by Eva Luxe
“Oh, I see how it is,” I tell her, laughing, but I’m nervous.
“Look, I understand your hesitation,” she says, “and I don’t want to rush you into anything. But we could start small. By the time we get back to the park, I doubt we’d have enough time to wait in line and ride The Beast anyway. There’s a smaller, less popular roller coaster you could start off with.”
“Is there, now?” I ask, knowing that I’m going to have to do this.
What kind of a fucking badass will I be in her eyes if I can’t even ride the dinkiest roller coaster in the park?
“Let’s go,” she says, raising her sexy body from the bed and searching for her clothes. “I’m not ready to stop having fun yet today.”
“All right, all right,” I tell her, getting up a lot less enthusiastically than she is. “But you’re the only person on the planet I’d do this for.”
“I know the feeling,” she says, flashing me her gorgeous grin.
And that right there is enough to make me agree to do any outrageous thing with her, including facing my fear of heights.
***
Chelsea takes my hand as we’re in line for The Rattler.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” she asks.
I shrug in what I hope is a nonchalant way.
“No, but I’m more sure than I’ve been in the past, and that has to mean something, right?”
The Rattler looms high and menacing above us and I start to doubt that it’s any friendlier than The Beast. The line is long and gives me plenty of time to think about changing my mind but I don’t.
I try to make light-hearted banter with Chelsea and to tell myself that this is nothing. And although I’m still scared, I’m not nearly as scared as I used to be.
Finally we approach the front of the line and I smile, looking more confident than I feel as we’re ushered into the loading area and sit down in the seats.
We buckle in, and then as the ride begins everyone— including Chelsea— lifts their arms over their heads.
I lift my arms too, the cool night air hitting my face in a breeze of fear mixed with excitement. And then the machine lurches forward, dropping us down and pushing us faster into oblivion.
“Holy fuck!” I yell, squeezing Chelsea’s hand above us in the air.
I’m embarrassed but then I realize that Chelsea is yelling the same thing, and so is everyone else on the ride.
Everyone is scared, and that’s the point. If it hadn’t been for Chelsea, I’d never have realized this one basic fact: I’m not the only person who might be afraid while riding a roller coaster. I was just the only person too pussy to try riding one until now.
She’s already been teaching me so much: how to fish, how to ride a roller coaster. How to open up and trust someone.
Maybe this could actually work.
But as The Rattler embarks on its long, fast descent, my heart jumps up into my throat and I scream in terror along with all the other passengers, but for an additional reason. Because I think:
What if I’m falling too hard?
What if it’s too late to get off this ride that I never should have gotten on in the first place?
I don’t know that I was ready to ride a roller coaster and I don’t know that I’m ready for whatever is in store with Chelsea. With both of them, it’s too damn easy to start out, yet so damn hard to not freak out during the ride.
And I don’t know how I’ll manage to get off either ride once it’s started. I hate fucking losing control and it’s clear that I already have.
Chapter 29 – Chelsea
I’m surprised to see my dad’s car in the driveway when I get home from my secret amusement park date with Wesley.
I let myself into the house as quickly and quietly as possible, hoping he’s already in bed. I don’t want to answer any suspicious questions. I just want to curl up under the covers and reminisce about everything that’s happened today.
But he clears his throat and calls out, “Chelsea?” from his study that’s just off the main entranceway.
Great.
“Yeah Dad?”
“Can you come in here please?”
“Okay.”
I sigh and walk towards the door, feeling thirteen years old. My mind rushes with possibilities: Maybe he was at Taylor’s mom’s house and Taylor was there, even though she’d agreed to be my alibi. Maybe he just plans to grill me about the details of my day. Why must I get the Grand Inquisition every time I go out?
But when I open his door he’s staring in frustration at his computer screen.
“I’m glad you’re home. I could really use your help.”
“Oh okay,” I tell him, relieved. He looks up at me a bit quizzically, so I add, “I’m surprised you’re home. I thought you would be…”
I trail off as he continues to look at me funny.
“I mean, how was your day?” I conclude.
“It was fine,” he says, with a slight smile on his face. “How was yours?”
“It was fine. What’d you do?”
“Not much. What’d you do?”
“Not much.”
“I like this plan of keeping our personal lives a little private,” he says, and I quickly nod my head in agreement.
I guess now that my dad’s been getting hot and heavy with Taylor’s mom, he recognizes the value of privacy.
“Me too,” I say quickly, definitely not wanting to disagree with the need for privacy between us. “So what is it that you need help with? And why are you working so late? You should be watching Cheers, not cooped up working in your home office on the weekend.”
Dad laughs. He loves to watch old Cheers reruns that play on Friday nights.
“It’s nothing too hard, or at least it’s not supposed to be,” he says. “The academic department upgraded its software across the board and they want me to rearrange my files according to their new fancy system. But I’m a dummy when it comes to computers. I feel really behind, and I haven’t had a lot of time to try to learn the new methods due to… personal factors.”
“Of course,” I agree.
“So I got home a bit early tonight and decided I’d try to catch up over this weekend, so I don’t have to go hat in hand to the administration and tell them I don’t know what I’m doing and haven’t bothered to learn it yet. But this thing is so damn tricky.”
“Okay, let me see what you’re supposed to do,” I tell him, walking up behind his desk chair and peering at his computer screen.
“This database has a folder for each player, and I’m supposed to move all their documents into each folder,” he says. “Their physical exam results, medical records for check-ups and injuries, their contracts, their disciplinary warnings, their stats, that sort of thing. I’ve always just kept everything together in one big file that I search when I need something. It’s worked just fine for me in the past, but no, now everyone has to follow this same system.”
He’s visibly worked up, a bead of sweat appearing just above his brow as his face turns red.
“It’s okay, Dad,” I say, getting a bit closer so that I can see the database better.
I place a hand on his shoulder. “I can figure it out.”
“Do you need this chair?” he asks me, gesturing to the desk chair he’s sitting in. “Or the keyboard?”
“Yeah, Dad, why don’t you go get yourself a glass of wine and take a little break. You can even catch a Cheers episode if you want. I’ll try my hand at this database and once I figure out how to use it, I’ll show you. That way you’ll know for the future, okay?”
“Thanks, honey,” he says, standing up and stretching. “I knew you’d be able to help.”
He leaves the room, whistling the Cheers theme song, and I sit down at his desk. It only takes a few points and clicks for me to figure out the database, which is much easier than the way my dad has been “organizing”— or not— his files.
I can see why the administration wanted him to upgrade to the
new system. They’d probably never be able to figure his out if they needed something.
I decide to type up instructions in terms of steps he can follow when I’m not around. That only takes me a few minutes, and I don’t want to disrupt his Cheers episode.
I lean back and sigh, thinking about Wesley’s hands all over my body…
And then I see his name on a folder in the database, ready to accept his documents. Maybe I should just do one as an example, I think, my palms feeling sweaty.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I run a search on his name to find his files the way my dad says he does it. Sure enough, a few documents come up: a short physical fitness file, some other boring and generic procedural documents that all the players have to sign, a contract, and then quite a few disciplinary files, which appear to have transferred with Wesley from his former college.
My heart pounding, I click on the contract and read as much as I can as fast as I can.
…due to the severity of the disciplinary actions incurred at Huningdale, included to but not limited to the following…
I scan down the document, my eyes picking up the important parts right away.
Fraternizing with the cheerleading team after complaints of mistreatment from several cheerleaders and despite warnings to cease contact with any and all cheerleaders…
Failing grades in several courses…
Selling of drugs on school property…
Wait.
What?
I read that last line again.
Selling of drugs on school property.
I feel nauseous. I want to throw up. I can’t believe Wesley would do that. And, if he did, then I can’t believe I just had sex with him.
I click the next page of the document, just being a glutton for punishment at this point.
Coach of Calton has agreed to allow Player to play on team for a one season probationary period, after which time he will transfer back to Huningdale if there has been no breach of this Agreement…
What?
Wesley’s only at Calton for one season? He didn’t tell me that.
Apparently he didn’t tell me a lot of things.
And I don’t know why I’m so disappointed in this news, after having read that he’s a drug dealer. But the fact that he’s only here for such a short time is more shocking and upsetting to me for some reason.
What the hell is wrong with me? Why can’t I just forget about this guy, especially after seeing everything bad about him written out here in black and white?
I’m still staring at that paragraph, reeling in shock when I hear my dad heading back down the hall that leads from the living room to his study. I quickly exit out of the document.
“How’s it coming, Sweetheart?” he asks me, carrying two glasses of red wine and placing one down in front of me.
I pick it up and sip on it, even though I’m tempted to down the entire thing in one gulp. I could use some mind numbing alcohol.
“Fine, Dad,” I tell him, trying to compose myself. “This is pretty easy. I’ll show you how to do it and I already typed up some step by step instructions you can use when you’re in your office on campus or I’m otherwise not around.”
“Thanks, honey,” he says, and I walk him through how to drag the files into the database, as well as other commands such as adding new folders, starting a new document, or linking documents together.
“That is pretty easy, now that you show me how,” Dad says.
I stand up and say, “Now you can go ahead and try it,” as I make my way to the door with my wine glass in hand. “If you have questions, just give me a holler. I’ll be up for a little while.”
But I pause when I get to the door.
Going through the different technical steps with him calms me to some extent, since it’s a distraction that requires focus. But as soon as I’m done, I realize I just have to know more about what I just read.
“Dad?”
“Yes honey?” he asks, looking up from the keyboard where he was hunting a key to peck.
“Why did you let Wesley Reynolds on the team?”
He stares at me as if he’s not sure he wants to talk to me about this. Or maybe he’s wondering why I’m asking.
“Because he’s a damn fine football player,” he finally says, with a resolute shrug. “And because of my loyalty to his dad.”
“To his dad?”
The image of Ronnie Reynolds shouting at Silvia Reynolds in their living room pops into my head.
“Yeah, he and I played together for the Wildcats, way back when.”
“Oh. I see.”
The timing would make sense. Wesley’s parents did look about the same age as mine.
I just never put two and two together until now. And Wesley had neglected to mention his connection to the string that was pulled in his favor.
Or I suppose he did mention it but I didn’t understand its importance at the time.
“What was he like?” I ask.
“Ronnie Reynolds?”
“Yeah.”
“He was a damn fine football player. But an asshole of a guy. His son clearly inherited some of his genes.”
I laugh, and he does too.
“But seriously,” he continues. “I feel kind of bad for Wesley, or anyone having to grow up in Ronnie’s shadow. It can’t be an easy life.”
I think about Wesley tumbling down off the playground structure, thinking his dad was going to catch him, only to have no open arms awaiting him at the bottom.
And how he’d shared with me the difficulty of growing up as his father’s son. Especially after the loss of his grandfather, who had accepted him unconditionally for who he was rather than trying to mold him into something else.
“But you just let Wesley on the team despite…”
He looks at me, and I just say, “…I’ve heard rumors.”
“I guess his hometown is only an hour away, so that was bound to happen,” my dad says. “But so far he’s done nothing but proven himself. Even though he’s a tad headstrong for my taste.”
“But…”
“Yeah, I know,” Dad says, shrugging his shoulders. “His reputation precedes him. The thing that worried me the most was how he supposedly ‘mistreated’ those cheerleaders. What did that mean? I wondered. You know my feelings about how a guy should treat a lady. Since I have a princess like you.”
“Ha.”
“Seriously, Chelsea. It bothered me. So I did ask his former coach about that aspect of his file specifically, and he said it was all blown out of proportion. He’d date a cheerleader and she’d think they were serious— ‘going steady’ or whatever you all call it these days— but then he’d move on to the next and the first one would get upset.”
This account matched up pretty well with what Taylor had told me. I guess I should have listened. Now I’m the cheerleader who had thought we were getting serious.
“His coach told me that he would have had as much right to complain about the women's behavior as they did about his. He’d call it off with them— or not, because I guess he thought there was nothing to call off— and they’d pester him with calls and voicemails and whatever messaging stuff you all do nowadays. When he didn’t respond, or when he asked them to stop, they’d run to the administration and say the star player was too much of a… player.”
“Ha.”
“It’s funny, you know? A lot of women— not you, because you’re too smart— want the bad boy, but they want to be blind to the fact that bad boys can’t be bad boys without a reputation. And that there’s a reason for that reputation.”
Good point, I think, but I say nothing.
“Anyway, I just decided to give Wesley the benefit of the doubt,” my dad says. “In that regard, it didn’t sound to me like he’d done anything too serious.”
“But what about the drugs?” I exclaim, and then wish I hadn’t, because my dad is looking at me as if he’s wondering how I know about that.
Dad final
ly just says, “I guess word got out about that too.”
He sighs before continuing.
“And I know it sounds bad. I don’t want you to think I condone drug use, or the sale of drugs of course. But the coach wasn’t too helpful on that front. He said a deal had been struck and that the terms were confidential. He did mention that it was a weird situation that didn’t seem to match Wesley’s character, and that there was never any indication of erratic behavior on his behalf or anything like that. As part of his contract Wesley gets drug tested regularly and he’s always turned up clean.”
I knew about the drug test requirement, having read the contract. It’s good to know he seems reformed now, but I still can’t wrap my head around him having done it in the first place.
“You’re really taking a big risk letting him play,” I tell my dad.
As if I’m one to talk.
“And for what? One year of having a star quarterback? Then he’ll just ditch you and go back to his old team?”
It’s as if I’m talking to myself instead of him.
And I probably should be.
“Well, I’d never admit this to the guy, since he’s already got such a big ego, but I think the rest of the team can learn from his experience and his intuition. Plus their morale will be bolstered by all these wins.”
“It’s still really nice of you,” I tell him.
He shrugs.
“I owed his dad a favor. A few years after we graduated, when the football team had started to go to shit and they started looking for new coaches, he and I were both being considered for the position but he stepped down to coach at Reardon. Said I was a better fit here. Sure, Reardon ended up being the better team so he got the better end of that deal anyway,” he laughs. “But whatever. Even leaving his dad out of it, when it comes to Wesley, I guess I just feel that even the baddest of bad boys deserves a second chance sometimes.”
“Well, good luck with the database,” I tell him, heading to my room.
And it’s about time I figure out whether I think the bad boy I willingly fell for deserves a chance now that I know all of this information about him.
Chapter 30 – Wesley
