Page 12 of Boys of Fall

CHAPTER NINE

Autumn

I spotted Jerry, sitting alone on a hay bale away from the crowd, as I made a second trip around the fire. He had leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, and a cup pressed between his hands as he seemed to stare at the crowd. But there was a searching determination to the way his gaze roamed the faces. Never still, always moving with his body tense as if ready to jump to his feet at any moment.

He’d worn a bright orange polo with the CCJC Cougar embroidered over his left breast like the rest of the players. The color brings out the gold in his brown eyes and turns his already white grin shockingly brighter. Dark jeans hid the rest of him within the blanket of shadows. One of his teammates handed him a cup accented with a hard smack to the shoulder that didn’t seem to faze him. Even when someone else spoke to him, he didn’t give them his full attention because he continued to search.

I’d dropped into the shadows on purpose to watch him as my stomach gave a lurch of excitement. After the sensations of the afternoon, watching Jerry isn’t something I can or want to resist.

Is he looking for me? He’d sounded happy to hear that I’d planned to go to the bonfire. Seeing him tensed to pounce on whatever it was he searched for made me want to be his prey in every way.

A stranger had flounced in to sit herself down beside him. Some hotsy-totsy basic bitch in a short skirt and boots of all things.

Yet, he searched. Answering her with nothing more than an uninterested expression or short quip, only when she spoke first. I shrank back even more into the dark seeing her overly familiar hand on his arm. She touched him in a way that I knew she’d touched him before. Her thin hand stood out so pale and perfect on his tan arm. It sent a bolt of jealously straight to my stomach that sizzled and burned the closer she tried to tuck in next to him. Her hand slid down to his wrist where he held the cup in a white-knuckled grip.

Then, she dropped something small and white into his cup and my feet were moving before my brain caught up to the fact I was jogging toward them.

Jerry stood and brushed her off as if to walk away, and the now tainted drink slowly rose toward his lips.

“Jerry!” My shout startled the people I raced past but seemingly not enough for them to really care. “Hey Jerry!”

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