Sasha now faced domestic violence charges. Being over eighteen, she was in some seriously deep shit.
With the new semester of school came soccer season. I went to every game, and sometimes even Momma and Daddy came with Cara to cheer Jack on. The team had its best turnout ever, thanks to new friendships our fighting at the beginning of the year and the reconciliations that came later had cultivated.
Weeks passed in a buzz of excitement as we moved closer to spring and prom season. Jack and I volunteered to help set up. The storage room in the basement was kind of our place where there wasnothing to talk aboutbut plenty said in other ways. We hooked up in secret as much as we helped decorate, and all the while, Trent watched us with a huge smile, thinking he’d been pivotal in the two of us becoming friends.
Okay, maybe he had. In our mutual frustration over being punished, Jack and I had found common ground. Our start, like an origin story.
A group of us went stag to prom and grumbled about not feeling comfortable taking who we wanted. And after prom came another huge event in our senior year: college acceptance letters.
Both Jack and Ty were accepted into Harvard. Unfortunately, I wasn’t accepted into MIT. What Daddy had said about me being a troublemaker might have hurt my chances, but who knew for sure. I’d applied to multiple colleges, though, and was accepted at another tech institute in Boston.
Not getting accepted to my first choice college had hurt, I wouldn’t deny it, and that probably had something to do with my next step of the self-recovery I’d claimed.
I didn’t know who was more shocked when I voluntarily walked into his office one day after school, me or Trent Wright.
“Hey, uh, Trent.”
He smiled as wide as ever and gestured to the chairs in front of his desk. “What’s up, Cal?”
As if the animosity and disrespect had never happened earlier in the year, Trent let me sit there and talk while he listened. I hadn’t taken advantage of that before, but when I opened up, he was actually there for me. An ear, a shoulder.
I stopped by his office often after that. In the beginning, we’d talked about football, a safe topic. He had good insights on how to put the football player away after identifying with it for years. We talked about classes and college and, eventually what brought me to his door.
Trent didn’t have the answers to life, but it felt good, relieving to just talk, to be heard. When I got around to Sasha, I’d expected him to joke about it. To chide me for being a weak ass or a dumb ass. He didn’t. He actually hated what happened. He took on the guilt with me, told me my circumstances had him seeking further study on abuse and bullying, more guidance for himself. He hoped one day he’d have the right answer, and my story might help him get there.
I supposed that made me feel pretty good.
Things happened for a reason. As long as we learned from our mistakes, then those things had a purpose.
More time passed, and Jack and I got closer every second, and so did our families. Jack’s daddy finally gave me the okay to call him Tanner, and Ty watched my back as faithfully as he did Jack’s. Jack helped Cara with homework when he came over after school and helped me cook when it was my turn.
We were inseparable.
Except at school.
All the way to the end, we maintained a respectable distance in public and kept our conversations to mostly heated glances and stolen moments of silence, heavy breathing, and quick blow jobs when we dared.
Then came May. Finals were a breeze, and on a warm, sticky Thursday, only one step stood in our way before high school was officially over.
Graduation.
Daddy drove to Birmingham the night before so Paw Paw could be here for it. All my aunts, uncles, and cousins came too. Momma and Cara had coordinated their dresses, and Daddy wore a light gray suit that Momma complimented. They wouldn’t get back together; I wasn’t expecting that to happen. But with each week, they became more and more comfortable around each other again. Sometimes they even joked and smiled at each other.
Paw Paw took pictures of Cara and me, and then I had to leave them to find my place among my classmates for the ceremony. With the clear weather, our graduation was held outside. Dressed in a black cap and gown, with a red stole and coordinating tassel hanging to the right, I disappeared into the sea of like-dressed students.
Half of the graduating class took a chair on one side of the aisle, with the other half across from us. Seated alphabetically, Jack and Ty were in the row in front of me and a few places toward the center. Speeches were made by Principal Woodson, guidance counselors, including Trent, two alumni, and the valedictorian, who was also the class president. Once that tedious shit was over, they started announcing names.
The faculty had asked everyone to hold their cheering until the end since they had so many names to get through, and it was a boring-ass wait.
Jackson Rutledge was called before Tyson, and I forced myself not to react.
But why?
This was it. Only an act of God could stop the next few minutes, and me staring with hearts in my eyes at the man Iloved walk across the raised dais to get his diploma wasn’t going to end the world. And if it sparked a gossip wave, who the fuck cared anymore?
I lifted my head as Jack shook hands with the principal.
God, he was beautiful.
