Speaking of paying for sins, I knew I had to talk to Brent, Tim and Karl, the sooner the better. They had to understand that what they’d done today wasn’t cool. Just because I hadn’t thrown them under the bus didn’t mean I was going to let them get away with it.
The three of them were standing in front of the lockers, eyeing me as I came in. I glanced around, but Coach wasn’t anywhere in sight. I stopped behind them, hands on my hips.
“In case you’re wondering, Nate’s going to be okay. No thanks to the three of you assholes. Are you out of your fucking minds? You could’ve killed him. And if that doesn’t bother you, if you’re that damned hard, think about yourselves. You think they’d let three cold-blooded killers play on this team? You think you’d still be in school at all? No way, man. Even now, if it wasn’t for Nate, you’d be facing assault charges.”
Tim’s eyes were wide, and Brent’s mouth had dropped open. Karl ran a hand over his face.
“Dude, we were just messing around. If you hadn’t yelled—”
“If I hadn’t yelled, the whole thing would’ve escalated and Nate might’ve been hurt worse. I’m not taking any blame for this, except that I didn’t get there faster to stop it. But I want you to know this: Nate’s the one who made the call to cover for you. If he hadn’t insisted on me keeping my mouth shut, I was planning to come back here and tell Coach the whole story. So you keep that in mind the next time you’re tempted to get physical with Nate. Or with anyone else you like to harass. Stay away from him, you got that? Or I swear, I’ll make you sorry you didn’t.”
Brent shuffled his feet and reached for a clean T-shirt. “Loud and clear, Lion.” He glanced at Tim and Karl.
Tim cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, man. I didn’t ...” He shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know why we did it. I guess we just fucked up.”
Karl slammed his locker shut. “Yeah, whatever. I’ll stay away from the—from him.” He turned his back on me and stalked off toward the showers.
The entire locker room had fallen silent, listening to us. I ignored them and went to my own locker, rooting around for my towel and clean clothes. Next to me, Matt was already shrugging into a button-up shirt, his blond hair still damp from the shower.
“You okay, Lion?” He kept his voice low, and his eyes were glued to my face.
“Yeah, guess so. I will be.” I exhaled long and deep.
“Hey, man. It’s done. Shake it off.”
“Yeah.” I closed my locker. “That’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to shake it all off. Every damn thing.” I thought about Quinn again, remembering with a pang the softness of her lips beneath mine and the way her body had molded to me. I closed my eyes and swallowed hard, repeating my last words.
“Every damn thing.”
