Page 89 of Fair Catch
Gavin watched me a long moment. “This isn’t about school at all,” he said, and it wasn’t a question. “It’s about Riley.”
“What are you tal—”
“Don’t,” he said, cutting me off. “Don’t lie to me. I can take that from her, but not from you.”
I looked at the paused image on the television screen, unable to look him in the eyes.
“What happened?”
I sighed. “I was an idiot, okay? I was just… in a rush, and I guess I had her essay points in my head as I finished mine.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
I cracked my neck, finally looking at him and wanting to shrink into nothing when I did.
“Was there something more between you two?”
My jaw ached from how hard I clamped my teeth together, and when I didn’t answer, Gavin rolled right up in front of me, leveling his gaze with mine.
“Answer me.”
I swallowed, knowing I was on the brink of making Riley hate me even more — if that was even possible. But I couldn’t lie to him, not when he already knew.
“Yes,” I croaked.
Gavin shut his eyes on a breath, one that shook my already fragile bones. It was laced with the same betrayal his sister had felt, and the fact that I’d heard it out of both of them damn near eviscerated me.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he finally asked when he opened his eyes again.
“I think the answer is pretty obvious.”
I gave him a pointed look, and he nodded on another sigh, running a hand back through his hair as he sank into his seat more.
“I should break your jaw, you know,” he said.
“About what I expected.”
“But,” he added. “Honestly, I saw it coming. I’m just surprised it took so long.”
I frowned, but couldn’t deny how I relaxed a bit knowing my best friend wasn’t about to take my head off after finding out I was into his sister. “You don’t want to murder me?”
He considered. “Maybe a little. She is my sister,” he said, glaring at me. “But... I’m more upset you hid it from me than anything.”
“We were going to tell you,” I explained, and my throat tightened with the memory of us planning that dinner for Gavin, how happy and excited we were despite the nerves. “But then…”
I didn’t have to finish the sentence.
“This all makes so much more sense now,” he said after a while. “How crazy she’s been acting, how miserable you’ve been.” He pinned me with a hard glare. “And you’re not thinking about the draft because you hate school. You want to run away.”
I didn’t even bother arguing. I just swallowed, nostrils flaring with emotion I couldn’t wrangle now that the truth was out. “Can you blame me?”
Gavin was quiet for a moment, digesting. “I guess we’ve all done stupid things to get away from heartbreak,” he whispered, eyes on his immobile legs.
When he looked at me again, I had to look away, inhaling a stiff breath through my nose to keep my eyes dry.
“You’re giving up,” he said.
“I have no choice.”
“That’s even more bullshit than you thinking you can’t get your degree.”
I shook my head. “You don’t understand.”
“No. I think it’s you who doesn’t understand. My sister has been in love with you since we were kids, you idiot,” he said, and his smile was an amused one when I snapped my head and pinned him with my confusion. “How the hell did it take you this long to realize that?”
“She hated me,” I argued.
“After the accident, yes. But even then, you couldn’t see it? The way she looked at you? How she got all nervous and weird when the three of us were together?”
I swallowed, jaw tight as I remembered how Clay had said the same thing.
“It doesn’t matter now,” I said. “Whatever chance I did have, I blew.”
“You don’t know that for sure.”
“Oh yes, I do.”
“Talk to her.”
“I’ve tried.”
“Have you?” he challenged. “I know my sister, and I know that while she may put up her walls and sit happy in her fortress of solitude, she’s got a heart about as hard as a couch cushion.” He waited to see if I would smile with the joke, but when I didn’t, he continued. “She’ll forgive you.”
“She already did, and I fucked up. Again.”
“Probably won’t be the last time, either.”
I screwed up my face at him, and he laughed, shaking his head. “Come on, man. We’re kids. We make mistakes. Some have worse consequences than others. But that doesn’t mean we just… run away. It doesn’t mean we quit on the people we love. If anything?” He shrugged. “It just means we should show up more. Try harder. Be better.”
I swallowed. “What if I don’t know how to be better?”
“You’ll figure it out.”
I stared at my hands in my lap, not convinced. Gavin let me sit in that silence for a long while before his alarm went off on his phone, signaling that he needed to leave for practice. He sighed, cutting it off before he knocked on the arm of my chair.
