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"Good.” She lets out a breath. “Carl is so worried."
My heart skips a beat. "Why's he worried?"
She makes a face like there’s a lot more to the story, but instead of telling me anything, she just says, “Oh, I think he’s just…hoping Ezra will do well here.”
"You think? You don’t know why?” Now that she’s started, I want to hear everything there is. I’m tired of that fucker having a leg up. And anyway, it’s clear that something must have happened back in Richmond. “Must not have gone well back with his mom, because he had been going to a fancy private school, right? And he was the star quarterback, with college scouts and all that?”
Mom gives a small nod, wiping at a spot where one of the succulents has overflowed its pot.
“I guess something must have happened. Who moves for their senior year?” I say. “And why? Was it his mom’s divorce? I heard you and Carl talking about that…how she divorced or something.”
"Well, that's not our business,” Mom says, giving me a tight smile. “We just want him to be happy." She smiles again, this time more genuinely. "Thank you for being so kind to him."
I trudge back up the stairs, trying not to feel guilty for being...not that. Family problems or not, Ezra is definitely no angel. I’ve done nothing but try with him. Maybe the best thing I can do for now is just avoid the guy.
Ezra
Never know what to make of guys like DG. Dude’s a goodie two shoes, as my mother’s second husband used to like to say. That guy was old as hell; I think the term “goodie two shoes” is from the fifties or the sixties. Maybe the bad kids only had one shoe? Who the fuck knows. But yeah, Miller seems, outwardly, like a good egg.
He’s got a temper hidden just under his clean-cut surface, but it seems to mostly only flare up when he’s near me. I’ve only been here a few weeks, but already I feel like I understand who’s who and what’s what in Fairplay. So I know he’s part of the “in” crowd. For one, he’s lived here forever. In a place like this, that matters. Got that local street cred.
People think he's a nice guy. Not just adults like Coach Nix, but the other students, too. When they hear that I’m his stepbrother, they nod like okay, well that's good. People talk about how he's great at soccer. And he's in the band. So all-a-fucking-merican, this guy.
What no one talks about is if he's gay.
Not that I care. It’s not relevant. In fact, none of this shit really matters. It’s all temporary. I’ll be here until I’m not, and while I am here, I’m not looking to make connections.
One thing I hate about DG is he won't actually be an asshole to me. Not anymore. It’s all shuffling feet and averted gazes when I see him on the stairs or in the kitchen. The other night, our parents forced a movie night and we all watched this Japanese film called Spirited Away. It was all fantastical and shit. The premise of it...let's just say I wasn't a fan. I spent half the time watching DG as he watched it. Seeing him get all wide-eyed, like an animated film is some kind of real adventure. Then when shit went sideways, he'd look genuinely shocked—near devastated, as if he'd never seen a cartoon character suffer before. At one point, his mom laughed and asked if he was okay and he said, "Yeah." But he made a funny face, and she told me, "Josh is a little...sensitive."
"I am not," he snapped.
But I guess she's right. He's sensitive, but somehow volatile, too. His feelings are like strings. Just a little pull, and the whole damn marionette moves. It's strangely satisfying.
That's why I'm out here on the roof at 1:30 in the morning. I plant myself right by his window, reach over to crack the thing open—looks like Aristotle doesn't keep it locked—and light a cigarette.
Truth is, I don't even want it, but I don't want to sleep yet. I can push myself till around 2 and still get up at 7 ready to play. Any later, and I'm fucked, and I get hit too much, and Coach Nix gets impatient. The other day, after a night I hardly got a wink of sleep, he asked how much I want to start, as if his ass didn't promise to re-organize the team for me, to let me help with strategy and all that shit.
I kept my head down, though, and took it. That's the way it's gotta be, at least in high school. Probably in college, too. Whatever the coaches say, you do it. They say jump, you ask how high.
Does it matter that I hate that shit? That taking orders makes my skin crawl?
