Quarterback's Secret Baby (Bad Boy Ballers) (10 page)

I woke up bleary-eyed and feeling like the human equivalent of warmed-up leftovers at about three in the afternoon. Alisha was sitting on the foot of my bed looking at me and I could immediately see from the look on her face that she knew what had happened.

"Your friend Lena called me," she said, before I could say anything. "I'm so sorry, Tash. I know this won't mean much to you right now but I know two things. The first thing I know is how you're feeling. Heartbreak is awful but your first heartbreak? That's the worst. The second thing I know is that you'll get over this. It doesn't feel like it now, but you will. There's nothing I can say to fix how you're feeling but just know that it passes. It does. You just need to get through it, to let time pass and believe it'll get better. Because it will."

For a few seconds I didn't know what Alisha was talking about but soon - too soon - the previous night came rushing back and all I could do was lift a pillow to my face to try and stifle the sound of my crying.

"I've already taken care of dinner," Alisha told me. "And I've got some clean clothes for you laid out so come on, let's get you up and into the shower."

I spent the next few days wandering around the house like a zombie. Even my posture was different - I could feel the way my head sagged low and my shoulders slumped forward. Just putting one foot in front of the other seemed to take an enormous amount of effort. And everybody around me made sure I was never alone. My friends messaged me constantly, Andrea delivered a tray of the famous 'crack brownies' her mom used to make us - and that I used to devour - when we were children.

Kaden blew up my phone with messages. I deleted them all unread. And anytime I was tempted to read one of them, just a single one, someone was there to set me straight. He tried to talk to me at school, too, but my friends were always there, forming a protective barrier around me and giving him the evil eye.

One day, he managed to find me alone at Lena's locker, which I was temporarily using as my own - precisely so he wouldn't be able to run into me.

"Tasha," he pleaded, before I had time to run away. "Tasha, please talk to me. I have no idea what's going on. I've called you a million times. I don't know-"

"Fuck off, Kaden." I hissed, surprising even myself at the amount of rage that was boiling up in my chest.

I didn't look at him but I could sense him there beside me with his hands on his head, doing everything he could to play the baffled innocent.

"Fuck off? Tasha - what the fuck, what the
fuck
is going on with you? Why are you-"

"What's going on with me?!" I yelled, spinning around so I was facing him and so angry it felt like my throat was closing and the words were barely making it out. "What going on with ME? I honestly don't even know what to say to that, Kaden. I can't believe you're asking what's going on with me. As if somehow I'm the cause of this. As if any of this is my fault! As if-"

Lena was suddenly beside me, physically pushing Kaden back, away from me. "Get away from her, Kaden. Right now."

Then Sadie showed up, too. I watched as they stared absolute daggers at Kaden and as he, seeing that they were serious, hung his head and turned around to walk away. I made the mistake of looking at his face just as he did it, too. It looked like he was going to cry. And there was nothing I could do about the sudden rush of pity in my heart at the sight of him trudging away.

"Don't," Lena admonished, her voice firm. "Don't, Tasha. That's exactly what he wants - you to feel sorry for him. Don't do it. He didn't even try to apologize, did he? Just did that stupid man thing of pretending like he's so innocent and he has no idea why the silly, hysterical woman is so upset."

She was right. He hadn't apologized. As she spoke I could feel my own heart hardening again, just as quickly as it had softened.

My friends ushered me around Reinhardt High like bodyguards, absolutely fierce and resolute in their loyalty. When I wasn't on the verge of tears over Kaden's betrayal I was on it at the unshakable love of my girlfriends and my family as they encircled the wounded member of the tribe and took care of me.

That isn't to say anything about those days after what happened was pleasant. Someone once told me that even with catastrophic physical injuries, a human being can stay conscious, even up and walking around, for a lot longer than anyone would expect, mostly due to adrenaline. It's sometimes an hour or more later that the body seems to acknowledge or accept that it is in deep trouble, at which point the person will collapse. I think the first few days after that disastrous prom night were the emotional equivalent of a wounded person stumbling around on the highway, grievously injured, after a bad crash. I was in full denial mode.

It didn't work. It worked for a couple, maybe three days, and then something inside me just refused to listen to my mind's furious demands to get up, to keep going, to not let anyone - even myself - see how badly I was hurt. Everyone had my back. When cooking a simple dinner for the family transformed into an impossible task, Alisha had my back. A few times my friends showed up with take-out or homemade soup and sandwiches. It wasn't just the cooking, though. Alisha came home one night to find me curled up in a ball on the sofa, oblivious to my niece who I was supposed to be watching. She was kind about it but I cried so hard I almost threw up and then retreated to my bed to fester alone.

School started to slip, too. Luckily by that point, I was too close to graduation to do any real damage - and I wasn't going to college anyway so what did it matter? I just seemed to go into a kind of zombie-mode. Constantly tired and when I wasn't tired - or asleep - perpetually on the verge of tears. It was terrifying, the feeling of becoming another person - someone even I didn't recognize.

It was the first time in my life that I ever caved in like that. I was the strong one. Everyone always said it - family, friends, teachers. I believed it, too. I was the one who stood up straight and got things done in even the toughest circumstances. Until I wasn't. Until life smacked me right across the face with the brutal truth - I was just as fragile as everybody else, just as prone to that awful robotic state of going through the motions of life while feeling nothing but sadness every waking moment. No matter how much I told myself to stop thinking about Kaden I couldn't do it. It didn't make sense.

'Why?' The question lay there at the forefront of my consciousness. Why? Why had he done it? And why had I fallen so easily for someone who didn't appear to feel any of the things he said he did? I could not get my head around any of it. And so I tortured myself, constantly turning my relationship with Kaden over and over and over in my mind, as if expecting to find some new, previously-missed detail that would explain it all.

Graduation day came and went. I put on my gown and mortarboard and walked across the stage to the enthusiastic cheers of my family - even my mother, who had made a point of coming out - and friends. It felt underwhelming. About half of the grad class was heading off the college, including a few of my own close friends. But I was staying in Little Falls and as far as I could see, life wasn't going to change much outside of the absence of school.

We went out for dinner after the ceremony, to the modest little restaurant where all of our celebratory family meals had taken place for as long as I could remember. Everyone came - even my mom. I still felt terrible most of the time but I managed, that evening, to maintain a somewhat cheerful demeanor. As the evening wore on it started to feel slightly less false. At one point Ray tapped his fork on his water glass and gave me a little nod.

"Natasha," he said, getting to his feet and ignoring the sideways looks from the other tables - it wasn't the sort of restaurant where a person made speeches, not that it mattered to Ray at all. "First of all, I just want to say congratulations. You've worked so hard - for yourself and for this family. I'm proud of you and I'm proud to be your brother."

I could feel my eyes beginning to well up, but looking around the table I could see I wasn't the only one. Ray continued:

"I know - we all know - that you're having a tough time lately. You try to hide it from us, I think because that's just what you do - you try to protect your family from pain and hurt. But we're your family, Tash. We see how difficult this is for you. And what I want you to know is that you're not alone. You're not alone right now, going through this. We've all been where you are. I have, Alisha has, CeeCee and Rosa certainly will. Hell, mom's been there, too. Right, mom?"

I looked over at my mother as the tears finally spilled down my cheeks and she was smiling at me, nodding. "Oh yes, Tasha. I've been there. And I don't just mean with your father. Heartbreak is just part of life, especially when you're so young and every experience feels so raw."

I looked back at Ray, who was giving me a pointed look. "Listen," he said. "What I'm trying to say to you, Tash, is that this is normal. No one thinks you're falling apart, no one thinks you've done something wrong. We're here for you and we know you would be here for us - and that you will be there for your little sister and your niece when their turn comes. So we've got your back, little sister. We've all got your back. For as long as you need - which, believe me, won't be as long as you think. And when the day comes that it's me who needs a hand or a little patience, I know you'll do the same. We love you and we're so grateful to have such a smart, funny, brave person in our family."

Ray's voice cracked on that last word - family - and I couldn't hold it together any longer. What had been a few furtive tears turned into a little sob and I got up from my chair and went to my brother so we could wrap our arms around each other.

"I mean it," he whispered in my ear. "We got you, Tash. We
got you
."

After Ray I went around the table, hugging everyone, thanking them for their love and patience. By the time we left the restaurant it was almost nine o'clock. It hit me while we were walking to the car.

"Oh my God." I said out loud.

Alisha, who was walking next to me with her arm around my shoulders, looked at me.

"What, Tash?"

I turned to her, slightly disbelieving. But no, it was true. "I haven't thought about Kaden once since we got here."

She squeezed me a little tighter and grinned. "Yeah. That's how it happens. Every day you just think about it less and less - some days are good, some days are bad, but eventually you hardly think about it at all."

For the first time since I'd seen my boyfriend kissing Kelsey at our high school prom, it occurred to me that I might, actually, manage to get over it.

I got hammered at prom. Properly, stupidly hammered. Hammered enough that Kelsey Richards thought she could just stick her tongue in my mouth and get me to bend her over the nearest desk. I suppose I couldn't really blame her, the tactic had mostly been successful for her in the past.

But after she grabbed me - and after I, in my drunken state, just assumed that it was Tasha before bothering to check - and then after I realized what had happened, I was overcome by an almost overwhelming feeling of revulsion. Not just at the smell of her overpriced perfume or the taste of her cigarette smoke-tinged kisses, but at everything going on around me. All the stupid, drunk football players who knew they didn't have to be anything other than football players and everyone was going to worship them. They didn't have to be smart or funny or interesting or anything except football players. Steve Carlson was obviously looking for a fight, too - or to get into Kelsey's pants - so I was done. Maybe it was the alcohol heightening my emotions but I felt more done than I ever had before with that crowd. It didn't enter my conscious mind at the time but Tasha was the reason. She was simply a better person than all of them. She was brave and sweet and sharp as a tack and spending time with her meant I would never again be able to hang out with simpering cheerleaders and buffoonish sports jocks (even if I was one) without feeling a sense of what I was missing.

So I blundered out into the hallway with one aim in mind: finding Natasha Greeley and spending the rest of the one and only prom night of our lives with her. Unfortunately, I'd had so much to drink that the rest of the night is, at best, a blur. I vaguely remember looking for her in the gym and coming up empty. Even her friends weren't there. Had she left without me?

The sun was up by the time I could string two thoughts together again. I pushed myself up on my elbows and looked around to try and figure out where the hell I was. I was on a couch. But I wasn't at home. I wasn't at Tasha's place, either. My throat was dry. As my consciousness swam through the fog of alcohol from the previous night it struck me that I was very, very thirsty and I got up and went looking for a kitchen to get a glass of water.

Aaron Sokolsky was in the kitchen and without looking up from the scrambled eggs he was making he simply passed me an orange juice container that was sitting out on the counter.

"Drink this, man. You need it."

"Mmph," I said, opening the carton and pouring the sweet liquid down my throat. When that wasn't enough he handed me a glass, which I immediately filled with cold water and drank in its entirety. Then I sat down in one of the chairs at the kitchen table and ran my hands through my hair. Was that - was that pieces of grass falling down onto my t-shirt?

"What the fuck happened, man?" I asked, expecting the usual 'we got wasted and we ended up here' tale. Which was pretty much what Sokolsky said. He told me I'd almost gotten into it with Steve Carlson and the memory of Kelsey Richards came back to me.

"Shit. That girl just doesn't know how to take no for an answer," I commented, watching Aaron as he stirred the eggs around in a frying pan.

"Maybe," he replied, opening the fridge and grabbing a green pepper.

"Maybe?" I asked, laughing because I assumed he was joking. "I told her a hundred times. Hell, I even sat her down and had a nice respectful little chat with her about it."

"Did you?" Aaron asked, looking surprised.

"Yeah, I did. Never done that before. And she still thinks she can come rub herself all over me any damn time she pleases."

Aaron paused for a few seconds as he chopped up the pepper. "I don't know man," he said, eventually. "I think she just really likes you. I mean, she's had a huge thing for you since eleventh grade. How did you think she was going to act after she finally got the quarterback - and the guy she's been making googly eyes at for years - naked?"

There was no joking in Aaron's tone. He was being serious. It annoyed me. "Hold up," I said, making an effort to keep my irritation out of my voice and probably failing. "I told you I had a talk with her. I was really clear, too. Didn't give her any false hope, none of that bullshit. And she still thinks it's cool to come up behind me and grope me because - just because she wants to?"

Sokolsky brought two plates of scrambled eggs and two forks to the table, setting one plate and one fork down in front of me. "Eat, Kaden."

I tucked in, suddenly ravenous. Aaron was looking at me disapprovingly, I could feel it.

"What?" I asked, through a mouthful of eggs. "I fucking told her, man. I told her I wasn't interested."

"Yeah," Aaron replied, slowly, like he was choosing his words carefully. "But you told her after you fucked her, Kaden. You
knew
she was into you. It's cool you had a chat with her and all but what did you think was going to happen? You know how girls get when they like someone. Hell, some of them get like that when you sleep with them even if they don't like you."

I didn't have an immediate reply. Aaron was right. I had known Kelsey was into me. It's probably one of the main reasons I slept with her in the first place - because we were partying and I was lazy. I knew she'd go for it. As for the consequences, I hadn't thought of those. It wasn't really something I did back then - think of consequences.

"I'm not trying to be a dick," Aaron said, picking up on the fact that I was slightly pissed. "I'm only saying this because I've been there and because you're basically the only other guy on the team I think might even give a small shit about this stuff. It's just, I mean, it's hard to talk about this without sounding like a giant pussy, right? But I don't want to be a dick, you know? And I don't think you want to be a dick. And treating people the way a lot of the football players treat people is a dick move. You know you shouldn't have touched Kelsey Richards, don't you? I can see it on your face, you want to be mad at me but that's only because you know I'm right."

I chuckled and shook my head because there was no other possible response. He had me. "Yeah, man. I know. It's weird, right? It's not even like I set out to act like an asshole - to Kelsey or to any of those girls - I just didn't even think about it at all."

"Yeah, I know," Aaron said, gathering scrambled eggs onto his fork. "That's why it's a dick move. I'm honestly not trying to give you shit - all of this stuff applies to me, too. I guess I'm just trying to be less of a dick these days. By the way, you got plans for today?"

I immediately thought of Tasha. "Not sure. Let me text Tasha and see what's up with her."

"Choose your words carefully, man."

"What?" I asked, confused.

Aaron just shook his head like I was the biggest idiot in the world. "Dude. It was our high school prom last night. You were passed out in the back of Jake's truck by midnight and we drove you home at around three. Tasha's probably not going to be too happy with you is what I'm saying."

Fuck. He was right. It was all coming back to me - the promise to meet her back in the gym after a brief interlude so we could both spend time with her friends. "Fuck," I said, out loud that time. "
Fuck.
"

"Text her. Tell her you're a dumb asshole and that you'll make it up to her. And then make it up to her - and I'm telling you right now it's going to take more than flowers. Prom is a big deal to girls."

So I did as instructed and sent Tasha a text:

"Really, really sorry about last night. I'm a dumb, stupid, drunk asshole and I want to make it up to you."

When there was no reply within a couple of minutes I tried calling her but it went straight to messages. Maybe she'd had her own wild night without me? A little stab of jealousy or insecurity sliced through my stomach and I pushed the thoughts of what Tasha might have gotten up to right back down where they came from.

"Let's go for a swim," Aaron said, pulling his shirt off and heading out the sliding glass door towards his family's huge, sparkling blue pool. "She probably needs a little time to cool off. She'll get back to you."

But Tasha didn't need a "little" time to cool off. And she didn't get back to me. By six o'clock that evening there was still nothing - no call, no text, no e-mail. Nothing.

"She's pissed," Aaron said. "I mean, if you're going to date someone like Natasha Greeley, you're going to have to get used to that."

"What the fuck does that mean?" I asked, assuming he was insulting Tasha and feeling my blood rising slightly at the possibility.

"Calm down, Kaden, I'm not dissing her. It's the opposite. Listen to me. You're used to cheerleaders, right? Girls like Kelsey Richards? It's all any of us football players are used to. And you have to get it through your skull - those girls are basically groupies. I mean, Little Falls is full of them, I admit, but it's not like we've got anything else going on here other than football, right? Anyway, girls like Tasha - and Amber aren't groupies. You can't just do whatever you want and expect her to be there with a big forgiving smile on her face whenever you fuck up. And it looks like you fucked up. So maybe it takes her a day or two to cool down, but she will eventually. And then you apologize and you make it up to her. And the making it up part is key. Smart girls, girls with their shit together - they don't put up with bullshit, Kaden. If you screw up, you own it and you make it better. The sooner you learn that the better."

I laughed and slapped Aaron on the back. "Damn, man. When did you turn into such a wise old man?"

"Amber," he replied, plainly. "She kicked my ass, bro. And it needed kicking, too. That's the thing about those girls, the good ones. They kick your ass when it really needs kicking."

So I spent rest of the day with Sokolsky and neither of us felt like going out drinking again that night. His girlfriend was spending time with relatives an hour away and my girlfriend - I didn't know what my girlfriend was doing. We hit the grocery store, got some beer (not enough to do any further damage, though) and floated around on inflatable pool toys, relaxing.

Although it was never fully relaxing for me because Tasha was constantly there at the forefront of my mind. Aaron kept trying to reassure me but every unanswered text and every call that went straight to messages just contributed to a growing sense of dread that I was praying was due to paranoia or my hangover.

After spending another night at Aaron's I went home the next day. My mom found me sitting in the living room, staring at my phone and doing calculations in my head. The last time I'd spoken to her was, I guessed, around nine p.m. on prom night. That meant it was over forty hours - almost forty-eight hours, two full days - since we'd communicated.

"Hi, honey," my mom said, coming over and kissing me on the head. "How was it? It's Sunday so I assume it went well? Thanks for texting your father to let us know you were staying at Aaron's. Do you have any photos?"

"Mom, didn't you take enough photos?" I asked, recalling the interminable, almost two-hour long photo shoot before I'd left to go to the actual prom.

"Sure I did, Kaden," she said and I could tell from the slightly hurt tone in her voice that she'd caught the snappiness in mine. "But that doesn't mean I'm not interested in seeing more. I want to see a few of you and Tasha, too."

"Sorry, mom," I apologized. "I didn't mean to bite your head off. I think I'm just pretty tired. Can I show you the photos later?"

"That would be nice, honey."

The rest of the weekend passed by in a blur of confusion and stress - stress from not knowing what was going on with Tasha and from having to put up a front that everything was fine to my parents. Then Monday came and went. And Tuesday. Tasha never seemed to be at her locker, and the complete radio silence was ongoing. On Wednesday, I ran into Tasha's best friend Lena, just outside the gymnasium after gym class. I smiled but she blanked me, looking away and saying nothing when I went further and said hi. I could have walked away but her reaction just pissed me off. So I'd gotten way too drunk at prom and failed to meet up with my girlfriend at the appointed time. The way she was looking at me you'd think I'd murdered someone.

"Really?" I snapped, as Lena gazed into the distance, determined not to acknowledge me. I continued anyway. She wasn't deaf, she could hear me. "I understand if Tasha's upset with me but this is a little childish, don't you think? I'm the devil because I drank too much at prom?"

Lena deigned to look in my direction, running her eyes coolly over me. "Drank too much at prom?" She asked, one eyebrow raised disdainfully. "Is that what happened, Kaden?"

"Yes!" I replied, confused at her tone, which seemed to imply I had done much worse than had too much to drink. "That is what happened. And I just think you're being a little dramatic about it, is all."

"Dramatic?" She asked, locking her eyes onto mine. It was only then that I noticed. Lena wasn't being bitchy. She was furious. Her eyes were narrowed into slits and she was actually breathing quickly.

"What the fuck?" I asked, even more confused. "Why do you look like you want to kill me? Have I missed something?"

"You didn't see us, did you?"

I took a deep breath, determined not to lose my temper and come out looking like an immature asshole. "I didn't see you where? Look, you're obviously beyond pissed, I can see that. But Tasha isn't talking to me - as I'm sure you know - so if you want to tell me what the hell is going on here, I would appreciate it."