All the Glory

by Elle Casey

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I said from behind the stainless steel barrier. A picture of Jason and his father held to the fridge with a magnet was about an inch from my nose.

  “Maybe you should.”

  I shrugged, even though he couldn’t see me. “If that’s what you really want.” I didn’t expect him to call me on it. Unfortunately, I underestimated him greatly.

  The door shut and he was standing there glaring at me. “I like you, Katy. I really do. But I can’t do this with you anymore.”

  My heart plummeted into my toes, leaving my chest an empty cavern filled with pain. I swallowed hard to get the lump in my throat to go down enough to let me speak around it.

  So much for having a skill and feeling confident. Unfortunately, since rejection was something I was much more familiar and comfortable with, this situation felt normal. More normal than anything that had happened recently, anyway. Now Jason was acting like the Jason I knew before. It was devastatingly sad to me, but I kept my game-face on.

  “Fine. I’ll leave, then.” I backed up and went around the kitchen island to grab my backpack, glad my hair was covering my burning ears so he wouldn’t see how humiliated I was.

  “And you probably shouldn’t come back,” he said, as I made my way to the front door. “No more picnics. No more work-outs.”

  Stab, stab, stab. More pain stabbing me in the heart with every word that came from his mouth. Who knew he had such efficient weapons at his disposal?

  My face flamed hot red, thinking about how desperate I must have looked coming over here with my lame sandwiches and goofy smile. “That’s fine too!” I shouted, opening the door and stepping out onto the porch. I couldn’t get away from him fast enough. The cooler air outside did nothing for my beet-red face.

  He didn’t respond, and I let the door shut behind me. I didn’t slam it like I wanted to, I just let it swing closed on its own. The latch clicking into place had a finality to it that made my entire insides ache.

  I took a deep breath, trying to get control over my raging hurt emotions. Just let things be, I thought to myself. That was the adult part of me speaking sense. The girl in me wanted to scream and rant and break all the windows of his house in with a brick. A big, frigging, bastard of a brick.

  My hair swung into my eyes, thank goodness, keeping the reporters from getting any clear shots of my face. With those stupid, high-powered lenses they’d for sure have been able to catch the tears swimming in my eyes.

  I made it all the way to my bedroom before any of them fell. When they did finally escape, they came in rivers I thought would never run dry. I cried for myself and my sad little attempts at befriending a person who didn’t want a friend, I cried for the coach and all the people who’d lost him, and I cried for Jason, a boy who was really and truly all alone in a world that had once revered him but now had turned on him with a vengeance. Life was so unfair.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  I DIDN’T TALK TO JASON for the rest of the weekend. When Bobby texted asking me if I wanted to hang out, I lied and told him I had too much homework and my parents had forbidden me to go out. My room became my hideout, where I could lie in my bed and lick my wounds, trying to forget what a loser I was.

  My mother was so worried about me, she let me have dinner in my room, which was normally a big no-no. I ended up eating two bites of my hamburger — all protein, Jason would have been so proud — and throwing the rest in the garbage. I fell asleep listening to the mix I made for him and picturing him having dance-seizures all over his kitchen. My eyes were pretty much swollen shut with all the boo-hooing I did.

  Monday dawned dark and dismal, a perfect background for my mood. Rain ruined my hair and brought out the scent of the fabric softener my mother uses on my clothes before I was ten steps out the door. I was sweating and hating every drop of it, more so than usual. Sweat reminded me of Jason and Jason reminded me of the pain of rejection.

  People in the hallways stared and whispered as I walked by, but I ignored them and their tiny minds. I had nothing to say to anyone, or so I thought.

  Mrs. Davis the civics teacher caught up with me on the way to fifth period. I’d made the mistake of taking the short way to class that led me right past her door during her off-period. She snagged me with a shout that pretty much alerted half the school that we were about to have a conversation.

  “Katy! Hey, Katy! Could you come here for a minute?”

  I tried to pretend like I hadn’t heard her, but everyone else stopped and stared, so it would have been too obvious a snub to continue on. Curse my parents for refusing to allow me to be rude growing up. So much for personal freedom. I was starting to think that I had none at all, seeing as how most of my responses and actions were dependent on the approval or disapproval of someone else. I was starting to doubt if I’d ever had an independent or original thought in my entire life.

  I sighed and turned around, making my way back to her door with my head down. “Hi,” I said, still not really looking at her. I focused on the black cummerbund around her waist, lost in her eighties time warp that wouldn’t quit.

  “Would you come in for a minute? I promise I won’t keep you very long.”

  “I have class…” I looked longingly out into the hallway.

  “I’ll write you a note if necessary.” She backed into the room and hitched a buttcheek up over the corner of her desk. “So, how are things going with Jason?”

  I shrugged. “How would I know?”

  “The news channels show you going over to his house every day, so I figured you were at least talking to him, seeing how he’s doing?” She leaned her head down, forcing me to look up at her.

  Busted. Fuck the news.

  I sighed, very put-out that she was using her teacher-power to force me into having a conversation I totally wasn’t interested in having. Could this be false-imprisonment? It felt like it.

  “He’s as good as you would expect,” I said with undisguised attitude. “Besides, I won’t be going over there anymore, so … whatever.” I twisted to the side, looking out into the hallway. I couldn’t have hinted any louder how badly I wanted to be gone from her classroom, but she continued to ignore my screaming body language.

  “Why’s that? Did your parents tell you they don’t want you to go over there?”

  “No,” not that it’s any of your cummerbund-wearing business, “they’re fine with it.” I finally looked at her, mad at her insinuation. “Jason’s not dangerous.”

  “I wasn’t saying that he is.” She stared at me, like she was trying to see into my soul or something. It was annoying as hell.

  “Can I go now?”

  “In a minute. Did you give any more thought to what I said before? About how I might be able to help you?”

  “I’m not the one who needs help.”

  I couldn’t figure this woman out. Was she a sicko who got off on hearing terrible news? Was she looking for a story to sell? It never crossed my mind that she might actually care about anybody but herself. My time with Jason had turned me against the world.

  “Help with understanding the whole process is what I meant when I said I could help. It can get very complicated and bewildering sometimes. Don’t you have any questions? Any concerns about where this process will take your friend next?”

  Friend. Now there was a concept.

  “Yeah, I have a question.” The statement burst out of me before I could stop it.

  She grinned and folded her hands. “Okay, shoot.” Her eyebrows were up, like she was anticipating my question more than Christmas vacation.

  At that point, I was mad enough at her, at Jason, and at all the idiots who’d been whispering about me today in the hallways and classrooms to just speak without even trying to put a filter on my mouth first.

  “What would it mean if Jason wasn’t the only person there when the coach was killed?’

  Ohhhhh shit. Did I really say that?

  Yes, I really said that. Talk about feedi
ng the monster. Now I was never going to get out of that room.

  She blinked a few times and then leaned back a little. Her hands slipped away from each other. She kind of stuttered. “Do you mean … if there was a witness to the murder?”

  “Yes,” I nodded, almost afraid to hear her answer, now that she’d put a familiar name to that alleged third person. Witness.

  “What would that do to his case or his trial or whatever?” I was suddenly nervous.

  She nodded, as if considering it, back in control of her facial expressions.

  “Well, I suppose it would depend on what this witness had to say.” She looked up at me. “It could help his case or hurt it. It could send him to prison or set him fee.” She tilted her head to the right. “Did he tell you there was a witness?”

  I shook my head emphatically. “No. Not at all. It was a hypothetical thing, completely. Totally.” I was getting a headache from all the rattling around of my brain matter.

  I knew Jason didn’t want me even thinking about that, let alone talking about it. It was like I’d betrayed him by making this woman think that there was something to his story that wasn’t being talked about in the news. I’d never forgive myself if I was the cause of a new rumor going around about him.

  She continued. “Hypothetically speaking, if there were a witness, it could be really good or really bad. But frankly, I don’t think it’s possible that there is one in this case.”

  “Why?” I hitched my bag up higher on my shoulder, no longer as interested in the hallway and my escape as I was in hearing her explanation.

  “Because there’s been no mention of it in the news. That’s a pretty big piece of evidence, so I can’t believe it’s been kept out of the public eye. Reporters follow detectives around, they’re at the police station, they have sources … they know when witnesses are interviewed. If there was one, we would already have a name.”

  My face fell. Even though Jason had completely rejected me and my lame friendship, I’d still been holding out hope that maybe there could be something or someone out there to save him.

  “Unless of course this witness has not yet presented himself to the police…” She leaned in closer to me. “That does happen you know. People fear the publicity, the backlash … they fear that they’ll become embroiled in the charges, which is a very real possibility, by the way.”

  “What do you mean?” I stepped closer even though her breath kind of stank, wishing she’d stop talking so loud. People were starting to slow down in her doorway, trying to listen in on our conversation.

  She glanced at the door and lowered her voice. “If a person witnesses a crime and does nothing to stop it, that person can be held liable as an accomplice.”

  I swallowed with difficulty, my throat suddenly dry. “So, if there was another person, it would help Jason’s case, right?”

  She shrugged. “It depends.”

  Her answer pissed me off. “Does everything depend on something else or what?”

  She laughed. “Yes. ‘It depends’ is always the answer in a legal situation.” She put her hand on my shoulder and left it there for a few seconds. I felt like I was being knighted by a very fashion-challenged queen. The Queen of Cummerbunds from the Land of Flowered Polyesters.

  “Depending on who that person was, what that person was doing, what that person’s involvement was, what his relationship was to the other people in the room … it all depends. It could help or it could make things worse…” She leaned down and stared into my eyes. “…It depends.” Her eyes crinkled up in the corners and her expression clearly said she pitied me. She was trying to be nice, so I didn’t feel the need to hold it against her.

  I stared at the floor, once again battling tears. “I don’t see how anything could possibly make Jason’s situation worse.”

  “You’d be surprised.” She let my shoulder go and stood. “You’d better get to class before you’re late.”

  I nodded and turned to go.

  “Do you want some advice?” she asked.

  I stopped in my tracks, knowing that the answer hell no, I’ve heard enough from you today would be rude but also not wanting to waste my time saying the polite answer I didn’t feel.

  She continued without waiting for my response. “Keep your mind, your eyes, and your ears open. Things happen in cases like this that can completely turn a situation around. Nothing is over until it’s over.”

  “Easy for you to say,” I quipped as I walked to the door, feeling more bitter than I ever had in my entire life. “You’re not the one on trial for murder.”

  I left before she could reply and spent the entire next period crying in the girls’ bathroom.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  THREE DAYS LATER I WAS on my computer clicking through photos when I came across the folder of shots taken by that photographer vulture guy. Football players and their fans flashed across my screen in various poses, caught in moments of candor interacting without knowing they were being watched.

  The ones of Jason made my heart swell. My chest was filled with the sea and my heart was floating on top of it, a terrible inner storm tossing it around. It was sickening how just a photo of him patting a kid’s shoulder could make me cry these days.

  A text came to my phone making it buzz, and I glanced over at it.

  I’m not taking no for an answer. Confess.

  I hadn’t yet told Bobby what was going on, and he’d been very un-Bobby-like in his patience at waiting for my explanation. It made me kind of sad actually, how willing he’d been to give me the time I needed. Normally he force-fed me his love, but this time he was letting me decide when it was the right moment to share. Suffice to say, absolutely nothing was right in my world.

  I figured there was no use candy-coating it or avoiding it anymore, so I texted him back right away.

  Jason told me to F off so I Fd off.

  My phone rang almost immediately.

  “He did not,” Bobby said.

  “Yes, he did.” I was angry that Bobby was playing silly games, acting as if this were a joke. “And I don’t want to talk about it or whatever. Believe me, I’ve cried enough tears. I’m totally dehydrated.”

  Bobby’s tone immediately changed; pity filled his voice. “Was he rude about it?”

  I’d gone over the situation in my head a thousand times, but it always came out the same in my analysis.

  I sighed before replying, “No. He was just being cool. He doesn’t feel like he deserves friends and I was kind of pushing him, so he cut me off. No big deal.”

  “Do you really think that?” Bobby’s tone went all soft. “That it’s no big deal?”

  That was my undoing, Bobby being tender when normally he was as much a smartass as I was.

  “Goddammit, Bobby, I told you I don’t want to cry about this anymore!”

  “Baby, baby, baby, don’t crrrryyyy! I’ll come right over!”

  “No! Do not come over. I don’t want my parents freaking out. My mom thinks it’s my period and my father’s completely oblivious. Just let it die.”

  “Die. That’s an interesting choice of words.”

  I choked on my tears. “Give it a rest, Bobby, please. I’m not kidding. Don’t analyze me, okay? I’ll live.”

  “Live and die. Both interesting choices of words. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  The line went dead, all the background noise of his television ceasing in an instant.

  “What?”

  Nothing.

  “Bobby? Hello? What did you say?”

  Nothing.

  “Bobby, are you there? I think I lost you.” I looked at my phone and saw the welcome screen. I tried to call him back, but it went straight to voicemail.

  Figuring he was probably trying to call me at the same time, I put the phone down, a little confused about what had just happened but too upset over the resurfacing memories to fix anything. Instead of worrying about it, I went back to paging through the pictures on my computer.

&
nbsp; I was buzzing through them pretty quickly until I came to one of Jason smiling. He looked amazing and obviously hadn’t known that the camera was on him at the time. He was talking to a young boy with a poofy afro, maybe about twelve years old or so.

  I went back through the photographs before it and after it to verify the scenery I was seeing, determining pretty quickly that this photo had been taken at that club or charity or whatever it was that the coach was involved in. This kid was probably one of the boys who got sponsored by a player for the year or for the season or whatever.

  I frowned as my mind wandered. Jason never talked about that place, but it looked from the photos that he was friends with this kid in particular. I paged through all of them again and found four pictures of Jason with this one particular boy. Jason had his arm loosely over the kid’s shoulders in two of them. In every single one, they were both smiling. A lot. If they’d had any physical similarities, I would have said they were brothers the way they seemed so at ease with one another.

  My finger tapped the key that would scroll through the pictures. Back and forth, forth and back. Where was this kid now? Had he visited Jason? Had he been at the funeral for the coach? Was he as devastated as I was over what had happened to Jason?

  I hopped online and searched all the news I could find on the coach’s death. I didn’t see the boy in any of the pictures. It wasn’t really that surprising, though. He was only a kid. How would he even go to those things if he couldn’t drive? And if he was part of that program Jason and the other players were in, it could have meant he really didn’t have much in the way of parents who could drive him places.

  I wasn’t sure why this whole thing, why this kid, was sticking in my head, but he was, and the thoughts wouldn’t leave. Jason said that no one really liked him, but surely this little kid did. And what twelve year old has ulterior motives? They don’t care who a person is really, just so long as that person will throw a football with them every once in a while. From the pictures, it sure looked like that was the basis of their friendship. So if this kid was Jason’s one true friend, where was he now?