Page 52 of Big Man on Campus

“Don’t get nervous. This isn’t about you. It’s about Glory Rose.”

Red hot anger rises like a nuclear flash, taking over. “Then it’s fucking about me too, because—”

“Don’t say another word, son.”

“Why? Because you don’t want to hear it? To know the truth?” I shout in his face. “Or is it because you’re on the case and you’ll have to report back every word I say?”

He shakes his head, the cold professional ice melting from his face as his eyes go lax, a sad droop forming around his mouth and if I don’t know better I’d think he might start crying any second.

But not my dad. Never dad. I never saw him shed one single tear when Sky died. In fact, based on the arguments I overheard when I should have been sleeping that summer, even after sucking down sleeping pills, his lack of tears, his substitute of anger for sadness, was what drove mom away finally.

“I’m here to bail you out of trouble, son.” The fury slips a notch, but the sting of understanding what his words mean isn’t lost.

“If that bail-out comes with strings—like that I betray Glory Rose—then no fucking way. I don’t want your fucking help.” I scream inside my head that I’ve done nothing wrong, but the words would fall on deaf ears if I said them out loud because according to dad and mom, I’m consorting with the enemy and that’s everything wrong.

What’s worse, though I know in spite of the fact that he’s an ex-cop, dad would have no problem with me covering for a friend in general, the fact that I’m covering for Glory is a whole other matter. And I know he knows by the way he looks at me, sad disappointment more lethally cutting than anger ever could be.

“Don’t you think she’s proven who she really is, son? Think with your head for a second, not with your pecker—”

My response is automatic and instantaneous. There’s not a shot in hell to stop it. My arm fires my fist into his face so fast and hard that dad stumbles backwards on impact. His hands fly to his nose and blood gushes out with a shower of swear words.

My knuckles sting like a son of a bitch and I shake my hand as I watch. I stand frozen, a gut-wrenching swirl causing my stomach to come close to up-chucking whatever’s inside. I can’t move because I don’t know what to do, how to react. The hate and anger generated the moment my dad accused me of thinking with my pecker when it comes to Glory fades away as I watch him bent over in pain, blood pouring from him.

Letting instincts take over, I go to him, force him to stand up and put his head back, ripping off my shirt to hold it to his face and staunch the blood flow.

“Give me that,” he growls. “You’re killing me. You’re fucking miserable at nursing a broken nose.” I walk him over to the front steps and we sit while he looks at the sky with my shirt held against is nose.

I can’t bring myself to apologize, because there’s no guilt for hitting him in the empty pit of my sucker-punched gut. There’s sorrow, but it’s sorrow for the impossible gulf between us, knowing if I need to choose between my parents and Glory it’ll rip me in two, knowing that’s what he’s actually fucking asking me to do.

“Don’t do this, dad.” My voice is a broken plea, desperation fraying the edges of the numbness caused by my swirling indecision. I wipe the sweat from my upper lip, my jaw twitches with tension as I wait for him to respond.

His eyes acre closed. He doesn’t ask me what I mean because he knows. A guttural whisper comes from his throat, sounding like defeat in the form of my name. “Kace. Son...”

“I love her.” It’s all I can say in my defense, all I have. All there is. When it comes down to the fucking bare ass of life, it’s all I want.

* * *

I go to Glory’s room and open the door. She stands wide-eyed and stone-cold sober thank fuck. I warned her with a text I was coming and she said she’d be ready. Pulling the door closed behind me, I take a long slow look up and down her glorious naked body.

“I see what you mean by ready.” My voice sounds old and scratchy, like it doesn’t want to be used because all my blood is going somewhere else, all my energy floods my cock, all the life in me focuses on one thing.

Getting inside Glory Sunshine Rose, going home, finding my solace and getting lost there for as long and as often as I can until the sun comes up.

Chapter 15

Glory

Arriving at dance team practice the next day is like facing the firing squad, but the memory of Kace’s arms around me, his body against mine all night, fortifies me. Until I see the specter of my new nemesis, my declared arch-enemy front and center talking to Coach.

Madelyn fucking Fontaine. I stop in my tracks. I should be surprised, shocked really. But I’m not. A sense of inevitably shivers through me before I gather my wits and shore up my defenses. Such as they are.

She turns to me. I’m ten yards away and not in a hurry to move closer.

“What’s the matter, Glory? Aren’t you glad to see me?”

Coach waves me forward and introduces us and explains how Madelyn was in a car crash last semester and they didn’t think she was returning but now she is and now I’m an alternate. I’ve been demoted to an alternate on the dance team. I spin around and look at the others. Some of them wince, a couple smile, most of them avoid my stare altogether. Did they know about this?

Is this bitch out to get me? Or is it Kace she’s hell bent on destroying? Anger heats me, but sad, pathetic defeat is right behind it. My chin quivers and I clamp down hard to stop it as I turn back to coach.