“My functional leg.” I sighed. “You’re really bad at this.”
“Sorry. I’m not usually friends with people who date guys. My social circle is more like… Well, I guess two points make a line. You and me form my social line. Before you, it was a social point.”
I listened to Marne ramble for a few more minutes before she made some excuse about lactose intolerance and the ice cream she’d had earlier, excusing herself.
All that was left was to watch Tristan. I’d overheard some parents on the way into the game talking about how this was a big game. That scouts from some of the biggest colleges were here tonight.
But when I saw Tristan heading to the sideline after a rough first quarter, he was staggering. When he looked up in my direction with his helmet off, I thought I could tell, even from here, that he was drunk.
My stomach sank. Maybe I should’ve wanted ruin for him after he’d broken up with me, but I didn’t. I knew what this meant for him. I just wanted to go up to him and smack him on the back of the head and ask him what the hell he was thinking? Why couldn’t he let good things happen for himself? Why did he have to ruin everything?
By halftime, Tristan had been benched. He’d thrown three interceptions and the only touchdown Parker had was because Cassian ran through half the other team on a handoff.
When the team came back out after halftime, Tristan wasn’t with them. I managed to get Logan’s attention before the players took the field. “Where is he?” I asked.
Logan took a deep breath. I could tell he was hesitating—trying to decide if he wanted to tell me or not.
“Logan,” I said warningly.
“Coach blew up on him in the locker room. Said he got the results of a drug test back. Tristan tested positive for marijuana and some other shit. And he was obviously drunk. Coach kicked him off the team.”
I closed my eyes. “Where is he?”
Logan shook his head. “He stormed out. I have no idea, Kennedy. But you should take care of yourself. If you go after him, you’re just going to get hurt.”
“Thanks for the advice,” I said, pushing my chair back out toward the parking lot.36TristanI sat on the hood of my car in the school parking lot. Behind me, I could hear the distant, echoey call of the announcer over the speakers. From the sound of the roaring crowd, I guessed Gage was playing his ass off at QB and leading a comeback victory.
Yippy Fucking Doo.
I was too drunk to feel the real sting of what had happened. That was the problem with making such a habit of being blasted. My body was starting to get used to it, and I couldn’t even tell myself the lie that all the pain was gone. I knew it was waiting, like some big ass rubber band that I could pull away from myself with booze, but sobriety always brought it snapping back to me with enough force to make it sting like a bitch.
I dug through my car, hoping I’d forgotten a bottle of something in the backseat. I tossed out my bag of spare clothes for practice on the pavement, growing more irritated as I realized I didn’t have shit.
“Tristan?”
I stopped, still hunched over in the back seat.
Kennedy fucking Stills.
I straightened to my full height. Part of me had expected her to come back—to be too damn stubborn to take the breakup for what it was. It was like trying to get a puppy to leave your side for good. You couldn’t just ask it nicely to go. You had to throw a few rocks, even if it made you hate yourself.
“Fuck off,” I said. I started getting into the driver’s seat, but she pushed her chair over and stood, balancing on the door so she could reach inside the open window. She snatched the keys from the car and sat back in her chair, pushing herself back slightly. “You’re drunk. There’s no way I’m letting you drive out of here.”
“There it is,” I said, spreading my arms wide as I got out of the car. “There’s the fucking judgment. I’d been wondering how long it would take you to just say what you’d been thinking.”
“What are you talking about? I’m trying to help you.”
I curled my lip.
All I had to do was pretend she was my parents.
Picture my mom’s face or my dad’s face in that chair.
The anger boiled up all on its own. “You want to help me? How do you plan to do that from your wheelchair? You’re the one who needs help, Wheels, and I’m done babysitting your ass.”
Her face had been calm, but something in my words seemed to break her. Her lip shook and her eyes looked glassy. “You don’t mean that. I know what you’re doing, you’re just—”