Senior Squad

40| "You Can't Do Anything With Almost."

One Week Prior...

Lyle

"So, who was your Kryptonite?" I asked Toby.

"My what?" Toby's nose wrinkled.

"You know, your... guy. The guy you were with when–"

"I was outed?" Toby scoffed as he pulled out some weeds from the ground before wiping his forehead and facing me. He crossed his arms and said, "Well he was quite the stud. That's for sure."

"Okay." I chuckled. "How so?"

"He was... he was this tall, solidly built Hispanic dude that was real smooth."

"Aren't they all?"

Toby laughed and nodded. "Yeah, But this guy was like on an entirely different level of smooth. He made me feel understood even if he was just mimicking whatever I had to say."

"Then what happened?"

"Life. Life is what happened." Toby took a little breath and looked up. It was as if he knew what to say but couldn't say it. He then looked at me once again and told me. "Things were heating up. Not just on the soccer field but when we were together, sneaking around. It was so scandalous, I felt like a pastor's virgin daughter."

"I've been there before. Except instead of the pastor, it was his judgmental wife and that wife was my mother."

"Gotta love those zealots." Toby smiled and shook his head. "Here I thought they were going to catch me with a mighty young fellow when it was that very bastard who outed me in the first place."

"How?"

"Well after we won the state championship, I was proud of our... teamwork, that I kissed him only for that little asshole to pull away and everyone to be shocked. Seriously, they were horrified as if I murdered someone right then and there."

"Is it because of your manly image?"

"That and the fact that nobody in my community seemed to know, I mean come on! What kind of guy wishes the old Tom Cruise and Matt Damon were in a movie together?"

"You're a fan of them?"

"Yep. I'd cast them in a movie of my own and not just for the acting if you know what I mean." Toby flashed his eyebrows. I burst out laughing and he did too only for our laughter to be drowned out by the cries of a boy six feet away.

"No!" He begged as he struggled against the overseers trying to restrain him. "Don't send me there, please! Can't we work something out?"

"That depends," said the egotistic, dominant leader. He went by the name of Chad Tradeau. He walked the camp with his god complex radiating brighter than anything on this bleak place. I swore there was no soul in those beady eyes of his. Chad wasn't even a person. He was a living, breathing spawn of the devil who ruled with power, influence, and a heart riddled with sadism that shook me to the core.

Chad turned away with a devious smirk on his face while taunting the poor kid behind him. "So Robbie, do you get off to pictures of your irresistibly attractive brother?"

"It's Robert and no. Not at all. I promise."

"Well he sure looks like you." Chad pulled out a picture and flaunted it in the air for all to see. "You sure you wanna go with that story? He does have your eyes and those ugly rabbit teeth too."

"He's not my brother..." Robert desperately denied. He shook his head and sniffled. "That's my cousin."

"Oh, so you fantasize about him you worthless, inbred, piece of–"