Page 35 of Untouchable Player

“Or do you?”

“What?”

“Why did you look kind of happy at the prospect of bunking with your brother and his sweaty teammates? Did you find anything more out about Jesse?”

“No.”

“So you don’t know whether he’s gay or not?”

I shake my head. I realise, maybe too late, that Jesse’s sexuality is none of my business. If he wants it to be my business then he will tell me himself.

“He did turn out to be different than you thought though.”

I have to swallow a smile because Katie is like a fucking ninja at reading body language and she does not let things go.

“I guess, yeah. He seems like a nice guy. But even if he were into guys, he wouldn’t be right for me.”

I’m glad she doesn’t ask me why. I don’t even want to verbalise why. Because he’s a jock? Because, even though he’s not as dumb as people say he is, he’s never going to be a PhD student and I won’t be able to riff off him about my research one day in our New York City apartment? That sounds pretentious and ridiculous even to me.

“Hey, I have to go to class in a minute, but do you want to watch movies tonight and eat our body weight in chocolate?”

“That sounds good, but I don’t know whether I should talk to Harrison or go back home and try and talk to my dad or what.”

“Well, you can decide later,” Katie says, “whatever you decide is okay with me.”

When Katie leaves, I open my contacts and think about calling Harrison. This isn’t something I can talk to him about in a message, but I can’t imagine calling him either. I decide to just send him a message letting him know Mom’s staying at The Hilton for a few nights. Why does it feel like a betrayal? He has a right to know where she is, and she didn’t ask me not to tell anyone. I’d want to know if he’d walked in on that scene.

Jesse

Jones looks at his phone while we’re all changing in the locker room and says, “fuck!”

“What?” I ask.

“Nothing,” he shakes his head and puts his phone back in his pocket.

My stomach drops. Has something happened to Nate?

Jones doesn’t exactly run out of there like there’s an emergency, but he does look like he’s in a hurry, and worried.

I stuff my things into my bag as quickly as I can and follow him outside. I catch him just as he’s getting into his car.

“Hey, Jones, what’s wrong?”

He looks like he’s going to tell me to mind my business and jump in the car, but he pauses with his hand on the door.

“Just some family shit, don’t worry about it.”

“Do you need help?”

He pauses as if considering.

“If it’s private then…”

“Fuck it,” he says, “jump in.”

I don’t ask him where we’re going until we’ve stopped seeing the little college logo on lampposts everywhere.

“The Hilton,” he replies.

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