Why the fuck was I crying? I wiped the tears off my face and leaned against mybed.
“Sometimes I wonder if you guys wouldn’t have done the things you have done if you didn’t have thebooze.”
I closed my jaw tightly. I hadn’t meant to utter those words outloud.
“Baby, we did those things sober,too.”
I turned to look at the door in disbelief. Newsflash: she actually said that, and hadn’t used the booze as anexcuse.
She could rot by the door for all I cared. I’d pack tomorrow. I had a pounding headache and needed to sleep. When I closed my eyes, the ache in my stomach reminded me that it wasthere.
* * *
“Ow,”Imurmured.
What the fuck? I opened my eyes and blinked a few times. Nothing was coming into focus, and I was seeing double of everything. I ached everywhere, but propped myself up slowly. It fucking hurt tobreathe.
My bedroom door was open, so I knew what that meant. I started to focus on certain areas of my body to see if I could tell whether or not somethinghadorhadn’thappened. It was my typical way to assess myself without actuallylooking.
Yep.Ithappened. On game daytoo.
The house sounded quiet, and I knew that I had a decent chance of being able to take a shower. I felt something sharp pull at my groin as I tried getting out of bed. I looked down and saw silver packaging tape on me that stretched from hip to hip. As I plotted my revenge on Chad, I began to pull the tape off slowly. Going slow almost made it worse. I felt every tug and pull. Immense pain in my ribs punished me while I tried to take a deep breath. I quickly laid back down to see if that helped ease the pain. I calmed my rapid shallow breathing and looked down at the tape that I had partially removed. The only part that remained was the patch over my hair. I had to get up and cut itoff.
I held my hand over the tape so that it didn’t move much as I walked down the hall. My ribs felt as if they were broken. Chad had done a number on me last night. The fact that I didn’t remember a lot of it scaredme.
I flipped the light on in the bathroom before I shut the door and locked it. I had to blink a few times before anything registered. I normally didn’t look at myself in the mirror simply because I didn’t like what I’d see looking back at me. But this time, I looked because I wanted to make sure I didn’t have ribs sticking out of myside.
Pale bruises and bright red marks covered my chest and stomach. Lines of scratches became heavier from my belly button downward and disappeared behind the tape. I turned my body and looked at some of myback.
“Fuck,no!”
I panicked when I saw my right shoulder blade was already a deep yellow and faint blue. My shoulder was also banged up. My throwing arm. He did this on purpose. Then everything else he did had set in. I took a step back and bent over as if I were on the field. I pretended to field a grounder, pop up and make a pretend throw to firstbase.
My ribs; I couldn’tthrow.
My lower back; I struggled to pop up quickly from a readyposition.
My groin; I couldn’t step into the throw without my hairpulling.
They were going to try to take away the only thing I had. Only they had another fucking thing coming; this was mine and not forthem.
I went through the motions of brushing my teeth, pissing and combing my hair. Thankfully my dick wasn’t wrapped up in tape. I went back to my room and pulled on clean boxers with the tape still in place. I slowly got dressed in my gray USC sweatpants and wanted to yell out in agony as I put on my pulloversweatshirt.
I took a few more shallow breaths while I tried figuring out my shoes. When I crossed my leg, and my ankle to my right leg rested on my left thigh, the tape pulled at my hair. I got my shoes on over ten minutes and pushed myself up and off thebed.
I put clean clothes in my backpack and grabbed my bat bag. Something told me to double check my bag. My mitt was still there, but when I pulled it out, I discovered it had been written on with marker. The word “pussy,” was all over the leather. I checked the physical status of the mitt. The laces were intact, and it was still in decentshape.
Okay. Nothing to panic over. The glove was usable. My cleats were inside and I picked them up. The laces had been cut right up themiddle.
Okay. Nothing to panic over. I could get replacement laces in the locker room. Now I know why a lot of guys leave their gear in our locker room. I was going to start doingthat.
I took my gear and slowly made my way to the living room. Quickly, I learned how fast I could realistically walk with tape on mypubes.
“There he is,” Chad laughed when I walked into theroom.
Chad sat in my dad’s old recliner while his girlfriend’s head was in his lap. A hand held her head in place while his other hand held his camcorder. He had it pointed downward to capture her blowinghim.
“Big game today, huh, Ry? Oh, wait, I mean,Pussy.”
