Long Pass Chronicles 01 - Outing the Quarterback (26 page)

The door flew open. “Hey, man, I been worried.” Jamal, barefoot and in sweats, came out and took his bags. “How’s your hand?”

“Okay.”

“What’s that?” He pointed at the Toyota.

“I sold the Ferrari and bought it.”

“You sure that guy didn’t step on your head?” He laughed and walked inside, carrying the suitcase like it was a plastic bag full of Styrofoam.

Big John looked up from his chair. “Hi, Will. Welcome to the Jones family.”

“Thank you, sir. I’ll try to make the addition to your clan short-lived.”

“Stay as long as you like. I don’t much go for that bullshit I saw on TV.”

“The game, sir?”

“Hell, no. The game was great. I mean that press conference last night.”

Will nodded. “I’m sorry to have involved Ev, sir.”

“I’m sorry they involved you! Damn, boy, whose business is it if you’re gay? Why didn’t you tell your father?”

“I did.”

Big John’s feet hit the ground. “You mean all that playacting was done with full knowledge that it was a lie?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Damn. You two go on upstairs and put Will’s stuff away, then get down here and we’ll eat. I think this man needs some family.”

“N
OAH
,
YOU
’
VE
become the number one sports fanatic in the restaurant. What gives, sweetie?” Penny leaned across the bar and jiggled his arm.

“Shhh.” What were they saying? He stared at the TV screen. One commentator had just said Will’s name.

A big guy who looked like he’d been a football player said, “What did you think of that pass by Will Ashford in the SCU game today?”

The white-haired commentator nodded. “One for the record books, Joe. And apparently he did it with an injured hand.”

“Yep. One player said he saw blood flying when Ashford passed.”

“Amazing.”

“But how badly is he injured? That’s his passing hand.”

Noah’s heart hammered. Fuck passing. That was his painting hand.

“We know he didn’t come back for the second half. Coach said he got stepped on.”

“Ouch.”

“It’s always a danger for these guys. Good thing they’ve got Sawicki. There’s a talented kid.”

They started talking about somebody else.
Shit!
What happened?
How badly hurt was Will?

“Noah, you’re pale, baby. What’s wrong?” Penny frowned.

“Will’s hurt.”

“Who’s Will?”

One of the busboys walked by. “Will Ashford from SCU. Don’t you know nothing, Mama?”

Noah grabbed the guy’s arm. “How bad is it?”

“Easy,
esse
. Don’t know nothing. He threw this pass like poetry, man, and then he went in the locker room and never came back out.”

Shit, shit, shit. Will bleeding. Not good. What if it was broken? Paralyzed? Damn, why did he throw that pass? Maybe he made it worse. Damned jockoid.

“Hold my drink order, Penny. I’ll be right back.” He hurried toward the back hall. Behind him, he heard the busboy say, “Didn’t know the hippie kid liked football.”

He didn’t like football. With every passing second, he hated it more. He grabbed his phone and pulled up the number he’d almost dialed five times since Will had left him in the parking lot. He stared at the digits. This was dumb incorporated. Will qualified as way too much trouble. The guy didn’t want Noah. Shit, he loved the inside of that closet, and Noah threatened his coziness. But, oh God, Will was hurt. His hand, his beautiful hand.

He dialed.

One ring, two, three. “Hi. You’ve reached Will.” Beep.
Shit, what to say?

“Will, this is me. I heard about your hand. Oh God, how bad is it? Don’t worry, okay. We’ll find a physical therapist. I can work with you. You can even learn to paint with your left hand, okay? Hell, it might do wonders for that jockoid style. Okay? Don’t worry.” Shit, what had he said? He clicked off.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Will would never call back. He’d laugh himself silly while he got precision superpower implants installed with his daddy’s money. What could Noah Zajack do for Will Ashford?

The phone rang and he hit connect so fast he almost dropped it. “Will?”

“Uh, no. Is this Noah?”

He frowned at a woman’s voice. “Yeah.”

“Noah, this is Mrs. Johnson from the College of Art. I’m sorry to call you so late, but there was a scheduling change.”

“Oh yes. Hi, Mrs. Johnson. What—”

W
HERE
AM
I
?

Will turned and his leg fell off the bed.
Oh, right.
He was curled on the narrowest daybed on earth. Smaller than Noah’s.
Don’t think about that
.

Soft snores filled the room. Jamal slept on the double bed across the room—across being a relative term, since it amounted to about three feet between beds. Will turned onto his back and stared at the ceiling. This was the first day of—his life. Emphasis on the
his
. What time was it?

He rolled onto his side again and could easily reach the back of the ratty, overstuffed chair on which his jeans were draped. Phone. He fished in the pocket and pulled out the cell. He had to go down today and get the thing put in his name. Fortunately, he had a bank account where he’d been stashing his stolen art tuition money. He could deposit his stolen 5K in there too. Hopefully, it wouldn’t take too long to pay that back.

Six a.m. Five missed calls. Not ready to deal with his father yet.
Yet? Shit, ever
.

He got up, grabbed his toiletries bag, and sneaked out the bedroom door to the shared upstairs bath. In the narrow room, he peed, washed up, and shaved with his left hand. That was a trick. It was hard keeping the bandage dry.

Outside the bathroom, he heard people moving around downstairs, getting ready for their day. Was he ready? They’d been so kind at dinner. Jamal’s mom and dad, Ev, and their brother Ty had all been there. With Ev’s encouragement, he’d told them about his passion for art. God, they’d loved it. Couldn’t say enough nice shit. By the time he finished dinner, he’d promised to do a portrait of Ev for the family and maybe one of Jamal too. Hell, right now he had nothing but time.

He crept back into the bedroom and sat on the daybed with his back against the wall.

Nothing to do. Oh yeah, a million things he could do, but everything felt like a giant jumble in his head. Nerves prickled under his skin and his heart felt—empty. Not hollow and awful like yesterday. Just a space waiting to be filled.

“Hey, man.”

Oh, right, the snores had stopped. Will looked up. “Hey.”

“Did you sleep?”

“Yeah. Like an f-ing baby.”

“All that heavy lifting makes you tired.”

“Heavy lifting?”

“Of your life.”

Will laughed. “Yeah.”

“What kind of job you gonna look for?”

He puffed his cheeks and blew. “I wish I knew. Everything’s just a big ball of ‘I don’t knows’ in my stomach. What kind of job to look for, where to go to school, where to live. Everything depends on everything and I don’t know where to start.”

“You plan to go to the city?”

“I don’t know. I might try to take classes at UCLA or Art Center, but I’m still kind of well-known there.” He shrugged. “I didn’t exactly plan this.” He leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes.

“You scared?”

“Shitless.”

“I’ll bet your dad is dying to take you back.”

“He’s called five times.”

“You haven’t dropped out of SCU yet. I’ll bet the coach hasn’t even officially written you off the team roster.”

Will opened his eyes and stared at Jamal. “Do you think I should go back?”

“Do you?”

The possibilities rolled over him. Money, security, support, approval, fame—certainty. His stomach tightened, rumbled. Every guy had a crisis now and then. Was this his? He’d had a plan. All he had to do was pick up the phone and call his father.

Noah’s beautiful, cynical face, just the way Will had painted it, flashed in his mind. Talk about accusation. But inspiration too. Will shook his head. “I’d rather die.”

Jamal’s face split in a huge smile. “I’m proud of you, man.”

“Nothing to be proud of. I’m running scared.”

Jamal sat against the headboard, his smooth, huge brown chest striking against the white sheets. He’d make a great painting. “Give yourself a break. You just made the leap less than twenty-four hours ago. Hell, you can’t expect to have everything figured out.”

“But I’ve always been a man with a plan. It’s weird—no, it’s scary to be without one.”

“Sometimes the best shit happens on its own. If you plan everything, there’s no room for the unexpected.”

“Thank you, Jamalcrates. That’s good wisdom.”

Jamal smirked. “What about Noah?”

Ice pick, meet heart. “What about him?”

“Well, damn, you’ve been dewy-eyed over this guy for weeks. He suddenly vanishes from the equation?”

Will shook his head.

“Use your words.”

“He doesn’t want me.”

“Come on, Wilhelmina, what does that mean?”

Will grabbed the pillow and threw it at the chair. “Would you want the guy who not only queered your chances for a major scholarship, but also got the press talking about what a poor, lovesick, little gay calf you are? Shit, I’d kill me if I did that.”

“Yeah, me too.”

Well, crap, his chest hurt more than his hand, and that was fucking saying something.

Under his hand, his phone buzzed.
Shit!
Will jumped a foot.

“Jumpy much? Is it your old man again?”

Will looked at the screen.
No
. He shook his head. It was a south county area code. The college? He clicked. “Hello?”

“Is this Will?”

“Uh, who’s this?”

“Hi, Will, it’s Mrs. Johnson from the College of Art.”

He smiled and let out his breath. “Hi, Mrs. Johnson. I know I left some stuff in the studio. I should be able to get down there tomorrow and get it. Is that okay, or do you need it out today?”

She seemed to be smiling. “Actually, I was calling about tomorrow. You see, you’re one of the finalists for the Milton scholarship, and they’d like to meet with you tomorrow.”

His mouth opened. Nothing came out.

“Will?”

“Uh, I thought that went to Donna Rios.”

“Oh no. Donna didn’t even apply for the Milton. No, the judges reviewed all the entries and you’re a finalist. Congratulations. So please plan to be here tomorrow at two.”

“Wow.”

She laughed. “I’m glad you’re excited. You don’t need to bring anything with you. All your materials are here. It will be held in the same studio as your master class. Good luck, dear.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Johnson.” He hung up and stared at Jamal like Santa Claus had just landed in the bed.

“What?”

“Remember that scholarship I told you about last night? The one I didn’t get?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m a finalist.”

“Shit, man, that’s great. Why’d you think you didn’t get it?”

“Kind of a long story about the artist who taught our master class getting pissed because I was fucking Noah, and so he recommended someone else.” He stopped. “Of course, that means Noah’s probably a finalist too. He’s a great painter.”

Slow down, heart
. Maybe he’d get to see Noah. Probably not if Noah saw him first.

“Do you think you can beat him?”

“They’ll look at both our work and decide. Our styles are so different.” He smiled. “He’s this hard-assed, cynical guy who paints like fucking Monet, all soft and dewy and shit.”

“Oh, you mean like your eyes right now?”

Will threw a pillow, and Jamal deflected it like a pro.

“He should get it. He’s busted his ass all his life just to paint while I’ve been dicking around with football and business school. Nobody gave Noah a free ride.”

“Hey, man, the only free ride you got was to everything your father wanted.” Jamal chuckled.

Will didn’t. “You’ve got a way with words, man.”

Jamal looked up.

Some weird heat pushed at Will’s eyeballs. Splash.

Jamal threw back the covers, jumped out of the bed in his boxer briefs, and landed beside Will in one move.
What the fuck?
The guy scooped him into a hug. “Not any more. You got your own life and people who want to help you live it.” He held Will at arm’s length and flashed those pearlies. “You’re an honorary Jones, my man.”

“Thanks. For everything.”

“I sure as fuck am going to miss you on that football field. I’ll have to start coming to art galleries and drinking tea with my pinky stuck out. It’s gonna be way bad for my image.”

Will punched Jamal’s arm with his left hand, which had the same effect as slamming his body part into a tree. Jamal rubbed it. “Ooh. Ooh. Seriously, I hope you get that scholarship.”

“I guess we’ll see.” No hoping. Hope never got him shit.

N
OAH
STOOD
in the parking lot and hitched his backpack higher on his shoulder. No blue Ferrari. They probably scheduled the interviews with the finalists separately. No chance Will wouldn’t be among them. Jesus, the man could paint. Or he used to be able to. But surely they could get the function back to normal. Oh crap, why had he called Will? The guy must be laughing himself stupid. Maybe with that asshole father.