Page 104 of Studs Up
“Fine,” I said. “Just ate something bad.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” I tried to look all fine and better and less green, but by the look on his face, I wasn’t very successful. “I ate something funny. That’s all.”
“Maybe you should sit this one out.”
I shook my head. What I needed right now was a game to play all this out.
“Naw,” I smiled. “I’ll be fine. Thanks, though.”
“Sure,” he didn’t believe me. “What are friends for?”
The text scrolled through my mind like a breaking news banner scrolling the bottom of a screen. I couldn’t get it out of my head.
I scraped and clawed for any measure of focus. The ball, the players, and the game were the only things that needed to be on my mind. But when the first whistle blew, the whole thing fell apart.
My partnership with Alex, which had the entire league talking about, broke. I couldn’t get to his balls fast enough, and when I looked for his crosses, I misjudged them by yards. I took a hit from Orlando’s right back, Sam Johnson, and rolled in the turf. I should have seen him coming, but my head was somewhere else. I kept waffling between the text and how Nolan looked at me in bed.
Nolan
He missed. A shot that couldn’t be missed. Literally, feet from the goal line, and he fucking missed. The keeper didn’t need to dive to save it. The ball sailed wide and out for a goal kick.
“What the fuck?”
The camera panned to him. He looked sick like he was going to throw up on the field. I had talked to him the night before, and he hadn’t sounded sick. He was fucking up all over the place, and he couldn’t even muster up the anger to do anything about it.
Something had changed. Something was wrong. The ref whistled the half, and I grabbed my keys.
For the next hour, I listened to the game’s radio broadcast. John and John were paying far too much attention to Holden’s mistakes. A cross that sailed into the stands instead of dropping at Alex’s feet. Slipping all by himself and turning over the ball. Bad passes and not in the eighteen when he needed to be. It got worse, and John and John gave it all to me.
I took liberties with the speed limit, making the drive in just under two hours and forty-five minutes.
I parked, took up a vigil on his porch, leaning against the rail, and waited.
Another forty-five minutes passed before his car pulled into the drive, and he got out. The midnight moon lit him up, and I saw a man so utterly defeated that rage ripped through me.
He hadn’t noticed my car because he stopped when he noticed me feet away from him as he trudged up the steps. Mouth hanging open and breathing hard. Holden looked around as if he thought we were being watched, but not a soul walked the streets.
“What are you doing here?” He hissed.
“You want to tell me what the fuck is going on?”
“You can do that with a phone call, Nolan,” he snapped.
“Yeah, well, I thought we should talk in person.”
He looked around again at the dark, abandoned street.
“Go home, Nolan.”
“No.” What the hell has gotten into him? He was shaking nervously. I hadn’t seen him like this since he admitted he was gay.
He glared at me and pulled out his keys. His hands trembled as he tried to find the right one, and he dropped them. He jumped at the sound of the keys clattering on the porch and looked around again. He was pale and sweating.
“Holy fuck,” I breathed. “What’s wrong?”
“You have to go,” he said. Holden picked up his keys but still couldn’t get them in the lock. I grabbed his hand and carefully pried the keys out of his fingers. He was so cold. His skin felt like ice.
