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I knew he would be the first to message me. He follows me on everything online. The team media manager Will Davies posted a video shortly after the game started of our opening sequence and I reshared it to my feed, along with a link to my article.
DUCKIE: Thanks, who knows, if I totally screw this up, I might be able to score a job as one of their backup dancers. Jokes.
I’m not really joking. If I do screw up this chance, I’ll be looking for a new job, because no way can I spend hours captioning graphics.
CARTER: What did you do?
DUCKIE: Why do you assume I did something?
CARTER: Because I know you. You only joke about messing stuff up if you think you already have. Spill.
I both hate and love that he knows me so well. It’s been like that from the moment the Grants brought him into their house. I’ve been with my family since I was six, adopted at nine. I don’t remember a huge amount anymore from my life before the Grants. But my life after them is all crystal clear. I guess that’s how the brain works, right? Or at least it’s how mine works. It decides what’s important and pushes the other stuff down or out. Either way, when they asked if I wanted another brother, I remember thinking they were having a baby. Then teenage Carter shows up, and it’s so much better than a baby. He was older, and so cool, he knew stuff. Like how to use tools and fix things and he wanted to spend time with me.
DUCKIE: I kissed someone I probably shouldn’t have.
The next second, my phone is ringing. It’s Carter.
“Just tell me it wasn’t a player’s girlfriend, or wife, because seriously, man, after two bites of that apple, you have to know it’s poisonous by now.”
“You know how I was telling you about that guy?”
“Mmm,” he replies, waiting quietly afterward for me to find the words I need to continue.
“Well, I did what you said, and I was just staying open to you know, letting myself feel whatever I felt without focusing on who was making me feel that way and I went to his room to read over his article, and it was… I don’t know. It was like there was this energy pulling me closer to him, and then I just grabbed him and kissed him.”
Silence.
“Carter?”
“I’m here, I’m just wondering what exactly you mean bygrabbedhim.”
“He was standing in front of me, and I just had this overwhelming feeling like I had to grab his face and kiss him, and he kissed me back, and then…”
“Then what?”
“Then my… body kind ofreacted, and I sort of, maybe, kind of ran away.”
The fucker actually laughs.
“Don’t laugh at him,” Lucas’s voice chastises my brother through the line.
“Oh, my god. Am I on speaker? You fucking asshole! You didn’t tell me I was on speaker. Who else is there?”
“No one, just Lucas,” he says, through chuckles. “I didn’t know you were going to blurt all that out. We’re cutting up brownies, so my hands are covered in cocoa powder.”
“You’re at the cafe? Holy shit, man. Anyone could’ve heard. That’s the last time I answer a call from you. It’s text only for all our future correspondence.”
“Sorry, I’ll warn you next time, promise. So, you said he kissed you back.”
“Oh yeah, he did. That’s what… You know, made me run.”
“You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of,” Lucas calls, and I groan and run my hand through my hair.
“I’m still on speaker, come on. Please take me off.”
Clattering noises and then muffled voices sound through the line and then all of a sudden Carter’s voice comes through loud and clear.
“Okay, you’re off speaker. Now tell me why is it that you think you shouldn’t have kissed this guy? By the sounds of it, it was amazing. If you want my opinion, run right back there and do it again.”
