Page 99 of Lovefool

“Crew, we need to talk,” I say, and the delicate statement hovers like a loaded gun. My vision swarms with the same slate-gray color that swipes deft fingers through the burling clouds outside.

Hackles raised, the landscape of his face creases with thinly veiled concern. “What’s going on?”

“Lake and I got into a fight. She was going on about something she saw, and it was this big moral debate, and I took the wrong side. I said some terrible things to her, man. Things I didn’t mean. And now she’s not returning my calls. She ran off to God knows where. She’s gone, and I don’t think she’s coming back,” I blurt out, my voice warped with grief, my whole body coiling up tight like I’m experiencing the brunt of the fight for the first time again.

“Shit, Sutton. I’m so sorry,” Crew consoles, bringing me into a hug.

Crew is one of those people you can always rely on. He’ll listen to your long list of problems even if he’s dealing with his own because he knows how hard it is to suffer in silence.

If I was in trouble in the middle of the night, hundreds of miles away from home, he’d drive those sleepless hours to come get me, no questions asked.

I pull back, not allowing myself to sink into his solace because a part of me still doesn’t deserve it. “That’s not the worst part, though.”

His eyebrows pinch together. “No?”

“I don’t know how to say this, but…fuck. Lake saw Montgomery making a monetary transaction with a known sports bookie, and there may or may not be a soon-to-be-published article detailing every little thing.”

Crew’s visage darkens exponentially, both figuratively and literally as the shadows from a car’s headlights carve out the subcutaneous fat on his cheeks, grinding everything into dangerous angles. His eyes linger on me with the same intent as a vicious predator pacing the tree line of a forest.

Crew doesn’t get mad. Or, at least, I’ve never seen him mad before. Frustrated that we’re performing poorly at practice? Sure. But mad mad?

He doesn’t move or lose his shit. His anger is a quiet, reserved thing, translated into a two-toned hiss that carries over the buffeting winds.

Peeling back humanity’s moral ineptitude and exposing the rotten flesh underneath wasn’t on my to-do list the night before the semifinal game, but at least it’s distracting me from the skewer-sized hole in my heart following Lake’s swift departure.

Crew forks his fingers through the front of his hair. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

“Do you think that’s something he’s capable of?” I ask, though the question seems somewhat rhetorical. I already know the answer.

Crew exhales noisily before his entire face screws up in vexation. His arms strain the sleeves of his nightshirt, the thick cables in his neck alternating between stark and subtle while a swallow hurtles down the canal of his throat.

“Buford? Yeah, dude. That’s something he’s definitely capable of,” he replies. “What do you want to do?”

Jesus, it’s fucking hot in here. I feel like a piece of livestock, waiting for a mercy kill that never comes.

I don’t even have to think about my answer. It’s second nature for the truth to loosen my lips. I may have failed at maintaining this balancing act of morality and loyalty, but there’s still time to rearrange my priorities.

“I want to get my girl back.”

“Great, then that’s what we’re gonna do.”

“We?’”

“When this comes out, there’s going to be a shit-ton of coverage. I don’t want you in the middle of it.” Crew, up to his head in bullshit, furls his fist in the collar of my shirt and yanks me into him with an archaic impatience that would bury anybody six feet deep. “You’re family, Sutton. Lake is family. I’m not going to let you guys break up over something that has nothing to do with the two of you. I’m responsible for Montgomery.”

Tears mist my eyes. “I don’t know how to get her back. She doesn’t want to talk to me, and I don’t blame her. I yelled at her. I belittled her. I was supposed to be her safe space. This article is her big shot, and instead of supporting her, I blamed her for doing what she’s the most passionate about.”

My eyesight is fuzzing like a camera lens going in and out of focus, and the slow trickle of shame inside me has graduated into a full-fledged flood. It feels as if my body is being ripped to shreds on the rocky ridge of coastline waters.

Then, Crew imparts four words upon me—easily comprehensible in theory, but impossible to grapple in practice.

“Do you love her?” he inquires.

Pish, do I love her? Of course I fucking do.

“So much it hurts.”

The first swatches of crepuscule bleed into the ink-spattered sky.