Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 116220 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 581(@200wpm)___ 465(@250wpm)___ 387(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116220 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 581(@200wpm)___ 465(@250wpm)___ 387(@300wpm)
“We were … such good friends,” says Brock. “We were so close, Kyle. My whole childhood is just … us. What happened? What’d I do wrong?”
“We changed,” says Kyle softly.
“You changed,” Brock spits back. “You were supposed to be my friend. Stick by my side. Then Tristan came along and you changed. You acted like he was your new God. Do you know what he did to me, Kyle?” he asks, his voice turning low. “The day your whole family burned up, including you? I was knocked out on the floor of the locker room with my team tied up all around me, all of them moaning and squirming, none of them remembering a damned thing. I had teeth marks on my ass, on my inner thigh, on my damned dick, Kyle.” Brock grits his teeth as he speaks, tears pooling in his impassioned eyes again. “I don’t have scars to show for it. Isn’t that messed up? I healed that same day. The scars I carry are burned onto my mind, the look in … in Tristan’s eyes … spawn of the Devil himself. Kyle, what he did to me, what he did to the team …” He shudders, eyes darkening. “What he did to you.”
Kyle only listens.
Brock’s eyes drop to Kyle’s chest, lost in thought. “I guess a lot happened to both of us that day. I went from wantin’ to kill you that morning … to learnin’ you and your whole family died in a house fire the night before. The game … The game didn’t happen. Everything fell apart that day. Tristan disappeared … you and your family died … and I …” Tears run down his rosy cheeks. He lets them. “I think somethin’ broke in me that day, too, somethin’ seriously … b-broke …” He covers his face with his free hand as he starts to quietly sob. “I-I-I-I’m l-losin’ my mind, I’ve f-f-fuckin’ lost it.”
Despite everything, it isn’t easy to watch Brock break down like this.
Brock’s whole life since high school is a mystery. What he has had to endure over the years. Unanswered questions he has had to carry, torturing him. Nightmares waking him without relent. Trauma from that day, not too dissimilar to Kyle’s own.
“Oh, God, my wife,” moans Brock, “she’s probably worried sick, the way I—God—the way I just packed a bag and left on some mad mission here to find you, to see if it was real … if I didn’t finally lose my last damned marble …”
“What’s your wife like?”
Brock squints at him, confused. “What? Who?”
“Your wife.”
“Oh. My wife?” He sniffs loudly, wipes away a tear. “You know her. It’s Jessica.”
Kyle blinks. “Wait … You don’t mean the class president Jessica, do you? The … The Christian Jessica?”
“Yes, her, so what?”
Kyle shrugs. “Just didn’t expect it.”
“So? God has saved my life. He took me into his hands and delivered me from evil. Evil like Tristan, who destroyed both of our lives. He delivered me from my dark thoughts. That was all thanks to Jessica, who brought me to Him, who saved me, too.”
Kyle wonders if this is a bad time to question how many times in their short reunion Brock has already cursed and taken the Lord’s name in vain. “That sounds … good,” he says dully.
“Jessica is a woman with values, a woman with conviction and a kind soul, a woman …” He sighs, frustrated. “I don’t owe you any explanation. You’re the one who should be talkin’.”
Kyle nods. “Alright. What do you want to know?”
Brock stares at him. A silence passes between them. Now that he’s presented with a chance to ask whatever he wants, it seems he has nothing to ask.
Or too much.
Just then, the doctor arrives, and their conversation is quite suddenly shelved in favor of attending to Brock’s injured hand. The whole time, Kyle stays in that chair in the corner, feeling like either a supportive friend or estranged brother. Brock now and then glances back at him, a weird look in his eyes.
Even at forty-four, Kyle still sees the same old Brock.
As if not a day has passed.
As if the walls that kept them apart in high school are no longer there, their friends, peer pressure, differences, no longer excuses for them to hate each other.
As if the walls were merely illusions, never there in the first place.
“You’re lucky,” says Kyle as they head down the hall to the front doors of the clinic some time later. “No breaks, just a tiny fracture that’ll heal all on its own.”
“Tiny fracture my ass,” says Brock, inspecting his bandaged hand, the fractured finger in question immobilized by a splint. “I’ve punched an actual brick wall before, this didn’t compare. Can we get somethin’ to eat around here? Fuckin’ starving.”
When they reach the front doors, Kyle abruptly stops.