campus that it was only expected that he’d overdose at some point and he wants nothing more than to slam his fist into the face of everyone who had ever said he’d never make it.
His body is cremated and he is not buried.
There is no grave for David to visit, to place flowers onto it when no one else would. There is no place for him to dig his fingers into the soil and imagine how different everything would have been if he had made it.
He wanted to apologize. He wanted to say sorry for not paying enough attention. He wanted to say sorry for forgetting to give him one more chance.
He wanted to tell him that they won, in the end. He wanted to tell him that, if he had made it, he would have too.
He knows that there is nothing he could have done to stop this. He knows that Seth was fighting an uphill battle that he was destined to lose, but he was fighting it until the end. He never once gave up in the face of defeat, just rolled his eyes and tried to push forward anyway.
He knows that he is not the only one to have cared for Seth. He knows that Allison will mourn him, but they will all forget about him eventually.
Everyone forgets eventually.
David remembers all of his foxes and he knows he cannot forget. He had wanted so badly to tell Seth that he was loved, that he had a place on the team, that he could make it if he just stuck it out a little longer.
He had given him chance upon chance upon chance and it still wasn’t enough. There is nothing he can do to change that, no matter how much he wants to give him just one more chance if he could.
All he can do is whisper out I love you and knock back another swig of vodka straight from the bottle.
vii. Allison
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to a woman who’s still trying to learn how to love herself.
Everyone knows her tragic backstory. It’s not that hard to know when it had been broadcasted on TMZ and every other major entertainment news site.
A modern day princess Allision Reynolds turned exy player turned bulimic when parents go too far with expectations of her. And, just like that, she fell from her throne with no one there to help her up anymore.
The media have a field day when it comes to her story, changing and warping the original until it’s all clickbait and profitable.
David knows he’s taking a chance when he signs her, one of the three girls he signed in his second year as a coach at Palmetto State University.
He doesn’t know if this is a risk worth taking, but when he sees her, he knows he made the first decision.
He wants to ask if she’s okay but instead helps her build up muscle and trains her into channeling her anger towards her parents into aggression in the game.
He wants to say I love you, but instead, he tries to help her love herself more.
She is filled with pride, but her heart is filled with spite instead of love and she holds herself like she’s a barbed wire fence just waiting to cut into anyone who gets too close to her.
It’s easy to pretend to be okay when prompted directly and Allision is nothing if not a publicist’s dream; A puppet who regurgitates the same lines to the same questions no matter the truth.
He wants to say I love you, but he doesn’t know her yet. He knows her puppet, the lines she tells him that have been so carefully rehearsed that there’s no emotion behind them anymore.
She says she’s fine and the word curls into a semblance of a shield to protect her from anyone who looks deeper into the words.
She says that she can play and her arms shake when they hold the racquet, her body can’t keep up with where she needs it to go.
One day, he tells her, quietly, that it’s okay to not be okay sometimes. That he’ll be there for her even when she doesn’t have the time to be there for herself and she blinks back tears from her eyes with a shaky smile. He worries that he said something wrong, but his worrying is cut off by the laugh that she lets out.
“Coach, my mascara is sixty dollars, please don’t make me cry.” She jokes, but it’s the lightest she’s ever sounded and his chest fills with pride. “I’m not okay yet, but I’m trying, and that’s okay.” She tells herself, just loud enough for David to hear it too.
Maybe he can’t say that he loves her yet, and maybe she can’t say that she loves herself yet, but they’re both trying to anyways.
viii. Nicky
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to the boy who cares so much about everyone and not enough about himself.
He knows that there are still people who look at Nicky and think that he just recruited him to get Andrew to sign.
He knows, deep down, that they’re mostly right. He had no reason to sign a backliner who hadn’t played in years, nor was that good at it, but he did regardless.
But Nicky was a fox through and through anyway.
David watches as the boy parades into a battlefield and hands the enemy the ammunition to an empty gun. He wears a shirt that reads ‘Let’s get one thing straight – I’m not’ and laughs when his teammates call him a slur. His smile doesn’t reach his eyes, but he seems fine with letting the others tear him down in order to raise themselves higher.
He watches as the boy diverts the subject around his parents with a practiced ease that speaks of hurt. His eyes dim at the thought of them, but his smile grows as if to make up for the lack of happiness in his eyes.
He learns about Nicky’s struggle in staggered pieces.
He learns of his parents, if they could ever even deserve to be called that, and their misplaced faith. David’s hands curl into fists at the thought of anyone ever thinking to force Nicky to be straight through a vain use of their god’s name.
He learns of his high school years, where he learned German and just barely found an escape from himself and the self-deprecation he had been taught. David learns about Erik and his family, who Nicky full-heartedly believes is his savior.
He learns of his struggle of two jobs and teenagers, of trying so desperately to make ends meet even when they weren’t meant to, of working harder to support his family so that his parents couldn’t hurt them too.
He learns of his nonchalant way of brushing aside hate, of pushing comments about himself away or tucking them deep down to a place where he doesn’t need to think of them anymore. The easy way that he tries to convince himself everything is fine.
David notices that when Nicky talks of himself, he isn’t really talking about himself. He is talking about his gayness or his faith or his family, but never truly himself. For all of the love that he showers others with, he never spares any of it for himself.
David tries to show his love through a hand on the shoulder after a game, a gruff “Good game, Nicky” when it was warranted. He tries to show his love through every “I’m proud of you” and every “You played well tonight.”
He doesn’t ask if Nicky understands what he really means, but he knows he understands. He watches the light in Nicky’s eyes grow brighter through every passing comment of praise and thinks that this is enough.
ix. Renee
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to the woman who looks at every sad case he drags in with a small, resigned smile that reeks of understanding.
When he had first meet Renee, he thought that this surely had to be the wrong person. The cross necklace and bible in hand had led him to believe that this could not be the Renee Walker that he was looking for. Stephanie had told him about the hair and what to expect, and he had seen her in the goal, but there was no way that she would fit his criteria for the foxes. She seemed so…put together.
That is the first time he learns of how appearances can be misleading.
She says that she is a bad person. She tells him her story and he still doesn’t believe it.
He signs Renee Walker to his team and she smiles and thanks him before asking for a pen.
He tells Renee Walker that he’s thinking of signing Dan Wilds as captain and she smiles, tells him that her team was a good team and she would make a great captain.
He signs each and every one of his foxes and she smiles at them when they arrive, with all of their baggage and all of their issues.
Matthew Boyd takes her smile in stride, returning it with one of his own and melding himself seamlessly into the group of girls he had signed together. She holds him together in his time of need and David does not know how to thank her.
Andrew Minyard snarls at her smile, at her faith, at the darkness hidden beneath that smile and she does not change. Instead, she gets closer and closer until she can hold him steady and David does not know how to thank her.
Neil Josten tries to run from her smile and she is perplexed, but it does not change. She does not change and David does not know how to thank her.
No matter who he brings into the Foxhole Court, Renee is always armed with a careful smile and David does not know how she does it. He does not know how she can look at these tortured souls and find the goodwill to smile at them in spite of them.
He remembers her telling him once, all those years ago, that she was a bad person trying really hard to be a good person.
He wants to tell her that she is a good person in spite of the bad decisions forced onto her. He wants to say that she is a good person through and through who made bad choices. He wants to say that she is just a good person who had once tried really hard to be a bad person.
He wants to say I love you, but she does not need that anymore.
He wants to say I love you, but all that comes out is ‘Thank you.’
x. Neil
David Wymack does not know how to say I love you to the boy who’s probably never heard it before.
When he first sees Neil Josten, his first thought is difficult. His next, however, is scared.
The kid looks up at him and David can see him tense up in fear. He stops just out of his reach and David knows not to take offense to it.
This is the kid who sleeps in locker rooms most nights out of the week and won’t change out in front of his teammates. His coach thinks family trouble and the kids fear of David confirms it enough for him to slide over the contract.
“Need a pen?” He asks because he assumes the kid would kill for a chance to get away from parents who don’t care enough to love him. “We can fly you out on May 12th.” He asks because he knows what it’s like to need to leave as soon as you can.
Neil flinches back and his eyes scream with the need to run the first time that David raises his voice at him, and he feels the guilt wash over him like a second skin. He should have known better, but he can’t change what’s already been done.
Instead, he speaks calmly when he tells the kid that he’d never hurt anyone who hadn’t thrown the first punch and wants to feel relief when the message seems to get through to him.
David knows what it feels like to be afraid, but he can’t help Neil when he embodies the very thing he fears. Loud, angry men used to scare him too.
He watches as the monster’s envelope Neil into their fold carefully. He watches as Neil gets closer and closer to Andrew until he’s whispering in German with Andrew’s hand under his shirt before he’s sent away.
He watches as the upperclassmen make the effort to go out of their way to protect him. Matt is his best friend and won’t hesitate to put himself between Neil and danger, even if Neil will never ask him to.
He watches as he signs his own death wish by mouthing off to Riko Moriyama on live television, at the fall banquet, to the press, at the winter banquet.
He watches as the kid crumples after winter break and it takes the whole team and then some to pull him back together.
He wants to yell at him that he loves him, that he cares about him.
Instead, he tells him to stop being an idiot and charge his phone, because it’s the most and the least he can do.
He watches as the FBI brings his striker back to him in a motel in Baltimore in more pieces than he had left him.
“We’ll wait for you, all right? As long as it takes, Neil.” He tells him as he watches him leave again because it’s a hell of a lot easier to say than I love you.