“Tudd?” Matty let out a high-pitched cackle, the kind of laugh that relinquished all social control. It was another thing of Matty that Coop found irresistible. He pulled him closer against his waist.
“What can I tell ya? The Totowa school system for you.” Coop shrugged his shoulders.
“Did you say Mr. Malmuth? From Totowa High?” The guy was burly with the matted down hair, idiot face, and the stocky build that screamed jock. He left his circle of friends by the window. “Totowa, New Jersey?”
Coop’s body tensed up, like he was in a car headed for an accident.
“That’s where I went,” the guy said.
“Small world!” Matty said. “Do you go to Browerton?”
“No, I’m visiting friends this weekend. We’re supposed to go to a party at Kappa after this.” He kept looking at Coop, observing him.
“Cool.” Coop turned back to Matty and tried to get back to his story, if he could concentrate.
“What year were you?” But before Coop could answer, the guy pointed at him with recognition. He stared deep into Coop’s face, like trying to decipher a secret code. “Wait, are you String Cheese? Holy shit. Is that you, String Cheese?”
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,” Coop growled. He forgot about his muscles and tattoos. They all dropped away, a mirage blinked away in the sun.
“That’s really you.” The guy looked him up and down, and Coop couldn’t move. He had no strength, no power. “String Cheese went and bulked up.”
“I don’t know who that is.” The words were barely audible. He was shrinking down to Lilliputian size.
“It’s totally you.” The jock cracked up with a loud, raucous laughter that was like punches to Coop’s face. “Tattoos and everything. Real badass. Are those things real?”
Coop wanted to beat the shit out of him, wipe the floor with his gross grin and red cheeks. But he couldn’t move. His arms hung at his sides completely useless. Like fucking string cheese.
“Actually, he is a badass.”No, no. Matty, stop talking.Coop knew what he was going to say next, but he couldn’t stop it, like an accident in slo-mo. “He raps, too.”
The jock lost it. He could barely breathe as he held the couch for support. Now the whole freaking party was looking at them. At Coop.
“Holy shit, String Cheese.” The guy took out his phone. “I got to take a picture. The guys back home are never going to believe—”
Coop whacked it out of his hand. The guy stopped laughing, and a fire brewed behind his drunk eyes. A twist of a smile fell on his lips, like he was going to enjoy this.
“You starting something with me?” The guy asked.
Coop sized him up. He knew on some level he had a similar build to this guy, but the guy’s frame loomed large over him, and Coop felt like he was a scrawny nothing all over again. All the bench pressing and reps in the world meant nothing right now.
“Let’s go, Matty.” Coop put down his drink and strolled out of there slowly, to show he wasn’t scared, even though every system inside him was on PANIC mode.
Fucking String Cheese.
Chapter 18
Matty
This was startingto become a pattern. Matty and Coop would go to a public place together, and Coop would leave in a huff. Matty had seen this in robots that go haywire from the tiniest circuit malfunction.
“That guy was an asshole,” Coop said as they walked down the street, his hands in his pockets when Matty really wanted them around his waist like before. That had sent Matty levitating above the hardwood floors, knowing that he was wanted.
“He was an asshole in high school, and he’s still an asshole,” Coop continued.
“Okay. And now you never have to see him again.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“It’s not? He doesn’t go to Browerton.” They passed a row of storefronts, closed for the night. Matty was getting used to the quiet of the nighttime streets, as if he and Coop owned them. “Are you worried he’s going to tell everyone back home? Your friends won’t care.”
