Page 1 of The Brotherly Shove
CHAPTER 1
BREAKER
Eighteen Months Ago
Texas State University locker room
"What team?" I roar, and my voice echoes off the tiled walls of the locker room.
"Panthers!" The team yells back to me.
"WHAT TEAM?" I scream even louder, and they meet my energy with their equally pumped up cadence.
"PANTHERS!"
I'm surrounded by teammates in this smelly locker room, standing on a rickety bench that I'm about ninety-nine percent sure is going to give out under my weight any moment now. I'm covered in sweat, grass stains, and the celebratory champagne that Coach sprayed all over us just a moment ago, and I don't care. I have never felt higher.
"That's fucking right! College Football Championship winners, baby!" I beat my chest while the guys trade shoulder bumps and one-armed man hugs. Our star tight-end, Marshall Jenkins, holds the gold football shaped trophy over his head while we all celebrate. I might be the starting quarterback, but as a Junior at Pennbrook University, I'm not yet eligible to becaptain. Of course, I'm certain I'll have the team's votes when Jenkins graduates and starts training with whatever NFL team inevitably drafts him this spring.
Coach Simmons makes his way to the middle of the crowd of dudes and holds his hands up in attempt to calm us down.
"You fucking did it, boys. This season started out rough, but you muscled through. You all killed it, I couldn't be more proud. You're bringing the trophy home to Penwood, and you deserve to celebrate. I'm not going to be a buzzkill, but don't forget the rules. Underagers — no drinking, period. And when you inevitably drink anyway, make sure nobody takes pictures of you. No hard drugs. No public indecency. No arrests. You're still representing Pennbrook, me, and most importantly, your future selves. Now hit the showers and then go have fun."
We all give Coach a collective "whoop whoop" with accompanying fist pumps as we all start losing our clothes and hop into the showers. I give myself a quick soap up and rinse off before I wrap a towel around my waist and head to my locker to get some pants on. I've been out as bisexual to the team since the end of my freshman year season, and I thankfully haven't dealt with any homophobia from my guys, but I'm still self conscious about being the only queer player in the locker room. I'm not a pervert, I would never check anyone in here out in real life, let alone naked in a locker room.
I know that my team knows that as well. They've never given me any reason to feel like the odd man out. Even still, I never want my guys to feel uncomfortable, so I'm always in and out of the showers the quickest.
"B!" I hear my best friend and our team's center, Lennon Griffith, call out behind me. He smacks a large hand down on to my shoulder and gives me a shake. I'm thankful that I've already pulled my shirt over my head before his skin has the chance to make contact with mine. Len is a super touchy-feelyguy. He's a self-proclaimed hugger, a fact that he told me the first day we met when he picked me up and squeezed me so tight that I thought he'd bruised one of my ribs. It's something that shouldn't really bother me, and yet…
Platonic physical affection is not usually an issue for me. My ma is a hugger. Half the people in my neighborhood back home are huggers. Hell, I'm almost always game for a good tight embrace. The problem is not that Lennon always wants to hug me. It's more so the way my nerves start to fire on every single cylinder when Lennon touches me. It feels nothing like just a hug between friends.
"We did it, man," I say, keeping my back turned until I hear Lennon buckle his belt.
"Fuck yeah, we did." He says, and I see him rub his hand over his right side where a bruise is already forming. He took a hard hit late in the fourth quarter that he is most definitely going to be feeling tomorrow.
"You alright?" I ask, nodding to the spot.
"Yeah," he answers. "It's just sore. I might bitch out after one drink tonight, though. That fluffy hotel bed and an ice pack followed by a hot compress combo is calling to me."
Damn, that actually sounds nice. The NCAA really pulled out all the stops for the championship game against Texas State University in Houston. The beds in those rooms really make it feel like you're sleeping on a cloud lined with angel wings and unicorn dust.
"I'll dip out with you. I'm exhausted, and I don't really feel like getting trashed tonight." It's true. I threw for 236 passing yards tonight, not to mention the touchdown I sunk in on a particular kind of quarterback sneak that Len, the starting offensive line, and I developed in practice. It's pretty sick, actually. On this play, I koala bear myself on Lennon's back after the snap while he surges forward, and the offensive line shovesus over the line of scrimmage by pushing us. Basically, instead ofall hands on deck, it'sall hands on Breaker's ass.
That particular play that no defense seems to be able to stop cemented the win for us.
I'll take a low key night with my best friend over watching the guys getting plastered and finger blasting jersey chasers under tables at the bar.
"Yesssss! Roommate movie night!" Lennon punches the air with both fists and then starts to floss. Not his teeth, no. He's doing that cringe ass old video game dance. At 300 pounds and covered in body hair, Lennon is the epitome of a teddy bear. Big, squishy, and cuddly. Looks like he could kill you on the football field, thighs that could crack a skull like a walnut, but actually just a big, real life plushie.
Unfortunately for me, he's exactly my kind of man. And he's painfully, painfully straight.
I haven't always had a crush on Lennon. Truly, for the first few years that we knew each other, he was just my buddy. We work well together on the field and we get along off of it. We both love card games and Tom Hanks movies, and we would both rather spend a night in with a six pack each than out partying on frat row. I've always known Len was attractive as hell, and sure, there were one or two 'what if' scenarios I let myself indulge in while trying to sleep over the years, but I swear that's all it was.
Until, of course, it wasn't anymore.
It was that cursed Christmas Eve game in Alabama. The Christmas Eve that changed everything. The December night where Lennon showed me exactly who he is at his core, and when he started to feel like more. Like mine.
Lennon feels like mine, and because of that, I have been living in my own personal hell for months.