8. Calvin
CHAPTER EIGHT
calvin
What am I doing?
Going to Coach’s house to hang out with his little brother.
I must be totally insane. Maybe I got knocked in the head at practice or something. This is not a good idea. But I don’t know . . . maybe I’m just tired. Too tired to fight today. Too tired to be alone.
I used to have friends—or people I thought were my friends. I’d go over to their houses, and they’d go to mine. But that changed when I messed it all up by going after what I wanted. By letting the veil slip.
So what am I doing? Parking in front of Coach’s house and watching as Jonah climbs out of his truck and grabs both of his bags. I need to drive away, but for some reason, I find myself grabbing my backpack and climbing out of my truck.
Jonah walks over to me, a confident smile on his face as if to say he knew I would follow him. How he knew when I wasn’t even sure, I don’t know. “I can’t stay long,” I blurt out, but he only smiles at me.
“Come on. You can meet the gremlins.”
I assume he means Micah’s kids—who I have met, sort of. They come to practice sometimes, and they are at every single game, but I’ve never talked to them.
I follow Jonah through the front door of the modest, yet nice home after he punches in the key code.
It’s instant chaos, and I guess he wasn’t kidding about his house being loud as two blonde-headed little girls screech and run to him, wrapping their arms around his waist. “Uncle Jonah! You’re home! ” the older of the two says excitedly.
“I am.” He hugs them back and looks down at them with a bright smile on his face. Then he turns to me, gently placing his hand on the top of the taller one’s head. “This is my niece Ruby,” And then he puts his other hand on top of the shorter girl’s head. “And my niece Hannah.”
“Hi!” Hannah says, her eyes bright and wide as she looks up at me. “You’re big.”
This catches me off guard for some reason, and a surprised laugh pops out of my mouth before I can say anything. “Uh . . .”
Jonah chuckles and gently ruffles his niece’s hair. “He is. That’s why he’s so good at protecting me out on the field.”
He winks at me, and my brain scrambles, leaving me totally helpless and silent, just staring at him like an idiot.
The older one, Ruby, lights up though. “You protect Uncle Jonah?”
“I, um . . .” I stutter, still messed up from that sexy wink Jonah threw my way—and did I just think that was sexy?
I should go.
“Girls, give Uncle Jonah and his friend a second to actually come into the house. Geez.” Coach’s wife walks over to us with a big bright smile, her girls clearly getting it from her and her blonde hair. “Hello,” she says to me.
“Hi.” Good job, Calvin. At least I formed an actual word.
“You’re on the football team.” She says it like a fact, and I nod anyway.
“I am. Um . . . left tackle.” Yeah. Because she totally cares what position you play, dumbass. I should go back to the silent thing.
But her smile only widens as she looks at Jonah. “Ah, so your job is to protect this guy then.” She pokes Jonah’s bicep, and he laughs.
“He’s pretty good at it too.” Please don’t let him wink at me again. I can’t look at him, just in case he does, so I focus on Coach’s wife. “This is Calvin Duke, by the way.”
“Oh, yes. I’ve heard about you from Micah.
” That does not make me feel good at all.
In fact, it makes me a little ill, thinking about what he could have told her about me.
But I try not to show it, and honestly, her kind smile gives nothing away.
I don’t see pity in it or any concern. “I’m Jenna.
Micah’s wife. What are you two up to on this Friday evening? ”
“Oh, you know, thought we’d go to a club, dance all night, maybe wake up in another state with no memory of how we got there,” Jonah jokes, but I look over at him, horrified.
Coach’s wife just laughs. “Ha ha. What are you really up to? Something that won’t give your poor sister-in-law a heart attack, I hope.”
Jonah just chuckles but takes pity on her—and well, me too. “Just some homework.”
She looks suspicious but doesn’t call him on it, and she shouldn’t. I mean, that is why I’m here. To study. On a Friday night. With my teammate.
That’s it.
“Well, when you two get tired of studying, I’m making spaghetti for dinner.” She smiles sweetly my way. “You’re welcome to join us.”
Before I can tell her that isn’t happening, Jonah grabs my hand and starts to pull me down the hall. “Great! Thanks, Jenna! Come on, Calvin.”
I follow him and hear Jenna telling the girls they can play with Uncle Jonah later just before he pulls me through the door at the end of the hall which must be his room.
He shuts the door behind him, and I swear the sound is still vibrating in my ears when he drops his bag next to the door. “Jenna should be able to keep them occupied, but the closed door will deter them a little if they make their way back here.”
Right.
I look around the room. A simple twin bed, a desk, and a dresser is all that occupies the small, slightly boring room. Jonah must pick up on my nosiness as he sits down on the bed. “I just moved in, and since I’m heading to college next year, I didn’t really see the need to take over the place.”
I nod, still clinging to the strap of my backpack, unsure what to do.
“You can put your bag over there and take a seat. Get comfortable.”
What the hell is he doing? What is all this about? Did Coach ask him to befriend me or something? The lonely loser. Or is it worse? A sinister plan to fuck with me to fit in with the rest of the team?
I don’t move, and he watches me carefully. “I thought we were doing homework. Don’t we need our bags for that?”
He laughs easily. Does everything come easy to him? “You really want to do homework?”
“What else would we do?” I ask, hating that my voice trembles slightly, looking at him on the bed, his long legs stretched out in front of him as he makes himself more comfortable.
And why shouldn’t he be comfortable? It’s his bed.
It’s his room. I’m the oddball. I’m the one who doesn’t belong here.
Everything inside me is telling me to dart through that door and never come back, but the soft way he’s looking at me right now—not judgmental.
Not aggressive. Not making fun of me but just waiting for me to join him.
“Come sit down,” he says quietly, still not in a demanding way.
I drop my bag next to his and walk closer to him, but instead of joining him on the bed, I take a seat in his desk chair. “What are we doing here?” I ask, pushing my hand through my hair that’s still a little wet from my shower. Asking him but also asking myself.
“I think you could use a friend,” he says, sitting up a little and scooting closer to me, a playful smirk on his mouth. “I’m a really good friend.”
“Yeah,” I say, rolling my eyes at him, but also . . . I think he’s serious. And I think he could be.
Which is just . . .
I can’t do this.
I move to stand up. But he shocks me stupid again when his hand reaches out and grabs my wrist, sending an electric shock through me that sparks, sending intense tingles all over my body, and I stay seated.
I jerk my hand back, and he doesn’t look all that offended. If I’m being honest, he looks just as bewildered as I feel. “I don’t need friends,” I say carefully, waiting for him to argue with me.
To tell me how lonely he knows I am.
But that’s not what he does. He just sits there, staring at me like he’s thinking hard. It makes me itchy, wondering what he’s going to say.
“Well, I could use a friend.”
My brow crinkles, and I want to laugh at him, but that would be cruel when I’m pretty sure he’s being nice. “You’ve been here a week, and I’ve seen you chatting it up with plenty of people already.”
“I’m a friendly guy,” he says with a smile—confident as usual, but he’s holding something back. I can feel it. “But I wouldn’t say any of them are actually my friends. They don’t know me. They don’t know what brought me here.”
I won’t ask. I won’t. From the way he’s looking at me right now, it’s like he’s telling me something without telling me, and I can’t know it. I don’t know why I can’t, but I just know it.
“My dad kicked me out.”
All my hackles rise at once, putting me on high alert. No parent should ever kick their child out, but with the way he’s looking at me . . . like he knows me. Like there’s something we have in common . . .
I start to shake my head as he goes on, “He kicked me out when he found out that I’m g—”
“No,” I say abruptly, standing from my chair and already heading for the door. I can’t know this.
He can’t tell me this. Even if it’s all bullshit—which instinctively, I know it’s not. He can’t.
“Calvin, wait.” He reaches for me, just as I’m grabbing my bag and slinging it over my shoulder. “I want to tell you—”
“No,” I say again, much louder, my entire body shaking.
I hate that I’m a trembling mess, but he cannot tell me this. I can’t know this.
“Don’t.”
“Calvin, just . . .” He reaches for me again, but I pull away and reach for the handle, yanking the door open.
“I said no. I don’t want to know why your father kicked you out. I don’t want to be your friend. I don’t want to sit in your bedroom and swap secrets because you feel sorry for me and you’ve obviously heard the rumors.”
I’m still shaking, my hand releasing the door handle, my whole body vibrating with the need to get the hell away from him.
“Please, just talk to me. I want you to know that I get it. I unders—”
“You don’t understand shit,” I say, leaning in to him, mistakenly breathing him in but fighting the urge to do more than just smell him to be near him like this. “I’m not like you,” I sneer and pull back. “Stay away from me.”
“Calvin.” I hear his voice in a soft, sort of defeated whisper that nearly makes me trip over my own shoes on the way down the hallway.
I barely manage a quick goodbye to Jenna as she races to ask me again to stay for dinner and if everything is all right before I open the front door and dart outside, running to my truck.
I start it and take off before I lose my nerve and go back inside to the nice, loving home that is a refuge for Jonah—where I’m pretty sure Jenna would try to adopt me too.
I don’t deserve their kindness.
And I don’t want it.
I don’t.
I can’t.