Dissonance - Chapter 28

I started off Monday feeling at least a little less stressed. I still hadn’t talked to Mom, or even been back to the trailer, since I left to stay with the Phillips, but at least the manager stuff was cleared up. Considering everything else going on, that was probably just as important, since I realized how much I was being distracted from paying attention to my burgeoning music career. Since most music careers die in their infancy, I’d set myself up to lose my entire dream. At least with Warren around, I had someone whose job it was to make sure things weren’t getting missed.

Given my history, I should have expected my good mood to get derailed, but I was once again blindsided by it. As usual, Kat broke off and headed to drop her stuff off at the locker room as soon as we got out of the car. She was still having problems with me and Sydney, and had decided she didn’t want to be at the front of the school where Sydney has started meeting me before we each went to class.

Since I was still ignoring that situation more than anything else, that solution worked for me too. Today, I was even more distracted. It was the first time I’d seen her since our date, and I found I was really excited about it. Even with the rough start with her dad, it had been a really great date. Part of my wanted to run up to her and sweep her into a hug or something, but we weren’t at the PDA stage yet, so I played it cool when I saw her. On top of that, I still didn’t know what she and Hanna had talked about after our date while I was up on stage. No matter how much I’d pressed Hanna, she’d refused to say.

“Hey,” I said, stopping next to her, looking towards the entrance of the school where he was looking.

Because I was playing it cool, it took me a second to realize she was crying.

“Hey,” I said, in a much different tone, turning and facing her. “What’s wrong.”

“Nothing,” she said reflexively.

“No. You don’t normally stand in front of the school crying, so it can’t be nothing. What happened?”

“I was standing here waiting for you, and a couple of guys from the football team kind of surrounded me. One of them was saying horrible things about how he got all your cast-offs and he … did things with the other girls you dated and that I should just go with him behind the athletic building now, to get it over with. He started describing all the things he’d do to me. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be crying. I normally ignore jerks like him, but they were all around me, squeezing me in, and it scared me. If one of the teachers hadn’t been nearby and told them to get to class, I don’t know what would have happened.”

“You’ve got nothing to be sorry about,” I said, pulling her into my arms. “It’s my fault. Harry hates me and is too much of a coward to come at me directly. he’s seen us together and figured he could get to you through me. It’s my fault.”

“No,” she said, pushing me back. The tears had stopped and now she looked angry. “It’s not your fault, it’s his. Next time, I’m going to kick him in the dick.”

“I’ll take care of him. If you see him or any of his friends, just turn and walk the other way. I don’t want you getting into trouble over this. I mean, you’d dad already hates me. You getting expelled over something to do with me would be the icing on that cake.”

“Fine, but if he gets in my way … a kick in the dick.”

“Works for me. Better?”

“Better,” she said, hugging me around and resting her face in my chest.

Maybe we were at the PDA stage, I thought, as I wrapped my arms around her. I’d have to thank Harry for pushing us to this point … after I kicked his ass, of course.

“I had fun this weekend,” I said into the top of her head.

“Yeah, me too,” she said, stepping back and wiping away the residual tears.

“So, what did you and Hanna talk about?”

“What?” She said, giving me a sideways head tilt.

I really believed she didn’t know what I was talking about for a for a second, until she let the mask slip and a hint of a smile escaped.

“Fine, you two keep your secrets,” I said, crossing my arms.

“And she said you were clueless about women,” she said, smiling and pulling one of my hands-free so she could put hers in it, pulling me into school.

“I think I might be getting more than I bargained for,” I said, matching my stride with her shorter ones.

“You have no idea,” she said as she intertwined her fingers with mine.

I held myself in check, partly to keep from upsetting her anymore and partly because I just wanted to enjoy being with Sydney, until after I left her in her classroom. As soon as she disappeared from sight, the smile I’d had on my face dropped. My first class wasn’t far from hers, but I went the other way.

Harry was a senior and a football player, and liked to push the boundaries of what that kind of status afforded him. I knew he and his friends usually hung out near the locker room or weight rooms in the morning, just in case anyone forgot they were football players, and didn’t even start heading to their first classes until after the bell rang, practically willing their teachers to mark them tardy.

With Coach Bryant back and Mr. Packer my new vice-principal, I knew I was pushing my luck, since both were looking for a reason to suspend me at the very least, but I couldn’t let what Harry did stand. He could come after me all he wanted, but once he started frightening my friends, he crossed the line.

Sure enough, he was walking from the hallway that lead towards the athletic department towards the main part of the school as I turned off the cafeteria. I quickened my pace to get across the cafeteria before he got out of the hallway, since even though there weren’t any teachers in sight, that was a bit too exposed for this kind of confrontation. He was horse-playing with his friends, which probably explains why he didn’t notice me coming towards him until I was at the mouth of the hallway. I knew the moment he saw me, because he paused, and then took several steps back. It made sense. Besides being an innate coward, I can imagine from his point of view I looked like I was out for blood, what with how quickly I was closing the ground or the fury he could clearly see on my face.

His two friends froze in place, unsure of what to do.

“You two can either leave, or you can end your season right now. It’s your choice,” I said to Paul, who was, if anything more pathetic than Harry.

Paul and Harry had both been Aaron’s lackey. Somehow, he’d managed the pathetic placement of being the lackey’s lackey, since he now followed Harry around the same way the two of them had followed Aaron around. He was also more openly cowardly than Harry, who at least tried to pretend he was standing his ground when directly confronted.

Paul and the kid I didn’t know both gave the briefest of glances at Harry before they hurried past us toward their classes. I didn’t watch them go, because knowing Harry he’d either run or try and take a cheap shot, but I listened to see if they might double back on me. When I clearly heard them running away, I focused all of my attention on Harry.

“I heard you had a talk with Sydney,” I said, walking slowly towards him as I did.

“I can talk to whoever I want to. What the fuck does it matter to you?” he said, trying to sound brave as he started taking steps backward, away from me, trying to keep our distance.

“It matters, because if you even look in her direction again, I am going to kick the shit out of you. I’m going to punch you in your idiotic mouth for every word you say to her from here on out. Even if it’s to ask her for a pencil. I don’t you to look at her. I don’t want you to think about her. And I definitely don’t want you to talk to her, is that clear?”

“Fuck you, Nelson.”

“What?” I said, taking two quick steps toward him.

He panicked, trying to scramble backward faster, and tripped over his own feet, landing hard on his ass. He started to try and scoot backward on his but until I stepped on the letterman jacket he always wore, regardless of the weather, pinning him in place. As position standing over him, straddling his legs, wasn’t a great one. If he was a braver, or even halfway competent, person, there were a multitude of ways he could go at me. I wouldn’t have done this to Aaron. Harry, though, was both an idiom and a coward, and the only way he’d take a shot at me was if I was already on the ground, or someone braver than him did it first.

“I … uhh …”

“Harry, I don’t know what I have to do to beat this into your two brain cells, but you need to figure this out. I’m done with your shit this year. I’m not going to be anyone’s punching back. I’ve been nice so far to not beat the shit out of you, but you’re running out of chances. Aaron got lucky his dad knows people and kept him out of jail last year. Your family doesn’t have nearly that kind of connection and you are too shitty of a football player to ever play a game after you graduate. No one’s going to stick their neck out to protect you the way they did Aaron. I can either beat the shit out of you right now, or you can decide you’re going to stay out of my way. So which is it, ass-kicking or are you going to be smart for once?”

Harry didn’t look up, but mumbled something.

“I didn’t hear that.”

“I’ll stay out of your way.”

“That means anyone I know too. I don’t want to see you near any of my friends either. Got it?”

He mumbled something else, his eyes darting around, probably looking for a way out. I wasn’t prepared to give him one. If he was smart, he’d just keep his mouth shut and wait for me to walk away. If we’d been somewhere else, I probably would have just kicked his ass, but we were in a public building and I was pretty sure there were security cameras around here somewhere. I wasn’t going to actually hit him here. Thankfully, Harry was too dumb to figure that out.

“Louder,” I said, stepping forward slightly.

“Yes. Fine. Whatever.”

“Good,” I said, stepping over so I was now on the side of him.

He just sat there, not even trying to get up while I stared down at him.

“Is everything okay here?” A voice said behind me, honestly startling both of us.

I turned slightly to see Coach Becker, the swimming coach. I’d talked to her a few times at Kat’s swim meets and practices, but I didn’t know if she remembered me.

“Yeah, Harry just tripped and fell down. I was just helping him up,” I said, offering a hand down to Harry.

I could see the furry in his eyes as he looked back up at me. I was humiliating him, and we both knew it, but he wasn’t about to do anything. instead, he took my hand and let me pull him off the ground. He mumbled something and stormed off into the cafeteria and out of sight.

“You should probably get to class,” Coach Becker said.

Her expression made it clear she didn’t buy that act for a second, but she wasn’t calling me on it, so I counted it as a victory and headed to class. I also didn’t believe for a second that I was done with Harry. At some point, I was going to actually have to kick his ass.

***

Although I made him run like a little girl, the whole thing with Harry threw me off for the rest of the day, to the point where I even turned down Sydney when she asked if I wanted to sit with them at lunch, and went outside to eat by myself instead.

I’d always considered myself as being pretty mellow, and not really violent at all. Yet in the last ten days or so, I’d threatened to beat both my father and Harry unconscious, and meant it both times. While I had no problem with self-defense I thought, or at least hoped, I was smart enough to find a way to deal with both of them without putting hands on them. Not so much because I was a pacifist, but because I was already ended up in handcuffs once after a fight, and that was before I drew the sheriff’s attention directly to me. I had the strong impression he’d like nothing more than to throw me behind bars, if only to prove to his daughter that I wasn’t a good guy.

It wasn’t fair, but I’d already learned that life was almost universally unfair. Pretending that it was okay because Harry was an asshole and dad was trying to screw me over wouldn’t protect me from assault charges, even if I was in the right. I’d gotten away with it this time, but who knows how many more times I could threaten, or actually do, bodily harm.

After school Cameron headed to the band’s house with me. While we practiced on stage on weekends, now that the guys were in town, our weekday practices were at their house. Partly to make Chef’s life easier, and partly because we’d set up the garage as a practice space, and it worked really well.

The interview itself went well, and even Marco seemed placated by it. I’d made sure, multiple times, to emphasize to Cameron how much I wanted anything he wrote to be about the band, and not me in specific, and the only questions we’d answer would be ones addressed to the group as a whole. I knew I was kind of torpedoing his story a bit, since he’d wanted to focus almost entirely on the success of one member of the student by, but the only reason I’d agreed to it was so I could use his article as a peace offering.

Most of the questions were about what it was like to be in a studio and what it was like to be on the road, which I guess made sense for someone who dreamed of making their own music, or at least performing in an official cast recording one day. I still wasn’t sure it would make a good article, even if it had focused on me, but he was Cameron seemed happy with what he got, so I left it alone.

The rest of the week was, thankfully, uneventful. Cameron continued to come to our practices, but he was true to his word, and hung out to one side, quietly watching and occasionally making a note of something he found interesting.

Saturday I had another busy day, although sadly not with a date this time. Sydney and Kat had another swimming competition thing, although it seemed like all the same schools and kids from the last time, so for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what was different from the last one. Unlike football, baseball or basketball, where there seemed to be a structure for how teams won, I didn’t really get how swimming, or track and field, which seemed to follow similar rules, worked. There were meets throughout the year where basically the same group of schools would compete, and then at the end of the year, they decide who gets to compete in regional and state competitions. Kat had tried to explain it to me once, but it involved a whole point system that I got lost in. I much preferred going by the teams that one the most games go on to post seasons competitions, and then it was a bracket or round robin, all of which seemed logical to me.

Not that the confusion was going to keep me from going to support Kat and Sydney. The fact that I was now supporting two swimmers also threw another little problem into the mix. Unlike Baseball, where everyone from one school won or lost as a team, each swimmer was competing for themselves, both for who finished first and for time. Kat had made it clear she didn’t love that I was talking to Sydney, but since our date, she’d started to grow a bit more distant. She wasn’t avoiding me precisely, but I could notice a difference.

I was dating Sydney, however. True, it was one date, but we’d already agreed to go out again this coming Saturday, and we talked every single day. She wasn’t my girlfriend, but it was going to be expected I root for her. As much as I’d been dealing with Kat’s attitude by ignoring it, but we’d reached the point where I couldn’t keep doing that, so I’d suggested that Kat ride with me instead. I think she wanted to say no, but ever since the thing with the UNC coaches, she’d reverted back to being compliant again, which was another problem, although not one for today. We’d entered a strange phase of our friendship where she was listening to me and doing what I suggested while being mad at me for doing it.

“Wait,” I said as she started to get out of the car. “We need to talk first.”

I made sure we left early enough that we’d have time for this and not eat into her warm-up. I realized this was kind of a jerk thing to do, hitting her with this right before a competition, since any sport was all about focus, but I didn’t think it would affect things too much. Kat was so much better than all of the kids in our area, the only person she was really competing with was herself and her past times. At their practices, everyone just assumed she’d sweep all of the events, so if it did throw her, it wouldn’t affect the outcome too much.

“What?” she said, still agitated.

“We need to deal with your attitude about my dating Sydney.”

“Why?  I don’t care who you date.”

“That’s not true, and we both know it. You’ve been giving me attitude ever since I started talking to her, and I’ve seen how you’ve talked to her at practices. You don’t treat anyone else like that.”

“What, she’s complained to you?”

“No, she hasn’t. She thinks you’re amazing, actually, and idolizes you. I’ve noticed it. And it matters, because I’m going to be cheering for both of you today, and I don’t want you to throw a fit or say something to her.”

“Fine, I won’t talk to her at all.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose and sighed, “That’s not what I’m trying to say. You know why we can’t date. We’ve talked about it and agreed it would be a bad idea. Did you think I’d just sit and pine away for you? That I’m not supposed to date anyone?”

“No,” she said, finally dropping the attitude, although replacing it with sadness.

“I don’t get why this is such a problem? All summer, you were throwing girls at me, and now that I ended up with one, you’re upset.”

“It’s not the same. They don’t live here and you won’t fall in love with them.”

“Okay, I do get that, but do you want me to never fall in love? You’d rather see me never find happiness if I can’t find it with you?”

“NO,” she said emphatically.

“But that’s how you’re acting. I know it’s not Sydney herself, because you two were friendly, if not friends, before we started talking.”

“It’s not,” Kat said, looking down at her hands.

“Then you’re going to have to figure out what you want. If you want me to be alone, then tell me. If you don’t, then you’re going to have to actually let me date without hating me, because whoever it is won’t be invisible, and unless you want to stop being my friend, you’re going to be around them.”

“I know,” she said, although I noticed she didn’t commit to any option.

“Will you try being at least nice to Sydney, and maybe stop busting my balls every time I mention her or you see me with her.”

“Yeah, I’ll try,” she said, wiping away a tear I hadn’t noticed, because she was still looking down at her hands, her head bowed.

“Hey,” I said, reaching under her chin and pulling her up to look at me. “You know I love you, right? You and Hanna are my best friends, and I’m not going anywhere. Just because I like someone else doesn’t mean I’m going to like you any less.”

“I know. I really will try, I promise.”

“Good,” I said, pulling her into a hug. “Now, don’t let this mess up your competition. You’re going to smoke every other girl out here and I’m going to be up in the stands screaming my head off for you, right?”

“Right.”

“Get your war face on and let’s get out there.”

She was actually smiling as we got out of the car. I wasn’t under any delusions that one conversation was going to fix everything, but hopefully this would at least tone things down. I had enough stuff going on right now, I needed to start fixing at least some of them.