Jock Rule

by Sara Ney

  “When you said you wanted to be friends, you said friends—it was kind of hard to miss the inflection in your tone.”

  “Oh my god. I can’t with you right now. I’m leaving.” Everything I brought with me last night is folded neat as a pin in a tote bag, ready to go. “Thanks for the hospitality. It’s been swell.”

  I throw him a two-finger peace sign for good measure, starting toward the door, pulling my jacket on along the way.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

  I don’t bother turning toward him. “What,” I clip out, agitated.

  “You have no idea where you are.”

  “Pfft. I can map it on my phone.” Duh.

  “All right. Go ahead.” He slurps from his mug, loudly and obnoxiously—on purpose, no doubt.

  “I’ll just do it now, if you don’t mind, since it looks a tad chilly outside.”

  “A balmy forty-three degrees,” he clarifies with a bright smile, whiskers covering most of his white teeth.

  Forty-three degrees?

  Lord, shoot me now.

  I fiddle with my phone, typing in the address to my apartment and wait for our location to populate. Glance at the screen, then up at Kip, confused.

  “Three miles! What the hell! Three miles? Seriously, why do you live so far away? Are you insane?”

  “Some of us have cars,” the bastard replies. One of his broad shoulders goes up then comes back down nonchalantly, mouth smug. “You still up for that walk? Or do you want me to drive you?”

  “I hate you right now.”

  “That’s the second time this morning you’ve said that—keep it up and I’ll almost believe you.” He sets the mug down on the white countertop. Brushes his hands off on his gray sweatpants and rises to his full height. “Let me grab a sweatshirt and we’ll go.”

  Why am I powerless against this guy? He is so bizarre and bossy.

  And rude.

  “Fine.” If he insists on driving me home, I should shut my mouth and stop complaining about a warm, free ride.

  When Kip is done gathering up a hoodie and pulling it down over his mass of messy hair, he grabs his keys and yanks the back door open. With a sweep of his hand, he ushers me through first—like a gentleman would do if one were here—and then we’re out in the frigid cold.

  “Thanks for the ride,” I mutter when I’m buckling my seat belt. The least I can do is thank him for his hospitality.

  “Don’t sweat it. My sister would kill me if I let you walk home by yourself—last night or right now.”

  “Your sister?”

  “Yeah, Veronica, but I call her Ronnie because she hates it. She’s older and into manners and all that other bullshit.”

  “Ahh, I see. Did she raise you?”

  “My parents are not dead, remember?” he deadpans, shooting me a raised eyebrow.

  Oh shit, that’s right. Why do I keep forgetting? It’s pretty much the worst slip-up, ever. “My god, I am so sorry.”

  “You’re going to give me a complex if you keep talking like that. I’m going to want to actually call my mother to hear the sound of her voice, and that will only confuse us both.”

  “Why? Don’t you ever call home?”

  “God no.” He pauses, hitting the turn signal and heading toward campus. “No, that’s not true. I guess I call enough—mostly texts and shit, though. My asshole sister’s favorite thing to do is put us in group texts.” Kip hangs another left, already knowing where I live and how to get there, and it feels like he’s driven it a thousand times before. “Family group texts seriously want to make me gouge my eyes out.”

  “Why?”

  “Dude, because. My mom never finishes her sentences. She will send three words, hit send, then type another two words and hit send. Then another two—hit send. To make one complete sentence, instead of typing the whole thing out, right? Then she’ll send a GIF. Then four more words. Send. It makes me fucking mental. Ronnie knows I can’t handle it.”

  That does sound horrific, but not unlike any of the group chats I’ve ever been in with my friends.

  “My mom does the same thing. Kind of. But then again, there are only two of us, so I don’t have to worry about an entire family chiming in.”

  “You’re not missing out.”

  “I’m not?” Honestly, it sounds kind of nice.

  “Fuck no!” Kip’s SUV makes a right at the stop sign before he asks, “So, no brothers or sisters?”

  “Nope. It’s just me. The lonely only.”

  “And your mom.”

  “Yup, just me and my mom—always has been, since, you know…my dad left.”

  Most people ask what happened to my dad—or sperm donor, as I started calling him when I realized what a piece of shit he actually was—and I hope Kip isn’t one to pry.

  He is.

  “You said your dad left, but what happened? Did he die?”

  “No, nothing like that, although I’m sure my mom wishes that were the case. Haha.”

  “Hey, sue me for asking. You seem fixated on death for some reason, so I thought maybe that was why.”

  He has a very good point. “My birth father and mom were never married, and he took off when I was little; I don’t remember him being around. After he left, we lived with my grandparents for a while.”

  “Ah, I see.”

  Yeah.

  “So what’s your mom do?”

  “Like, what’s her job?”

  “Yeah.”

  “She…” I clear my throat and straighten my spine. “She’s a bartender. And she waitresses.”

  I wait for the awkward pause that usually follows that statement, but it never comes. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t embarrass me that my mother is a bartender and waitress—it’s other people who get all weird and judgmental about it.

  Especially women her age, ones with husbands and families and minivans and carpools. That was never my mother, never us. We never had the money for that kind of life—barely had the money for me to play sports or join clubs.

  Always just squeaking by.

  I was left alone a lot. Not only did my mom work a lot when I was growing up, she couldn’t afford babysitters or whatever. Taking every available extra hour, working overtime to pay the rent and utilities, at the same time saving for my college education.

  “Damn, do you ever get to see her?”

  “Sure I get to see her. I mean, not a ton…not really.” If I’m being honest, my mom works way too much and I rarely get to spend time with her. “I, uh, I’m here on a partial scholarship, so…” The sentence trails off. “And I was just awarded a grant from the engineering department.”

  “Is that your major? Engineering?”

  “Yes.”

  “What kind?”

  “Civil.” I pause. “Does that sound boring?”

  “No—not at all.” He reaches over and turns down the volume on his radio. “So you have a partial, and a grant, and your mom busts her ass to pay for the rest.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I get it.”

  “Do you?” Somehow I doubt it. I glance at Kip out of the corner of my eye, at the leather and chrome interior of his luxury vehicle, the branded logo on the sleeve of his pricey sweatshirt, not to mention his little slice of suburban heaven tucked away in a high-end neighborhood.

  For a caveman, Sasquatch sure has expensive shit.

  If he senses me eyeballing him, casing my surroundings, he chooses not to mention it.

  “What’s your major?” I ask out of polite curiosity.

  “Economics.”

  “Wow. Really?” I’m sincerely surprised.

  “Yeah. Business and economics seem to be in my future.”

  That’s an odd way of putting it. “Why is that?”

  “Family business.”

  “I see. Do you have a choice?”

  “Kind of, but not really.” A master of deflecting, Kip changes the subject as he slows down when we near the edge of campus.
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br />   “Have you ever lived in the dorms?” I cock a brow.

  “Uh, no.”

  “Why not?”

  Shrug. “My parents wanted me off campus.”

  That makes no sense. From my experience, most parents keep their kids on campus as long as they can—at least, that’s what my mom wanted.

  “Why?”

  Instead of answering, he shrugs.

  Kip measures his words. “It’s complicated.”

  “Then I’m not going to ask.”

  “Thanks.”

  I catch a smile, a flash of his straight, white teeth. “You should smile more.”

  “I smile plenty.” His face scrunches up, lip furled.

  “You really don’t though.”

  “Sure I do—you just have to catch it at the right moment. Sometimes you don’t see it happening.”

  “Because of all the hair on your face?”

  “Correct.”

  Despite myself, I take him in, his whiskers highlighted by the sunlight streaming into the driver’s side window and through the windshield.

  “Don’t girls get whisker burn from your face?”

  A short laugh. “No.”

  Pfft. “Yeah right.”

  “I’d have to kiss one for that to happen.”

  “You haven’t kissed a girl?”

  He rolls his eyes.

  “Oh.” Ohhh… “Now it all makes more sense.”

  “What does?”

  “You being into guys.”

  He shoots me a quick glance, brows furrowed. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

  Yeah, I know that wasn’t what he meant, but it’s fun to tease him. He’s so serious.

  My laugh fills the cab of his SUV. “You should see the look on your face—you look like a serial killer.” One who’s not amused.

  “Ha ha.”

  “I would have said Bigfoot instead, but that seems too obvious.”

  “I do get that one a lot.”

  “Figured. That’s why I went with serial killer, although you don’t really look like one of those, either. You’re too tall.”

  My stomach chooses that moment to growl, and it’s so loud it fills the sudden silence.

  Of course it does.

  “You hungry?”

  There is no denying it when my stomach rumbles again. “Uh, kind of.”

  “Why didn’t you eat anything?”

  “I wasn’t about to go digging through your cabinets.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I barely know you—it would have been rude.”

  “You want to stop somewhere and grab something?”

  “No! No. It’s okay, I have food at home.”

  “You sure? What about that little diner on the corner of South and Meridian—they make a killer omelet.”

  I mentally calculate the meager change stuffed inside my wallet. It’s barely ten dollars and the only cash I have.

  “Yes, I’m sure, but thank you for the offer.”

  “Come on,” he urges. “Do you have somewhere else to be right now?”

  “Don’t you? You’re the one with rugby practice today, right?”

  “Later. At noon.” His car is no longer headed toward my apartment, damn him. He’s the shittiest listener; I’ll have to remember that from now on.

  “Kip, it’s fine. Really.” I cannot spend my money on food when I need it for rent, books, and tuition. Frivolous spending is not in my budget for the month.

  But for some reason, he isn’t letting it go, and he isn’t taking me home.

  “My treat.”

  Well. In that case. “Fine—twist my arm.” Because honestly, I’m starving, and food from an actual restaurant sounds like heaven. Cinnamon roll? Eggs? Breakfast sausages?

  Yes, please.

  ***

  KIP

  Jesus, where is she putting all that food she ordered?

  Seriously, Teddy is tiny—compared to me. I guess for a girl, she’s pretty average, but next to my six foot four? She’s pocket sized.

  And she’s stuffing breakfast links in her face with a forkful of egg and washing it down with chocolate milk. It’s more than I’ll pile in my mouth at once.

  “Is that going to be enough food for you? Sure you don’t want to order more?” I tease, eyeing her plate of eggs, hash browns, and the side order of a giant cinnamon roll. The quantity rivals mine, and with both our heads bent, we go at it, stuffing our faces like we haven’t eaten in days.

  I’ll pay for this during practice by running it off with extra laps around the field, but right now, the greasy breakfast is worth it.

  Even if I end up with the shits later.

  I shovel a spoonful of food into my mouth and chew, wiping my mouth with the sleeve of my sweatshirt, totally cognizant of the fact that if my mother saw me right now, her mouth would fall open in horror at my complete lack of decorum, my complete disregard for the manners she drilled into me from day one.

  “Gross, you have eggs in your beard.” Teddy’s lilting, soft voice floats across the table, half amused, half disgusted.

  “Where?” I don’t tell her that half the time when I eat, food ends up in my beard, a hazard of having so much hair hanging from my face. “Show me.”

  “I’m not touching it.”

  I snicker into my napkin as I swipe it across the lower half of my face, tempted to throw in a That’s what she said but think better of it when her lip curls up and her eyes narrow like she knows I’m thinking it.

  I don’t even have to say it.

  Nice.

  “Don’t say it.”

  I shrug. “I wasn’t going to.”

  “But you were thinking about it.”

  I laugh and egg flies out of my mouth. Teddy’s disdain grows, lip now completely curled up under her pert little nose.

  “Yeah, I almost said it.”

  “Wipe your face, Kipling.”

  Ugh, that fucking name. “Dude, I can’t help it if shit falls out of my mouth.”

  “You’re disgusting. I’m never eating with you again.”

  “I have a feeling you’d eat with me every night of the week if I was paying for it.”

  Teddy considers this, finally nodding. “You’re right, but only because my budget is so tight moths fly out of my wallet when I open it.”

  “That’s sad.” The words leave my mouth before I can stop them. Insensitive as they are, Teddy doesn’t so much as blush.

  “Poor me, I know. Feed me, Kip!” Her laugh is punctuated by the fork in her hand stabbing at the sausage on her plate, metal meeting porcelain, her moan fills the air between us as she stuffs the entire thing in her pretty mouth.

  “Now who’s the slob here? You don’t have to be a pig about it because I had food in my beard.”

  She rolls her eyes pretty damn hard. “You’re also spitting food out.”

  No shit, but, “Not on purpose.”

  She flops her fork in the air, pointing it in my direction and squinting. “Still, didn’t your mother teach you any manners?”

  If only she knew. Not only did my mother teach me manners, she hired etiquette coaches to come to the house and drill manners into Veronica and me—actual fucking etiquette coaches like it’s the year 1845 or some shit.

  No one can tell Lilith Carmichael what to do, and what she wanted was for her children to be impeccably mannered and well-behaved. And we were.

  For a while.

  Then, my sister and I became two teenagers who hated the watchful eyes of our parents, their staff, and the media. Our parents weren’t just wealthy, they were celebrities in our corner of the country, Dad appearing on news broadcasts, buying up a professional football team when his net-worth topped nine figures.

  Everyone knew our family, and Ronnie and I hated it.

  The fact that I call my sister Ronnie? My mom hates that more.

  “Are you listening to anything I say?”

  “Huh?”

  “You do that a lot
you know—zone out.” Teddy is back to picking at the food on her plate with the tines of her fork, pushing the scrambled eggs to one side, wry smile plastered to her face. “Sorry I’m so boring.”

  Shit.

  “You’re not boring.”

  “I kind of am.”

  “Would you stop?”

  “Next you’re going to tell me you have a lot on your mind.”

  “That’s not what I was going to say because it’s not even remotely true. There is nothing on my mind.” I laugh, grabbing a hunk of toast, folding it in half, and stuff it in my gullet. I can’t very well say I zone out when you talk because I’m reminded of all the secrets I don’t want anyone finding out, and you just discovered the second biggest one I have.

  The first being my family’s ridiculous wealth.

  The other is my giant, fancy fucking house off campus with its Egyptian cotton sheets and granite countertops no twenty-two-year-old on the planet should already own, because what the actual fuck.

  Thanks Mom and Dad for making it impossible to have a normal life, or a relationship with a girl who doesn’t care about that shit.

  Whatever. I’m over it.

  Still. My nostrils flare as I rip the paper napkin in two, balling up the pieces and tossing them to the far end of the table.

  “So,” I clip out. “When a guy comes up to you and says he likes your shirt, what do you say?”

  A well-manicured brow shoots up into Teddy’s hairline. “No guy is going to tell me he likes my shirt. My boobs, maybe.”

  “Your dress?”

  Teddy heaves a sigh. “Kip, do we have to do this right now? I’m trying to eat my free breakfast.”

  “My coach always says practice makes perfect, Ted.”

  “Please don’t call me that.”

  “Why? It’s an awesome nickname.”

  “Because Mariah calls me Farmer Ted and I hate it.”

  “Mariah calls you Farmer Ted to be an asshole and to put you in your place. I’m calling you Ted because I think it’s adorable.”

  “It’s a man’s name.”

  “So is Teddy.”

  “No it’s not.”

  So argumentative, this one. “Uh, Teddy Roosevelt?”

  “Fine.” She sighs again. “It’s a man’s name, but don’t call me Ted.”

  “Fine.” My hand moves across the table, toward her plate. “Are you going to eat that?” Fingers grapple for her toast.