Uppercut Princess (The Heights Crew #1)(44)

“Quarterback.” He tries to hide his pride, but it comes out anyway. His chest puffs up. “And I’m fucking good, too.”

I smile, a genuine one. Oscar’s fucking full of himself. That’s for sure. “So, you played football in Spring Hill, too?”

He nods. “Briefly. Their QB was hurt, and I stepped in.”

A shadow passes over his features, telling me there’s way more to the story than he’s telling me, but I won’t push.

“Football’s a big thing in Spring Hill. Their games are huge. They actually have a cheerleading squad, nice uniforms, and new pads.”

“And the Heights has?”

“Decades old pads, uniforms without our last names on them, and I think I saw a Burger King wrapper in the stands last time we played. When we go to away games, we have to drive ourselves.”

His eyes grow darker, anger seeping in. I can’t blame him. It would make anyone mad. This piss poor community holds him back. If he’s as good as he says he is, he would be better off at another school that actually has money. “It sounds like you really love the game if you’re willing to put up with all that just to play.”

He blinks at me. Uncertainty crossing his face. He didn’t expect that to be my reaction.

“Are you going to go to college to play football?”

The degrading laugh spills from his mouth again. My shoulders lock in annoyance. “What?”

He shakes his head, and I have a feeling I’ve just told him more about not being from around here than anything I’ve done yet. “If I get a scholarship, I might be able to go. Even if that, maybe not. I’m a part of the Crew now. They might not let me go.”

Understanding fills me, pulling at the string in my stomach. I’m beginning to understand who Oscar is now. “And you joined the Crew because…” I wait a beat for him to tell me the story, but he seems content for me to put the pieces together. “Because when you came back, you had to. It was the only way you had protection.”

“Because no one leaves the Heights thinking they can have a better life, Princess. No one.”

His words seep into my pores and then sink into my stomach like a dead weight. No one gets out of the Heights. That’s about as worse of a threat as you can get. This place isn’t for people who want to better themselves. There’s no opportunity. Sometimes by force, sometimes by choice. It’s not like the kids around here see people succeeding every day. There’s no one to look up to.

And even with all that, Oscar tried. And even with him trying, things got a lot worse for him. Now he probably won’t ever be able to escape. He’ll become a statistic the suburbs hear about on the nightly news. Another gang member gunned down. Or stabbed. They won’t tell his whole story. The people listening will sit in their picture-perfect lives shaking their heads at all the youth who can’t seem to get their shit together.





16





The next morning, Oscar’s still with me. I tell him to take off because he has to attend practice to be eligible to play in his game. He hesitates, but eventually, I push him out the door. If Johnny realizes he left, I’ll — Well, we’re just going to have to hope he doesn’t realize he’s left.

As Oscar walks out of the apartment, a genuine smile lighting his face, he looks about as real as I’ve seen him yet. He’s fake when he walks around the school like his shit doesn’t stink. He’s fake when Nevaeh plastered herself all over him. He doesn’t want that. He doesn’t want any of that.

It makes my heart hurt to think how trapped he is.

No wonder why I’ve felt like he’s like me. We’re both trapped. The only difference is, I plan on getting the fuck out.

I’m not alone for long. Just enough time to shower and think about how I’m going to spend my Saturday even though I should’ve known it wasn’t mine to plan. The door to my apartment opens, and I peek out of my bedroom to see who it is. A rough looking guy with long hair moves a loveseat into the room. “Hey, whoa,” I say, not recognizing the guy who’s currently turned away from me. “What are you doing?”

He ignores me, but Brawler pushes through holding the other end. “New furniture,” he says in explanation.

“New furniture?” My mind starts to race. I didn’t order furniture. What the—?

“Rocket,” Brawler says as they place the loveseat down in the area where we trained only yesterday. He bends over to push the loveseat against the wall. Bandages wind around his neck, and I suck in a breath. Before I can ask him about it, he stands and looks to the side of me instead of right at me, and asks, “Is this good?”

I shake my head. “What’s going on?”

“Rocket,” Brawler says again, turquoise eyes still avoiding me. “He told us to pick up this furniture and to drop it off for you.”

The other guy, who’d left, comes back in carrying a short table and plops it in front of the loveseat. Brawler claps him on the back, and the guy leaves. I stare at the stuff in shock. It’s clearly a set. A nice one. The coffee table is squat with a beautiful cherry wood. The loveseat is a dark gray microfiber.

“He probably realized you didn’t have much,” Brawler says, his voice tight.

“Nobody does.” I’d picked just the old armchair out because I knew no one would have very much, and I wanted to blend in. Plus, the more money I keep in my getting-out-of-dodge fund, the better.