Page 18

EIGHTEEN

EASTON

I walked into the locker room quietly, greeting those guys who greeted me. My spot was on the other side of the room, near the hallways leading to the shower, and I tossed my duffel on the bench.

“Easton,” Elio said by way of greeting.

“How’s it going?” I asked, neither committed nor confrontational.

Elio licked his lips. “I was wondering if we could talk after.”

I shrugged. “Sure.” Perhaps I should have expressed interest, but I couldn’t find it in me to be compassionate right now. What would we talk about? Would he tell me he was ready to rival Kyle for my position? He had been lukewarm about the whole thing. As if not stepping on my toes made it better. As if letting Kyle have the captaincy removed the fact that Elio was another favorite.

Patrick’s ears perked up when he heard the short exchange. He nodded once to himself, then strapped on the protection for his calves.

I changed quickly, putting on my jersey and my pads, tying the laces of the skates, and picking up my stick before leading the team out. All coaches were present, which failed to fill me with confidence.

Coach Webber’s hands were behind his back. He was a tall, muscular man, his normally dark hair dusted with a few silver ones, white streaks combed back from his temples and above his ears. He had been a pro player early on but left that career behind in order to have a more stable family life. His wife and sons lived in Chicago, too. The younger of the two sons studied at Westmont, but he didn’t play hockey.

I watched Coach Webber’s stiff expression as he scanned the team. “Alright, boys,” he said, his voice carrying effortlessly. “We had a tough season. That is normal. Don’t ever let anyone tell you it’s not. There isn’t a player out there who hasn’t had a bad streak.”

Mutters of agreement rippled through the Saints. They weren’t inspired, and they didn’t pretend to be.

“What truly devoted players will do isn’t easy. There’s no time to lick your wounds. You will reassess. You will focus. You will adapt. It may require making difficult decisions, but we are not here to search for individual glory. If you’re after that, you’d better try fencing or tennis. No. You are a team. I shouldn’t have to tell you this. Being part of a team means putting the whole above any one part of it.”

A pained groan was rising through me. This was it. This was the day I had been afraid of. Coach Webber was going to replace me, and I couldn’t do shit about it. I’d failed the Saints every step of the way.

Accept it , I whispered to myself. Accept it because you can’t fight it. Use it. Use it to reinvent yourself and rise stronger because of it. Then, as I thought about the origin of this idea, I understood. After every defeat and every betrayal, Jace had absorbed the blows and grown stronger. Be more like Jace , I told myself, bracing for the inevitable.

“Today, you will practice as you have practiced so far. It may be confusing; the structure of your team and the leadership are scattered, but pay attention. Today, you will make the decisions that will define the rest of the season. These will be the decisions you will have to stand by for the rest of the year. Am I understood?”

I glanced around. Kyle wore a smug expression, his face red and veins standing out on his forehead and neck. He looked like a bull, all muscles and confidence. He had plenty of votes among the Saints, although not the majority. Not if it were between him and me. Or him and Elio. But as Elio and I tore up the majority between ourselves, we practically handed Kyle the victory.

My gaze turned to Elio, who seemed dull and emotionless. He gazed forward, not looking at anyone. He was aware of the attention that was directed at him, but he didn’t acknowledge it one way or the other.

Finally, I looked at Patrick, whose eyebrows rested flat over his eyes and whose lips were a thin line of anger.

Assistant Coach Garner began to outline the strategies we would work on today when Coach Hurst hurried to join us. I hadn’t realized that he had gone out during Coach Webber’s speech, but now he whispered furiously into Webber’s ear.

Webber’s face turned dark, and he stormed out, following Hurst. Both men were in panic mode, and my senses were alert. It felt as though an earthquake was imminent. But that couldn’t have been the case. It was something that bore the same destructive power.

Coach O’Brien followed out while Coach Garner remained with the team.

“What’s going on, Coach?” I demanded.

Garner looked at me pleadingly, as if begging not to be put in this position. “We seem to have a problem.”

“Yeah, we can tell,” Kyle said, a few bulls around him sniggering.

Garner’s phone buzzed, and he pulled it out of his pocket. He frowned, glancing once at Kyle, then put the phone back into his pocket. “We best wait for Coach Webber to return.”

But it wasn’t Webber who came for us. It was Hurst, and he consulted briefly with Garner before gesturing to the hallway that led away from the ice.

Garner turned to us and put his hands on his hips, inhaling a deep breath of air. “Alright, team,” he announced. “There is an issue that will require everyone’s attention. Remain calm and follow me back to the locker room. Understood?”

“Aye, aye,” a few of us said, but bewildered gazes clashed throughout the team. We filed down the hallway and into the locker room, where Coach Webber was flanked by the other two assistant coaches. The two were frowning at their phones.

A sense of doom opened up in the pit of my stomach, cold and slithery, and I bit my lip hard as I waited for someone to tell us what the hell was going on. Several of my teammates in the back of the group fidgeted, some reaching for their duffels and their phones.

Nervous whispers floated from the back.

Coach Webber cleared his throat. “Settle down, everyone,” he commanded. It had an immediate effect. “There is some unfortunate news that has deeply disappointed me. One of the maintenance men working on campus and with a storage room in this rink has just been taken into custody after an anonymous tip alerted the authorities of an ongoing possession and distribution of illegal drugs.”

The whispers turned quickly into demands to know more.

“Who?”

“Who’s the dealer?”

“What drugs?”

The crowd’s questions rippled through the locker room until Coach Webber raised his hand for silence. “The man in question is DJ Jones, and we simply don’t know if anyone else is implicated. The authorities are taking this matter into their own hands.”

I frowned. That was bad enough for Westmont, but I didn’t understand why they took us off the ice to tell us. This DJ person was neither the first nor the last university employee who moved drugs or broke the laws in one way or another.

But Lennox asked the question that would explain it all. “Did everyone get this email?” He raised his phone. “Did we all get it?”

My phone was in my duffel on the other end of the locker room. But Coach Webber’s face darkened even more. “Settle down!” He rarely roared like this, but the words thundered through the locker room, and we all stood still, only our heartbeats drowning out the silence. “A serious allegation has been delivered to everyone on the team, it seems, and we don’t know who else. It’s possible that the NCAA will be investigating this immediately, as the previous allegation led the authorities to find the drugs in the rink. But in order to do our due diligence, we will begin an investigation as well.”

“What investigation?” I asked, unable to keep my voice down. This was ridiculous. If they thought they had a team made up of drug addicts, they had to be stupid. We were athletes, every single one of us. These guys barely indulged in a few beers on Saturday nights when the season kicked off. “What is this goddamn email?”

“It’s Kyle,” Patrick said, raising his voice, his gaze on his phone’s screen. “Someone is saying that Kyle is taking performance-enhancing drugs. The ones in DJ’s cabinet.”

“Bullshit,” Kyle barked. “That’s slander.”

“Silence,” Coach Webber yelled again. Then, when not everyone grew completely quiet, he proceeded in a quieter tone that demanded we listen carefully. “The accuracy of the tip regarding the suspect in custody and the timing of these accusations merit it. Hobbs, you are suspended until you are tested. The results will speak for themselves. And as the allegation against you suggests that you’ve previously purchased epitestosterone in order to pass the regular tests, you will be tested immediately. This discussion is over.”

“This is bullshit,” Kyle cried.

“The rest of you, I will see on Monday,” Coach Webber said loudly, rendering Kyle’s protests inaudible. “Just know that the reputation of this team is hanging in the balance. Rivalries are a natural occurrence in competitive sports, but celebrating the disgrace of one of you, be it factual or not, will not be tolerated. Should the NCAA request it, you will all be subjected to further and random tests due to these events, and you will do so gladly. You are all dismissed.”

Coach Webber turned on his heels and marched out of the locker room. O’Brien was red and furious, walking toward Kyle, while the other two assistant coaches oversaw it. His test would be immediate, and he wouldn’t be able to fake it.

But he wasn’t budging despite O’Brien’s quiet urging.

“Don’t you see what’s going on?” Kyle demanded, his voice booming. It truly was deeper than it had been before. The changes weren’t just the product of my imagination, shifting from liking him to hating him. He was bigger, older, rougher. He was using something. “These are lies,” he cried. “I bet it’s Easton who sent them. He’s jealous. Can’t you see? He wants to be the captain, and he knows he’s losing it. And if that’s not enough, he has a good reason to see me off the team. You didn’t know that, did you? You didn’t know he’s a pervert. That’s right.”

Blood boiled in my veins. My face heated up. My heart pounded in my chest, but my feet were stuck to the floor, welded to it so I couldn’t move.

“He wanted me to bend over for him. Ask him. Fuck, guys, just look how red he is. He wanted to screw me, and I didn’t let him.”

“That’s enough!” O’Brien screamed, outraged beyond his usual quiet grimness. “You will follow me immediately, Hobbs, or you are off the team permanently. Screw your tests.” O’Brien grabbed Kyle’s shoulder pad and practically dragged him into the hallway.

The silence that settled in the locker room was worse than any I’d ever heard. Nobody had raised a voice against Kyle’s accusations. Nobody had said a thing except O’Brien, and that guy had been Kyle’s ally. I doubted he stood up for my sake. It was more likely that he was sick of his protégé digging the hole deeper.

I looked around the locker room, my heart thundering so loudly that I wouldn’t hear it if someone spoke to me. But nobody did. Not one goddamn friend or teammate said a word to me.

They all undressed with methodical speed, then put on their regular clothes and did not speak to each other. I stood in my uniform, turning around while the locker room spun and spun.

One by one, defeated and deflated, my teammates left the locker room until only Elio and Patrick remained. Both of my friends had changed out of their uniforms.

I looked at Elio, who seemed hot with fury. “Congratulations, Captain,” I spat, driving another wedge where I couldn’t build a bridge. Even now, he couldn’t speak up for me.

Patrick sat on the bench, looking at his hands. Elio stood, tall and muscular, his head held high.

“You both know he’s full of shit, right?” I demanded. “That wasn’t how it happened.”

“But it happened,” Elio said tightly.

I choked, my mouth opening and closing without a sound.

“Something must have happened. He didn’t make it all up,” Elio said, the accusation thick in his voice.

“I…” Again, my voice cut off, but I stammered on. “It’s not…the same. I just…I thought… Fuck, Elio. He led me on. He wanted to…together…”

“Spare me,” Elio said. “I don’t want to hear the details.”

The terrible confusion that had fogged my mind lifted abruptly. I understood what this was, and it made me hot with anger. “He lied there, and you didn’t say a word.”

Elio’s cheeks were pink and darkening. “Why should I? They’re already gonna think I’m like you because we were friends.”

“And that’s your problem?” I demanded, taking a step forward. I was padded, and Elio wasn’t. If it came to it, I had a great defensive advantage, even if he was bigger. “You were scared they’d think you’re gay?”

Elio winced. “I’m not. You better remember that.” He sidestepped me and slammed his shoulder into mine as he passed. “And I’m not your friend.”

“Because of this?” I asked, my voice torn between emotions. I didn’t know if I hated him or longed to reconcile with him.

Elio spun around. “Because you’re selfish,” he said. “You led me on to be friends with you when I wasn’t a threat. You risked my reputation by…by keeping me close and doing whatever the hell you did to Kyle. And you made me your enemy as soon as the coaches favored me.” He turned away from me with cold dignity and walked away.

“Wait,” I said.

“Go to hell, Easton,” Elio said without turning back. He left the locker room, and tears stung my eyes. Angry tears. Tears of hate. Tears of losing a friend in the worst way I could have imagined.

I glared at Patrick, who still sat, his blue eyes on me. He shook his head defensively. “Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t say anything.”

“No. You didn’t.” I ripped the pads off my shoulders. “You better tell me I’m going to hell and run before someone thinks we’re fucking in here.”

Patrick sucked his teeth. “You’re not my type, Captain.”

My heart trembled. Was it hope or fear? I didn’t dare to hope, though. “Don’t you have a slur for me?”

Patrick rolled his eyes and shook his head. “I don’t care who you sleep with.”

“So long as I do it in my four walls?” I asked.

Patrick rose to his feet calmly, but his expression was like a brewing storm. “You need to back off, Easton. Stop baiting me for a fight. I’ll rip you apart if my patience runs out, and I’m really fucking trying to have some understanding for you.”

That shut me up just fine.

“Last year, you were the voice of reason in this locker room,” Patrick said. “From the day I joined this team, whether they liked you or not, the team respected your opinion. You were impartial, and you were coolheaded. Sure, we lost all the games, but nobody blamed you for it. You blamed yourself for it. And whatever the hell happened with Kyle, I don’t think you deserved it. But you let it change you, and we can smell it.”

I pressed my lips tightly into a line, not trusting them not to quiver.

“You have to stop fighting against the whole world,” Patrick said. “Because if you don’t, you’ll quickly see that you’re outnumbered.”

A silence followed, thick and stuffy. My will to fight went away, but the depth of my misery remained. “They all hate me because I’m gay.”

“No, they don’t,” Patrick said.

“Elio does.”

“Then he’s a piece of shit,” Patrick replied. “The rest of them are just cowards. It’ll take time to see that there’s nothing wrong here. And if you didn’t bite every hand offered to you, that would go a long fucking way in mending things.”

“So what? I should be understanding when everyone else runs in fear of the homo in the locker room?” I asked, bitter and angry once again.

Patrick shrugged. “I never said it was fair.” He picked up his backpack and tossed it over his shoulder. “I’m sorry it happened this way.”

I nodded.

“But it’s not over, Easton,” Patrick said. “I still believe in you.”

“Yeah,” I managed to whisper. You and what army? I wondered. There was no cliché camera pan revealing an army behind Patrick. It was just him, a lone guy with a short fuse and a scowl on his face. He stalked away from the locker room and left me alone in my failure.

Perhaps I couldn’t fight the whole world. Perhaps I didn’t need to. But as I walked out of the rink long after all of them had gone, the tall figure with arms crossed on his chest and a sharp gaze fixed on the door sparked enough of the fuel in me for one more fight.