Beast(74)

“Let me see you do one.”

“Nah, I got to stretch.”

“Come on, help me out. Spot me. My coach says I need more power at the plate.”

I don’t move.

“My season starts in like two months. Help a fellow St. Lawrence Lion out.”

“Fine.” I get my crutch and hike up to my good foot. One more day and I get this cast off my leg. Just one more day and I can take a real shower and a real bath. JP waits on the machine and I amble over and put fifty pounds of plates on. I have no idea what he can pull, so let’s start small. “You sit, like what you’re doing, yeah. Grab on, and pull down,” I say. “Bring your chest to the bar, like that, and keep your elbows pointed down. Pull from your armpits.”

We go through the rest of the gym. I show him everything I’ve learned, all the form and stuff I’m working on. Lats, biceps, triceps, neck, stomach, and he does okay on all of them for his first pass. When he’s done, I actually freaking smile at him. Can’t help it. Old times sneaking in. Maybe the resolutions he made are working.

I sign off with Coach Fowler and hit the locker room. JP massages behind his neck. “I’m going to be so sore tomorrow.”

“You get used to it.” Popping my locker open, I stall at taking my clothes off the hooks. Years of him laughing at my back, my arms, my legs, you name it, ring in my ears. I seize the clothes and get dressed. Fuck it. Let him laugh. He’s right: things are going to change. When scouts come to St. Lawrence, they’ll be coming to see me. Not him, me. Starting left tackle, number sixty-five. The Beast.

I slam the locker shut.

When I get my crutches and stand, he’s there waiting for me. “What?” I grumble.

“Nothing. Wanna go?”

Maybe I am being a dick. JP and I leave the locker room and head toward the lobby. We tread silently through the dark mezzanine and down into the foyer by the double doors leading outside. It’s one of those days where the gray sky is blinding. No rain, no sun, but the threat of both. Light streams through the glass windows above the doors. JP punches the doors open. It’s like walking into a klieg light while my eyes adjust.

My eyes water as I blink, scrambled rods and cones struggling to adjust.

A voice I will know until my last living day gasps. “I don’t think I’m ready for this,” she says.

“Jamie,” I say.

Her bike clatters to the sidewalk.

“Oh, good. You’re here.” JP skips down the steps, lighter than cotton candy, and slings an arm around her shoulder. “How was school?”





THIRTY-THREE


Jamie’s eyes are as big as mine.

We stand opposite one another in shock, my crutches shaking inside my hands. It’s her. I’m happy, I’m panicked, I want to hug her, I want to hide, but it’s too late now. We’re locked in the same square concrete grid on the sidewalk. She inches backward, wavering on her toes to run. The only thing that stops her is JP clamping her in place.

His arm around her, her camera with a new purple strap. For Christmas? A present? I want to punch him into next week. “Are you two together now? What is this?”

“Seriously? That’s the first thing you say?” she asks.

I swallow a blob in my throat. “Hi, Jamie.”

“We’re not going out.” JP releases her and they take a step apart. “We found each other.”

“He found me,” Jamie clarifies.

The weather changes and mist starts to fall. I want to wrap her up and breathe inside the crook of her neck, but I can’t. Those days are gone. Seeing her kick-starts every ache I’ve been pretending doesn’t exist and they explode all at once. My fists spasm and I have to squeeze them together like I’m clutching two Ping-Pong balls to my stomach. There’s so much I want to say to her, but all that fades like winter sunshine. I can’t bring back what’s gone. Jamie stands next to him, beautiful as ever. She catches my eye. We stare at each other a good, long minute.

“JP and I are friends,” Jamie says.

“I call bullshit. He wants something.”

“Huh?” he says, all innocent.

I ignore him and talk directly to Jamie because if I so much as see him in my peripheral vision, I might just go to prison after all. “JP never does anything without trying to get something in return. It’s the only thing he knows.”

“Not anymore,” he says. “Like I told you in the weight room. New Year’s. I made resolutions.”

A thousand pounds of shit in a JP-shaped bag. “Jamie, can I talk to you? In private?”

“Not without JP,” she says.

“What?”

“Don’t you ‘what’ me, Dylan, because I swear to god, you’re lucky you have one person willing to fight for you, because I’m done.”

“That’s not what you said,” JP whispers to her.

“Yes. It is,” she shoots back at him under her breath.

“But you’re here,” I say, stumbling with shock.

“Yeah, she is because she’s f*cking awesome as shit,” JP butts in. “Look, dude, you can be mad at me forever, but what you’re doing to her is frigging stupid. And like seriously, when you’re all straight up miserable like this, you’re a black hole of suck. You’re bringing down the whole school. One giant, kinda literally, downer fest. It’s obvious you like her, you’d do anything for her. Everyone knows it; we can all see it. Just get the hell over it and apologize for treating her so shitty so we can be all good again.”