Pain & Redemption

by Kat Kenyon

  “These guys may be fuckups at times, but they’re your fuckups, part of your family. And you’re gonna need ’em.”

  Coughing on my second gulp, I give him a wry look. “Really, tell me, Captain Obvious, where were they before?”

  “I guess I am your fucking Captain Obvious, freshie.” His shoulder shoves into mine, his grin letting me know he’ll remember my mouthiness.

  I still have a hard time believing I can trust anyone. I trust Mike, and surprisingly, Ethan, but that’s it. Old wounds die hard, even when I’m a fuckup myself.

  I know he knows everything I’m thinking because he takes a deep breath before he speaks. “Listen, the guys blew it where you’re concerned. Made life harder on you than they should’ve. They know that.” Pointing at a cluster of our teammates, he says, “Ty, these are the people who’re gonna get you to the NFL. They’re your family, and families, even the best ones, can blow it.” Huffing around his next drink, his tone turns serious.

  “The truth is, they’ll need you to lead them. You’re the star, the breakout every team needs to breathe new life into the team. You’re the model of excellence once Lark and I are gone. Show them how to work harder, be stronger, perform better. Show them how to be a better teammate. And fuck, man, show just this once, a little forgiveness.”

  McVey’s been a good leader. And I know he’s not wrong, but I still have to take a few moments to work through what he said.

  “And Wyatt, how should I handle that?”

  He’s my sticking point. I might be able to forgive the others, my mistakes far outweigh theirs, but I still can’t look at my roommate without my temper exploding.

  “Him.” His jaw sets, eyes narrowing. “That was just fucked up, man.”

  He looks out at the crowd of people playing beer pong in the center of the room, his lips pursing before he says, “Be pissed. Don’t fucking trust him. Not for a minute. I don’t. I wouldn’t. Nothing I hate more than an entitled prick, but he isn’t everyone. Quit cutting the rest of us out ’cause of him.” He takes a long drink of his beer. “And don’t punish us ’cause you’re mad at yourself. Keep the parts of your life that are still in one piece, in one piece.”

  As the pong table’s noise lulls, I hear the music upstairs where dozens of people are dancing. Where we usually were.

  “I miss her.” I can’t help but let it out. I haven’t talked about it outside of the therapist’s office, not really.

  His head falls forward on a nod. “I can’t imagine how you feel. I know I missed her when she wouldn’t talk to us, and I’m not you.” He glances at his hands, then at the people hanging out. The moment feels full until he says, “Don’t think for a second I didn’t want to kill you when I found her in the quad.”

  The image of her racing down the hallway after she realized how badly I’d betrayed her flashes in my mind, sharp enough to punch me in the gut. I try to close my eyes and rid myself of it, but it doesn’t go anywhere.

  “I wish you would. There are days when I wish someone would. I see her, what I did to her, and I don’t know how to fix it. Or if I even have the right to want to.”

  His eyes catch mine and his subtle nod of acceptance is something I didn’t know I needed. “You do it day by day.” Another drink. “Let’s see how things play out. But you’re right, don’t trust Wyatt. I don’t know what’s goin’ on there, but it’s something. And Ty…” He stands and nods to the door. “Get the hell outta here. You’re miserable.” A small smile plays on his face. “And you’re killing my buzz.”

  • • • •

  It takes too long to get through the crush on the stairs to the porch, but when I hit the porch, I’m assaulted by the chill that’s finally found its way into the California nights. Without the surrounding oppressive heat of the crowd, some of the pressure releases.

  The walk back to the dorm should be quiet, but even at one in the morning, this campus is alive. The black sky is masked by the warm glow of street lamps and the decorative golden hue of the campus safety lights. Night air cloaks the source of the music and talking, but almost all the dorm rooms are lit up, and the sound of lobby doors popping open and closed is like an intentional rhythm.

  The sounds only speed up as I hit my dorm. Even as the smell of dirty clothes, athletic gear, booze, and sex hits me when the elevator opens on my floor. The pounding of music and people running in and out of their rooms fills the space with the same stifling press as the party I just left.

  Hands pull on me as I make my way down the hall, trailing on my arms, pulling on my belt loops, and groping anything they can reach, each touch an invasion. I have to push through my floormates and half-naked girls all dressed in togas, dancing and drinking out of red Solo cups.

  This is what these jackasses do every weekend, and as many days of the week as they can. Vin, one of the few I know and like, waves from the far end of the hall, surrounded by girls from the swim team.

  Nodding at him as I hit my room, I slip through my door, locking it behind me. The last thing I need is one of these drunk assholes getting in. They’re exhausting.

  The invitations to join in the debauchery and stupidity come through the closed door, but I’ve had enough for a lifetime. The noise of the party is barely muted, making me glad I’ve got earplugs now. While I hate how they feel in my ears, they’re the only thing that might let me sleep.

  Nights like this, I’m reminded of holding Rayne in the dark. The way she smelled. The way she snuggled up to me in the middle of the night. The calm she brought to my mind, to my life.

  Yanking my shirt off in the dark, I try to use the breathing techniques Vaan showed me to relax. They don’t work.

  Rayne made it easy to forget what life was like at home, where I was always looking over my shoulder to see if Dad was there, ready to blow.

  I can admit I numbed myself at home with parties, friends, booze, and random hookups. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was always in mental chaos. Always in a state of pain, panic, or rage. Rayne was the only thing that ever made things make sense.

  I’m finishing stripping when my phone rings. Dad’s ringtone.

  Mom has let me know they aren’t going to be okay. After our talk, she tried again to get him to admit what was going on, and he didn’t. He didn’t try to explain or defend himself, instead, he blamed me. He told her his punishments were always earned, that I was failing all his efforts to make me strong, make me smart.

  The phone rings again, and I’m no more likely to pick it up.

  Mom begged him to take it back, tell her he was sorry, that he understood why his actions were wrong, but he did worse than say no. His brain and his humanity, the bit of his soul she was looking for, were apparently lacking because he made the mistake of laughing at her.

  She’s nuclear now and is treating the whole thing as if it were all his fault. I don’t remind her she saw him attack me, and that if I’d kept my mouth shut, she wouldn’t have noticed anything. Of course, he told her that if she hadn’t noticed before now, it couldn’t have been that bad.

  She didn’t take it well. She didn’t like his threat that I would improve and live up to my obligations, or he’d make me. And she definitely didn’t like him telling her to stay out of the way while he makes me a man.

  Why Dad thought he could laugh at her, I’ll never know. It was the worst thing he could have done. She gave him one more chance, one opportunity to salvage the relationship that was the foundation of our family.

  He didn’t.

  Mom may have been blind to how he treated me, but she wasn’t blind to him laughing in her face. She took it personally, dropping the happy yoga instructor and reverting to the child my granddad raised. When we talk now, she sounds far more like my ball-buster granddad. Which is exactly who she turned to when she decided she wouldn’t put up with him.

  My phone continues ringing and I ignore it.

  Their divorce will happen, and my granddad has assured us both we’ll want for nothing. I
feel a little guilty, but not enough to interfere. She’s told me to stay out of it and I am.

  The call goes to voicemail, and I let out a breath.

  Mom and the therapist say it’s not my fault and I’m choosing to believe them. He decided to laugh in the face of a woman who loved him beyond all common sense, so it’s on him. He can fucking own his shit, just like I have to.

  Crawling into bed, exhaustion presses down. We’re past the halfway point of the season, and I hurt. After months of games and practice, I’m black, blue, and varying shades of yellow and green. The bruises on my body are a Rorschach test in various stages of healing. Each game gets a little harder, the practices wearing me down as I chase meals with ibuprofen to move, the same to sleep, and tonight’s no different.

  Washing down three pills with the bottle of water by my bed, I know it’ll get worse. I’m still struggling with my appetite, which is a problem. The fuel I need if I want to keep my spot, let alone be good at it, is in short supply. I just can’t eat, and that makes it hard to keep my performance up and heal. In class, I’m struggling to keep afloat, even with the tutors.

  I’m drowning.

  Just as I close my eyes, the pills sitting in the middle of my chest instead of going all the way down, my phone goes off again, Dad’s ringtone a threatening sound in the dark.

  It’s after midnight and he’s calling again. I purposely roll away from the light of my phone, letting it go to voicemail for the second time.

  When he calls for the third time, I know I can’t keep ignoring him. He’s going to keep calling until I answer, and I’d like to get to sleep sometime tonight.

  There’s also a chance it could be important. Glaring at the phone, I snag it and swipe to answer.

  “Hey, Dad, everything okay?” I ask, unable to keep the exhaustion out of my voice.

  “No, everything isn’t okay!” His proverbial smackdown stretches across the distance and makes me wince. “What the hell were you doing, pick up the phone when I call you!” Before I can answer, he launches at me again. “Do you know what you’ve done? Do you know what your mother’s done? Do you think—”

  No longer afraid of the repercussions, I cut him off, too tired to listen to this shit. “Dad, I’m in bed and tired, is anyone hurt?”

  “Do you think I give a shit if you’re tired? We had rules, Tyler. Your mother isn’t capable of understanding what goes on between men, and you used her against me. Everything is going to hell because of a stupid piece of trash!”

  Too far. Again. Heat and red flood my system even though I’m too tired to move. “Shut the hell up! Don’t say another fucking word. She’s off limits, she’ll always be off limits.”

  His snort is clear. “You’re not even with her anymore, why are you defending her?”

  “I’m defending her because you’re spewing crap. If she gave a shit about money or fame, she wouldn’t have walked. The fact she left me proves it!” I can’t let him talk like that about Rayne, I don’t care if she never talks to me again.

  Staring at the ceiling, I know I have to rip off the Band-Aid fast if I’m ever going to be done listening to him bitch at me. He’ll complain and blame everyone else but himself forever and allowing him to believe I’ll cower to him will just make it worse.

  “This is precisely why Mom’s leaving your ass. Because you act like a dick.” Loss and exhaustion lace every word, and all I want is to beat the shit out of him.

  “So, you know?” His voice gets quiet, setting off warning bells.

  Sighing, I roll over. “Yeah, she told me she’s leaving.”

  Him quiet means he’s thinking bad thoughts, but I think I’m too tired to care.

  “Did she tell you she was taking her investments?” he finally asks.

  No. She hadn’t in so many words but compared to losing his wife, I don’t understand why that’s what he’s asking about. It’s just money. Make more, asshole.

  “No, she didn’t. She wouldn’t. It’s not my money.”

  There’s a pregnant pause, while he weighs whether I’m on his side or hers. With Richard Blackman, there’s always a side. Mom never understood that before. It seems she does now, or rather, Granddad does.

  “She didn’t tell you she’s stripping Blackman Construction?”

  Well shit! Go, Mom.

  “No.”

  A heads-up would have been nice. She had to know he’d flip. I’m sure she thought I’d feel guilty, so of course, she didn’t tell me. She’s not good at facing up to things.

  “We’re gonna need to do something to block this, Tyler. She can’t just leave like this.”

  Wrong move!

  Keeping my tone even, I press him. “What’s that mean?”

  I’m sick of his pronouncements of what people can and can’t do, and I’m not helping him do anything, especially to my mom. I may not trust her completely, but she’s never actively hurt me. She loves me even if she avoids the tough stuff.

  “I can maneuver it so it appears she promised the business to you.” His gears are clicking, I can tell. “Listen, Tyler, I gotta go. I’ll call you back.”

  As soon as he hangs up the phone, a tired groan escapes me. He’s definitely up to something. I text Mom, telling her everything. Dad’s aggressiveness has me worried. He’s volatile, and I don’t know how far the threat of losing his business will push him.

  Granddad’s behind this move on Blackman Construction as much as Mom, and they need to know what he’s thinking. Between the two of them, they can handle anything coming her way.

  As far as my view of the money or the business, Mom can take everything. It all came from her family; it can all go back.

  Tossing my phone down on the floor, I put the earplugs in, and roll toward the wall, the blank canvass an empty space that feels sad rather than clean. This is life now.

  Everything is disappearing, falling apart. There aren’t any answers to the stream of problems that seems to flow around me.

  I don’t know how to make Mom okay. Or how to make Rayne okay. Fuck, I don’t know how to make myself okay. I need someone to show me how to make it better because it has to get better than this. It has to.

  I throw myself on my back, close my eyes, and focus on the sound of my breathing, which with the plugs in, almost blocks out the noise in the hall.

  My mind drifts to how her hands felt, nails raking across my scalp, pulling on my hair. I feel her, smell her.

  I don’t know how long I’m in the memory, but when it ends, I feel tears and know, even though she’s lost to me, I’m still hers. I love her enough to hope she’s happier than I am.

  I hope she’s happy soon.

  Be happy, baby.

  December

  Chapter Fourteen

  Rayne Mathews

  It’s my birthday. I’m eighteen and I haven’t told a soul. I tried so hard to get emancipated two years ago, only to fail, and today marks the day I’m officially an adult. I’m right where I wanted to be, doing what I wanted to be doing, and it feels…empty. So many things in my life are good and I have a million reasons to be happy, but I’m not.

  I’m legitimately free of Emily’s control, and I should be ecstatic to be free. The money from my grandfather comes to me, so I’m free to do anything I want…and I don’t want anything.

  The Western Civilization professor drones on, and Bay’s beside me trying not to fall asleep after a rough week. He’s still running with me in the morning, even though his season has been long, and even though he hates it. He begged me to take notes because he knows he won’t be able to focus. He didn’t need to. The least I can do is this tiny thing to help keep him from failing.

  The professor’s monotone seems to numb everyone around me and leaves my mind wandering, and I can’t help but glance over my shoulder.

  I shouldn’t. I know I shouldn’t. He looks gaunt. It’s getting worse. When he came in, he shoved past the blockade again like they weren’t there. If I’m honest, it’s been like that from t
he minute we broke up.

  He hasn’t been seen with anyone. He doesn’t seem to talk to anyone but Mike although Ethan hasn’t stopped pestering me.

  He’s a star on a winning football team, but the exhaustion’s obvious. A star, but the pain bleeds through. More than that, the broken shows. He looks like he’s falling apart. He’s a ghost of himself, and that hurts almost as much as the distance.

  I want to tell him it’ll be okay, even though I don’t know that it will. I want to hug him and hold him until the hurt goes away.

  I believe Tegs. I wasn’t wrong. We loved each other, but I can’t fix this. I wasn’t wrong to walk, and I certainly didn’t make him cheat. He needed more than I could give him, and I can’t believe it’s only about me after all this time.

  From the back of the room, he catches me staring, and I can’t turn away this time. There’s a light that sparks in his eyes whenever he catches me watching. It’s dim, but it’s there, his hope, and it rips open the wounds again.

  God, I miss you!

  I don’t know how to give him what he needs without losing myself. The glassiness in his eyes matches the burn in mine, forcing me to drag my eyes away from him before we burst into flames. A shudder passes over me, and I’m lost until a big hand covers my shaking ones.

  Bay’s hand squeezes mine as he sits up straight, long legs coming out of the stretched-out slump he’d fallen into. I keep my eyes forward to avoid the pain I know is behind me.

  The professor releases us a moment later, and the class bursts into movement, the sound of clacking wooden chairs springing back into place and chatter filling the auditorium.

  Unconsciously, I glance back again to find him still watching me; the hope missing. This is killing us both, but I don’t know how to do anything else.

  “You want to grab something to eat?” Bay’s whisper cuts into my turmoil and jars me as we walk out.

  “No, not really hungry.”

  “That’s what you said before class,” he says softly, wrapping his arm around my shoulders.