Page 12 of Bad Man on Campus

No. My gut protests, my heart revolts, my soul weeps because I’m not ready to let go of that fresh start for us. We’ll figure a way. Right?

Swim for your life.

Going downstairs to the darkened dining room, I rummage inside the sideboard and pull out one of the nips, a little bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream that my mom had left from last Christmas. It’s not exactly a life jacket or a crutch. More like training wheels until my bravery muscles get stronger, until my sense of balance is restored.

Chapter 2

Kace Jennings

Throwing my cards face down on the battered kitchen table, I pick up my phone to check for messages as if the message chirp has suddenly stopped working, though I have no reason to think that. I can’t help my compulsion. Glory arrived on campus today and she’s coming over tonight.

“You folding again, big shot? Or maybe you’d rather play with your phone,” Brick, aka Rick Blanick, says around the Twizzler hanging from his mouth. It’s the black licorice flavor, his signature and emblematic of his attitude. He’s an ice cube with a rare atomic flare inside him that he keeps wrapped tight under the sardonic wit.

“Your teeth are going to rot sucking on those things,” I say. He flips me off.

“You’ll make a good mommy someday.”

“I’m folding too,” Fitz, aka Liam Fitzgerald, my other buddy at BMOC House, smiles, but his usual frown of concern furrows his brow. He doesn’t like it when I butt heads with Brick, which is almost constantly. It’s the way we get along. But Fitzy likes calm. He’s chill to the bone. I could see him in charge of the UN someday, if he wasn’t headed for a career in hockey, probably as a referee, I muse.

Lifting the bottle of beer to my lips, I almost spill it when my phone chirps. I snatch it like a nervous puppy and I’m glad none of the other house guys are in the game with us. They’re out or in the lounge streaming some undercard UFC match.

Brick collects the small pile of chips and says, “Who the fuck has you anxious like a teenybopper?”

Checking the message, I see it’s only a group text from Phoebe and a few others and I wish she’d take me off her group, but I ignore it for now and put the phone down faceup. I take a long pull on my beer and say, “I’m having someone stay over tonight so don’t give me shit about it. I don’t care if it’s against the house rules.”

“Go for it. You’re in charge, asshole,” Brick says. “For now.” Fitz shakes his head. Brick’s the heir apparent to being in charge of BMOC house as the starting QB, though he’ll only be a junior next year. You’d never know it because he’s a seriously cool fucker, plays poker close enough to his vest so the cards look painted on. Plays life that way too. He’s our buddy, but I don’t know much about him.

But then I can’t talk since I’ve never shared my story either. The guys never heard of Glory Rose, not even after I got back to campus a couple of weeks ago from my eventful weekend at home, enough drama to last me for another year, though Dad’s already talking about resuming family holidays at the house.

Not even a losing hand can put a damper on the way I feel, because damn, I can’t think of a more unreal heaven on earth than having Glory Rose back, with me every day, and in my bed every night or close to it. She was my world until the accident, until I left her behind. And it wasn’t because she told me it was over, it was because I needed to get away, needed to escape to St. Paul’s and lose myself in hockey and college life.

So no, I never told anyone about Glory Rose or about Sky. In the last three years never told my good buddies one single word about the tragedy that turned my world upside down, that changed my life. Because I was too busy running away from it.

We ended up a world apart in spite of the soul-hot love affair we had that branded my heart my senior year of high school. I wanted to keep her, but everyone knew she was too broken.

I want to heal her, breathe life back into her damaged soul.

Hell, I’m no Ben Weaver, a fucking unicorn miracle worker. I’m the practical guy with the temper and unrealistic goals and dreams, the devil-may-care guy who jumps into a fight and picks up the tab when it’s the last money I have.

I’m the guy with half a chance to get to the pros, at least to the AHL, if not the big-time NHL like Ben. I’m the guy with a lot to gain and just as much to lose.

But that all changes now. As of today. Because Glory is back, she’s here at St. Paul’s, and it’s weird as much as exhilarating, scary as much as exciting.

I want pro hockey. I’ve wanted nothing more all my life since I put on my first pair of fucking skates at two years old. Until now. Now I want Glory Rose even more. Or so it feels as I sit on the edge of my chair pretending to give a fuck about a poker game.

She should be coming over any time now. I check my phone again.

“That’s the third time in the same hand you flicked your fucking attention to the phone. What the fuck?” Brick gets impatient when we don’t take poker seriously. As far as he’s concerned it’s the same as any competitive situation and we should be in it to win. No compromise. No distractions.

I smile and flip him my middle finger. Fitz suppresses a laugh. But then he piles on.

“He has a point, Kace. You got a hot date we don’t know about. Who is she?”

“Funny you should ask.”

Brick’s eyes go wide and he throws his cards down.

“What the fuck? You’re ditching our poker game?”