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He sat down across from me, and we were just quiet for a while, licking the drips off the edges of the cones, working down and around through the chocolate to keep from losing the top scoop. Real challenge trying to get through two scoops without getting ice cream everywhere, and by the time I had a flat top cone, I felt better.
“Coach Travis really worked you guys hard today,” Caleb said, breaking the silence as he leaned back and kicked one of his legs up on the chair next to us. I stared at his giant ass sneaker, wondering how cramped he was in these swirly little dollhouse chairs that were not being kind to my ass. “I don’t know how you keep going. What are those blue things he makes you run into?”
I blinked at him a minute, coming out of my ice cream fog, and settling back into my brain. “The sleds? They’re for blocking drills. You pretend they’re guys from Ollie and beat up on them instead of each other.”
“That looks fun.”
I grinned, wishing I could watch him tackle a dummy. “Yeah? Come be a walk on, Coach would probably slot you in at quarterback.”
“Still not going so well, huh?”
I shook my head. “You saw. It’s a shit show. I don’t know what the fuck’s up. Everybody’s fucking stressed. Friday’s looking like a beatdown. If anybody survives until then.”
“What’s gonna happen? To Walker and Ellis?” I watched him swipe the edge of his cone with his tongue, and I was probably never going to be able to eat ice cream or watch anyone eat ice cream again without thinking a billion dirty thoughts about his mouth, but really, was that so bad?
“You mean the fight? Nothing. Coach stuck them on clean up for a week, but… fights on the field aren’t like fights in the hallway. You know, aggression, testosterone, adrenaline, whatever. People just look the other way.” I felt shitty even saying that, felt like I was circling right back to jocks getting to beat up on people all they wanted, and probably it should have been different, but it wasn’t. “But if they don’t get it together…” I shrugged. “I don’t think Coach will really bench anybody, but Howser’s chomping to get out there and Walker actually threw to him, so… I don’t know. Not a winning team without Ellis, but we’re not a winning team with him right now either. Maybe they’ll bury whatever it is during clean up. Or kill each other.” I sighed and stared out the window where the sky had finally gone from orange to pink to purple.
“You worry a lot,” Caleb said quietly, and I wondered if that was true.
“I don’t know,” I finally said, shrugging, answering like it was a question. “I just… think about things that could happen.”
“You ever think about good things that could happen?”
“Like what?”
“Like… all kinds of things. College? NFL? Being rich and famous and… going to Italian restaurants and getting lots of blow jobs?”
I laughed a little. “Nah. Safer not to. Then you’re not disappointed. Better to be ready for bad things and let good things be a surprise. Safer,” I said again, and yeah, I could hear myself, a fucking dark cloud cliche, but what were you gonna do. “Not like I care about any of that anyway. Except the blow jobs.”
“You don’t care about college? Or football?”
“I care about it being a way to not end up living in Maddox the rest of my fucking life. If I can pull that off I’ll be happy.”
He nodded. “Okay.”
“What, no lecture about how I can be anything I want and all that crap?”
“You want a lecture?”
“No.” That might have been a lie, I wasn’t sure. “I mean… Not that kind.”
He smirked. “I’m not going to force you to believe your life is going to be good. Why the fuck would you believe that? You’ve got a whole lifetime of proof it’s not true. Easier for me to just make sure it’s good. Eventually you’ll believe it on your own.”
Swear I could feel the ice cream spreading out all warm in my stomach, melting and melting until it was covering all my insides.
It wasn’t just the ice cream, though.
* * *
I always thought it was Walkerwho lived in the best part of town, but really it was just giant houses over there and not much else. This neighborhood was way nicer. Pointless, because no one actuallyneededcandles or pottery or organic dog treats, but still nice. The vibe was quiet and slow, and no one actually seemed to be going anywhere, they just seemed to be walking, like that was point enough.
I only came to this part of town during Homecoming week when we had to sell raffle tickets, because it was easy as hell to knock off your fifty in an afternoon. People who bought birthday cakes for their dogs would buy fucking anything.
I definitely didn’t fit in here with my busted up clothes and worn out shoes, but Caleb did, and when he slipped his hand into mine and squeezed, I felt like we melted together for a second, like I almostdidbelong before I made myself pull my hand away.
I’d never actually said don’t hold my hand. I’d said maybe I wasn’t into it at school, and I wasn’t even sure that was true anymore. But that heart-pounding, sweaty stuff that happened when he slid his fingers in between mine, I wasn’t ready to be feeling that. Or figuring out what it was.
It didn’t seem to bother him, though, like maybe all he’d wanted was that one little squeeze, and he just put his hands in his pockets, no big deal, and walked beside me all comfortable quiet as I stared at the flowers and murals and the chalkboard signs advertising drink specials with stupid names, although maybe I’d try a Maddox Mad Dog one day before I got the hell out of this town.
