STUFFED (The Slate Brothers 2)

Carson moves; the crowd erupts in cheers or boos as he shoves past his teammates on the sidelines. The guy he’d been talking to on the field— Desi’s boyfriend, I think— tries to stop him, as do a few other teammates when they realize what’s about to happen. Coaches are running in from the sides, shouting, but Carson is already at the bleachers. Thank god the people themselves are too high for him to reach— but their sign isn’t. He grabs the sheet and yanks it down so sharply that one of the students nearly tumbles over the side rail. Thankfully, they remain safe; the sign flutters to the ground just as most of Carson’s teammates reach him and pull him back, but the damage is done.

The announcers are going nuts, pity in their voices— understanding why the sign got to him, but unforgiving about him acting from his emotions. The crowd is going crazy, and the conversation between the referees and coaches, which was previously about that incomplete pass, changes tone. In a matter of seconds, the pass is ruled incomplete, and Carson is cited for unsportsmanlike conduct. Bowen loses fifteen yards, but worse, the coaches opt to pull Carson from the game— the first time it’s happened all season. I close my eyes— I’m not sure I can watch this any longer. I fumble for the remote and, eyes still shut, find the mute button.

I understand why they pulled him from the game— it’s not the coaches’ fault. In fact, it’s what reasonable-headed-Carson would have wanted— for the team to succeed rather than for the focus to be on him. But this is all my doing, even if it wasn’t on purpose. The fact that I didn’t mean for it to go down this way doesn’t make it any easier— in fact, if I’d plotted to take Carson down like the article suggested it’d probably be easier, since it’d mean I was against him from the beginning. Devin’s probably fist pumping in his living room right now, in fact.

I wish so badly that Carson was here with me. I wish his arms were around me, I wish my chin was tilted up toward him. I wish I could tell him to power through and finish the job— that he is his father’s son, but not his father. That I know the fake alibi was an accident, in the same way the article was an accident. That I know he’s good, and that I want him, and that no stupid college newspaper editor will ever change that.

The internet lights up that evening with information on Carson. Because of my past research on him, it feels like every ad I see has something to do with football, or Bowen, or the Slate family— I can’t escape it.

So I open up a new file on my laptop and begin to type out what really happened between me and Carson. I don’t really know where I’m headed with it; I guess it just feels like I might be able to take all the pain and frustration out of my head and let it live on the computer for a while. When I’ve written a dozen or so pages— the story of that disastrous first meeting in the locker room— I sit back, consider it, and then send it to Carson without any explanation.

I don’t know why, honestly. It just feels like I should— the story is half his, after all, and I feel like he ought to see anything I write about him from now on, even if it’s just going to live on my computer.

For the next few weeks, I do this nearly every night, until it becomes almost a ritual. Come home from class, dinner and marathon reality show watching with Arianna and Jess (those shows really are addicting), then to my room, to the quiet, to the memories of being with him. It’s bittersweet, writing about our relationship, remembering what once was— but it’s also a reminder that it happened. Despite it all, I know I’m a better person for it. I’d never have stood up to my parents, if things hadn’t happened the way they did. I’d never have realized what a creep Devin was, and probably dedicated way too long to journalism before realizing that my heart wasn’t in it. I’d never have lost my virginity, which sounds like a silly thing to mark up in the “better person” category, but it is— being wanted, being desired, being willing to bare myself to someone and trust completely was powerful. Was good, and not just in a sexual way.

I send it all to Carson, periodically, even though he never replies, but the act of zipping the email off to him is as ritualistic as the storytelling itself. It’s not until I finish writing the final stage of our story— the article, the meeting with Devin, the breakup at Reign— that I realize this email I send to Carson will be the last one that goes his way. Will likely be my last communication with him ever, in fact— if you can call a one-sided email chain “communication.”