Page 39 of Bad Man on Campus

With my jaw clenched, instead of listening to the prof, I scroll through the photos on IG of Glory’s car being towed with a perfect V-shaped dent in the hood. The caption speculates the worst and calls for the police to investigate further. The tags include the campus police and the town police. Fuck.

I hope to hell my dad ignores all this. But knowing he monitors it adds another layer to the pressure of the nasty social media. Hopefully being a newlywed is giving him better things to do, since I haven’t heard from him.

Either way, I know I’ll stand up for Glory, take the fall for her. No way am I letting her go down. No way am I not standing by her this time when she needs me. Even if my parents turn on me. Even if I get thrown out of SPU. And even if my future career in the NHL goes down the tubes.

She worked so damn hard to get back to where she is. For three years, without my help or support, she served her probation, volunteered, and took classes at the fucking community college so she could get here to SPU. To be with me. I wonder what shit she had to put up with living in that town all that time, everyone judging her every day. But at least she wasn’t drinking then. Not until she came to SPU, until she picked up on the dreams for the future she’d left behind.

The prof ends the class and I’ve hardly heard a word he said. Brick slides his iPad into his backpack and points at my empty screen with his signature arched brow before sliding his shades on.

“Where the hell is your head at, man?” I give him a blank stare, trying to get myself back into the moment, to dispel the drama in my head.

“Never mind. I know who your trouble is.”

We stand.

“That right?” I say.

He laughs at me, a rarity, as we walk from the room. A couple of people give me mean looks and Brick stares them down until they turn away and scurry off.

We get outside and Brick sticks with me, almost like he’s my protection now, wanted or not. He walks with me to the grassy quad outside the Music Arts Building where I’m meeting with Dooley.

“What are we doing here?” Brick looks around at the music and drama majors dressed in a decidedly different style than the students that hang around the athletic fields, gym, and arena. I don’t bother to answer him because I see Dooley come out of the building and head our way.

“Good afternoon, gentlemen,” he says, his signature grin in place as if he’s trying out for the role of the Cheshire cat. Maybe he is.

“Did you get the information?” I notice Brick’s eyebrows shoot up at my words, but in true Brick form, he says nothing, only observes.

Dooley nods. “I got the phone number and address.”

“Good. Let’s have it. I’ll make a call now.”

“What about him?” Dooley nods in Brick’s direction without looking at him. Brick suppresses a smile.

“Brick can keep a secret.” I turn to him. “We’re calling Madelyn Fontaine, the Mad for SADD bitch, to ask her where she got the video clip.”

He takes a second to digest the information without expression, then says, “Why call when you have her address.” It’s not a question.

“He has a point,” Dooley says. “The impact of you in the flesh will be lost over the phone. You may as well be some wimpy little accountant with a pocket full of pens.”

Swiping my hand through my hair, I’m still not sure what good will come of this, but I have to at least find out why she’s pushing the issue and to try and put the record straight—or as straight as I can put it—about me drunk driving.

“If the girl has a grain of reason in her, I intend to find it and convince her I’m not an evil athlete getting a free pass for drunk driving.”

“Good luck,” Brick says, his skepticism there if understated. “I have to get to practice. Then we’re leaving town for an away game.”

* * *

“I’m not going to lose my cool,” I say as we walk.

“Of course not,” Dooley says, hopping up onto the curb four blocks from BMOC House and closing in on Madelyn’s apartment building.

“She probably lost someone,” I say. It’s the kind of thing that drives people to do things that may not be rational. Like my lost freshman year when I deserted Glory, attempted to forget about her by shutting out her and any news about her. How did I do it? Of course, by drowning myself with every eligible jock-sniffing girl on campus and plenty of off-campus girls too. I’m not proud of my fucked-up year, but I more than got the idea out of my head that being a player off the ice would be any fun. I take a deep breath and swipe a hand through my hair.

“I don’t know,” Dooley says, “but I heard she was in an accident last semester and broke a leg or something. A drunk driver hit her. Doesn’t seem as big a deal as losing someone though. Maybe you’re right.”

We reach the door and of course it’s locked. Dooley presses the first button and says he has a pizza delivery.

“You’re an ass,” I say and punch his shoulder. But the door buzzes open.