Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 87395 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 437(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87395 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 437(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Kevin's expression was indecipherable. Whatever it was, it didn't look particularly happy. "This is going to be a very long season."
"I told you I wasn't ready."
"You also said you wouldn't play with me, but here you are."
Neil didn't answer that accusation. Kevin got right in his face and tangled his fingers through the netting on Neil's racquet. When he started to pull it away, Neil held on tighter, silently refusing to let go. Kevin probably could have wrenched it away if he tried a little harder, but he seemed content just to hold on.
"If you won't play with me, you'll play for me," Kevin said. "You're never going to get there on your own, so give your game to me."
"Where is 'there'?" Neil asked.
"If you can't figure that out there's no helping you," Kevin said.
Neil gazed back at him in silence, pretty sure 'there' didn't apply to someone like him. Kevin must have seen that in the unimpressed look on his face because he reached up and covered Neil's eyes with his free hand.
"Forget the stadium," Kevin said. "Forget the Foxes and your useless high school team and your family. See it the only way it really matters, where Exy is the only road to take. What do you see?"
Imagining life in such simplistic terms was so ridiculous Neil almost laughed. He kept the vicious twist of his mouth off his face through sheer willpower alone. Something still must have shown, because Kevin gave his racquet a hard tug.
"Focus."
Neil tried to picture the world as if Neil Josten was really all there ever had been and would be. It was almost enough to make him despise the persona when he could see it in such easy terms, but he swallowed that distaste and turned his mental gaze toward Exy.
Had the game ever been his, or had it been pulling him to this point? Exy was the only bright point of his shattered childhood. He remembered his mother bringing him to little league Exy games, traveling an hour outside of Baltimore to where no one knew his father and the coaches would actually let him play. He remembered her cheering for him as if their every move and word wasn't scrutinized by gun-toting bodyguards. The memories were fragmented and dreamlike, distorted by the bloody reality of his father's work, but he clung to them. They were the only times he'd ever seen his mother smile.
Neil didn't know how long he played with his little league team, but his hands remembered the weight of a racquet as well as they did that of a gun.
That thought was sobering, as it put him right back to square one and the fact that Neil Josten was a fleeting existence. It was cruel to even dream he could stay like this, but Kevin had escaped, hadn't he? Somehow he'd left that bloody room behind at Edgar Allen and become this, and Neil wanted the same so bad he could taste it.
"You," Neil said at last. Kevin pulled at his racquet again, and this time Neil let go.
"Tell me I can have your game."
It wouldn't do them any good, but Neil wasn't going to get into that. "Take it."
"Neil understands," Kevin said, dropping his hand and sending Andrew a pointed look.
"Congratulations are in order, I suppose! Since I have none to give, I will tell the others to respond appropriately." Andrew pushed himself to his feet and swallowed more whiskey on the way up. "Neil! Hello. We meet again."
"We met earlier," Neil said. "If this is another trick, just let it go."
Andrew grinned at him around the mouth of his bottle. "Don't be so suspicious. You saw me take my medicine. If I hadn't, I'd be keeled over somewhere by now puking from the withdrawal. As it is, I might puke from all the fanaticism going around."
"He's high," Kevin told Neil. "He tells me when he's sober, so I always know. How did you figure it out?"
"They're twins, but they're not the same." Neil lifted one shoulder in a shrug. "One of them hates your obsession with Exy while the other couldn't care less."
Kevin looked to Andrew, but Andrew only had eyes for Neil. Andrew took a second to process those words before he started laughing. "He's a comedian, too? An athlete and a comic and a student. How multitalented. What a grand addition to the Fox line. I can't wait to find out what else he can do. Perhaps we should throw a talent show and find out? But later. Kevin, we're going. I need food."
Kevin handed Neil his racquet back and the three went to the locker room. Aaron and Nicky were already in the showers when they arrived. Neil heard water running and sat on a bench in the changing room to wait.
"We're not taking you by Abby's like that," Kevin said. "Wash up."
"I won't shower with the team," Neil said. "I'll wait, and if you don't want to wait on me, just go on ahead. I'll find my way there from here."
"Nicky going to be a problem for you?" Andrew asked.
Neil didn't like the look of his manic smile, but he liked Andrew's veiled warning less. "It's not about Nicky. It's about my privacy."
Kevin snapped his fingers at Neil. "Get over it. You can't be shy if you're going to be a star."
Andrew leaned toward Kevin and put a hand to his mouth, but he didn't bother to lower his voice. "He has to hide his ouches, Kevin. I broke into Coach's cabinet and read his files. Bruises, you think, or scars? I think scars, too. Can't be bruises if his parents aren't around to beat him, right?"
Neil felt cold all over. "What did you just say?"
"I don't care," Kevin said to Andrew, ignoring Neil.
Andrew, in turn, ignored Kevin and gestured at Neil. "Showers aren't communal here. Coach put in stalls when he built the stadium. The board wouldn't pay for it—they didn't see the point—so it came out of Coach's own pocket. See for yourself if you don't believe me. You don't believe me, do you? I know you don't. That's probably for the best."