Page 25 of The Do-Over
Rob flinched away.
He hated doing that—hated letting his father see fear or weakness. But he had learned through painful experience that sometimes it was enough for his father to see Rob flinch. Sometimes that made him feel as if he was in control. There were plenty of occasions when he’d stopped short of hitting Rob because he knew Rob was already afraid of him.
This wasn’t one of those times.
The blow wasn’t the worst Rob had ever had, and it landed in his ribs, which was good. No one would see the resulting bruise and ask him what had happened. He would just have to play basketball with his shirt on for the next week or so. Nothing suspicious about that.
It occurred to him, suddenly, that Thea probably would have noticed a new bruise.
Just as well that she and I won’t be seeing each other anymore.
He pulled out of his father’s grip for the second time and ran up the stairs. His father yelled after him, cursing, but Rob ignored him. He reached the safety of the bathroom, locked the door, latched it with the chain he’d screwed to the inside when he was twelve years old, and leaned against the sink in front of the mirror, breathing deeply.
He hated that his father still had the power to mess with him like this.
Carefully, he peeled off his shirt. The bruise wasn’t showing yet, but he could feel where it would be. Not so bad. At least the whiskey bottle hadn’t hit him. He still had a scar on his shoulder from an incident like that a few years ago. A piece of glass had become embedded in his skin, and he’d had to run to a friend’s house and ask his friend’s mother to drive him to the emergency room. He had made up a story to avoid anyone suspecting what his father had done, and no one had ever guessed.
A part of him had always wished that someone would come to his rescue. But he’d never been able to tell anyone the truth about what happened here at home.
He had never even told Thea.
It doesn’t matter now, he told himself again. It’s almost over. In a few months, I’ll be away at Larrimore. My scholarships there will pay for everything. I’ll be completely on my own.
This was the part he hadn’t been able to explain to Thea. There was no way she would have understood—not unless he had told her everything.
Iowa State was a fine school. The distance was a problem, of course—he didn’t want to be anywhere near this close to his father. He wanted to be out of Iowa entirely, to close the book on this whole chapter.
But there was more to it than that.
He went to the shower and turned it on, holding his hand under the hot spray. Sometimes his father came at him for using too much hot water, for staying in the shower too long, but Rob didn’t think that would happen tonight. His father had been really drunk. If he stayed in the shower long enough, maybe his father would have passed out by the time he got out.
He would hope for that, anyway.
The real benefit of going to Larrimore was the basketball team. They didn’t recruit as many top-tier athletes as Iowa State did. They didn’t have as much athletic scholarship money, either, but what they did have, they’d been able to offer to Rob.
His education at Larrimore was fully covered. Classes, room and board, even his meal plan. He’d need to buy his own textbooks, but that was all.
If he’d decided to go to Iowa State, it would be a different story. He hadn’t bothered to apply for any academic scholarships because he had never taken it seriously as an option. He hadn’t wanted to go to school in Iowa. He couldn’t imagine anything worse. He had only agreed to fill out the application to make Thea happy.
And the basketball scholarship they’d offered him…
She didn’t understand. She couldn’t. She thought of him as a rich kid who could go anywhere and do anything he wanted. She couldn’t understand why it would matter that Iowa State hadn’t offered him a full ride the way Larrimore had.
But it did matter. Because going to Iowa State would mean accepting his father’s money. It would mean giving his father four more years of control over him.
He wouldn’t do that. Not now that he was so close to finally escaping the man forever.
He stripped off the rest of his clothes and stepped into the shower, letting the spray beat down on his skin and wash away the sweat and the emotions of the day.
He hated that he had had to end things with Thea. More than she’d ever know, he hated that. She wasn’t the only one who had looked forward to going away together, to the way it would feel to live in the dorms together and spend nights and early mornings together and fall even more in love than they already were.
But he had been waiting for this moment ever since he’d been old enough to understand what college was. He had known for years that this was his escape, that it might be the best chance he’d get to break free.
Thea didn’t need it the way he did. She would be happy going to Iowa State. She would be happy staying near her family. And as much as he hated the thought, she would eventually fall in love with somebody else. And so would he.
He wasn’t going to throw away the opportunity to get away from his father over a girl he had only known for a few months.
Feeling a little more at ease in his mind, he got out of the shower, toweled off, and put on his pajamas. Then he unlocked the door and tiptoed into his bedroom.
There was no sound from downstairs. His father must have passed out, as he’d hoped. Still, he locked his bedroom door too once he was inside. Better safe than sorry.
He went to his desk—the five-hundred-dollar mahogany desk his father had bought to put in this room—and pulled the letter from Larrimore out of the top drawer.
Nothing was going to ruin this moment for him. Not even an unexpected breakup with a girl he loved.
This was the happiest moment of Rob Honeycutt’s life.
He was finally free.
