Page 183 of Wrath

"How do you know my name?"

He opens a compartment in the dashboard. "Left your wallet on a nightstand."

"Fuck."

"It's all good."

He drops me off in the parking lot of my apartment complex, looking like an angel who fell to earth with his glowy gold-blond hair and stunner face and what I'm pretty sure might be mascara. Masculine and...so pretty.

He looks down at me as I sit my seat up. "Give me your number,” he says.

I do, and take his shades off, and his hazel eyes hold mine for a long second. "Texted you. Save the number. If you ever need me."

He looks slightly wicked as he says it, like maybe what I need will be his dick. But his face softens as I look down at myself and ask would he like his clothes back.

"No, babe. Go upstairs and get a nap. It’s only lounge gear."

I nod, feeling my eyes tear a little, which is unfortunate since I don’t have any shades on right now. "Thank you," I manage.

Nobody's made me feel this good in...a while.

"Always." He winks.“Take care of yourself for me, okay?”

Can’t make any promises. So I just say, “I’ll try.”

Nine

Ezra

July 4, 2019

He's at the bar again. This time, in Auburn. Always at the bar and always with the drunk, glazed eyes, and always with his tired, halfhearted smirks, the little duck-faced, not-smile smiles.

It's the usual suspects, wearing dumb shit for the Fourth of July. There's the blond one he tags sometimes—DanielG6. I think that might be his boyfriend. Another guy—FinnyGuy12. And some girl named JennaWinnaBinenna. I like that one okay. I can tell she likes him, that she cares about him. It's in her face.

It's getting late—almost midnight—and I've got practice tomorrow. I went to the football cookout, but I only stayed for an hour and a half because there's no drinking before a practice.

Also because of this.My fucked-up obsession. Watching this guy that I don't evenknowas he lives his best semi-out gay life in fucking Auburn. My school's rival. This year, the infamousAuburn-Alabama game is happening down in Auburn, so I'll play on his home field. Assuming I get field time. But I already know I will. Bama lost their big star last year to the draft. There's a rising junior, Kip Hollis, who was second-string QB last year, but I'm better than Kip. I really like the guy; he joined the football yoga class, and I found out he’s pretty funny. But...his numbers aren't what mine are.

It's weird, but I think they’re gonna start me. Or maybe start Kip first, but they'll switch to me pretty fast.

Auburn's where my brain is almost all the time now, so I think about that game. Their stadium. I think about their campus, which I’ve looked up online. I can see its red brick crosswalks and the streetlights dappling the sidewalk gold at night, the red and black brick buildings, all the green lawns. I can feel the heat of the grass, heat that seeps up through the warm dirt, like it does on our lawns here.

Mills snaps chipmunks, their cheeks filled with nuts; cars some drunk ass parked all crazy; lots of bar stuff. I learned through his snaps that he doesn't have a car; he's walking everywhere. His calves are getting muscular from all the walking. He takes Pepcid, Advil, and drinks a Bloody Mary, of all fucking things, for his hangovers. There's a slanted lawn by his apartment building, and he lies there on a blanket sometimes just to get some sun. He's in a fucking frat, or will be later? I’m not sure the rules; I think rush hasn’t started. The frat where he’s been hanging out has a nice house with a kudzu-swathed lawn and a pond out front, and in the pond, there's a dock that just floats around. You have to row a boat out or swim to reach it.

I hold my phone, my back pressed against my headboard, waiting for the next snap. He snaps a few at a time, then takes a break and comes back usually about an hour later. I don't know why he likes Snapchat so much. Maybe he's doing it for the boyfriend.

Maybe he's just lonely.

He seems lonely to me. Not happy. I keep wondering why he never seems to drive. I see on his Facebook profile, in a picture that's not private, that he used to have a white Jetta. He's got eleven pictures public on his Facebook. It’s true I don’t know him, but I’m pretty sure he used to look a whole lot happier.

Maybe that's what I like about him. This started out with the MILLER on my arm, and it got more intense when I realized I have a stepbrother named Miller. But this obsession...it's more visceral. It's how he looks, yeah. He's hot. He's cute. I want to reach in through the screen and touch him. Also, he gives me that clenched-chest feeling—the weird one. Which may mean something.

But more than anything else, he looks alone. Like me. When the blond is around—Daniel—he smiles, but it's like he's just tolerating it. He posts a lot of snaps where he's smiling at his phone's cam with his cheek down on a bar's table. Or he's got his wavy hair ruffled, or he's rubbing at his dark brows like his head hurts.

The guy is self-deprecating. He'll get eviscerated at the bar and snap himself walking to class the next day with a light bulb icon above his head and the caption "genius." Below that, even smaller, "Van Gogh-style."

Van Gogh was a drunk. And so is Miller.

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