Page 31 of The Jock
He looked up and down the block again before heading inside. He saw no one.
* * *
Classes started two days later,and despite Coach’s heavy sighs and his cajoling, Wes stuck with his major. Coach looked at him like he was making the biggest mistake of his life. But his dad’s tears and his mama’s pride kept him on his path, kept him following the fragile dream he’d had since before the NCAA and the NFL dominated his life. College. Degree. Future.
He kept his French class, too. Even though just thinking in French made his chest ache, made his eyes burn and his throat clench, he kept the eight a.m. fourth-year French class on his schedule. The rest of the house was dead asleep, the snores loud enough to shake the walls, but Wes was up before dawn, restless. He jogged for forty-five minutes through the dewy West Campus morning and then showered, started all six coffee pots for the guys, and munched a bowl of cereal, three boiled eggs, two square slices of American cheese, and a protein shake, dutifully notating everything on Google Sheets for the team nutritionist.Eat more calories, the nutritionist said. He said the same thing every day.Eat more.
Pay me, he wanted to shout at the phone.If I’m your best player, give me more to eat than just snacks at practice and protein powder to take home.Colton spent a thousand dollars a week on food. Wes scrounged for every calorie he could find.
That was an old argument, and one he wasn’t going to make a dent in. Wes poured a half cup of cream into his coffee, grabbed his backpack, and headed out the door.
Not many people signed up for an eight a.m. French class. There were seven other students, according to his registration, and when he walked in, he spotted six heads scattered at the tables around the room. Wes kept his head down as he slumped in a chair in the back, but he still heard the whispers of his name, saw the sidelong glances sent his way. Even the teacher beamed at him, starstruck.
Less than a minute before class started, the door swung open.
The remains of Wes’s heart slammed to a halt.
Justin hurried in, his textbook and notebook in his hands and his eyes down as he headed to one of the empty tables. He slid in right in front of the professor, trying to be unobtrusive despite his last-minute arrival. He was wearing running tights and a baggy long-sleeve T-shirt, and his hair was disheveled. Wes watched him pull the top strands back into a ponytail. The sides were still shaved, but his hair hadn’t been long enough to do that over the summer.
Jesus Christ, what was Justin doing in this class? Wes had picked it specifically because it was the worst possible time. He’d thought there was no possible way, if Justin was even going to continue with French, that he’d take this class.
And yet.
Wes slumped in his seat, pulling his ball cap as low over his face as he could. He stared at the table, at his lap, at his fingers as he worried the skin of his thumb. The professor’s voice droned as he introduced himself and briefly went over the syllabus, which was already posted in the online class module, before asking everyone to introduce themselves. In French, of course.
Justin went first. He lifted his chin, squared his jaw, and said, in flawless French, his name and his major and where he was from. The professor asked if he had been on the stay-abroad trip over the summer. He had a note in his records indicating he had two students who had attended.
“Oui,” Justin said, after a long pause. “J'étais là.”
“And we have another study-abroad student in this class.” The professor, a geeky man built like a string bean, his head like a birthday balloon rising from his thin neck, beamed at Wes in the back corner. “Monsieur Van de Hoek.”
Wes saw Justin tense. Saw his spine go rigid and his shoulder blades seek each other, racing for the center of his back. Saw his jaw clench. Wes looked away.
“S'il vous plaît, monsieur,” the professor said to him, still smiling. “Racontez à la classe de votre voyage en France.”
“It was, um.”
“En français, s'il vous plaît.”
“C'était bon,” he grunted. “J'ai beaucoup appris.”
Yeah, he’d learned a lot. He learned how gay he was. How deeply he could love a man.
Wes had been around guys his entire life, and never had he fallen for anyone like he’d fallen for Justin. He’d tried to tell himself the whole thing was just Paris, just summer, just study abroad. His mind playing tricks on him. The psychology of it all, being away from home. Away from responsibility.
Yeah, sure. Except he loved Justin, and that didn’t stop because he wasn’t in Paris anymore. He loved him, and he’d always love him.
Even if Justin was sitting ten feet away and projecting so much bitter hate from those rigid shoulders that the university could power the stadium with the force of his emotions.
The professor made it through the rest of the introductions, and then he asked everyone to partner up and to prepare five-minute presentations about what their partner did over the summer to share with the class. “Oh, s'il vous plaît,MonsieurSwanscott, MonsieurVan de Hoek? Since you both were in Paris over the summer, will you two be partners? You may share with the class what your experience was like and what you learned.”
Justin wrenched his head around, staring at Wes like Wes was human garbage. Like he’d murdered Justin’s family. Like he was beneath Justin’s attention. Wes slumped in his chair. Flicked his pen against his notebook.
Neither of them moved, even though the rest of the class had already scooted their chairs together and started sharing their summer experiences. Wes heaved a sigh and grabbed his books. Justin would not be standing up and moving to join him. The earth would cool, the sun would burn itself out, and the black hole at the center of the galaxy would swallow their solar system before Justin came to Wes. He knew that much. He made his way forward instead, taking the farthest seat from Justin that he could.
“Hey,” he mumbled. He stared at the tabletop. Dug his gaze into the plastic laminate. If he looked at Justin, he’d break down. Start begging Justin’s forgiveness.
Justin said nothing.
