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“I ordered an Uber.”
“So, is this it?” I asked, no longer able to hide the tears.
Claude didn’t answer. He just said, “Bye, Merri,” and walked out of my life.
It was only then that I let loose everything I was holding back. Falling to the ground, I cried. I thought it had hurt the first time he had left me. But that was nothing compared to what I felt now.
Chapter 10
Claude
Why had I let myself want it? I was a fool to think that anything Merri was telling me was true. I knew I wasn’t as good as I used to be. I could feel it. Yet, I chose to believe him. I had trusted him when I knew that the only person I could trust was myself.
Now I felt like my insides were being torn out. I didn’t want this. I hadn’t wanted this. But getting a taste of it, I craved it like nothing I had felt before.
What was it that I wanted so badly? Was it to get back onto a football team? Was it to once again feel like I mattered? I didn’t know. All I did know was that I hurt and I didn’t know how to stop the pain.
On the way to the airport, I held myself together. The same was true as I waited for my flight and boarded the plane. With hours to remember how I had escaped these feelings before, I did my best to push down my heartache and disappointment.
By the time I had landed in Tennessee, I had realized that it wasn’t working. None of my techniques for going numb were working. I could still feel all of it, the unworthiness, the loneliness, they were all floating just below the surface.
At any moment, I felt like I was going to explode. The only thing left for me to do was to pretend none of it had happened. I would tell no one about it. I would try not to think about it again.
‘How’s it going in Florida?’ a text from Titus read as I rode the bus from Knoxville.
“Shit!”
I wasn’t going to be able to pretend like none of it had happened. Everyone knew it had. Merri had told everyone about it, ensuring that I would never be able to escape the questions. My only respite would come by hiding in my room, and the thought of that made me want to peel the skin off my bones.
I was trapped. Merri had trapped me. I could no longer run from my feelings. Cowering in the corner like a scared child, I looked up at them.
The monster was dark and terrifying. Without mercy, it consumed me. And with nowhere else to run, I fell forward in my bus seat and bawled.
It wasn’t just for the workout that I had cried. It was for everything. It was for hearing my best friend call me what he had. It was for the pain I felt bottling up my loneliness. It was for the eight-year-old who couldn’t have fun with his friends because he had had the reputation of his entire race put on his shoulders.
With the tears flowing, it didn’t feel like they would stop. But it was a long bus ride between Knoxville and home. And getting off the bus at the closest stop 20 miles out of town, I retreated to the nearest bench, put my elbows on my knees, and my face in my hands.
I had made a mess of so many things. What was my life? Who did I have? How had I ended up alone?
Looking at my phone when it buzzed, Titus’s text read, ‘BTW, Lou says that when you start playing for the Cougars, he’s gonna stage a corporate takeover of the tour company.’
Seconds later he wrote, ‘Now he’s telling me I wasn’t supposed to tell you that.’
Seconds after that, ‘Now he’s saying that he will never have sex with me again if I don’t tell you that he didn’t say that. So, he definitely didn’t say that.’
Seconds after that, ‘Hey Claude, this is Lou. Titus is just kidding around. You know how he likes to kid. How’s the workout going? Are you their starting quarterback yet? No hidden agenda behind the question. Asking for a friend.’
Reading Titus’s last message, I couldn’t help myself. I laughed. It was enough to remind me that my world wasn’t coming to an end.
Sitting up, I took a deep breath. Staring at my phone again, I called Titus.
“Claude, how’s it going?”
“To be honest, not great.”
“What’s the matter?” My brother asked, concerned.
“Could you pick me up at the airport bus stop?”
