Jamie added, “Or to any girl like that. I wouldn’t want my sister to get treated like that.”
“I still don’t want you around.”
“Oh, come on! Why not?” The polite charade was gone. A sulking five year old came over the big jock. “I apologized to her. Twice.”
“Words are cheap. Find a new place to stay over the season.”
Outraged, Jamie’s mouth hung open. “Are you fucking with me?”
“No,” Jesse snapped back. “I’ve been getting tired of your shit anyway. Last night was the last straw.”
“So this isn’t even about your girl?”
I fidgeted in my seat as new pairs of eyes turned my way. The argument had taken center stage in the small cafeteria. No one else even pretended to be having a conversation. They all shut up and were waiting with open ears.
“Some of it. Some not.”
“This sucks. Come on. What do I have to do?”
“Not be such an asshole. How about that?”
“Why are you riding me? You trying to grow big balls for the team now?” But as soon as those words left him, Jamie knew he’d stepped wrong. His mouth clamped shut and a tense silence filled the room. A pin could’ve been heard dropping. I knew I quieted my quick gasp as Jesse had clenched his jaw. His body grew rigid like stone and I didn’t dare look in his eyes. I knew the deadly threat that would’ve been in them.
Jamie tried to backtrack immediately. “Hey, I’m sorry, man. I didn’t mean—”
Jesse cut him off. His tone was soft, but even more lethal because of it. “It’s comments like that. It’s because of that attitude that I don’t want you in my home. If it were up to me, I wouldn’t even have you on the team. You were in Camden’s corner all last year. You think I don’t know about the shit you said about me? That I was weak, a Hollywood pansy, mooching off my daddy’s strings?” He rose from the table, his arms so clenched that his veins stuck out. “If you even fucking knew one real thing about me, you’d know that I’m anything but those things.”
As Jesse was lashing at Jamie, I recognized the tortured look in his eyes. I knew what he was feeling. Jamie wasn’t Ethan. No one was. Cord wasn’t. Derek wasn’t. Jesse was surrounded by a bunch of people that thought they knew him, but none did. It was only me and I’d just gotten there. A mirrored emotion came up in me.
“Jesse,” I touched his hand. “Let’s go somewhere private.”
He wrenched his arm away, but glared, keeping himself in check. Barely. Then he sighed, “Fine.”
I led him down a hallway until I spotted a room that resembled a conference room. Plush leather chairs surrounded the table with an expensive-looking projector in the middle. It slid up from the floor. Two speakers were in the corners. No matter how many hours I might’ve trained at a sport, I knew I’d never be good enough to be in that room again. But this was Jesse’s world. Private cafeterias. People trying to get to him for what they imagined they could get from him, and he had ripped into one that might’ve been a friend. I wasn’t sure about Jamie so I held my tongue. At times, he seemed genuine. Other times he was just an ass. But it wasn’t Jamie that Jesse wasn’t mad with, and it was starting to hit me that I was the only one who really knew him. It was my job to help him now.
“Hey.” I took a deep breath.
Jesse slumped into one of the chairs, gaze lidded, and shoulders hunched forward. Everything about him was screaming for me to shut up.
I couldn’t. “I’m mad at him too.”
“You’d be crazy not to be,” he snorted, rotating the chair to level me with a dark look. “He was bordering on abusive last night.”
“Not Jamie.”
Ethan’s presence was there now. I felt him so strongly. A chair moved an inch. It could’ve been from the wind, if there was any, but I imagined him there. I wanted him to be there. In fact, I wanted it so badly that I was struggling to keep my emotions in check.
“Oh.”
All the fight left him.
I sat beside him and leaned back. I was going on instinct here, but touching would take us into a different dimension. This was about Jesse. This was about my brother. Biting the inside of my cheek, I started, “He was supposed to be here.”
A ragged breath left in a whoosh. “You’re damn right he was supposed to be.” He shoved his chair back again. It went crashing into the wall and he was pacing around the table, twisting his hands together. “He was supposed to be on the fucking team with me. He was supposed to be my roommate. Him and me. That was it. He was supposed to have my back, not go off and get killed going to— He was supposed to be here. Instead, I got Cord. And Derek. They’re both good guys, but they’re not—”
He stopped and gripped the chair in front of him. His jaw went rigid and he was swallowing his words. He was fighting the emotions that had rushed out.
I sat rooted in my seat. Holding my breath, I thought that would’ve taken longer, but I didn’t dare mess it up.
I began praying for him to keep going.
One. Two. Three. I counted to six before he started again, saddened, “He was my best friend and my brother. And he’s not here.”
“But he was supposed to be.”
“He was supposed to be.”
“I came for him.”
Jesse had turned towards the wall, but he looked over again. A slight shimmer was over his eyes. He never moved to brush it away or pretend it wasn’t there. He let the moisture build as he nodded. “I know you did.”
Nodding, I didn’t know what else to say or even what else there was to say.
Then he added, “I came for him too.”
“You did?”
“Yeah.” He let out a deep breath. His voice was calmer now, stronger. “I was offered at six other places. I came here because of...”
Because of Ethan. We were in the same boat.
“Your family was like my only family. Hell, my dad might’ve had tons of kids, but I didn’t grow up with them. I don’t know any of them and this girl, I can’t reach out to her. The lawyer went nuts when I said I was thinking about talking to her. And you know the messed up part?” A strangled laugh rose from his chest. “I don’t even know if my mom’s my real mom.”
“Jesse?” I rose from my chair and went to him. Sliding into his lap, I waited as he leaned back in the chair. His hands rested lightly on my legs.
“I saw a file. It’d been left open.”
It hurt to hold his gaze. There was so much pain.
“It said she was barren, she couldn’t have kids. I don’t know if she was like that after me or...”
“You think another woman had you and your dad passed you off as hers?”
He nodded, swallowing thickly. “I loved her, but what if she wasn’t even who I was supposed to be loving?”
“Oh, Jesse.” How could I answer that? I couldn’t. Resting my head against his chest, he tightened his arms around me and rested his cheek on top of me. I felt him take another deep breath.
I used to do that, to lessen the pain. It never worked. The pain always won out. It always suffocated me.
“I’m so sorry, Jesse,” I whispered.
“Yeah,” he bit out. “What do you expect, though? I should’ve thought of that growing up with him. You have no idea how grateful I am to your family for taking me in and letting me live with you guys. Your parents have been so good to me.”