Chapter 50
Luke
I drop into the next set before my brain can talk me out of it: twenty push-ups, fast, chest to floor, breath burning in my throat.
You’ve still got command, kid, but the zip—that late life on your fastball—it isn’t there.
Sweat runs down my temples and drips onto the mat, little dark splatters keeping time with my pulse. I flip over, crunches, then bicycles, then that damn plank that makes every muscle in my core quiver.
Your mechanics are clean, Luke, but the radar gun doesn’t lie.
Jump squats next, twenty of them, legs burning. Then alternating lunges, long and controlled until my quads are shaking.
Look, you’re smart, you’re gritty, you’re coachable. But without that extra seven, eight miles per hour, scouts aren’t coming.
No free weights today, just gravity, body weight, and the stubborn need to push until my mind shuts off Allison, Finley, betrayals and backstabbings and lies and secrets.
I collapse in my second bedroom, wiping sweat from my eyes with a towel. Maybe the workout will help me with sleep, which has come in fits lately.
My phone buzzes. It’s Grayson, of all people. Haven’t heard from him in a while. Whatever my current feelings toward his mother, I can’t project them onto him. Nor can I reveal anything to him. The kid adores his mother.
“Hey, buddy,” I say into the phone.
“Luke?” His voice sounds broken, shaky, high-pitched.
I snap to alert. “I’m here, Gray, what’s up?”
“I—I—I…fuck. I don’t know who else to talk to,” he says.
“You can always talk to me, kiddo. Anything. Tell me.”
“Um…” His voice is shaking. “I’m in town.”
“You are? You came home for spring break? I thought you were—”
“I’m in Chicago, downtown. Not home home. A bunch of us came in town for a few days, got a hotel room. Last-minute. I didn’t tell Mom. More of a guys’ thing.”
“Oh, I didn’t—”
“What’s going on with Mom and Dad? Are they, like, broken up?”
Two instincts pull me in opposite directions.
One is the uncle in me, the one who wants to shield him, keep him out of the blast radius, tell him everything’s fine so he can stay a kid a little longer.
The other is the brother in me, the one who knows exactly how bad things have gotten and hates the idea of lying to him.
“Gray, did you talk to your mother?”
“No. I just saw Dad.”
“Well, what did he say?”
“I didn’t talk to him. I saw him. He didn’t see me.”
“He didn’t— I don’t—”
“I saw him. In a restaurant. Like sitting by the window. I was on the street. He was with another woman, Luke. He had his hands all over her. What the fuck is going on? He’s cheating on Mom?”
Oh, Finley, you piece of shit. You just can’t help yourself, can you?
“Grayson…”
“Y’know, I always thought he was cheating. I did. I never said anything. Mom always put on her usual brave face and apologized for him. But I knew it. I fucking knew it!”
“Call your mother, kiddo. You owe her that. Call her right now. Okay?”
He exhales hard into the phone. He sounds like he’s outside. “You know something, don’t you? You must know. Mom would’ve told you.”
“I know…that they’re having some problems.”
He bellows out an exaggerated laugh. “The problem is him, that shitbag. Are they even still living together? I always wondered what would happen once I left for college. I could see Mom holding it together just for me while I lived at home, the big happy family and all.”
This is not my place. He needs to talk to Allison.
“I’m right, aren’t I?” he pushes. “What, does Dad live in the condo now?”
“I…Gray, I think right now, yes, he’s staying there. Really, call your mom. Please. Call her.”
“I gotta…I gotta go.”
“Listen, Gray,” I say, but the line goes dead.