Page 43 of His Secret Santa
“We broke up. It’s done.”
“No, it is not done,” Darren Pratt countered. “Fix things with McKenna. And your friends. What the hell were you thinking of kicking them out last night? Are you trying to alienate everyone from your life?”
Maybe I am. Lincoln stared into his cup. “Maybe I need a new group of friends.”
“What is with you lately?” his dad snapped. “It’s as if you’re determined to fuck up your life before it even gets started.”
Lincoln sighed. “I’m just… reevaluating some things.”
“Reevaluate this.” His dad smacked the counter next to Lincoln, making him flinch. “Fix your relationship with McKenna and your friends—or you’re on your own after graduation. If you want to fuck up your life, you’re not doing it on my dime.”
Roger that, Lincoln thought as the man left the kitchen. I wouldn’t expect anything less from you, dad.
• • •
“You think it’s funny, me having a naked gay guy in my bedroom? That’s how bullshit rumors get started. Now, give me his fucking clothes so I can get him out of here.”
Lincoln’s voice—his cutting words—circulated inside Holden’s head all night and into the following morning. The few times he managed to fall asleep, the quarterback’s brittle words to his friends made their way into his troubled dreams.
Bullshit rumors.
Holden sat on his bed, his hair damp from the recent shower, water trickling down his neck from the tips of his hair. Everything about the previous night felt surreal, like a bad dream that stuck with him.
It can’t be real. There has to be some logical explanation. There has to be.
His heart hurt as the fear of it being all too real consumed him. Why did he feel as if his whole world had been knocked off-kilter? It shouldn’t be this important to him. It shouldn’t matter this fucking much.
Talk to Jamie, tell him everything.
But could he? It shouldn’t even be a question, but somehow… it was. And that bothered him. There wasn’t a thing in the world that Jamie wouldn’t understand. Holden realized it wasn’t the fear of Jamie not understanding… but his unyielding advice once he knew all the details.
You know what he would say, and you don’t want to hear it.
Jamie always gave solid advice. That was the problem in this case. He would be right, and Holden didn’t want him to be. Not this time.
His cell vibrated on the nightstand. Jamie. No one else ever called him.
Holden sighed and picked up the phone. Before he answered the call, he noticed the scores of unopened text messages from his friend. Some he had been aware of and had put off replying to, and others were new, probably sent while he was in the shower.
“Hello?”
“Hey,” Jamie said. “I’ve been texting. Are you okay?” He faltered. “After last night, I was worried about you.”
“I’m fine,” Holden lied; a lie that had no hopes of slipping past his best friend.
“You don’t sound fine,” Jamie noted. “I’m coming over. And don’t tell me not to, because I will anyway.”
Holden smiled small. “Okay.”
“I’ll be there in just a few,” he said. “Don’t you dare take off.”
“I won’t.”
While he waited for Jamie to arrive, Holden went down to the kitchen and fixed himself a bowl of cereal. He wasn’t hungry but needed something to occupy himself, so he wasn’t just sitting in his room… thinking. His thoughts weren’t his friends right now.
“You’re up,” his mom said quietly when she entered the kitchen and found him at the table. “Are you… feeling all right?”
Holden stared at his cereal. “I’m fine, mom,” he mumbled. When she just looked at him, eyes worried, he added, “Really, I’m fine. Like I told dad, I’m just dealing with some stuff right now, but it’s nothing to worry about.”