State, Jess Merriweather, G
Title: State
Fandom: Friday Night Lights (TV)
Characters: Eric Taylor, Jess Merriweather
Rating: G
Spoilers: set after the end of s5.
Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit being made. Characters remain the property of Peter Berg et al.
Summary: A coach takes a team to State. History comes along for the ride.
"So the shadow became a head coach." he says, and Jess doesn't need to look around to know who's talking. She's been expecting this moment since she saw his name in the program.
"Got yourself a whole damn team of shadows," he continues, gesturing towards her boys training in black, his face unreadable behind the same old M-frames and the ever-present cap. It's a Penn State cap now, and nothing to do with Dillon, but the face underneath seems to have barely aged at all. Must be something good in that chilly northeastern water.
Jess makes him wait for an answer; this is her show now. A few more seconds of drills and she blows her whistle. It's still an impressive sight when all these huge young men stop dead at the sound.
"Alright, y'all take five and get some water. Offense, I want to see some life in you today. Get ready to knock the crap out of Defense after break."
As they all surge towards the tables, Jess finally turns around and offers her hand.
"Coach Taylor, fancy seeing you here."
"I heard that some Coach Merriweather had brought a team to State. They invited me down for some glad-handing and I thought I'd better check it wasn't my shadow going around coaching teams and winning stuff."
"I'm not your shadow anymore, Coach," Jess protests, but he's been smiling the whole time and she knows well enough when she's being teased. "Besides, until there are rings on fingers, ain't nobody won a thing."
"Funny, that's what Tami said to me thirty years ago." And with that, Coach Taylor (she'll never call him Eric, she already knows, because old habits die hard and he was her Coach before anything else) lets his little smirk bust out into a big old smile. Jess finds herself returning it, and she doesn't miss the surprised stares from her nearest players, most of whom have never seen anything close to that from her before now.
"You staying for the game, Coach?" she asks, and she knows at least that it can't make the pressure any higher than it already is.
"They threw in a ticket with my gift bag, yeah."
"So maybe I'll see you in the hotel bar tonight? I hear all the 'special guests' are staying the same place as us." Jess might be a grown woman who can drink her body weight in tequila should the mood arise, but she still feels strange at the thought of drinking alcohol around a man who hasn't seen her in nearly thirteen years.
"Sounds like a plan. Now you get these lumps running some more, or Denton's gonna hand you your asses tomorrow."
"My boys run just fine. You watch them tomorrow," Jess shoots back, and there's no disguising the pride in her voice.
With that, Coach Taylor walks off into the throng of people milling around her practice session. Jess would prefer it be closed, but sponsors and well-wishers have come all the way from Cibolo, and it doesn't seem smart to piss them off now.
Maybe she'll ask Coach about this tonight--this tightrope between standing your ground and knowing which fights to walk away from--because she sure as hell won't be trotting out sob stories about how hard it is being a woman in a man's world or any of the stuff that the interviewers seem to be obsessed with. They don't see that Jess is just a coach doing her job, but Eric Taylor does. He was the first one to see it, and she owes him a whole hell of a lot for it.
"Alright! Get your lazy asses back on the field. I hear you boys want some pretty jewelry tomorrow, and you won't get it for drinking Gatorade! Let's move!"
And move they do, a well-oiled machine with all its component parts. Her quarterback who finally has an arm to match the ego she met on the first day; her linebacker who would run through a brick wall if she told him too, and a defensive end who's turning her hair prematurely gray, when he isn't winning her games. Jess crosses her arms, squinting a little even behind her own Oakleys, and barks out another set of instructions.
The hairs on her arms are standing up a little, despite the warm Texas sun. It's pure adrenalin now, to be this close. Her playbook has been a pillow for most of the past three weeks, despite the handy little computers they all work from, she doesn't feel right without the sheets of paper to flip through at least once a day.
So yeah, tonight she'll buy her Coach a drink, and he won't tell her how much she's grown. But that's okay, really, because Jess Merriweather already knows.
Fandom: Friday Night Lights (TV)
Characters: Eric Taylor, Jess Merriweather
Rating: G
Spoilers: set after the end of s5.
Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit being made. Characters remain the property of Peter Berg et al.
Summary: A coach takes a team to State. History comes along for the ride.
"So the shadow became a head coach." he says, and Jess doesn't need to look around to know who's talking. She's been expecting this moment since she saw his name in the program.
"Got yourself a whole damn team of shadows," he continues, gesturing towards her boys training in black, his face unreadable behind the same old M-frames and the ever-present cap. It's a Penn State cap now, and nothing to do with Dillon, but the face underneath seems to have barely aged at all. Must be something good in that chilly northeastern water.
Jess makes him wait for an answer; this is her show now. A few more seconds of drills and she blows her whistle. It's still an impressive sight when all these huge young men stop dead at the sound.
"Alright, y'all take five and get some water. Offense, I want to see some life in you today. Get ready to knock the crap out of Defense after break."
As they all surge towards the tables, Jess finally turns around and offers her hand.
"Coach Taylor, fancy seeing you here."
"I heard that some Coach Merriweather had brought a team to State. They invited me down for some glad-handing and I thought I'd better check it wasn't my shadow going around coaching teams and winning stuff."
"I'm not your shadow anymore, Coach," Jess protests, but he's been smiling the whole time and she knows well enough when she's being teased. "Besides, until there are rings on fingers, ain't nobody won a thing."
"Funny, that's what Tami said to me thirty years ago." And with that, Coach Taylor (she'll never call him Eric, she already knows, because old habits die hard and he was her Coach before anything else) lets his little smirk bust out into a big old smile. Jess finds herself returning it, and she doesn't miss the surprised stares from her nearest players, most of whom have never seen anything close to that from her before now.
"You staying for the game, Coach?" she asks, and she knows at least that it can't make the pressure any higher than it already is.
"They threw in a ticket with my gift bag, yeah."
"So maybe I'll see you in the hotel bar tonight? I hear all the 'special guests' are staying the same place as us." Jess might be a grown woman who can drink her body weight in tequila should the mood arise, but she still feels strange at the thought of drinking alcohol around a man who hasn't seen her in nearly thirteen years.
"Sounds like a plan. Now you get these lumps running some more, or Denton's gonna hand you your asses tomorrow."
"My boys run just fine. You watch them tomorrow," Jess shoots back, and there's no disguising the pride in her voice.
With that, Coach Taylor walks off into the throng of people milling around her practice session. Jess would prefer it be closed, but sponsors and well-wishers have come all the way from Cibolo, and it doesn't seem smart to piss them off now.
Maybe she'll ask Coach about this tonight--this tightrope between standing your ground and knowing which fights to walk away from--because she sure as hell won't be trotting out sob stories about how hard it is being a woman in a man's world or any of the stuff that the interviewers seem to be obsessed with. They don't see that Jess is just a coach doing her job, but Eric Taylor does. He was the first one to see it, and she owes him a whole hell of a lot for it.
"Alright! Get your lazy asses back on the field. I hear you boys want some pretty jewelry tomorrow, and you won't get it for drinking Gatorade! Let's move!"
And move they do, a well-oiled machine with all its component parts. Her quarterback who finally has an arm to match the ego she met on the first day; her linebacker who would run through a brick wall if she told him too, and a defensive end who's turning her hair prematurely gray, when he isn't winning her games. Jess crosses her arms, squinting a little even behind her own Oakleys, and barks out another set of instructions.
The hairs on her arms are standing up a little, despite the warm Texas sun. It's pure adrenalin now, to be this close. Her playbook has been a pillow for most of the past three weeks, despite the handy little computers they all work from, she doesn't feel right without the sheets of paper to flip through at least once a day.
So yeah, tonight she'll buy her Coach a drink, and he won't tell her how much she's grown. But that's okay, really, because Jess Merriweather already knows.