Heartache and Hope (Heartache Duet #1)(80)

I yell, tears blinding my vision, “Go to your fucking room!”

Mom’s laughter is hysterical in the most menacing way.

I ball my fists at my sides, my jaw clenched.

“Ava, calm down!” Trevor orders.

Pressure builds in my chest, and I can’t… I can’t breathe. Through clamped teeth, I seethe, trying to hide my anger, “You need to take her to her room so I can clean up the glass!”

Trevor’s throat bobs with his swallow as his eyes bore into mine. He nods once. “Okay.”

He helps Mom into her room, closing the door between us. I pick up my phone with only one thing on my mind. Connor. I need to show him that I’m here. That I care. That I’m trying.

Ava: Good games, #3.





Then I take a moment to put myself back together, to hide my anger and my fear and my self-loathing. I’ve never yelled at her like that before. Never. No matter how hard things got… I never raised my voice. At least not to her.

I get what I need to clean up the glass, careful not to cut myself. It takes an hour on my hands and knees, making sure there are absolutely no shards left so we don’t have a repeat of the last two times she was around broken glass. I go outside to trash what I need to, all the while listening for signs that things will get worse. That we might need to call the crisis team… and it will all be my fault.

I have one hand back on the front doorknob when a text comes through.

Connor: Are you fucking serious?





Connor


I choked.

And while the winning team celebrated around me, I collapsed on the hardwood, fatigue setting every muscle ablaze. Failure blocked my airways as I stared up at the arena lights, wondering if this was it.

Some people peak in high school.

And that’s as far as they’ll ever go.

We were one point down with five seconds on the clock, and I choked. I had time, I had space, I had enough muscle memory to go blind into a simple lay-up. I went for the three-pointer. The rest is history.

I thought all of that was as bad as it would get, and then I opened my locker, reached for my phone, and read her message.

It’s ironic, really, because while I was on that hardwood, she was the first thing that came to my mind. I thought if I could just leave, if I could go to her, if I could see her, speak to her, then everything would be better. It wouldn’t be perfect, it wouldn’t even be okay, but it would be better.

But I can’t get to Ava, don’t really want to, and so I search for what I needed from her and find it at the bottom of a bottle of beer. Or six.

Rhys’s house is full of kids, and I don’t think any of them care that it’s a Sunday night and we have school tomorrow. Most of the team are in the pool house watching the highlights from today’s games. I watch, too, my lids heavy from the booze. I listen to the guys talk about how good they look on camera and how much pussy they think it’s going to get them. And then Karen enters the room, sits on the arm of the couch right next to me. “Tough break, Ledger,” she says, ruffling my hair.

My head falls forward, and it’s an effort to lift it again.

I focus back on the screen, and my heart drops, my stomach twisting when I see him—Tony Parsons. From Duke. And he’s shaking hands with the two guys from Philips who had me covered the entire game. At no point today did he shake my hand or even acknowledge that we’d spoken before.

I drop my head in my hands, tug at my hair and groan the loudest groan in the history of groans. Mitch laughs. “It’s just a fucking game, man.”

I glance at him, my words sloppy. “Hey, guess what? Fuck you.”

Karen scoffs, taps me on the shoulder.

I look up at her.

“You want to get out of here?”

Yes.

But Ava.

I check my phone. She hasn’t replied. Hasn’t called. And all it does is heighten my frustration. “Why the hell not?”

I grab another six-pack on the way out and tear into it the second I’m in Karen’s coupe. Top down, I welcome the cold chill against my face.

I don’t ask Karen where we’re going because Karen seems to have a plan. Karen’s also got good taste in music. I turn up the stereo to full volume and rest my head on the seat. I close my eyes, get comfortable, and don’t bother opening them until the car’s stopped. We’re parked just outside the sports park gate, and Karen turns off the car, filling my ears with silence.

“Are we breaking and entering, because if so, I should call my dad and warn him about the bail money. We’re poor, Karen.”

“You’re not poor,” she tells me, her blond hair blowing in the breeze. “You’re middle class. You just live in an area that has too many one-percenters.”

“Perspective,” I mumble.

“What?”

I heave out a breath. “It’s all about perspective. You have good perspective.”

“Riiiight,” she drawls. “And no, we’re not breaking and entering. Stepdad number five owns this place.” She hops out of the car, taking her keys with her, and uses them to open the giant padlock on the gates.

“Will you get in trouble?” I ask when she’s back behind the wheel.

With a shrug, she says, “He gave me a key for a reason.” And then she puts the car in drive and makes her way through the park, around the batting cages, and parks right in the middle of the basketball courts.