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Tommy

There’s no feeling quite like being calledfaggotat age twelve by the kid you worship like royalty. Even at fourteen, people called Rowan Hughes the next Beckham, the next Messi. I believed it. Still do. Especially now, as he’s racking up insane stats as captain of the Sacramento State Hornets.

I played against his team in youth soccer back when. I’d just made it into the age bracket, and Rowan was on his way out, half a head taller than everyone else on the field. Sparred with him a little in the second half when Coach finally put me in. It was the best moment of my life, playing on the same field as Rowan Hughes. Even if we were opponents. Even if it was only for five minutes at most.

His team kicked our asses, and as we all shook hands after, he gripped mine tight enough to crackle my bones and send a shiver up my spine. He looked me dead in the eyes, his face still beet red from earning that win and sweat still rolling down the sides of his face. At the same time that I chirped, “Good game,” he snarled, “Suck my dick, faggot.”

I watched him walk off the field where all the parents were, and I don’t think I spoke one word the whole rest of the day. Until then, I never had two thoughts in my head about the concept of gay or straight, but there was a hole carved out of me that’s stayed hollow all these years. Funny how four dumbwords exchanged between near strangers can change the whole way someone navigates life. Then again, maybe I’m just too sensitive.

Annalese always calls me sensitive, and it’s always a bad thing when she does, like I’m letting her down. Ever since Rowan called me…that word, I’ve tried to be hard, but it’s…hard. It’s gotten a little easier since starting college. People aren’t as up in my business all the time. I’m not constantly on guard like I used to be, especially now I’m not playing soccer anymore.

But today…right now…it all comes crashing back. That hollowness Rowan carved out of me is still there, but everything else in me fills with pure, full-throttle rage.

It began as a simmer almost an hour ago when my boy, Malik, texted that one of his buddies thought he saw Annalese fucking around at some party she had tried dragging me to last weekend. That simmer turned to a boil when Malik sent receipts. A grainy pic of a packed apartment living room, where I see clear as day my girlfriend pressed up against some guy who looks awfully familiar.

“Word is she was all over him before they disappeared together for a good minute,” Malik tells me when I call, and I’m already seeing red.

“Who?” is the only word I can get out of my throat without screaming.

“Rowan Hughes, man. Fuckin’ team captain. On him like a groupie.”

I hang up after Malik makes me promise not to go ape shit, but I’m damn near close to flying off the handle when I call Lese up and ask her straight up if she’s fucking around again. Takes some prying, but once she starts crying, I know what’s up. Now, she’s sobbing through the phone, saying the sameshit she said last time.It was an accident. It meant nothing. I’m sorry. I love you. I’m coming over.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” I tell her, because I can’t look at her right now. I can barely see my steering wheel, and I’m staring right at it. Still parked in my space outside Ma’s house, because I can’t go inside like this. Heated and ready to punch something.

Lese is bawling the way she only does when I catch her acting out, and she’s pleading with me to “just listen,” but I’m done listening. Maybe it would be okay if it wasn’t with Rowan fucking Hughes. I didn’t get this crazed the other times, about the other guys, but this one hits different.

It takes some calling around, but I find out where Rowan hangs out on Tuesday evenings. I drive straight there. All the red lights blur in my vision, but I make it to McKinley Park without running myself off the road. I take it as a sign I’m doing the right thing. Finally standing up for myself. Things are done with Lese—for good this time—but the humiliation will devour me if I don’t take action. Maybe things haven’t been great lately. Maybe I’ve had my doubts for a long time. But she was my girlfriend, and I won’t let Rowan get away with hollowing me out all over again.

There’s some kind of pickup match going on at the far right soccer pitch, and I’m out of my car, marching across the field with my fists clenched. I haven’t been face to face with Rowan in years, but I watch enough of his film to pick him out among the other bodies sparring on the field.

He’s no longer the tallest guy out there. Peaked around sixteen at just under six-foot, but he commands every second of field time with the way he blocks, the way he moves with the ball, the way his body is built, and the way he carries what God gave him. My eyes find him immediately, and he’s theonly thing I see as I get closer and closer. My heart races with adrenaline, and I’m sweating in the cool air.Do not chicken out.

I can’t remember the last time I knocked someone’s lights out, but I won’t chicken out. I don’t care that he’s probably going pro with the next draft.

A second after he shoots a goal, his head turns across his shoulder, and I swear his eyes stare right into mine.

Closer and closer.

He’s shirtless, lean, cut and glistening, chest heaving, lips parted. He’s staring right at me, but there’s not a hint of any definable expression. No confusion. No realization that I’m here to fuck his shit up.

Closer and…something blunt crashes into the side of my face.

It’s not Rowan, though.What the fuck was that?

I’m on the grass, shoulder aching, and the left side of my face stings like I was hit with a hot iron. No, a soccer ball. It rolls off toward the side of the field. I flop onto my back, feeling wet grass through my shirt and suddenly dizzy as hell.

“What the fuck?” someone says from a few yards away, or maybe that’s just the voice in my head asking the same question.

I’m blinking up at the dark, cloud-stripped sky.What the fuck, and where am I?

It all comes back to me when I’m suddenly blinking up at Rowan Hughes. He’s standing over me, staring with his black brows lowered. He licks his lips, and they plump up, a shade pinker than his sweat speckled face.

“Hey, man. You good?” His voice vibrates deep, tickling that emptiness inside me he left there a long time ago. It feels strange. The first time he’s spoken right to me since middle school.

The pain in my face subsides quickly, but I’m too out of it to nod. Am I good? Something about getting knocked on my ass stole my fury, and now I’m left racking my brain for what to do next. Can’t fight a dude when my back is on the grass.