Chapter 2 #2
“Dude, did you leave anything up there for the rest of us?” Scott joked as he took stock of my overly full plate.
“What? I’m bulking up. You might want to follow suit.” Scott was fast, but mainly because he was skinny as hell.
“Works to my advantage. Last season I was only caught stealing twice. I’ll take speed over strength any day,” he mumbled around a full mouth of pasta.
I would never admit it to anyone aloud, but while my main motivation for the extra workouts was to prove my father wrong, I also had an ulterior motive – to be finally big enough to fight back.
“So I guess that means you won’t be joining us in the optional weight-lifting session tonight, huh?” I asked as I sank down into my chair.
“No, we’ll be there. Even though it says ‘optional’, we know they keep track of those things,” Eric answered for both him and Scott. “Our coach back home would kill us if he found out we didn’t do everything that was ‘optional’. He’s quite the overachiever.”
“Sounds familiar,” I grumbled under my breath, wondering if their coach was as mean about over-achieving as my father was.
We laughed through the rest of dinner, sharing horror stories about our coaches and laughing about some of the stuff that went down that day. For the first time in so long, it felt cathartic to be with friends and not have to worry about anything.
However, stepping into the weight room a few hours later brought the worry back in full force.
Determined to prove my father wrong, and maybe finally shut him the fuck up, I grabbed a pre-printed workout routine from Coach, and then Eric, Scott, Dylan, and I hit the circuit.
After forty-five minutes, our arms and legs were shaking and we were covered in sweat.
I tossed Dylan a bottle of water and sat next to him on the bench where he was sitting, his head in his hands wiping away the sweat with a towel. “Hey, man, you okay?”
He didn’t say anything at first, swigging back most of his water in one huge gulp.
He made another pass with the towel across his face before finally looking over to me.
When he did, it was as if he was seeing me for the first time, as if I hadn’t been in the same room as him for the last hour.
“Yeah, I’m good.” He stood from the bench quickly, again without even looking at me.
When he got to the door, he turned around, an almost sad look on his face.
“Must’ve ate something funky at dinner or maybe I’m just shot from the long-ass day. I’m gonna head back to the room.”
When he walked away, I knew that something else was bothering him, but I was in the zone and needed to get in another round on the circuit before I could call it quits.
Standing at the head of the bench, I spotted Eric on his second round of bench-presses. “He okay?” Scott asked from the other side of the bench, tipping his head at the doors through which Dylan had just left.
I shrugged before helping Eric place the bar back in its holder. “Yeah, I guess. Just tired probably.”
“No, I mean like…” Scott’s words fell silent as Eric stood from the bench.
Eric shot him a glare and gritted out, “Dude,” as a way to silence whatever Scott was just about to say.
I stood back, watching the entire exchange pass in the blink of an eye, not really sure what to make of it. “What do you mean?” I folded my arms across my chest, my voice taking on a defensive tone.
“Nothing. He meant nothing, right, Scott?” Eric shot him another look as he twisted open a bottle of water.
Scott straightened his back, took a deep breath, and puffed out a “whatever,” before facing me. “Is he,” rather than using his words to complete the sentence, he flipped his hand back and forth, “you know? A fag?”
I’d like to think there wasn’t anger or hatred in the way he spat out the word “fag”, but then I’d be lying. I’d also like to say that my world didn’t spin a little, threatening to swallow me whole as the word tumbled out either, but then again, I’d be lying once more.
Scott, a kid who I’d known less than twenty-four hours, had put a voice to what I’d always thought about my best friend, but could never say myself.
He’d also put a voice to my own darkest secret – one which would never see the light of day.
Knowing there was no way I could let them think that, or let them see my faltering, I recovered quickly and tossed my sweaty towel in his face.
“No way in hell. I’ve known Dylan my whole life.
Don’t you think I’d know if he was queer?
” A feeling of betrayal punched me in the gut at calling him a queer, even if it was only intended to defend and protect him.
It still makes you a coward.
“No need to get your sac all twisted. I was just curious.” Scott punched me jokingly on the arm, and all I could think about was whether I’d been convincing enough.
Twenty minutes later, when we were all done with our workout, the three of us trekked across the campus to our dorms, more than exhausted and in desperate need of a shower.
When I got back to my room, Dylan wasn’t there, but it was clear he had been.
Shrugging off the unease from the early conversation, or accusation depending on how you looked at it, I showered quickly, not wanting to focus on the possibility of Dylan being gay.
Or the reality of me being gay.