Chapter 22 – Grace
When I think about the look on Tommy’s face as he lay there on the locker room bench, my heart cries out for him. I wish there was more I could have done for him. Seeing him like that – I just wasn’t prepared. But I did my best.
When I saw him from the stands, when that guy from the other team kicked him, I just couldn’t believe it. It was so blatant. He just straight up kicked him and didn’t even try to hide it. There is no way you could even attempt to say it was an accident. He deserves to be banned from the game forever, doing something like that to another player.
I know Tommy has to be freaking out inside, no matter how stoic he looks on the outside. Basketball is his entire life and he must be terrified of the idea that he might not be able to play again.
But I don’t believe that will happen. Maybe I’m just being naïve again, but I really do believe Tommy will be back on his feet in no time. He’s just one of those men that seems indestructible. Some asshole on the other team kicking him in the ankle isn’t enough to keep him down.
A meteor could streak down from space going a million miles an hour and crash off Tommy’s chest and shatter into dust and he’d be back next week to win the game.
He will be back. I know it.
But now, sitting back in my dorm, constantly checking my phone, I’m probably feeling just as anxious as he is.
I imagine he’s at the hospital now, either getting his ankle x-rayed or getting the results back. I would imagine Tommy Mason gets some priority so I should be hearing soon.
Just as I’m checking my phone for the forty-fifth time, the door opens and Shannon tromps in and dumps her bag on the floor like she just had the worst class ever.
“Fuck. Chemistry!” She groans, collapsing onto my bed. “If I have to balance another chemical equation…”
She looks over at me with a sigh, but immediately can tell that something’s going on with me. I look away, thinking maybe that will do something to avoid the incoming conversation, but nope.
“What is it?!” She asks me. My lips twist as I realize I have no idea how to even begin having this discussion. So much has happened, and there’s no way she’s going to approve of any of it.
“Well…” I start. Maybe I’ll sort of dip my toes into the conversation before getting into the deep waters. “Tommy got hurt during the game. Maybe broke his ankle.”
“Uh huh,” Shannon says slowly. “And…?”
“And…” I reply, just as slowly. “We’re sort of…a thing…kind of maybe…”
“Ugh,” Shannon reacts instantly, slouching back on the bed. She claps a hand over her forehead and groans. “Grace, Grace, Grace, Grace, Grace.”
“Stop it!” I protest, leaning forward in my chair. “He’s nice! He really is!”
“That’s what they all say at first,” Shannon groans. “You didn’t bang him yet, did you?”
“No,” I tell her, giving her half the truth. “We didn’t bang.”
“Well, thank god for that.”
I really wish Shannon wouldn’t be like this. She is really set in her ways when it comes to Tommy, and this whole thing has been enough of a whirlwind without me having to keep worrying about what she thinks. Maybe it’s time to put my foot down.
“Shannon, stop!” I say loudly, a little bit too whiny. “He really isn’t like you say he is! At least not to me.”
Shannon sits up and looks at me inquisitively. I’ve never asserted myself like that around her and the surprise shows in her face. If Tommy hadn’t hurt himself today, I doubt I would have said anything. But I’m on edge thinking about him, worrying about how his x-ray will come out, and I just can’t hide my frustration.
“Wow,” Shannon says. And that’s all she says. She looks at me, waiting for my explanation.
“We…hooked up,” I finally say. “We didn’t have sex but—”
“You sucked his dick.”
“Gah!” I exclaim. “Do you have to be so crass?”
“Well, that’s what you did, right?” She asks as though we were discussing the weather. My shoulders slump and I sigh. Reducing the time Tommy and I shared together to such a concise, crude statement feels like a sin.
“Well, yes,” I admit. Shannon groans. “But it was more than that! He stayed with me, and laid with me, and said all these amazing things to me. We almost fell asleep but he had to get up for a game—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,” Shannon says quickly. “Wait a hot second.”
I realize what I’ve just admitted and feel like I’ve just been caught redhanded with a bag full of cash on my way out of a bank.
“He almost fell asleep with you? But he had to get up in the morning?” Shannon closes her eyes, bites her lip and shakes her hands in front of her face. “Did you suck his fucking dick in your bed while I was sleeping!?”
All I can do is look at her, and I’m sure my guilt is written all over my face. I’m waiting for her to scream at me or tell me to get out and she’s going to find another roommate, and while it was super hot at the time, I now feel horrible for doing it. But to my surprise, she bursts out laughing.
“What!?” I blurt out.
Shannon collapses back on her bed and cackles like I’ve just told her the best joke in the world.
“What!?” I repeat. How could what I just told her possibly be so funny? Isn’t she mad? Or maybe she’s so mad that the only thing she can do is laugh at me.
“Oh, Grace,” she says between laughs. “You surprise me! Seriously! I mean, I really can’t believe it!”
I breathe a sigh of relief. At least she doesn’t sound angry. I still feel guilty, but at least I’m not panicked.
“So you’re not mad?”
“Eh,” she waves her hand like she couldn’t care less. “It’s college. You were horny. It’s Tommy Mason. I get it.”
Finally, I allow myself to laugh too. What a way to sum up the magic time I spent with Tommy, Shannon: I was horny and I sucked his dick. So much for romance.
“It’s more than that, Shannon,” I tell her. “I really like him. And he likes me. He invited me to his game today.”
Shannon ponders this for a second, and it seems like part of what I’m saying at least gets to her.
“So, they lost? Is that why you’re upset?”
“No,” I say with a sigh, thinking about the events of the day. “He’s hurt. Someone on the other team kicked him in the ankle and they took him to the hospital. He was in a lot of pain.”
I wonder if they’ve gotten the results of his x-ray back, or if he’s even gotten in to have one. He must be terrified. The look on his face in the locker room was heartbreaking and it’s hard to accept that right now, there’s nothing I can do for him.
Shannon’s giving me a look that I don’t quite understand. It’s like I’ve just told her a riddle that she knows is a trick but she’s struggling to figure out. All of this has me feeling really off balance. So much has happened in such a short period of time.
I left home, came here, realized I was on a coed floor with coed bathrooms where I ran into Tommy Mason naked, and he hit on me. I ran for the hills, found out he was my partner, fell for him, hooked up with him after my roommate told me a thousand times not to, and now he’s injured and I’m breaking the news to Shannon.
Talk about drama!
“Well, Grace,” she says finally. “If you like him, you like him. Even though I can’t see this ending well, I’ll try to be all right with this.”
“Ah, thank God,” I say with a huge sigh of relief. Shannon comes over to me a gives me a hug that is just what I needed. “I was worried you were going to hate me and kick me out of the room or something!”
Shannon laughs. “No, nothing like that. But I will give you the biggest ‘I told you so’ in the world if things go bad.”
Will things go bad?
I try to tell myself they won’t. But what happens if Tommy really hurt himself and doesn’t know how to handle it? I’m not sure I know how to be there for him if his whole entire sports career comes crashing down around him. But I will do my best.
I glance at my phone again to see if he’s texted me. But there’s still nothing.
Come on, Tommy! You’ll be okay. I know you will.