Heartache and Hope (Heartache Duet #1)(2)

“Don’t overdo it, Connor. Just the small stuff.”

When he leaves, the first thing I do is try to lift a three-seater couch on my own. Because I’m a shit of a kid and I don’t listen apparently.

“Yo, you need a hand?” a guy calls from behind, rushing to lift the other end of the couch before it falls off the back of the truck. He asks, “You thought you could lift this on your own?”

I’d be annoyed by his words if he wasn’t laughing when he said them. Besides, the guy’s huge. If Shaq had a long-lost son, he would be it… so it’s probably best not to start off on the wrong foot.

“Apparently so,” I murmur.

With his help, we get the couch into the living room within seconds.

“Hey, man. Thanks for that.” I throw out my fist for a bump as we walk out of the house.

“Nah, it’s nothing.” I expect him to leave, to go back to wherever the hell he appeared from, but he simply walks back to the truck, jumps in, and comes out with a mattress.

“Dude, honestly, you don’t need to help.”

He jumps down, then lifts the mattress onto his back as if it’s air. “I got nothing going on.”

“I can’t, like, pay you… or anything.”

He shakes his head. “Man, shut up with that.” Then he motions to the rest of our shit in the truck. “But I’m not doing this on my own.”

“Right.”

An hour later and the entire truck is empty. I’m completely drenched in sweat. So is Trevor—whose name I just asked a minute ago. “I’d offer you a drink,” I tell him, rolling down the truck door, “but we don’t really have anything.”

He looks over at my house. “You got AC?”

I nod. “I assume so.”

He slaps my arm. “Get it on. I’ll be back.”

A minute later, AC blowing in the living room, he returns with two beers and hands me one. I take it without a second thought, down half of it in one go while he makes himself comfortable on the couch. Legs kicked up on the somewhere box, he says, “I live next door by the way.”

I sit on a desk chair opposite him. “I figured. Hey, I can’t thank you enough. My dad had to run out, so you showed up at the right time. Or wrong time for you, I guess.”

He chuckles, his voice deep, low, when he says, “I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t want to.”

“Well, thank you. Again.”

He lifts his beer bottle in a salute motion, looking around the room. “So, you’re here with your parents?”

“Just my dad.”

“That him walking up your porch steps right now?”

I look through the window behind me, and sure enough… and I’m too late to remember the beer in my hand because it’s the first thing Dad spots when he walks into the house.

The second is Trevor.

“This is Trevor,” I tell Dad, standing, trying to hide the beer in plain sight. “He lives next door.”

Dad clears his throat, takes the beer from my grasp. “Nice to meet you, Trevor,” Dad says. “And I assume my son didn’t mention he was a minor.”

“Oh, my bad.” Trevor gets up to shake Dad’s hand. “To be fair, I didn’t ask.”

Dad simply nods, enjoying the ice-cold beer that I once called mine. “You help him bring all this furniture in?”

“Yes, sir.”

Dad opens his wallet.

I cringe a little on the outside, and a whole lot on the inside.

Dad tries to hand him a twenty, but Trevor shoves his hands in his pockets, declining. “You’re good, sir. I just saw him trying to lift more than all our weights combined. Didn’t want him hurting himself, you know?”

“Well, thank you. I appreciate it.”

Trevor eyes me. “A minor, huh?”

I nod, face heating with embarrassment.

“High school?”

“Yep.”

“West High?”

“Nah. St. Luke’s Academy.”

Trevor’s eyes widen. “Oh yeah? That’s my old stomping ground.” He takes a quick glance around our two bed, one bath, paint-peeling-off-the-walls rental, and all our belongings, focusing a few seconds on the framed Larry Bird jersey. When his eyes meet mine again, he’s smirking. “Let me guess. Basketball scholarship?”

“Yeah,” Dad and I answer at the same time. Dad asks, “You play ball?”

Trevor looks down at his feet. “Football. Well, I used to. Not so much anymore.”

“You in college?” Dad asks him, and I hold back from doing the whole ohmygod Dad stahhp, you’re so embarrassing! thing and keep my mouth shut.

“Nah,” says Trevor. “I just work full-time now. Got my own company.” He pulls out a card from his wallet and hands it to Dad. “Electrician. If you need anything, my number’s on there.”

“You got it,” Dad asserts.

Trevor smiles at the both of us. “It’s been fun, but I gotta get going. Hope y’all settle in all right.”

“Hey, thanks again,” I tell him.

Dad says, “Are you sure you won’t take any—”

Trevor lifts his hand, already halfway to the door. “I’m good.”