Present Day
I heaved out a sigh as I dropped the large box onto my bed. That was the last of it. The last of the belongings I’d taken to college with me.
It felt like yesterday I was packing up my stuff, excited for what would come next in life. I’d had big plans. I was confident, cocky, and completely unprepared for the responsibility and freedom that came with leaving home for the first time.
And now here I was.
A college dropout. A failure. A disappointment to everyone I knew, including myself.
As I scrubbed a hand over my face, all I could do was feel shame over the past and dread about the future.
What was I supposed to do next? I had no idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, but I probably needed a degree to do it.
There would be consequences for my actions.
And I deserved it.
I’d had my chance and I’d blown it.
Everything looked the same in my childhood room. The Aerosmith poster still hung on the wall over my bed. If I flipped my black comforter over, I’d see a charred spot in the fabric—an innocent mishap from a camping trip when I got a little overzealous about roasting marshmallows.
A shelf of trophies and ribbons decorated the opposite wall over my desk.
I wanted to tear it down.
Those awards represented my greatest accomplishments, but they meant nothing now. Baseball participation trophies, swim medals, and a second-place ribbon in the 8th grade spelling bee didn’t make me a success.
A soft knock interrupted my self-loathing, and I glanced at the doorway to see Ezra. Immediately, my crappy mood improved.
My younger brother was one of my favorite people in the world. Only a year apart in age, we grew up more like twins. We were complete opposites, though.
While I got my dad’s dark hair and olive skin tone, Ezra was lighter like Mom with blond hair, blue eyes, and a fair complexion. In fact, we looked so different some people didn’t believe us when we told them we were brothers.
“Heard you were back,” he said with a grin.
I smiled and went over to wrap him in a hug. Putting him at arm’s length, I observed how he’d changed since the last time I saw him.
“You got taller,” I announced before giving him a noogie.
Laughing, he pushed me away and went to sit down in the chair at my desk. As he made his way across the room, I noticed his uneven gait was worse than usual.
“Your leg bothering you again?”
Wincing, he rubbed at his left knee. “I fell at school. Twisted it a little.”
“You fell, or someone made you fall?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest. His silence was the confirmation I needed. “Who’s been fucking with you? Is it that AJ prick?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Ezra shook his head. “I’ll be graduating in a couple weeks anyway. I can’t wait for high school to be over.”
I frowned, thinking of how he might’ve been treated since I left.
Ezra was shy, and because of a leg injury he suffered as a kid his physical abilities were limited. He often walked with a limp, and he couldn’t play sports or even participate in P.E.
Lack of exercise had caused his body to be on the softer side, and he suffered from low self-esteem. It made him the perfect target for asshole bullies.
When we were in school together, no one dared to mess with him when I was around. Everyone knew I wouldn’t stand for it. But he’d been on his own for the past year.
Ezra was one of the best people in the world. He may have been younger, but I looked up to him. Physical traits weren’t the only differences between us. I was the risk-taker, the wild one. Ezra tended to follow the rules. He was a peacemaker, a voice of reason. Kind-hearted and good.
Out of the two of us, I knew who was the better man. Hands down, it was him. I just wished he knew it, too.
Sweeping the mess of hair off his forehead, he sat up a little straighter. “Mom and Dad are downstairs. Said they needed to talk to you.” He looked sympathetic. “They seemed pissed.”
I sighed. “I know. They should be. I messed up pretty bad.”
“They wouldn’t spill the details to me, but I’m guessing it has something to do with school.” He swiveled in the computer chair and it squeaked with his movements.
I nodded. “Failed three out of my four classes.”
Ezra winced. “That sucks. What about the fourth class?”
Shaking my head, I huffed out a laugh. “Not much better. I got a C in music appreciation, but I have no idea how because I snoozed through most of it. Pretty interesting stuff when I wasn’t hungover.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you gonna go back to college?”
Frustrated, I ran a hand through my hair. “I honestly don’t know.”
“Shit,” he breathed out. “I guess I didn’t realize it was that bad.”
“It’s that bad,” I confirmed with a nod. “Don’t have anyone to blame but myself.”
“Well, good luck.” He stood up before limping across the room. At the doorway, he turned back. “For what it’s worth…I don’t think it’s too late to fix it.”
“Thanks.” I smiled, touched by his never-ending faith in me.
When I got downstairs, Mom and Dad were waiting for me at the dining table.
That’s how I knew I was in deep shit.
Only serious conversations took place in those chairs, unless it was a special occasion. We usually ate dinner in front of the TV, with those trays and everything. Some people thought you had to eat a meal around a table to connect and interact, but that wasn’t true. The best dinner memories I have are of laughing with my family over Seinfeld reruns and Jeopardy episodes.
The gleaming mahogany surface mocked me as I sat down for what was sure to be an unpleasant talk. As I looked at the expressions of disappointment on my parents’ faces, the guilt got worse.
Way worse.
Taking a deep breath, I rested my elbows on the table. It was time to face the music.
Mom broke the silence first. “We’re so disappointed in you.”
I knew that was coming, but hearing it out loud fucking hurt. That five-word sentence pretty much summed up the last eight months of my life.
Dad cleared his throat. “Well, we didn’t send you off to college to learn how to do a 55-second keg stand, though that’s pretty impressive.”
Mom smacked him on the arm. “Matthew.”
“I saw the Facebook video,” he told her, then turned his eyes to me. “Quite an accomplishment, James, but not what we paid thousands of dollars for. We’ve spent almost half our lives building your college fund. Seeing you waste it pisses us off.”
“I know,” I said, hanging my head. Nearly two decades of saving, budgeting, and cutting corners, and it took less than a year for me to flush a good portion of it down the drain.
“What happened?” Mom asked, and the hurt in her voice made my chest ache. “You were such a good student in high school.”
She was right about that. I used to get straight A’s without even trying very hard. But simply being smart didn’t mean jack shit in college. Intelligence was useless if I didn’t put in any effort.
“I fell into some bad habits,” I admitted. “I partied too much. Skipped class a lot. Didn’t study enough. By the time I realized how bad my GPA was, it was too late to turn it around.”
Dad sighed. “Look, we know you were upset after things ended with Erica. Letting go of your first love is hard, but you can’t let it ruin your life.”
I thought about how I started drinking after my high school girlfriend broke up with me, needing something to numb my damaged ego. We’d been dating since our sophomore year. Blinded by puppy-love, we made a pact go to the same college, graduate together, and live happily ever after.
Seemed like a good plan at the time.
Then life happened.
In the real world, we realized we didn’t have that much in common. We disagreed about everything, from what movie to watch on a Friday night to where we should live after college. It didn’t matter what the subject was. If a topic got brought up, we fought about it.
Two months into the school year she called it quits, and getting dumped for the first time sucked.
I drowned my sorrows in a bottle of Jack, and suddenly I was the life of the party. I was the guy everyone wanted to hang out with. And for a while, I thought that was what mattered most.
My dad cleared his throat again, and I realized he was still waiting for me to explain myself.
“It’s not Erica’s fault we weren’t right for each other,” I said. “The partying might’ve started because of the breakup, but it continued because of me. I just got caught up in it. After a couple months, I was over her. And looking back, I’m not even sure we were in love in the first place.”
Dad nodded like he understood and Mom sat silently. Her blue eyes searched my face, as if she was trying to find the boy she raised.
“James—”
“I prefer Jimmy now,” I interjected softly, and Mom made a sound of distress.
“It’s like you’re this whole other person.” She motioned toward me. “New name, bad grades, the tattoos.”
“Mom, I’m still the same guy I’ve always been,” I told her. “Grandma has called me Jimmy forever, so that’s not new. And if there’s one thing I don’t regret from this past year, it’s the ink. I love my tats.”
I didn’t bother telling them about the body piercings hidden under my clothes. Adding insult to injury wasn’t going to help my case.
“What about the maxed-out credit card?” She slid the bill my way, and my stomach lurched when I saw the total amount was in the quadruple digits. “What do you have to show for it?”
“Funny story about that—there was this guy hanging out on campus, offering free pizza coupons if we applied for a card. It seemed like a good deal…”
My parents didn’t look amused.
“That’s an expensive pizza.” Dad tapped the paper.
“Some of that was for the tattoos, which are a life-long investment,” I pointed out, then decided to go for honesty. “But most of it was for booze.”
Dad coughed, and I suspected he was holding back a laugh. Mom shot him a look.
“And the fighting?” she continued. “You’ve never been violent before.”
“It wasn’t real fighting,” I said, hoping that would make her feel better. “It was street-fighting.”
“Well, I don’t see the difference!” Her eyes shimmered with tears, and I felt like the biggest piece of shit ever for making her cry.
“The public disturbance ticket you got didn’t see the difference either.” Dad turned toward Mom, rubbing soothing circles on her back. “It’s okay, Linda.”
“The dude and I weren’t pissed at each other. It was for money. For sport…” My lame explanation faded away as I witnessed the full weight of my bad decisions, and how they affected the people I loved most. When I came home over Christmas break with a banged-up face and a $250 fine, they were pretty upset. But, at the time, I was still in denial about the downward spiral I was in.
“When I taught you how to fight, I didn’t mean for you to use it that way,” Dad said sternly. “Bare-knuckle street-fighting is not boxing. You never know what kind of person you’ll end up against when rules aren’t enforced. When you’re not in a controlled environment, it’s dangerous.”
My dad had done college-level boxing back in the day. When I was younger, we used to spar with each other. Some of the best times I had with my dad included having those gloves on, learning how to bob and weave and block.
Looking down at my hands, I said two words that couldn’t even begin to fix the mess I’d made. “I’m sorry.”
“Do you have any idea how worried we’ve been? Your mom has lost a lot of sleep over all this.”
“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “I don’t know how to make it up to you, but I’ll do anything. Seriously, you just name it.”
“Good. I hope you mean that because we have plans for you.”
“I’ll get a job and pay you back.” My mind ran through the possible places of employment in our small town. “I can move back home. Take a year off school to get back on my feet.”
“We had something else in mind.” Dad paused. “Grandma Beverly isn’t doing so well these days.”
Alarmed, I felt the blood drain from my face. “Is she sick?”
“She’s as healthy as ever,” he reassured me. “But her house is deteriorating. Regular chores have become too much for her. She needs help but she’s too proud to hire someone. Says she doesn’t want anyone touching her underwear.” He rolled his eyes and I chuckled.
“I’ll do it,” I said automatically, knowing what they were getting at. “I mean, not the touching her underwear part. But I’ll go and help any way I can.”
“Really?” Mom asked skeptically. “Just like that? I expected a little more resistance.”
Leaning forward, Dad placed his elbows on the table top. “You realize it’s for the entire summer, right? She’s got a long list of things to be done, including yard work, cleaning, and painting her house.”
“Did you guys think I’d say no?” I frowned.
Did they really think so little of me? I knew I’d done a lot of immature things, but I was still loyal to the people I loved. If Grandma needed my help, she’d get it.
Shrugging, Mom dabbed at the corner of her eye with a tissue. “After the way you’ve acted over the past several months, we don’t know what to think anymore.”
“I’d be happy to stay with Grandma. In fact, I can’t think of a better way to spend the summer.”
Dad let out a snort. “That’s probably just because she’ll be mixing your mojitos. I’m not sure she’ll be the best influence on you.”
I grinned.
Beverly Louise Johnson was the coolest motherfucking lady in the entire world. She was brutally honest, didn’t take anyone’s crap, and swore like a sailor. On more than one occasion, my parents had said they thought I inherited my wild streak from her.
They were probably right.
“There’s one last thing,” Dad added. “If you follow through with this and behave yourself… We’ll pay your tuition in the fall. We believe in second chances, but you have to earn it.”
A burst of hope filled me, because this was it—my chance to redeem myself.
Looking my dad in the eye, I made a promise I intended to keep. “I won’t let you down.”
“So, what’s the verdict?” Sitting down on the edge of my bed, Ezra narrowed his eyes at the duffle bag I was packing. “You going somewhere?”
“Yep.” I stuffed some more clothes in, not bothering to fold them up. “The ‘rents are shipping me off to Grandma’s for the summer. I leave first thing in the morning.”
Ezra’s eyes got wide. “Seriously? Do they realize what kind of mayhem you and Grandma could cause?”
I barked out a laugh. “I know. I think Mom’s a little nervous about it, but Dad thinks it’ll be good for me. I’ll be at Grandma’s beck and call for the next couple months.”
“Well, I would say I’ll miss you around here, but they’re sending me to fat camp.”
“What the fuck?” I stopped packing. “Are you serious?”
He laughed. “No. It’s actually a physical therapy retreat. Supposed to help my leg. But it might as well be fat camp.”
I went back to shoving handfuls of T-shirts into the bag. “You don’t need to go to fat camp.”
Giving me a look, he brought his hands to his stomach. “Yeah, I do. I have man-boobs.”
“Ezra…” I warned. I hated it when he put himself down. “Don’t talk about yourself like that.”
“Well, it’s true.” He shrugged. “You don’t know what it’s like. Look at you.” He pointed at my arms and chest. “You’re like one of those statues in the art museum. A statue with tattoos. God, the girls must love you.”
I couldn’t argue with that. I didn’t have any trouble attracting women, but dating wasn’t in the cards for me. Probably not for a long time.
Casual hook-ups had been par for the course with the party crowd I hung out with. After Erica, the last thing I wanted was a serious relationship.
It’d all been fun and games until I woke up one morning with not one, but two half-naked girls in my bed—and absolutely no recollection of the night before. I had no idea if we were even safe about it.
I’d spent the next day freaking the fuck out until one of them mentioned in a text message that nothing happened. Apparently, I had passed out before they could even get their clothes off.
I’d never been more relieved in my entire life.
And ashamed.
And pissed at myself for being so careless.
The fact that I’d gotten so hammered I couldn’t even remember if I’d had sex? That was some scary shit.
But it was the push I needed to turn my life around.
Immediately, I went to the clinic and got tested for everything under the sun, took a few scalding hot showers, and made a vow of celibacy. I stopped partying so much, distanced myself from my friends, and started going to class.
Unfortunately, it hadn’t been enough to salvage my grades. And no amount of abstaining from sex was going to pay off that damn credit card.
“I’m done with women for a while,” I told my brother. “Just wait until college. A bunch of girls will be flocking to you.”
“I don’t want a bunch of girls,” he muttered. “There’s only one I want.”
“Is this the same girl you’ve been going on about for the last few years?” I asked. He blushed, which was something he did often, but not usually with me. That’s how I knew I’d hit the nail right on the head. “Aren’t you tutoring her?”
“No. She’s tutoring me,” he said, letting out a humorless laugh. “Not only am I a cripple, but I’m also not smart enough to pass high school math.”
“Fuck, man.” I sighed and sat down in my desk chair. “Would you stop with that? Any girl would be lucky to have you.”
He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter anyway. She’s been dating the star linebacker since freshman year. Off limits.”
“Well, you might still get your chance. High school relationships don’t always last. I would know.” I shoved the last pair of jeans into the bag and zipped it up. “Just don’t do what I did if you don’t get your way.”
“Which was what, exactly?”
I smiled ruefully before summarizing my actions. “Throw an adult-sized temper tantrum.”