The word hits like a slap. “Fair? You’re right. I’ve been more than generous. You said until Spring Training, and then you said until the end of the month. Which, hey, no big deal. It’s just a few extra days. But your agent approached me during the game, and he wants this to go on into the summer.”
Lucas’s face flies to mine.
“Would you?” Jake asks, brightening.
Lucas leans forward, and for a second, I think he’s going to lunge at Jake. But when I look at him, the muscles in his jaw are flexing, and his arms are folded across his chest, like he’s bent on containing himself.
All I want is for him not to contain himself. To let go, cross these arbitrary, maddening lines and just stake his claim on my heart.
But he won’t.
“Are you kidding?” I ask.
“Did he tell you the Tide thing, though? He could bring you on. It could be the two of us in these commercials, Opening Day launch, worth a couple mil. They pitched it as ‘A Clean Start.’ They’re all over my redemption story.”
I’m so frustrated, my hands are shaking. “Don’t just make it a story, Jake! And I’m not the only one who promised. You promised me three favors. What was the first one?”
Jake’s eyes go hard. “I need to do the work on my own so I don’t need you.”
“Exactly. Are you?”
“I am! Look at how much better I did in my interview today!”
“Yeah, but you still snapped at that man at the charity event, Jake,” I say, my chest shaking with sobs I cannot cry.
“I didn’t punch him, or anything.”
“That’s not a bragging point! I know how the taunts are triggers,” I say, remembering what my parents told me about Jake’s home life. The abuse—physical and verbal. “But you can’t overcome it on your own. Remember?”
Asking Jake if he’s found the therapist he promised to find would be delicate under the best of circumstances.
These aren’t the best of circumstances.
“I’m still looking,” he says.
“You’ve said that for three months! I know someone in South Carolina who used to work in Chicago. She has connections. I’ll call her today and get you a referral?—”
Jake’s lip curls. “Scot?—”
“Watch your tone,” Lucas says, as cold as ice.
“I don’t want to talk about this in front of your boyfriend,” Jake says.
I catch a glimpse of Lucas from the corner of my eye. His jaw is so tight, I can see the muscle working. He’s not looking at Jake. He’s looking at me.
Not with pity. With something that looks like grief.
“You never want to talk about it,” I tell Jake, trying to ignore the pain on Lucas’s face. “You promised me you’d see someone, and you haven’t fulfilled your promise.”
“What about what you promised? That you wouldn’t let anything change between me and your family?”
“It hasn’t changed! They defend you every time something happens! My brothers are constantly harping on me to do more for you, to talk about you in interviews, to post! It’s never enough for them!”
“Your mom’s mad at me.” His voice cracks, and his lip is curling, like he’s trying not to cry. “I can’t lose your mom. Your parents. I can’t let this happen.”
“My mom takes your sideevery time!Every time you did something growing up, Itook the fall! You took money from my parents to give to your junkie dad? I said it was me. You broke a window coming in late drunk in high school and didn’t want my parents to be disappointed? I told them it was me. I can’t keep doing this, Jake! I can’t throw myself in front of another train for you when you’re the one driving it!”
The words come out louder than I intend, and a second later, the echo of my voice against the walls bounces back to me.
