He’s All That (LHU Men’s Choir #1)

1. Chapter 1

Ordinarily, Jake Fallon wouldn’t speak to Ezra Mitchell.

For one thing, Ezra sat all the way over on the other side of the choir with the second tenors. That was practically Siberia to Jake, who sat on the opposite side with the first basses.

But desperate times called for desperate measures, and Jake was desperate, so on Tuesday, before rehearsal started, Jake sat backwards in the seat in front of Ezra and smiled his friendliest smile. “How’s it going, Ezra?”

Ezra was doodling on the corner of his music folder. From where Jake was sitting, it looked like Ezra was drawing an upside down dick—complete with a hairy ball sack.

“Can I talk to you for a sec?” Jake asked politely.

Ezra glanced up at Jake through thick, red-framed glasses that looked like they crawled right off Sally Jessy Raphael’s face. He frowned at Jake with irritation. “What for?”

And that was the other thing. Ezra Mitchell wasn’t exactly the most approachable guy in the choir.

If there was a Leigh Howard University Men’s Choir Award for The Most Disliked, Ezra would win it.

Hands down. Especially since they’d had that mixer last year to welcome all the new choir members.

Ezra had stood off to the side, away from everyone, quietly drinking a soda, and wearing a dark blue T-shirt that had Ex-squeeze me with a cartoon hot dog squeezing a ketchup bottle on it.

Jake had thought the guy was odd, but nonetheless, Jake and some of the section leaders had tried to talk to Ezra and include him, but Ezra had scowled at all of them and rejected any offers to hang out.

So, Jake was going to have to handle this delicately.

“I heard, um,” Jake began, feeling intimidated, even though he could bench press Ezra Mitchell. The guy was tall and lanky and maybe one-fifty soaking wet. “I heard you were pretty smart and make good grades?”

Ezra stared at him. Jake noticed Ezra’s longish black hair covered up half of his face. It looked greasy and frizzy at the same time. He had some black hairs all over his chin and around his upper lip that looked like a half-assed attempt at a beard. Or a goatee? Mustache, maybe?

Jake glanced away from Ezra’s face to his T-shirt, which had Rest in Peas written next to a cartoon bag of frozen peas laying in a bed. “I was just wondering if you could help me out with my Stats class? I’m not doing so great.”

That was sort of an understatement. Jake was bombing Stats.

Hard. It was because he was stretched kind of thin these days with lacrosse on top of the men’s choir.

And there was his part-time gig at the country club, fishing golf balls out of ponds and sand pits, and then driving around cantankerous old men in golf carts while they made wisecracks about their wives.

He had to maintain a C+ GPA. Otherwise, he’d have to give up lacrosse or choir and he loved both.

Not to mention, if his grades slipped too low, his dad would freak and make him give up the choir.

Jake’s dad hadn’t been all that thrilled to find out his All-Star Athlete son was singing in a choir.

Jake thought playing a sport might help, but apparently it was making things worse.

So, Jake needed help, and he had heard Ezra was quite brainy. And he’d heard from a friend of a friend of a friend that Ezra sometimes helped people with their studies. Jake was hoping Ezra would be just as helpful for him too.

But Ezra looked less than helpful right that minute, frowning at Jake—or a half-frown at least, because his hair hid the other half—and tapping his foot with impatience. He’d stopped doing his little dick doodle, leaving the shaft incomplete.

“All right, guys.” Dr. Martin entered the choir room and set a big binder of music on the piano with a thunk . “Let’s get going. Get out the Robert Shaw Medley. We’ve got a lot of work to do.” He sat down at the piano. “Basses in your places, please.” He looked pointedly at Jake.

Jake sighed and went back to his seat.

So much for that , he thought as he got out his music and started the vocal warm-ups.

So now what? He didn’t want to give up lacrosse.

And he definitely didn’t want to give up the choir.

He’d put so much work into his first audition.

He’d prepped like a professional opera singer with breathing exercises and keeping his vocal cords warm with a cloth wrapped around his neck.

He was worried his athletic look would work against him.

At Jake’s high school, only the dorky, wimpy dudes sang in the choir.

Dudes that looked almost exactly like Ezra Mitchell.

It was social suicide, so Jake had decided to be Mr. Choir Boy in his room when he was alone, and Mr. Cool Jock around everyone else.

He practiced and practiced until he was sure he’d be good enough for the LHU Men’s Choir.

It was an honor and a tough audition, and a less-than-stellar response from his dad, but he’d made it. And he didn’t want to ruin it now with his damn Stats grade. He didn’t know what he was going to do.

After rehearsal, as Jake was putting his music folder away, he was surprised to see Ezra approach him.

“Meet me at the Au Bon Pain in the library,” Ezra said, putting his folder into his bookbag. Jake saw he’d been wrong about the dick drawing. It was actually an elephant with a long trunk and big cartoon eyes.

“Right now?” Jake asked.

“Half an hour,” Ezra answered and walked out of the choir room.

Jake stared after him a little stunned, but he decided he could kill thirty minutes by stopping by the post office on campus to see if he had any mail.

Freshman year, his parents sent him care kits filled with deodorant, toothpaste, and shaving cream as if Jake lived in the middle of a desert and couldn’t just take the bus off campus to Rite Aid.

Or maybe they worried he’d forget to do all those things being a busy college student.

Either way, now that Jake was a junior, his parents rarely sent him anything except birthday cards and sometimes a check.

After finding his mailbox empty, Jake made his way to the library. He took his time walking up to the fourth floor—where the café was—because he was still way too early, but as he got in line for a coffee, he saw Ezra was already there, hunched over some books at a table.

“We couldn’t have just walked here together after rehearsal?” Jake asked, pulling out a chair and sitting down.

Ezra put down his pen and crossed his arms. “This is how it’s going to work. I charge fifty bucks an hour. I only do Wednesday evenings and Saturday afternoons. And I only take cash. Upfront.”

Jake stared at him. “Uh, okay?”

“Tomorrow at six, meet me at the tables on the main floor. If you’re late, I’m peacing out and not coming back. You got it?”

Jake blinked. “Yeah, okay. I’ll be there.” He felt around for his wallet. “I don’t think I’ve got fifty bucks on me right now. Can I give it to you later?”

Ezra set his elbows on the table and leaned forward. “Maybe I can cut you a deal. If you do something for me.”

Jake was almost afraid to ask. “It’s not illegal, is it? I can’t do anything illegal. I work at the country club.”

“You sit next to Sean Campbell, don’t you? In the bass section?”

“Yeah, why?”

Ezra suddenly looked bashful. He bowed his head a little and looked away for a second. “Do you think you could… help me get a date with him?”

Jake was taken aback. “Say what?”

Ezra rolled his eyes. “If you’re some kind of homophobe or whatever—”

“No, no, I’m not,” Jake interjected. “One of my cousins is gay, actually. I guess I just wasn’t expecting that.” He paused, tilting his head. “You’re into Sean Campbell?”

Jake often thought—but not too often, of course, because that would be weird—that if the LHU Men’s Choir gave out an award for the Best Looking, it would be between him and Sean.

Sean looked like he belonged in a boy band with his soft curls and big blue eyes, but Jake thought his own jawline was better.

More square. And Jake was taller. And Jake thought he had a better smile.

And blue eyes, schlmue eyes , Jake had been told by many a young lady that his brown eyes were deep and soulful.

So—hypothetically speaking, of course—if there were ever such an award, Sean would be Jake’s competition.

And Sean sat right next to Jake in the bass section and on stage they were nearly dead center, the two most good-looking guys in the choir.

Jake wondered if Dr. Martin had done that on purpose.

But not that Jake had really been thinking about it all that much or anything.

So, Sean was okay. He was openly gay and seemed cool, although Jake had only been sitting next to Sean for one semester because some seniors graduated. So, Jake didn’t know Sean that well. He supposed Ezra could do worse.

Or maybe better?

“Why Sean?” Jake asked, genuinely curious.

Ezra shrugged. “I think he’s attractive. And we both like singing and music. So, we’ve got that in common.”

“Have you ever talked to him?”

Ezra thought about that for a second. “A couple months ago when we were moving all those music stands into the storage room, he walked past me and said, ‘excuse me.’ And then last week, he kinda winked at me after rehearsal.”

“Really?”

Ezra brushed a lock of frizzy hair from his face. “Well, it might have just been his contact lens or something.”

“I see.” Jake paused, thinking. “So, how much of a deal are we talking about here?”

“If you help me get a date with him, I’ll tutor you for free, and you’ll ace your Stats class,” Ezra said confidently.

“Hmmm…” Jake considered, tapping his chin. Then he shook his head. “I don’t know, man. I don’t really know Sean that well. And I don’t think he usually dates…” Jake gestured to Ezra, not wanting to say it, so Ezra said it for him.

“Dorks like me?”

Jake shrugged.

“Well.” Ezra scooted his chair closer. “What if I wasn’t a dork?”

Jake raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

Ezra looked at him for a few seconds, then around the café. There wasn’t anyone sitting near them. Ezra leaned in and lowered his voice. “Maybe Sean would like me if I was a little bit… cooler.”

“Do what?”

Ezra rolled his eyes. “I know what I look like, Jake. And I know what people think of me.” He sat back in the chair and picked at a fingernail.

“I just don’t know how guys like you do it.

Be all suave and easygoing and look good at the same time.

I’ve just never been able to be that way, you know?

And I thought maybe you could help me, since everybody seems to like you.

And you’re one of the better-looking guys in the choir. ”

“Really?” Jake beamed like a headlight.

“Well, besides Sean.”

“Oh.” Jake frowned.

Ezra crossed his arms. “So, do we have a deal or what?”

“I don’t know…” Jake studied Ezra for a moment or two.

How on earth could he make Ezra Mitchell cool?

Much less, get Ezra a date with Sean. It would take some work.

A lot of work. Maybe a couple of miracles.

But he’d get free tutoring out of it and a passing Stats grade.

No more worries about having to give up the choir or lacrosse, and his father would never know there’d been a problem. He’d be in the clear.

But there was something kind of bothering him.

Jake folded his arms on the table and looked over Ezra for a second. “You really want to change yourself for somebody else?”

Ezra adjusted his Sally Jessy glasses and said a resolute, “Yes.”

“Why don’t you just wait for the right person? Someone who likes you for you.”

“Nobody likes me for me. Trust me.”

Jake felt a little sorry for Ezra, which is something he thought he’d never feel. “People like you,” he fibbed. “Some of the time. I think.”

Ezra shook his head. “Gee, thanks.”

“You do come across kinda abrasive sometimes.”

Ezra leaned an elbow on the table. “It’s like, I’m always worried people are going to be mean to me, so I think if I be rude first, they’ll leave me alone.

I got the shit beat out of me in junior high, and part of high school until I joined the choir.

I found some real friends, you know? Then I come here, and I’m all psyched I got into the LHU Men’s Choir, because it’s like this big deal, but… ”

“But what?” Jake was rapt with attention. He’d never heard Ezra talk so much.

Ezra pushed his Sally Jessy glasses up his nose. “Then I saw all you guys, how cool and good-looking you all were, it made me feel like they’d made a mistake. Like I don’t belong here.”

“Well, Ezra, it’s not really about how you look. It’s about how well you can sing.”

“I guess.”

“And you can sing great.”

“Sure, second tenor.”

“You’ll get first tenor one day. Maybe next year.”

Ezra shrugged. “So, you gonna help me, or what?”

Jake sat back and examined the guy in front of him.

Dorky Ezra Mitchell with his frizzy hair, weird shirts, and Sally Jessy glasses—those were going to have to go, by the way—and tried to envision a New Ezra.

One that Sean Campbell would want to date.

Jake could almost see that New Ezra in there somewhere.

Almost.

And almost was close enough.

“Okay.” Jake reached across the table to shake Ezra’s hand. “You help me pass Stats, and I’ll turn you into the man of Sean Campbell’s dreams.”

“Nice.” Ezra grinned, returning the handshake.

And the deal was done.