5. Five
Five
Cole
What a difference a year makes. Last summer, at this time, my guitar was strapped across my chest while I sang for a rapt crowd with my cheerleader girlfriend shouting my name from the benches.
This year, when Mitch and the other guys had asked about our regular opening campfire performance, I brushed them off.
“Stop being such a pussy, Michaels,” had been Greer’s response, “You’ll never get your girl back if you keep acting like a little bitch.”
‘Little bitch’ was exactly what my dad had called me, too, after I’d shit the bed at nearly every game this season.
It was a miracle we made it to play-offs, and I definitely couldn’t take any of the credit for it.
Hell, I wouldn’t even blame Coach if he stripped me of the captaincy next season.
Not that it mattered really, since I had probably ruined my shot at the NHL with my abysmal performance, just like I had ruined my relationship.
Originally, I might have blamed Toni for our breakup, but hindsight being what it was, I could see now that the largest part of the blame sat with me.
Thinking back to that night in the Creative Cluster was a painful reminder that, by the end, Michele had been afraid to be alone with me.
All because of my anger. And somehow, once that knowledge sunk through my thick skull, it was difficult to concentrate on anything else, let alone hockey.
Sure, there had been distractions aplenty on offer.
Once word of our breakup spread across MSU, girls started showing up to Badgers games wearing my jersey and offering themselves to me on silver platters.
But I didn’t want some random puck bunny.
So, instead, my school year had turned into a giant pity-party for one.
Now, I was back here, again, for round two as Boys’ Section Head.
Unlike last year, when my confidence and self-assuredness were at an all-time high, I was now equal parts too proud and too embarrassed to get up and sing.
From the back of the Point benches, I watched while Mitch led our camp band, the Back-Hill Boys, in my place. While they tried to harmonize, Mitch’s voice couldn’t quite catch the right notes, and it made my eyes twitch. A voice from behind caught me off guard, making me jump in place.
“His voice is shit compared to yours,” mumbled Xavier.
He stepped out of the forest to join me at the back of the crowd.
Even at our distance, the flames from the fire were big enough to throw their light to us and cast his face in relief.
His eyes looked heavier, almost sunken into his olive cheeks.
Maybe it was just the firelight, but everything from his face to his posture made him look tired.
“Thanks, I guess,” I finally answered, once he stopped to lean against one of the nearby pines.
I didn’t mean to, but while the guys sang on from the stage, I continuously flicked my eyes between their performance and my former friend.
These days, I didn’t know much about Xav’s life, but judging by the way his eyes were closed and mouth taut, and by the fact that I hadn’t seen him anywhere near Toni or Brennon all day, that shit had blown up in their faces.
Served them right. Of course it ended in disaster. Look at our history.
Still, when the Back-Hill Boys wound down their song, only to be replaced by Brennon, Xavi’s eyes flashed at the first notes of his gravelly voice.
Normally, Bren opts for folksy, nostalgic songs at the opening campfire.
Tonight, though, was all angry chords and vicious words.
Halfway through the first verse Xav was leaning forward like he wanted to storm on stage and clock the guy.
I wasn’t sure why I cared, but the question popped out before I really thought it through.
“You okay?”
His eyes shot my way, and he stared for a few seconds, his head tilting sideways like he was investigating my motivations. Then, his brown eyes narrowed.
“Why do you care, Cole?”
“I don’t.” I fired back, voice rising. A few of the staff seated in front of us turned their heads to look our way.
Xav laughed harshly, “Of course not. The great Cole Michaels doesn’t give a shit about anything other than himself.”
Shrugging his words off with a grunt, I said, “Whatever man.” I turned to walk away. Xavi giving me shit left me cold and hollow, feelings I didn’t need. But the second my back was turned, that’s when that fucker really let it fly.
“Yep, doesn’t give a shit,” he taunted loudly, “Not about his girlfriend or his friends.” And as his final potshot, “Or should I say ex-’”
The mask of indifference that had held so firmly in place all year finally cracked, and of course, it was anger that did it.
I launched myself at Xavier, grabbing him by both shoulders so I could slam his back against the tree trunk over and over again.
When the singing stopped, I wasn’t sure.
All I could focus on was Xavi’s mocking question, though I could feel the weight of the crowd drawing closer, the whole camp watching our fight, reveling in the rise he was getting out of me.
“Would kicking my ass help you feel like a big man?”
Or worse still, his snide comments like, “I already knew you liked it rough, no need to prove it now.” By that point, we were ringed by onlookers, and through the buzzing in my ears, I could just make out the sound of a few people calling out encouragement and one feminine voice yelling, “Stop! Please, stop! Coley!”
Neither Xavi nor I moved, locked in our fight until he finally tossed out the one jibe that sent me swinging for him, “If you wanted a hate fuck, Cole, you coulda just said.” My right hand flew for his jaw, but the hit never connected.
Not with its intended target, anyway. It wasn’t until I heard the audible gasps and several shouts of “Holy shit!” That I looked beyond the end of my fist.
Straight ahead of me, dragged back from the tree I had slammed him against, Xavi was being held back by Brennon.
Bren’s guitar was nowhere in sight as he fought to restrain a raging and disheveled Xavier.
All traces of his previous sarcasm were gone, and now he looked ready to kill me.
When Michele’s blonde ponytail flicked against my face, I looked down and realized why.
Why Mich was shouting at me and why Xavi had turned rabid, spit flying from his mouth as he screamed and threatened me.
I couldn’t hear any of it, though. My hearing zeroed to nothing at the sight of Toni, her face already red and swelling fast, lying beneath me on the ground.
Her limbs were thinner than I remembered, her skin gaunt, even in the firelight.
I might hate her. Her face might fucking torture me every time I had to see it, but she’s always been strong and stubborn.
Not the fragile-seeming girl looking back at me.
Never, not in a million years, did I ever want this.
“T-... I…”
My throat closed over my apology. I wanted to beg for forgiveness.
Toni deserved a lot of my anger. She’d turned us into criminals, after all.
But that strike was never meant to be hers.
I stepped towards her, desperate to help, or apologize, or do anything to redeem myself.
I was stopped by a human wall made up of Abbi and Michele.
Abbi spat at me, “Don’t even think about it, Michaels. I’ll rip your balls off.”
“Abbi,” I begged, “It was an accident.”
“I genuinely don’t give a fuck,” she replied, crossing her arms over her chest, blocking my view of Toni altogether.
“I meant to…”
This time it was Michele who spoke up.
“We all know what, or who, you meant to hit.”
Hearing her disappointment was almost as gutting as watching Isabella help Toni stand. Sadly, Michele said, “Cole, I think you should just go.”
My ex was right. I stepped back from the girls, flooded with shame that the entire staff team had just witnessed me lose control.
I practically fucking blacked-out with rage.
I looked around, expecting horrified faces, but the whole campfire was empty.
Other than Brennon and Xavier, who were still locked together at the fringes of the forest. That didn’t last long.
Xavier ripped himself free of Brennon’s grip, sprinting away into the woods.
Brennon lumbered off quickly after that.
Leaving just myself, Toni and her friends.
Hell, even the fire had been put out. With some distance between us, one at a time, the girls turned their attention from me to Toni.
They circled her and offered soft comforting words that I couldn’t quite hear.
Slowly, letting Toni set their pace, they moved as a unit in the direction of the nurse's office. They passed within feet of me, and while Toni never looked my way, the other three watched me with hard stares as they walked. It felt like I had broken something I didn’t know was there to break, and looking at her, head downcast, I finally forced the words out.
“Toni… T, I’m so, so,” my voice cracked, “sorry.”
Toni never replied, and the girls just kept walking in silence.
I watched their backs until they crested the hill.
Alone in the darkness, exactly where I deserved to be, I slumped my ass to the ground and dropped my face into my hands.
Only when my cheeks connected with my palms did I notice the dampness on my skin.
For the first time in more than ten years, I was crying.
The last tears I could remember shedding were the ones that fell the day Dad picked me up from school to tell me Mom was gone.
That she’d left us and left me with him.
We sat in the front seat of his truck, and the second my tears started to fall, my father grabbed my jaw, forcing my fat little face to look up at him and said, in his hard angry voice, “Don’t be such a wimp, Cole. ”
Thinking about my father was always fucking depressing, and I generally tried not to do it, but as regret coursed through me, there was no escaping memories of him, memories of Toni’s trial, and all the shit that followed with me, Brennon, and Xav.
I wasn’t sure how long I sat in the dirt, reliving my worst memories and wishing the soil would swallow me whole.
From above me, a voice said, “Get up, man.” I raised my head from my arms to find Mitchell looking down at me with his hand extended. “You look like a damn bitch.” I chuckled, internally thanking the universe my tears were dried and gone, before reaching out and letting him help me to my feet.
“Come with me, brother. I think there’s someone you should meet.” He nudged his head towards the Centre Circle and, gutless as I still felt, I followed.
As we walked, Mitchell prattled on.
“I’m not saying that bitch didn’t deserve a good smack but probably wasn’t a great idea to do it in public.”
He smirked and my gut turned over. How was this guy the closest thing I had to a friend?
“And maybe don’t mention it just now, yeah?” He said, once we crossed the Circle and the threshold for the Section Office.
Inside, seated in my chair, was a hulking figure with their feet kicked up on my desk. All my notes about section programs had been pushed into a pile on the floor. Normally, I would have cursed and lost my temper, but the last thing I needed tonight was to hulk-out again.
Heavy boots hit the office floor with an angry bang and the chair spun in place to reveal a guy with dusty brown hair.
When he stood, he nearly matched my six-foot-one height.
And he was big, not in the athlete kind of way, not really, more like the steroid kind of big.
I was exposed to more than my fair share of juice heads at the school gym to recognize the look.
My real problem, however, wasn’t any of that.
The problem was that looking back at me was a twisted version of a face I knew far too well.
The freckles, the nose, and goddamn, the eyes were all so familiar, but their combination, which on Toni’s face added up to something beautiful, looked warped on a masculine face.
He extended an open palm towards me, “Francis Barrett, nice to meet you, Michaels.” I shook his hand, unsure if the chill of his skin was real or imagined.