Chapter 29. Ethan
The alarm doesn't wake me. Liam does, or rather, the absence of him does, the sudden cold where his body was, the missing weight against my chest that my sleeping brain interprets as something gone wrong.
I sit up fast, heart already in my throat, and find him standing by the bed in his briefs, arms crossed, staring at his clothes lined up on the comforter. Not yet dawn.
"Hey," I say. My voice is rough with sleep. "How long have you been up?"
"Didn't really sleep. You know when you can't tell if you're asleep or not? The whole night like that." His hands are fidgeting at his sides, fingers drumming against his thighs. "My stomach's doing a thing."
"It's okay, baby. Daddy's here. Come here."
I swing my legs off the bunk and go to him. I hug him tight, then put my hands on his shoulders, feel the tension in them, and press my thumbs into the knots at the base of his neck. He exhales, long and shaky, and leans back into me.
"You're going to be fine," I say.
"You don't know that."
"I do. I trained you."
He chuckles softly. "They're going to wipe the floor with my face."
"Well, you do like pain," I joke. He laughs again, burying his face in my neck, and I kiss him. "Griff believes in you, and so do I. And you don't need to win. I never won."
"And you're much better than me!" he exclaims.
"The point is, you're going to have fun, and we'll be there together."
"Thank you, Daddy," he says softly. It always does something to me when he says things like that.
Then there's the buzzer, the groaning around us, the lights coming on automatically. I can tell we're all nervous. Maybe even me. But we get ready nonetheless.
We spend the day basically on autopilot. We leave at four, with the competition scheduled for the next day. The hours drag, and Liam is a ball of nerves by the time we all meet in the admin block and are taken to the parking lot.
We get to the white van, the same one that brought us in, with "Penitentiary System" written on its side and "Aspire Academy" below it, with a grille separating us from the driver.
We pile in. Reed first, and he takes the back corner, stretches his legs across the seat, and closes his eyes like a man settling into first class.
It had to be Reed. Tyler tries to sit as far from Reed as the van allows, pressing himself against the window in the front row.
Jack vaults in, catches his foot on the bench, stumbles, recovers, and drops into the middle row with a grin that says he meant to do that.
Dan and Cedric follow. Dan has dark skin and is always quiet.
Cedric is the same height as Liam, has brown hair and eyes, and sits beside Dan.
Santana slides in too, with his shaved head.
Liam climbs in, and I follow, taking the spot beside him in the middle row.
Our thighs press together in the cramped space.
Then Santos gets in to ride in the back with us.
Her name is Janette Santos, and she was the one who supervised Liam during meals last year.
Patterson drives up front, and Griff is in the seat next to him.
The gates open and we move. Behind us, Aspire shrinks in the side mirror. I love seeing it shrink like that.
Three hours of highway. The windows don't open, but the AC is pleasantly cool, and soon enough the kids start talking shit, as usual.
"I'm going to destroy someone," Santana says, cracking his knuckles. "I can feel it. The universe has aligned. We're getting into Scorpio season."
"The universe doesn't care about your fight record," Cedric says.
"The universe absolutely cares. I had a dream about it. I was a lion," Santana says.
Jack laughs, immediately hooked.
"You were a lion?!" Jack asks, as if it makes any difference.
Reed grunts at us for disrupting his beauty sleep.
"A big one, with a mane. It was very symbolic. I believe this shit. You can't tell me that being alive is just this physical existence."
Dan leans forward, his deep voice cutting in. "I once had a dream I was a fish. Doesn't mean I can swim."
"You can't swim?" Jack turns around, delighted. "How can you not swim?"
"I grew up in Akron. Where would I swim?"
"A pool? A bathtub? A large puddle?"
Liam laughs. I'm glad. Jack can always make him laugh.
The banter continues, escalating in volume and absurdity. Liam's leg bounces. I press my knee harder against his. He presses back. I lean close enough that my mouth is near his ear.
"Breathe," I say. "In for four. Hold for four. Out for four."
He does. He's always so obedient. I count with him silently, matching my breath to his, and by the third cycle, I feel his leg slow just a little bit.
Around the two-hour mark, when the talk has mostly died and we're just riding it out, I notice it clearly: the thing between Tyler and Reed.
Tyler shifts, adjusting his position, and his eyes flick to the back of the van for half a second before snapping forward again.
Then, a few minutes later, Reed opens his eyes.
He stares at the ceiling of the van, then his gaze drifts forward, directly to Tyler, and he watches him before closing his eyes again.
It's not a normal stare, though. It's a charged one. A weird one.
Liam catches my eye. He's noticed it too. We both nod. Liam smiles.
The highway narrows. Signs for Westlake appear. It's a forgotten little town. The van slows, turns, and the landscape turns suburban: schools, strip malls, and parking lots.
We get to the hotel. It's a Holiday Inn. Not the kind with a pool and a continental breakfast, but the kind with a parking lot that needs repaving and a lobby that smells like carpet cleaner. The sign out front is missing the L, so it reads HOIDAY INN.
But it's a hotel nonetheless.
Griff assembles us outside the lobby while Santos handles check-in at the front desk.
"Ground rules," he says. "You are representatives of Aspire Academy.
You will conduct yourselves accordingly.
No leaving the hotel. No disturbances at any time.
You may stay on the hotel premises, but if I even dream that you thought about leaving, you'll be sitting in the hole for the next month.
No more MMA, no more trips or breaks for the foreseeable future, and you'll definitely have time added to your sentence.
Same goes if I hear about any issues from the hotel staff. Are we clear?"
We say a variant of "yes, sir" in unison.
"Room assignments." Griff consults his clipboard, though I suspect he has them memorized and the clipboard is just a prop. "Ethan and Marsal, room 204."
Liam's body does a thing beside me, a full-body suppression of joy, every muscle engaged in the act of not reacting, which is itself a reaction so obvious that Jack snorts loudly.
"Hoffman and Farley Junior, room 206."
Tyler's head snaps toward Griff. Reed, who has been leaning against the wall menacingly, stops leaning and frowns.
"No," Tyler says.
"No," Reed says half a second later.
Griff looks up from the clipboard. His expression doesn't change. "That wasn't a request," he says. "Room 206. Key cards will be at the desk."
Tyler opens his mouth. Griff raises one eyebrow. Tyler closes his mouth. Reed exhales through his nose, trying to control himself.
"Perry and Santana, room 202. Smith and Hamilton, room 200." Griff tucks the clipboard under his arm. "You have thirty minutes to settle in. Then, team meeting in my room, 212. Dismissed."
We head to our rooms. Tyler and Reed can barely walk down the same hallway without glaring at each other.
"They're going to murder each other," Liam whispers to me.
I shake my head slowly. I know Reed wouldn't do anything that bad, but I still don't like the way he is with my brother.
The hallway on the second floor has stained blue carpet. The doors are spaced at regular intervals, each one identical, each one representing something none of us have had in years: a room with a lock that works from the inside.
Liam gets the key card to work on the second try, his hands shaking, and it's very cute how nervous he is.
The door swings open and we step into the room.
Two queen beds with white comforters. A TV bolted to the wall.
A bathroom with white tile and individually wrapped soaps. A window overlooking the parking lot.
Liam stands in the middle of it like he's entered a cathedral.
"There's a coffeemaker!" he exclaims. "Daddy! There's a coffeemaker."
"I see it."
"And little shampoo bottles. Look at them. They're so small."
I chuckle. "Yeah, baby. They're small, like you."
"I'm keeping all of them."
"They won't let us take them back," I say.
He scowls for a second, playfully, then goes to the bed, throwing himself onto it with his arms spread.
"It's soft," he says, a little muffled, and he's so cute I want to squeeze him.
Jack appears in our doorway, leaning against the frame.
"Quick PSA," he says, his voice like he's delivering grave news.
"These walls are thin. I can hear Santana unpacking from two rooms away.
So whatever you two are planning…" He gestures between us.
"Just know Griff will hear. Maybe you're into that. You never know…"
"We're not planning anything," I say.
"Sure. And I'm not planning to eat every snack in the vending machine downstairs." He winks. "Behave, children."
He vanishes.
Three seconds later, his voice echoes from down the hall. "Cedric! There's a vending machine! It has Doritos! Do you think we can convince Santos to get some for us?"
Cedric's door opens and slams. Two sets of running footsteps pound toward the stairwell, suddenly competitive.
"Cedric bet me twenty push-ups he advances further than me," Dan says from somewhere in the hallway.
"I said I'd last longer," Cedric calls from downstairs, which isn't good behavior in any sense of the word.