ᴍᴀᴇᴠᴇ ᴡɪʟʟɪᴀᴍꜱ
𝐈 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐑 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐃 rushing around my body. My head is spinning. I'm nervous. More nervous than I was on the first day. I still don't know much more from the party than what Guy told me. I'm embarrassed enough that I called him, and probably said things I shouldn't have. I don't remember. I just want to remember.
Adam is walking next to me. He is quiet. School doesn't start for another 45 minutes, so the campus is dull and empty. The building is beautiful but looks haunted--old and cracked. He wanted to come in early and get coffee. I think he wants to talk about something serious and is too scared to do it in his house anymore.
I let him be silent for as long as he wants. You can never push Adam to talk, you have to let the words form the way he wants them to form. Instead, I lightly press my fingers to his wrist and hold his arm.
"Do you know how much I hate Varsity?" he finally asks.
I shake my head. "You haven't really talked much about it since you made the team. I thought you'd love it--getting to play with people on your level and who can push you."
"Well, I like that part of it," he nods. "It was stressful, having to always be..."
"The best," I finish for him because Adam does not like to sound full of himself.
"But it's still hard, you know? I feel like I can never do anything right and I'm just trying so hard to be the player they all think and want me to be. Like, here's this new freshman, is he really as good as he's supposed to be? I guess I'm just scared that I'm proving them all right--that I'm not good enough to be playing up there."
"Are the guys mean to you?"
He shrugs. "It's difficult to describe. It's not like they are directly mean or saying mean things. It's more intimidation, I think. They always have this grin on their face when they look at me--like I'm in on this joke, but really, I don't know what the joke is at all."
"I think they're intimidated by you, A."
Adam laughs. "Yeah, okay. Why would they be intimidated by me? I'm 15 years old and on the third line."
"Because," I say, pulling him to sit on a nearby bench that faces a large pond. "How many of them can say they were 15 years old and on the Varsity third line? Very few. Whether you know it or will admit it, you are incredible at what you do, Adam. And it's not just because you're good. It's because of how much passion and heart you put into it. You work and you work. For every single thing you've ever gotten. Talent gets you far, but drive--real love for the game, gets you even farther. That's why they are intimidated by you."
"I guess I also just really miss you guys. Half of the ducks hate me now, and the other half pity me, so it's like--how would it be any different playing with Varsity now?"
"None of them hate you. None of them pity you. Jealous? Maybe."
Adam pulls on his fingers. I look at his hands. He no longer doodles in blue ink pen. There are no animals or 'C's anymore. I wonder when that stopped. "Charlie hates me."
"Why would you say that?" I question, moving his hair out of his eyes.
"Because he just does. He's not..." Adam mutters. "He's different now. He's not the same person he was last year. He's not the person I fell in love with, and that hurts."
"Do you still love him?"
Adam nods. "I don't want to, but I do. It sucks. Everything about this sucks. I just feel so stupid, you know? I really thought he might have liked me back. I thought that I mattered to him--when it was just the two of us..."
The world is beige. I stare at Adam while he stares out at the water. The wind blows, sending ripples across the pond. Two ducks flap their wings and fly over our heads.
"I just did the very best I could for him. I kept all his secrets. I lied for him. I did so much, and it still wasn't enough. Why isn't it enough? Why is she suddenly enough for him?"
Linda. This is about Linda, I realize. Adam knows.
"If Charlie is too blind to see this stuff, Adam, then he isn't worth this stuff. You deserve someone who will appreciate you and treat you right. You matter and your love is worth it."
Adam pulls at the skin on his face with his hands. His eyes are red and glassy. His cheeks are puffy and raw. "He has kissed me, and I never said anything. Not to you, not to anybody. Because he said he wasn't ready. I was his science experiment, even when I said I didn't want to be. I was his secret--this whole fucking secret for months because he said that the press would ruin it. I put up with this shitty feeling of thinking that I'll only ever be someone's secret for so long. I'm tired of it, Maeve. I'm just tired. Why did I let him do this to me?"
"Because love makes people do crazy things. When you love someone, you would bend over backward for them. But love, Adam, love isn't supposed to feel like that."
"I just never thought that he'd find someone else. I didn't think that he'd come here, and find this girl. It's over now, and I don't get any part of the decision. I'm never part of the decision. It's always whenever he wants me, or whenever he doesn't. We're together when he feels like it, but it always has to be a secret. It has to be private and no one can know because they'll ruin it--'someone else will tell us it's not right'. But it was always Charlie who made it not right. It's done when Charlie doesn't want to look in the mirror and face the facts. It's over when he tells me that he's not fucking gay."
I don't say anything. There are no words that would comfort Adam right now. I want to tell him that he will find someone, but that means nothing to him when the one person he wants, keeps up this wall.
Adam looks at me. "Is this how it feels--when you see Guy and Connie together?"
I hold his hand and lean into his side. He puts his head on top of mine.
"Yeah, this is how it feels."
☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆
"𝐇𝐄𝐘, 𝐇𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐑! 𝐖𝐀𝐈𝐓 up!"
He stops as I catch up to him. First period starts in four minutes, but I've never needed to talk to anyone more in my life.
"Oh, hey, Maeve."
"Please tell me you remember something from Friday night."
"I remember everything," he tells me.
"I need you to tell me every detail. I don't remember any of it."
Hunter scans the hallway for anyone who might be listening or watching. "You up for skipping class?"
I weigh my options. I could go to class and overthink every look I get. I could go to class and stress over the fact that I don't know what I might have done, while everyone else does. Or I could skip class, and possibly risk getting detention, but at least know.
In the end, I nod. He pulls me into a nearby janitor's closet.
"What do you want to know?"
"Whatever you can tell me."
Hunter says that he picked me up, just like we planned a few days before (he reminded me that he is a very good driver and has had his license for two months). He says that I wasn't in a good mood when we first got there because of the first game.
"The J.V. game," I clarify as the beginning of the night begins to come back to me. "We blew a nine-goal lead in the last period."
"I asked you if you wanted anything to drink. You said yes. And we just talked."
"We talked? We didn't do hook up or anything?"
"No," he answers, scratching the back of his neck.
"What did we talk about?"
"Family shit. You told me about your dad taking some letters from you back in California. I told you about how much of an asshole my dad is. We talked about everything, Maeve."
I closed my eyes. My dad. The letters. Guy. Memories started flooding back through my mind like they were just now plugged into my brain.
"And then you told me about Guy."
"What about Guy?" I ask, crossing my arms over my chest.
"You said that he was with some other girl now, but he wasn't supposed to be. And then, you said-"
"That I wasn't supposed to leave, either. So I guess it's my fault. All of this is my fault," I whisper.
"Yeah," Hunter nods, laughing a little. "And it kinda sucks, because I was really starting to like you, too."
"You liked me?"
"I do like you."
"Even after I screwed up?"
Hunter drew his eyebrows together and smiled like he didn't really understand me. "Yeah, Maeve. When you like someone you don't just stop because they mess up one time."
"No, right," I say. "I know that." I didn't know that, though.
"And then you called him."
"How many drinks in were we at this point?" I question, pinching the bridge of my nose.
"A lot, honestly. We weren't really counting."
"And he came. Guy actually came," I filled in.
Hunter nods. I can tell he's forcing a smile on his face. "And you left with him."
"We didn't do anything. I know we didn't. He's not like that."
"What is he like, then?"
I pause for a long second. I don't know what he's like. I can't put him into words. I realize that I either love him or hate him. "I grew up with him. He's kind of a big part of who I am. I think he always will be. We just understand each other, I guess."
He pushes his hand through his hair. "Maeve, I really want to ask you out. Like on a real date, I mean. But I can't do that when he's still this fresh wound. I'm not going to make you pick between us, but I just think it would be really hard for you to pretend that you like me if you're still hung up on him."
"I'm not hung up on him," I say, even though we both know it's a lie.
"You're a good person. I get you," Hunter tells me. "I don't want you to not be in my life."
"I don't want you to not be in my life either."
"So we'll make a deal. At the end of the hockey season, if you can really say that you're not hung up on him, then call me, and I promise you--I'll take you out on that date."
"And until then?"
He shrugs. "Just try to figure things out. That's all I want from you. I want you to be happy, whether it's with me or not. You have a complicated past and I'm never going to hold it against you, I just want you to be able to understand it fully before you tell it to me."
"No one has ever really done that for me before--given me time to figure things out."
"I had a feeling," Hunter says. "So, friends?"
"Friends."
☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆
𝐋𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐇 𝐈𝐒 𝐍𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐋𝐘 over when Les Averman mutters a warning under his breath. Like a dark cloud--actually, closer to a pool of rushing blood--the Varsity team, with their snottiness and all (excluding Adam), struts over to our table, aggravating grins plastered across the smugness of each face.
"Congrats on the Blake game," Rick Riley is the first to say.
"Yeah, right," Charlie grumbled. "We tied."
I lock eyes with Adam. He's as clueless as I am. He smiles a little and so do I.
"Hey, a point is a point. We're all Warriors now. You guys proved your guts."
I am sitting next to Russ. I glance over at him, also catching Kenny's eye in the process. The three of us exchange three words silently: not buying it.
"You guys all set for dinner Friday?"
"Dinner?" Russ questions.
"Well," Rick shrugs, innocent. "It's an Eden Hall tradition. Varsity gotta treat the freshmen to dinner. So, round up your posse and meet us at six at the Minnesota Club, downtown. Anybody needs a ride--we can take you."
I'm still skeptical. I look around at my table and discover that they have also all shared three words silently: let's do it.
"I mean, you guys do like steak and seafood, right?"
Averman laughs but Charlie is the one who answers. I see it now, what Adam was saying. "Yeah, we do!"
"Look," Cole says next. "I don't like you pukes. But this is a tradition. And at Eden Hall, I learned to care about tradition."
The upperclassmen walk away. Rick, on his way out, gives me a good, solid wink. I roll my eyes. He knows I was at the party, that I'm going out with his brother--or at least, was going out with his brother. Hunter was right when he said that Rick would never let it go. Perfect.
"It's cool," Adam adds lastly, quickly noticing that he is the only one left.
I laugh quietly when he waves subtly (and awkwardly) to me on his way back to the other side of the cafeteria.
"Well, if Banks says it's cool," I hear Guy murmur.
I turn to Averman because I know he's the easiest to get the truth from. "Hey, Les?"
"Yeah?"
"Why does the entire Varsity team have new jackets?"
"You don't know?" the boy questions, completely oblivious to Charlie trying to get him to shut up. Clearly, there's something here they don't want me to find out. "After the game on Friday, when they soaked all our clothes-"
They didn't soak mine, I want to say, but decide against it.
"Hey, Averman!" Charlie interrupts. "Shut up."
"No, Averman, don't shut up," I contradict. "What happened after the game?"
"Well-"
Charlie cuts him off again. "If Maeve wanted to know, she would have stuck around herself to help out. But she didn't. She had other plans--clearly demonstrating her priorities."
"You wanna talk about priorities?" I scoff.
I realize that our table is staring at us, listening to every word. I don't care, though. Someone has to knock Charlie off his high horse at this point. If it's me, then fine. Mess with Adam, I mess with you.
"Tell me what happened after the game," I insist.
"We froze the Varsity locker room!" Averman caves. "With the liquid nitrogen from the science lab!"
I smile sweetly at the two boys. "See that wasn't so hard, was it?"
"So where were you, Maeve?" Charlie grills next, even though he appears to already know the answer to this.
"Not committing a felony."
"Hm," he hums. "You sure? Or is underage drinking only a misdemeanor in Minnesota?"
"Oh, don't tell me you're looking into being a lawyer like Bombay. How shocking."
"Both of you, cut the shit?" Julie speaks up. "We destroyed the jackets. They got replaced. Problem solved?"
"Yeah," Charlie pretends to agree. "And Maeve is dating a Riley. Okay, glad we got that cleared up."
I narrow my eyes at the boy. "Hunter is just my friend."
I got up and left the table. Thank you, Charlie Conway, for rubbing it in that any chance I had at dating a Riley is now out the window because apparently, I'm hung up on Guy Germaine.
☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆
"𝐖𝐇𝐘 𝐀𝐑𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 so many forks?" Dwayne whispers to me in a panic as we sit down in the private room at the Minnesota Club. "What's this little bitty one for?"
I let him continue his nervous mumbling and hum a response when he says my name. I'm barely able to focus, though, because Guy is standing in the doorway, talking to a Varsity player, and he looks good. His hair is combed and glistens under the dim lighting. He looks really good. I almost want to pretend, for just a moment, that it is just the two of us. Like this is a date--a thing that real, happy couples would do.
I am brought back to reality when Connie enters behind him. I turn my attention to Dwayne.
"It's stupid," I tell him. "But the forks are for different parts of the meal."
"Oh," the boy says, his country accent as thick as ever. "Did 'Little Riley' take you here? Is that how you know all this?"
I roll my eyes. I'm about to answer when Dwayne grins widely.
"I'm only kidding, Darling. As long as he treats you right, it's none of my business."
Dwayne Robertson, a man of few words, but nonetheless, a man. I smile at him. To hide it, I lightly elbow his ribs and tell him he should be using the salad fork instead.
I steal a few glances at Guy throughout the dinner. Each time, I mentally curse myself and swear that I'll stop. And then I do it again. I didn't know it would be this hard to see him when all I want to do is reach for him. But reaching for Guy Germaine is like reaching across undiscovered waters--dangerous and unknown. It is a risk that few have taken, with even fewer tales of survival. Love, it is a tricky thing. I don't have a good track record with it.
"On behalf of the Eden Hall Warrior Varsity State Champion Hockey Team," Rick stands up, tapping the end of his spoon to the glass of his cup. "I'd like to welcome the future state champs, the Eden Hall freshmen."
Everyone clinks their glasses together in cheers and pretends to have a good time. I glanced at Adam wondering if they really had to say that whole title every time they talked on behalf of their team.
Rick Riley wasn't done with his speech apparently. "We're just glad you loaned us Banksie so that we'd have a chance to beat you guys in the annual Freshmen-Varsity showdown."
Oh God, here we go.
Rick tells us to stay put because they have one last surprise for us. I knew it the minute they proposed the idea in the lunch room. It was a bad idea. Coming here was a bad idea.
Adam gets up, too, when Rick nods to him. It's not easy, watching him follow them around like a lost puppy even though he feels like he doesn't belong. Adam Banks doesn't think he belongs anywhere, and I want him so badly to know, that he and I have always belonged. He's my best friend and he doesn't need the approval of the Varsity hockey team, to matter. But he leaves with them, anyways.
Rick pats Adam's back at the door. With one last devilish glance back at me, Rick Riley winks. And then the bill was brought out to the table, and I realized that I was not going to make it home in time for my 10:30 curfew.
☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆∵☆
𝐈 𝐀𝐌 𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐋𝐋 not particularly fond of Charlie in this current moment, but there is one thing that is for sure: ducks stick together. We are there for each other. So, when he said that we needed to respond, I was suddenly so far into this prank war against the Varsity team, that I'd almost forgotten why I wasn't in originally.
"Coast clear," Julie announced in a hushed whisper. "Come on."
Fulton, Luis, Kenny, Averman, Julie, and I (in all black, of course) were committing a felony, probably, by breaking into Eden Hall's boy's dormitory. To live on Eden Hall's campus, you had to be either an away student, like Russ, Luis, Kenny, Dwayne, and Julie, or you had to be an upperclassman. Lucky for us, almost all of the Varsity players lived in the dorms. Even luckier for me, Adam didn't.
We strung ropes from door to door while Averman stared at the stickers placed on random walls. Luis led us down the hall toward the rooms, in hand, two long tubes.
Julie and Ken maneuvered the pipes under the doors, waiting for further directional instructions from our lookouts--Connie and Guy.
"A little to the left," Guy's voice quietly said through the walkie-talkie. "Good."
Averman looked at me and wiggled his eyebrows. I slapped his finger down before he could try and poke my cheek.
"How's it look to you, Cowboy?" Guy asked Dwayne, who was patrolling the campus on a horse (stolen, crime #2).
"All good, I'll check the other side," Dwayne answered.
In the back of the intercom, I could hear Connie and Guy begin to bicker about something.
"Try not to look so jealous, eh?" Kenny smirked.
"I'm not jealous," I scoffed. When he continued to stare at me, I grabbed the tubes from his hand and started moving them myself.
Charlie and Russ joined us with a jar of Brazilian Fire Ants. With extreme caution, because they aren't called that for nothing, we funneled the ants into the pipes. They spread like wildfire, scrambling along the tunnels into the rooms of their unsuspecting victims.
The screams started a minute later. Then the doors wouldn't open. More shouting as the ants set in to do their job. This was too good. When the knots finally came undone, the boys sprawled out into the hall, scratching and slapping themselves vigorously.
They finally came face to face with us (Goldberg was wearing a bush on his head???), and the realization hit. Don't fuck with the ducks.
"You think you're funny, huh? You think you're worth a damn?" Rick shouted, his aggression blazing almost as much as his agony. "You're just white trash!"
"Uh, who are you calling white trash?" Russ asked.
Charlie shoved his flashlight in Rick's face, shining the blaring light directly in the boy's eyes. "Yeah, that's right. We'll take you anytime, anywhere."
"Tomorrow, dawn. At the rink!" he shouted, the rest of the group pushing past us to get to the showers. "And you're so never going out with my brother again!"
It's funny how they do that, men--think they can decide what or when I do something.