by Zoey Shores
I just don’t know how he’s friends with these other assholes.
“Hey, man,” I respond, trying to summon up all the enthusiasm I can muster.
“You guys don’t have a drink yet?” Tristan twists his head back, scanning the room, and then calls out, “Hey, rookie! Get your teammates some beers!”
A very fresh faced young guy across the room snaps to attention, nods, and hustles off to the cooler.
Tristan chuckles. “Breaking in the new guy.”
“What’s he play?” Chase asks. Chase, Archer and I are sticking together, hanging out near the kitchen, while social butterfly Lincoln – who somehow gets along with the Alpha Kappas, probably because he’s from a pretty rich family like all of them – is off mingling somewhere.
“Wide receiver,” Tristan answers.
Chase casts a skeptical eye at the kid who’s now dodging his way through the improvised dancefloor, packed with gyrating bodies, his hands full of our beer. “Shit, he’s gotta bulk up.”
I laugh and clasp Chase on the shoulder. “Hell, I saw your pictures from freshman year. You were a scrawny runt yourself. Most receivers are before they actually get on a serious nutrition and weight training regimen.”
The rookie wide receiver walks up to us and hands us our beers. His eyes are bright with enthusiasm. Shit, he just exudes innocent, youthful optimism. I imagine a freshman coming into a now-top football program, with a secure spot on the team right away, must feel like he holds the world in the palm of his hand.
“What’s your name, rookie?” I ask, taking my beer from him and cracking it open.
“Sage,” he answers, smiling.
“Isn’t he just the cutest thing?” Archer reaches over and tussles his hair like a big brother. Sage’s smile morphs into an annoyed smirk. I catch him rolling his eyes.
“Don’t mind him,” Chase says, as he nudges Archer with his elbow. “Glad to have you on the team, Rookie. Put her there.”
Chase extends his hand and shakes with Sage. Chase lifts up his head in a nod of acknowledgement toward the rookie. “Yeah, those are receiver hands alright. I have a good feeling about this kid.”
The look on Sage’s face announces that he’s eating up the praise from Chase – since Chase is our current top receiver, it’s no small compliment.
“Hey, those hands did their job tonight, so no complaints from me.” Archer lifts his beer up toward Sage in a toast, and then downs it in one gulp. “How about another?”
“Make it another round,” I tell him, lifting my beer to my lips and downing the can.
Archer lets out a loud belch that just about shakes the floor. Archer’s a huge guy, our star running back. He could probably outdrink everyone else in this whole house. I know he’s just getting started.
Sage brings us over another round of beers and then takes his leave. Who knows if Sage will end up being one of the cool guys on the team, or another Alpha Kappa asshole?
Tristan thanks us again for coming, before his attention is captured by a girl in a tight black dress walking past us. His head snaps in her direction and his eyes latch onto her figure as she walks away. Soon, he’s brushing up against her on the other side of the room, and she’s looking very appreciative of the attention.
I think about going to find a girl myself, but the idea just doesn’t appeal to me. I had a bunch of hook ups and “friends with benefits” last year, but over the summer I was back home, working and hanging out with my mom, older brother, and a couple old friends. I didn’t as much as go on a date. And honestly, it’s not like I missed it. I guess I’ve realized that, for me, sleeping around gets old fast.
I’ll probably just hang out here with Chase and Archer, get a little buzz, and then head back home once we’ve stayed long enough to make Lincoln happy.
I finish off my second beer and take aim at the recycling bin across the room. I lift up my hands and flick my wrist, sending the empty can on a perfect arc, dropping right into the bin without hitting either the rim or either of the interior sides.
“Show off,” Archer teases.
As I turn my gaze away from the recycling bin, I think I see something out of the corner of my eye that makes me do a double take. I scan the area of the room that caught my subconscious attention. My eyes narrow on a figure on the opposite side of the room. She’s standing at profile, most of her face turned away from my field of vision. But something about her is drawing my attention.
When she turns her head to talk to the girl on her other side, I catch a glimpse of her face. Heidi.
My heart starts beating faster than I’d like to admit. Even though I was just thinking how unappealing the idea of finding a girl to stumble home with tonight feels to me right now, taking in an eyeful of Heidi makes my cock twitch. She’s wearing a light summer dress that shows off her smooth, tan arms. The fabric lightly clings to her contours, teasing my mind with promises of her delicious, soft curves, without revealing too much to the eye.
I wouldn’t mind going over and talking to her right now. But then I remember our awkward interaction yesterday. It would be an understatement to say that she didn’t exactly seem over-enthused to see me. Besides, I was here all last year, and she never thought enough of that fact to try and seek me out to say ‘hi’ – not even for old time’s sake.
I guess it’s not like us being three-month-long high school sweethearts five years ago is that big of a deal. Shit, we were already a mismatch back then. Me, from a poor family from the poor side of town, with a brother always getting into trouble. Her, from one of the respectable families, a straight-A student, on the track to real success. Her future didn’t depend on a one-in-a-million chance at making it in football.
Clearly, she didn’t need an athletic scholarship to make it into Winthrop.
Shit, I can only imagine what her parents said after I got expelled from high school. They never liked me to begin with; I’m sure they outright forbid her to ever speak to me again after that. I doubt she’d ever to be too eager to let them know we’re talking again – even though I’m sure they know I’m here at Winthrop.
Hell, they probably warned her against talking to me again after the sports media started covering me and the evolving Winthrop team.
Of course, it doesn’t matter that I only got expelled for trying to defend my brother. My older brother, Ryan, was always getting into trouble. He had a tough life growing up with a poor single mother, too, obviously – but unlike me, he didn’t have an older brother to look out for him. He started running with the wrong crowd for a while and got into trouble.
One day, he stopped by after school let out for the day to walk home with me. Another group of people – some older guys out of high school, and a couple seniors from my school – tried to jump him. Something about him owing them money. I helped him fight them off, and in the process knocked two of the seniors out cold. Word got back from the school, and that was that: zero tolerance. Expulsion.
That’s what I get for having an arm too strong for my own good, I guess.
“You lost in a trance or something?”
I hear Lincoln’s jocular voice in front of me, and I jolt my head up. Lincoln’s standing there, smiling – the guy is always smiling, no matter what – and holding a beer in his hand.
“Just got lost in my thoughts for a minute, I guess,” I answer. I look to either side of me and see that Chase and Archer have wondered off. Damn, I guess I really was deep in my thoughts, reminiscing.
“Lighten up, bro. I swear, most of the Alpha Kappa guys aren’t that bad.” Like I said: Lincoln, the eternal optimist.
“Well, no one’s tried to shank me yet,” I joke.
Lincoln laughs. “Just stay away from Carson and Bryce.”
“Words I wish I could live my life by, man.”
“Go grab another beer, man, lighten up. Enjoy yourself. You know we won’t be able to party like this too often after the season starts.”
House parties are another thing Coach Ri
ker has clamped down on hard. He expects the best from his players: best conditioning, and best behavior. Parties like this aren’t exactly conducive to either of the two.
“I need one, too,” Lincoln says, tossing his empty beer can in the direction of the recycling bin. Unlike my earlier shot, his bounces off the rim and lands on the floor next to the bin.
Lincoln shrugs – his empty beer can certainly isn’t the only one littering the floor around the recycling bin. “I guess it’s not for nothing I don’t play quarterback.”
Lincoln’s one of our tight ends. He’s sturdy, athletic, and tough. Beyond just being pees in a pod personality-wise, he and Tristan make up a formidable tight end duo on the field. Tristan can catch a pass better, but Lincoln’s tougher and more physical.
Lincoln and I head over to the cooler and both pop open a new beer. Once I drink about half the can, I feel like I’m finally starting to relax. The tension in my muscles is easing, as are my anxieties. Even though I’m in enemy territory, I’m starting to feel more like I’m just at a regular party.
With a couple more sips of beer down my throat, I must really be feeling it, because I’m even thinking about finding Heidi and talking to her, in spite of our less than encouraging interaction yesterday.
I’m not that drunk, yet, though. I know how to take a hint, and the vibe she was putting off was loud and clear: not interested. She wants the past to stay in the past.
I guess that’s where it belongs.
Lincoln and I step out to the backyard of the frat house. The cool, late-August breeze is a refreshing change from the inside of the house, packed full of moving bodies and hot.
There’s a commotion across the expansive lawn. A bunch of people are cheering – and shit, I hear Carson. The last thing I want to do is watch Carson Wright make a spectacle of himself. I’m about to turn around and head back in the house with Lincoln, when he places his hand on my shoulder to stop me.
“Hold up, what’s Carson doing?” he asks.
I narrow my eyes to see across the dark distance, and I notice the rookie, Sage. Sage is standing, just barely, with a cup in his hand. Carson, laughing, is hold a keg nozzle and filling it up.
“Drink another, rookie!” he yells, before breaking out in obnoxious laughter. The crowd gathered around him – all Alpha Kappa douchebags – starts to chant drink, drink, drink.
Lincoln and I step down the wooden stairs of the back porch on the grass of the lawn to get a better look. Sage doesn’t look into what’s going on. In fact, he looks like he’s about three seconds away from throwing up, passing out, or both.
“What are you waiting for rookie? You wanna be known as the team bitch?” Carson taunts him.
Then, I see Bryce step toward Sage from beside Carson. “Drink it, rookie,” Bryce says to Sage, his voice a mixture of sternness of mocking.
“They’re hazing him,” Lincoln says, his voice sharp with disapproval. The Alpha Kappas would absolutely be the kind of guys to haze a young freshman by bullying him into drinking way too much.
That shit might have passed back in the day, back when the Winthrop football team was just a country club for rich boys like Carson and Bryce. But I’m the Quarterback now – that means, this is my team.
And this shit isn’t gonna happen on my team. Not to anyone.
A nervous look crosses Sage’s face. Carson and Bryce stand in front of him, looking at him, applying all the peer pressure their body language can muster. Sage starts to slowly bring the full cup of beer up to his mouth.
“Hey!” I call out. Lincoln and I walk forward, purposefully.
“Oh shit, it’s the love birds,” Bryce says mockingly. A joke as lame as he is.
“Sage, don’t drink that,” I tell him. A look of relief passes across Sage’s face, and he lowers the cup away from him lips.
“Hey! You’re in our house rookie, you play by our rules. Drink!” Carson looks to Sage while he barks the order, and then he looks back at me, his eyes narrow and his smirk taunting.
“Cut it out, guys,” Lincoln says to them in his peacemaker voice, preferring to handle this civilly. “This isn’t cool.”
“Forget these dorks, drink!” Bryce grabs Sage’s arm and forces him to lift the cup up towards his mouth again.
I step forward and with one motion, swat the cup out of Sage’s hand. The cup goes crashing to the floor, the beer inside spilling all over Carson.
“What the fuck!?” Carson reacts. Anger is etched on his face as he tries to wipe down his now-wet muscle shirt with his hands.
“Come on Sage, let’s get out of here,” Lincoln steps forward and puts his hand on Sage’s back, leading him away from the scene.
Instead of following them, I stay standing here. There’s about eight Alpha Kappa guys in the group that was hazing Sage other than Carson and Bryce. Some still players on the team, others former players who lost their spots to the transfer students who came in last year, and some who are just frat guys and never played on the team. They’re all staring me down – they probably think they’re real intimidating.
Nope. Not to me.
I stand up straight, my spine hard and unbending as a steel rod. I look Carson square in the eyes, not flinching, not blinking.
“Why don’t you get out of here, Tanner?” he finally says, a hint of a threat in his voice.
Getting out of here sounds fucking great. But I’m not going to give this jerk the satisfaction of thinking he chased me out.
“Why don’t you make me?”
CHAPTER FIVE: HEIDI
“No way, right in the balls?”
Rory, April and I have run into another friend of ours, Katie, at the party. She was here with her friend Megan, but Megan slipped away to dance with one of the Alpha Kappa guys. In fact, we can see her grinding against him out in the middle of the living room right now. Luckily, Katie found us, so she doesn’t have to brave the onslaught of drunken frat guys alone.
Rory is recounting her the story of how she broke up with Mark.
“That’s right,” Rory nods her head, a look of pride etched on her face. Hell, she deserves to feel proud. Forget a text, a phone call, or even an in person conversation – some breakups are best done not with the mouth, but the with the foot: the breakups caused by cheating.
“Right in your driveway, too?” Katie asks. She wears a look of incredulity on her face.
“Yep. We had planned for him to visit me at my house over the weekend. He pulled up to my driveway, I went out to greet him, he walked forward with his arms wide open, expecting a hug, but I gave him a swift kick right to the family jewels.”
Rory takes another sip of her drink and tries to suppress the devilish grin that spreads across her bright red lips.
“What did he do?” Katie asks, spellbound by the tale.
Rory shrugs. “Got back in his car and drove home.”
“He didn’t, like … ask you why you kicked him in the balls?”
Rory rolls her eyes. “He knew what he was doing. Mark wasn’t smart enough to do a lot of things, but he was smart enough to put two and two together this time.”
“Was your dad home?”
Rory smiles and nods. “Yep. Watching from the living room window. He cheered for me when I walked back in the door.”
Katie busts out laughing, and April and I join her. It’s a story I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of hearing.
“If only you had your dad film it,” I comment.
Rory sighs. “True. My only regret.”
“To kicking guys in the balls,” April raises her cup, offering a toast. We all heartily join her, happy to lend our support for her motion.
“The cheating bastards at least,” I say, noticing a hint of bitterness in my voice more noticeable than I wish it were. I’m trying to act blasé about my breakup with Paul – I know it’s for the best in the long run, and hell, even in the short run – but still, I can’t pretend that it doesn’t sting just a little sometimes.
Honestly, it’s not even about Paul. I saw him yesterday, and it just rolled off my back. I guess the bitterness I feel is toward relationships in general. I can’t say I’ve ever had a really good one.
I mean, back in freshman year of high school, with Luke … but we were kids back then. Is a tenth-grade high school relationship even a relationship? Hardly, it’s just two kids playing. In the real adult world – and even the later high school world – all my actual relationships have been big disappointments.
If Luke stayed around in high school, and didn’t get expelled, I wonder what would have happened between us …
I shake the thought out of my head. If there’s one thing that’s not worth wracking my mind over, it’s the possibility that I could have ended up with the hottest guy on campus, the man destined to be a top NFL quarterback making more money in a month than my entire family’s net worth.
“Who’s the guy Megan went off with?” April asks, looking towards them on the dancefloor. Megan has her back pressed up against the guy she’s with, a tall, muscular guy with short dark hair. I guess I’d say he were good looking if I were still in the market – but I’m not.
Even though it’s not one of our formal rules for our man-free semester, I’m making an effort not even to enjoy looking. If I’m not playing this semester, I’m going to try not to be a spectator, either. It’ll make things easier.
Granted, easier said than done. Especially if I spot Luke on campus.
“One of the Alpha Kappa guys. Megan’s into athletes, though I don’t think that guy is actually on the team.”
“Oh yeah, that was a sort of big deal last year, wasn’t it? A lot of the old players losing their spots to the new transfer students the new coach brough in? Something like that.” Even though Rory loves gossip, she’s totally oblivious when it comes to sports news.
“Sort of big deal?” April balks. As an athlete herself, she’s been neck-deep in the whole drama. “It’s all anyone on campus talked about all last year!”
Rory looks at April absently for a second and then shrugs. “Really? Not in the theater department.”
