Except that the Principal wanted my feedback from that whole experience. I was avoiding him. Even if I wanted to do that, I had no idea what to say. To him or right now, so I let other people take over. There was a conversation happening around me. Guess I should feel relieved, like this was the bright side. Because finally some people were speaking up for me.
“Can’t we focus on playing ball?” someone wondered.
“Chambers is the only one who likes dealing with your lazy asses,” someone else said. I wouldn’t say I liked that; it was an unfortunate necessity.
“I never thought I’d be able to play with a Muslim or a Mormon, but here we are.” Nope, I couldn’t even touch that one.
“Who cares what he’s into?” said Obviously Not Very Well Endowed. No. Wasn’t going to use that nickname. He was going to be eaten by hyenas. Or giraffes. I don’t remember. “He’s still our best bet for captain.”
Some of the guys standing behind me was nice, but I’d stayed fit over the summer from my job and wasn’t one of the guys who needed to get back in shape. I didn’t really have to be here. And I didn’t want to be. I told the rest of them to get moving already or something and then walked away.
My plan was to take the long way around the school to my car, which I hadn’t moved closer because exercise. I was gonna go home and bug Lydia with my frustrations while texting everything to Ryan. This part wasn’t healthy, but Lydia and I had saved the packaging from some plant-based meat alternatives that my sister Rose ate when she visited. We hid the good desserts in the vegetarian boxes so no one else would eat them.
However, Ted stopped me before I could make it to my vehicle. We were away from the guys, standing by one boring wall of the building.
“Don’t worry about them, man,” he said. Ted Summer of the flabby ass and third base. Solid fielder, really good hitter. Also, his hair was currently green. Like, neon green.
“No, I won’t,” I told him, trying for a smile. Ha-ha, yeah right.
Ted looked like he didn’t believe me. Smart Flabby Ass. “Coach has a vote every year, even when he knows and we know who the captain is going to be.”
“I guess.” Kinda caught off guard by the third basemen seemingly offering support, I admitted, “Didn’t think there would be competition.”
“You’ve got my vote,” he informed me with a smile, then went back to join the rest of the guys.
He really hadn’t been thrilled by me or Zach coming out. Why was he on my side now? He must really want to win. Also, I wanted to take him seriously, but his hair looked really stupid. Green.Brightgreen. Jesus, what was he thinking?
Speaking of people having trouble taking us seriously, that’s what would happen if he played with bright green hair. Though maybe it would distract people? No, the cap would cover most of it, but people would still be able to tell it looked stupid.
That wasn’t the point. This was about the team. Sam was a big, stupid, dumb jerkhead but that didn’t matter. Not if he was alone. Didn’t expect anyone to step up with a rousing defense of all things queer or wave a rainbow pride flag, but...
When my parents were giving me a hard time about dating Ryan, the team had been there. They rallied. But maybe that was, like, for the good of all us. Maybe some of them still weren’t very comfortable with it. Dammit.
Shouldn’t feel betrayed but I kind of did. Sam hadn’t said anything last year. But now he had more people on his side, a new crop of players who had little familiarity with me and no loyalty toward me. Had more people felt this way and just didn’t know how to say so or didn’t want to bring it up before?
Yeah, the problem wasn’t a person. It was the whole team.
4. The World According to Zach Ahmad
He also has nice hair.
Ryan
The baseball boys were starting a kerfuffle. Calling it that made it sound fun and not a hassle. Guess they never really accepted me, but they rallied around Luke when he needed them because they were a team and that’s apparently what teams did. Also, I bribed them for a while with baked goods.
But now they wanted a new captain. I wanted to punch all of them, but many of them were stronger than me. I was pretty fast, but those that weren’t stronger than me weredefinitelyfaster because they did things like exercising and running and using their legs for fun and profit, so. I imagined punching them.
A nice few moments. But if I’m going to be imagining boys roughly my age, why envision something so violent? Much more things I’d rather be doing with boys in my mind than fighting. Unless the fighting led somewhere dirty.
We were at lunch. The whole crew. The whole crew of people who I liked and considered my friends and then also Joey. We’d been doing this thing where him and I tolerated each other’s existence when we were around friends and ignored each other the rest of the time. It worked well for us.
Though weirdly, we were on the same side now.
“You’re wrong,” Joey told Lydia. If she had chosen a better superpower and could melt people with her mind, Joey would be a puddle of goo right now. At her look, he continued with, “And I’m not scared of you because I can bench press way more and I have an iron stomach.” Which meant she couldn’t use force or poison against him.
“Creepy, just like I’d expect from a Lydia,” I told her, pointing my fork at her. She sat across from me with her girlfriend. “But really uninspired.”
“Invisibility is like flight,” Alicia spoke before her girlfriend could curse us for disagreeing with her. “Seems cool in theory but has little practical value. And it’s not exactly a power people want.”
