Carefully, I walked up to the side of the pool and got Joey’s attention by making seal sounds and clapping my hands at him like an idiot. Fourteen and idiot seemed to go hand in hand.
The shock of the cold drops of water he splashed at me caused me to yelp. He called me a string of silly names, which made me and the other swimmers laugh, until we heard the loud bang of the poolroom’s door.
“Well, well, well,” a deep voice echoed against the silence of the walls. Slate Marshall and a gang of wannabe-Goodfella-guidos, filed into the room. “If it isn’t little Miss Hottie Stone,” Slate sauntered over closer to me, licking his lips disgustingly.
I tilted my head to the side. “You got something wrong with your lips, Marshall? You keep licking them.”
“I always loved your smart mouth, Charlie, and one day I’m going to shove my dick in it and you’re going to suck me dry.”
“I’m not too worried, Slate. I’m sure I wouldn’t even realize it was there, because you’re dick’s so small.”
“Get out of the pool, fags. I don’t want any of you eyeing my dick in my swim trunks and getting all hot over me,” Slate yanked off his shirt and stood there, flexing his muscles. God, he was huge, intimidatingly huge, and watching me. He pecked a kiss on his biceps and winked, “Like what you see?”
I gagged.
The three other students who had been swimming laps with Joey climbed silently out of the pool, quickly grabbed a few towels, and ran for the lockers.
Damn, I hoped they were getting the stupid coach.
Joey slowly made his way out behind his teammates, but stayed by the edge of the pool across from me. I knew he wouldn’t leave me alone in here with Slate and his minions.
Spiky-gelled-haired-stupid-guido #1 walked behind me, and Joey’s eyes flared with anger. Crap on a guido, I wish Jase was here. I glanced up at the clock above the door; his lab was over two minutes ago. Where the heck was he?
Spiky-gelled-haired-stupid-guido #2 walked behind Joey and without warning, shoved him hard into the pool.
“Leave him alone, you piece of shit!” I screamed, moving closer to the edge of the pool.
“Hey, baby, we’re just having a little fun is all,” Guido #1 said as he grabbed me around the front of my chest and yanked me away from the pool.
I watched in horror as the rest of the guidos dove into the pool and swam for Joey. Slate stood at the edge and goaded them on.
“Let me go, or you’re going to be sorry,” I calmly told the son of a bitch behind me.
The idiot behind me laughed and held me tighter.
Joey was too fast for the greasy guidos, and he made it to the ladder. Must have been all that hair gel that made them all too slow. But, Slate was there to cut him off and shove him back in, slamming his body on top of him and pushing Joey under the water.
I could see Joey’s arms and legs ferociously kicking and flailing and struggling to get free as Slate held him under and laughed.
“Let him go!” I screamed. He was going to drown him!
Instantly, my arms reached up, one grabbed the collar of the jerk behind me, the other took hold of the arms that he had tight around my neck. Pushing my jaw into the crease of his elbow, I whispered, “Goodnight, big boy,” and did a perfect ippon sainagi. Kneeling and rolling forward, I threw the dumbass guido through the air and face first into the hard, tiled floor. He landed with a glorious wet smack, so loud it caused all the guidos to stop and stare at me.
No one but me saw Jase walk into the poolroom.
I lunged at Slate’s arms, sliding along the wet edge of the pool, as Jase dove into the pool towards us.
Clawing at Slate’s arms to free Joey until he finally let him go, Joey broke through the surface of the water sputtering and coughing.
Frantically, I yanked him over the side at the same time Jase caught up to us and helped me push him up and lay him flat on the ground.
I felt the tears spill out over my face, watching Joey throw up pool water, while desperately gasping for air, and I clung to his heaving chest, sobbing loudly.
The coach was beside us in seconds, and the school safety officers were pulling the sick guido pieces of shit out of the water.
They brought us to the main office and called Joey’s mother and the police. I still clung to him. We sat shivering, soaking wet, until they brought towels and wrapped us both together to try to stop our bodies from shaking.
Jase sat in front of us on the wooden chairs of the office and silently watched us. His eyes never left us. They scanned back and forth over Joey and me, wide and angry, over and over.
By six o’clock that evening, Slate Marshall and the other four students involved in the attack were expelled from the school and brought up on charges. The words were said to me, and my statement was asked, but I couldn’t focus on anything but holding Joey.
Even when we were driven home, they couldn’t pry me off him.
That night, Jase and I took Joey back to the beach, and the three of us just sat silently watching the waves lap against the sand. We stayed and watched the sunset and looked out on the cold dark ocean we conquered just the day before. I could distinctly remember sitting there, the gritty sand against my skin, the smell of salty water, and thinking that one day soon the tide was going to come in and wash my friends and my life away from me, sweeping them all out to sea…
As the memory faded and I sat across from a passed-out Bren, I knew that I needed to go visit Joey. It had been too long since I was near him; he always had the ability to ease my heart without ever having to say a word. Then, maybe I could figure out what it was I needed to do with the rest of my life.
Because every time there was
Something good in my life,
It was always overshadowed
By the bad.
Chapter 7
Jase
Brooke was in the locker room changing in front of everybody. The command didn’t have separate rooms for us, and nobody ever gave a shit, but now she was using it to her advantage. She had an audience of men watching her taking off those painted on yoga pants she wore. Then, for good measure, to make a solid point, she bent over dramatically to pick up something out of the bottom of her locker. She even pretended to look around a bit, waving her ass with its lacy little panties in the air for the whole damn precinct to see.
She was playing some stupid mind game and trying to get me jealous; I snorted out a laugh and turned my back on her, letting her put on her show for whomever she wanted. I didn't care what she did. I threw my belongings in my locker, jammed my Glock in its holster, and left without her ever realizing it. She was too caught up in her “Brooke” show to even notice. Forget that mess. I’m a grown man; I don’t play stupid high school games. Well, unless we’re talking about naked Twister or something like that; I’m always up for those games.
I was only ever jealous with one girl.
I was only jealous when it came to Charlie.
∞
Even when we were fifteen and all my thoughts were clouded with Charlie, the loser I was still hadn’t told her how I felt. We were sophomores in high school. Both of us had a few dates with other people, but nothing serious ever happened with them.
Then spring came, and with it came the blossoming of hard-ons for every teenage boy in the vicinity of any girl, anywhere, but especially anywhere near, or around, Charlotte Stone. Hell, even the mention of her name or the thought of her in a T-shirt…
I watched Joey as he scanned the field for Charlie. His eyes widened when he saw that jerk, Mason LeDoux, talking to her. Yeah, it made my damn gut twist up, but what the hell was I going to do? All the guys in the whole damn school seemed to have it bad for her—except for Joey. He was immune to Charlie. It baffled me that he didn’t spring wood every time she walked in a room. Everyone else did, and there was no way I could stop them all. And believe me, I wanted to. I even threatened a few, but don’t tell Charlie that.
“Jase, you better step up
your game and stop the stalling,” Joey said, giving me a hard shove to the shoulder. “Mason LeDoux looks like he wants to eat your dinner.”
“Shut up, Joey.” I gave him a glare and a harder shove back.
“You shut up, Jase. You have had it so bad for her for so many years and now you’re just going to hand Mason your girl?” He tossed me the basketball we’d been doing drills with in PE class as we watched Mason La Douche making time with my Charlie, my girl.
“I got it covered,” I mumbled, bouncing the ball back at him, knowing full well I didn’t have anything covered when it came to Charlie. “And you should talk! You’ve had a hard-on for Ava Marie since you felt her up at her thirteenth birthday party, but you can’t even say ‘hello’ to her without turning all green.”
His eyes narrowed and he hurled the ball back at me, slamming me in the side of the head with it, hard. I loved this kid like he was my brother but, damn! I could kill him some days. He always knew how I felt about Charlie, but the last few weeks he’d been giving me crap about it, calling me out on it, saying I needed to make my move before it was too late. The night before, he even went as far as unscrewing all the handles on every one my drawers, so that all my stuff fell all over the place when I opened them. Then, thinking he was so clever, he told me to ‘go get a handle on my love life.’ So, after that, I flipped him on the floor and did a full nelson on him.
The problem was, I had too much crap going on in my head, and I was freaking the hell out about telling Charlie. I couldn’t lose my best friend. That girl knew everything about me. She was my anchor. If I lost her… Just the thought of it made me feel like I was just going to die—or float away.
She was my family. She was my home.
It had gotten to the point where my father was never home, which was perfect for me, since then he couldn’t tell me what a “waste of life I was” or call me by my favorite nickname he’d coined endearingly for me, “useless piece of shit.” The man even set up a twenty-four-nurse service to take care of my mother; I swear I think he was screwing every damn nurse that came there. I had no clue how my old man’s dick wasn’t dribbling with pus and falling the hell off. I wished it would. I would’ve served him right.
It didn’t matter to me, though; I didn’t care about what happened at home, anymore. There’s only so many times you can try to help someone get out of a situation, like my mother, who refused to speak to anyone now. I just stayed the hell away. It worked for me—for them—for everyone.
Besides, it gave me more of an excuse to be with Charlie. Most nights, Charlie slept in the tree house just to get away from the pervy eyes of her mother’s boyfriends. Jesus, that woman had a lot of them, too. Whenever I saw Charlie’s little drawing light on, I’d sneak out my back door, climb up my garage, jump over, and sleep by her side all night.
She had to know how I felt about her, right? I mean, what guy would go to all that trouble to sleep next to a chick? And I do mean sleep.
Charlie waved goodbye to Mason and started walking toward us. Mason’s gaze dropped to her ass and then the jerk adjusted his dick through his pants. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he whipped it out and started losing his shit right on the field, while watching her ass sway as she walked away. Hell, I jerked off to Charlie every day. I kept a bunch of pictures of her in my nightstand, and I have one amazing video of her walking around in her little white bikini that I loved so much. I swear to you, when that tiny piece of material on a string was wet, you saw right through it. Yeah, I watched that video every damn day.
“Hey, guys. Wassup?” she grinned.
“Hey,” I croaked, my voice cracking like I was twelve again. God, I was such a mess around her.
Joey, again, shoved me on the shoulder. Hard.
“What the hell, dude?” I snapped.
“Oh, sorry,” he smirked at me and laughed. “I thought I’d try to push some sense into you, chicken shit.” He turned to Charlie before I could say something back to him, “So what’s up with that Mason dude? Your heads were stuck pretty close together.”
“Yeah, he just asked me to that spring fling dance next week.”
“What? What did you say to him?” I spat. A sudden burning sensation surged across my chest. She said “no” to him, right?
“Um, I said ‘yes.’ Girls like to get asked out to dances, you idiots. And I need the both of you to come to the mall with me on Saturday to help me find a dress,” The girl was actually bouncing on the balls of her feet. She was excited about this?
“The hell I am,” I snapped back, that burning feeling traveled down into my stomach and twisted in my gut.
“Yes. You. Are.” She held her hands on her hips and smiled that beautiful smile at me, the one that raked at my insides. “You’re both guys and know what guys think, so I’d like your opinion on a dress, okay. Please, Jase.” Her long eyelashes batted at me. “This is my first real dance, guys. I don’t want to mess it up.”
Damn, she was going to kill me if she went with another guy. “Charlotte Stone, you could go to that dance with mud from head to toe, and you’d still be the prettiest girl there.”
Her smile got even wider. “Thanks, Jase. But I wish you guys were coming with me too. Too bad you both can’t dance.”
Joey and I looked at each other, “Oh, hell girl. We can dance,” Joey went all drag queen on us, pulling his shirt up over his head like it was long hair. Laughing loudly, we both started dancing around her, Joey busting out with the Charlie Brown dance and me doing the Airplane and dry humping her leg. She covered her mouth, giggling.
Mason was squinting his eyes in our direction, grimacing.
I stopped dancing and hunched down in front of Charlie, like I always did when we were messing around, and winked at her, “Come on, Charlie, hop on. I’ll give you a ride back into school.” I flipped Mason the finger as he watched us.
She jumped on my back and wrapped her legs around my waist as I carried her past the field and track, back into the building. I even tried carrying her right through the doors to the girls’ locker room, but Ms. Hart, the girl’s PE coach, stopped me.
Mason walked in behind us, smoke coming out of his ears, nostrils flaring. Ha-ha, loser.
The day dragged on after that. Seventh period literature was the last class of the day where Joey and Charlie usually sat on either side of me.
As soon as he walked in the classroom, Joey had this pissed off look on his face. Joey was always smaller than the rest of the kids we went to school with, and I guess that’s probably why he was teased so damn much by the bigger dudes. Lately though, he was getting huge. He walked in the damn classroom and looked like some kind of menacing maniac, eyes all serious, demanding my attention. He had to be about 5’ 11” now, almost up to my 6’, and all the swimming and lifting weights we’d both been doing was transforming him into a monster. I was damn proud of him.
“Dude, you look all Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal Lecter; what the hell? You look like you’re going to disembowel someone,” I said, trying to ease his visible anger.
He gave me a hard glare and collapsed into the seat next to me. Leaning forward, he poked me hard in the arm, “I wouldn’t have to feel like I wanted to make a skin suit out of somebody, if it weren’t for your chicken shittedness.”
Slapping his finger away from my arm, I deadpanned, “One, screw off. Two, Buffalo Bill was the sick freak who did that—NOT Hannibal. Three, shittedness is not a word and four, screw off again. Now, tell me what the hell is going on.”
Joey threw his pen at me. “That Mason dude has been walking Charlie to every one of her classes today. Plus, he asked her to hang out with him tonight at the weeds to watch him race his bike.” He threw another pen at me, smacking me right in the head with it. “She said ‘yes’ They’re going out.”
“Are you kidding me?” The weeds was an area that cut off our neighborhood from the waters of the Jamaica Bay. It was an expanse of land about a mile long, with dirt tracks that the neighb
orhood kids rode their dirt bikes on, without getting in any trouble from the cops. It was also filled with giant ragweed, taller than me, and at the farthest end of it was a rocky beach that we sometimes built campfires on at night.
I watched his gaze move toward the door. Nudging his head to make me look in the same direction, “Check it out for yourself.”
There stood Charlie, clutching a handful of books to her chest, laughing at something Mason was dribbling on about. The whole scene cut me. My stomach churned and I jumped up out of my seat like a fool, making the whole desk tip over and crash to the floor. Damn it.
Charlie’s full, pink lips smiled at me, and I wanted to immediately rip Mason’s head off his body, thinking he might have touched them.
She gave Mason a wave goodbye and placed her books on the desk next to my fallen one. “Are you okay? Desk attack?”
Joey chuckled next to me. “More like a heart attack.”
“Shut up, Joey,” I hissed and looked at her. Damn, she was so pretty that it hurt. “I heard you’re going to the weeds tonight? With Mason La Douche.”
Her eyebrows furrowed. “Yeah, Mason LeDoux asked me to. He said you guys should come, too. Didn’t you say you were going racing tonight?” she asked, sitting down in the seat, her fingertips touching the edge of her books like they were some kind of shield for her.
“Well, I’m glad I got Mason’s permission to go. And what the hell? He’s walking you to every class now?”
She looked up at me with those deep green eyes, and I wanted to die. “Yeah, he just did it all day today. Why? What am I missing?” Her eyes assessed mine, looking for answers I didn’t even understand the questions for. “Are you okay, Jase?”
“Yeah, Charlie. I’m fine,” I said. “It’s just that he should be holding your books for you when he walks you to class,” I mumbled, grabbing my books off the floor. “I gotta get out of here…I’m going home. I feel like crap. See you later.”
So, like a coward, I left. I didn’t even take the bus; I walked and walked, and then after two hours, I went home. Like an even bigger coward, I walked through my front door with tears in my eyes. I was fifteen and my heart was crushed; it just never occurred to me that Charlie might like someone else. I just kind of thought she’d always be mine.