Page 141 of Call the Shots
Montoya brought me to the couch. “If you want to get drunk, you can get drunk with us, June. You don’t have to drink alone.” He dropped his voice to a whisper. “Bear swore us to secrecy.”
“Secrecy?” I repeated.
“He said if anyone finds out you got alcohol poisoning, he’ll break a finger for each person who gets told.” He grinned, sheepish. “It’s cool knowing a secret like that. Not one where you’re hurt! But a bone-cracking secret.That’spretty cool.”
Montoya had no idea. The Gladiators had no idea how I’d gotten that drunk—Bear kept his word. My heart thumped steadily, and I pulled a pillow to my chest as the door opened again.
“You’re looking better,” Fridge remarked, giving me a side hug, leading the way for more hockey players.
“June’s back!” Charlie announced, drumming his hands on the back of the couch.
Pickles ruffled my hair. “Shouldn’t have left in the first place—I can’t believe Mom’s still gone.”
Denali took one of the chairs. “Sorry it doesn’t smell better, I tried to convince them to shower before the homecoming.”
There was a team-wide vote on what to watch—most wanted a gruesome trucker massacre movie—but when Montoya heaved through the trailer, they switched to a video game instead. Wrapped in blankets, I snuggled with Montoya while his character kept falling into endless abysses.
The door opened again, and I glanced over my shoulder to see Bear. He made his way to me, quiet, and placed a bowl of orange slices in my lap.
Careful to shield his screen from everybody else, he showed me a picture on his phone.
It was my cardboard box.
There were my old calorie-counting journals, my weight goal dress bunched in a ball of pink fabric, a pile of tiny, indiscernible shreds of the polaroids, and other things he picked from around the dorm. My scales from the bathroom, the bedroom, and under my bed. My food scales from the kitchen. Stickers he must’ve peeled off my water bottles—excuses don’t burn calories!My monthly gym calendar, fitness trainer business cards, and little odds and ends I didn’t realize I’d been collecting.
“What do you want to keep?” he asked, his voice soft.
Bear was so close, I could feel the heat from his body. Maybe it was instinct, maybe it was because it felt so good to hug him earlier, but I leaned against him.
“I don’t want to keep any of it.”
“Okay,” he said simply and moved to leave.
“Bear?”
“Mm-hmm?”
I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “Can you add the flowers too? And the nametags? And the crown?”
“Uh-huh.”
Bear looped his arm around my chest, pressing me to him. His cheek brushed against mine. It was a two-second hug before his hold disappeared and he left the dorm. I could feel the eyes on me. The guys were curious, but none asked questions.
I’d been waiting to burn the box in a bonfire, toss it in a woodchipper, have some kind of climatic ending but that never came, and it felt like the box grew roots in retaliation.
I didn’t need a climatic end. I just wanted to sleep without being haunted by a blurry gloss over the truth.
The truth wasn’t two sizes smaller. The truth was my hair falling out again, my nails cracking. The truth was the constant headaches, the ones so bad, I’d pass out from them. If I worked to get two sizes smaller, I wouldn’t just hear the ocean. I’d sink into the water and wouldn’t make it out.
Gingerly, I picked an orange slice and bit into it.An orange is around sixty to seventy calories—I dismissed that thought.What’s an orange?They’re delicious, I always loved oranges, and I was touched that Bear cut one up for me.
I needed that peace more than I needed to handle it myself. I needed to get better more than Ihadto do it on my own.
Twenty minutes later,Bear appeared. I thought he would’ve said something about the cardboard box but he didn’t mention it. He took the seat on the couch next to me and stretched out.
“You don’t get a controller,” Sully said, eyes glued to the screen.
“Don’t want your ass kicked?” he chuckled.
