Chapter 7
WOLF
Everything feels so far away.
The sound of the pool water lapping against the sides fades. The echo of Coach’s yelling fades.
I watch Beatrix leave, and trace the red-hot marks her fingertips left on my cheek. My skin crawls with goosebumps, my nerves standing on end with some invisible electricity.
What the hell is wrong with me? Am I having a stroke? The doors open and close behind her and all I can think about is how I want more of her touch. More of her eyes lingering over my ridges and lines. Just…more of her. Period.
Frustrated, I growl and shove the twenty dollar bill into my backpack.
“Where do you think you’re going, Blackthorn?” Coach shouts. “Get back in the pool!”
I’m so distracted I hear her, but don’t process any of her words. She blows her whistle in my ear and I start.
“Jesus, coach –”
“I thought I told you to tell your girlfriends to stay away from the pool while we’re practicing,” She snaps. “And you said you had it taken care of. Don’t tell me I’m gonna have that hassle again – you could barely get in here with all of them crowding the door.”
“No, it’s not like that.”
Coach eyes me up and down. “Alright. Then get back in the pool and let’s burn a few laps.”
I head to the edge of the pool. My teammates stare at me from the benches they perch on, half-soggy and sipping Gatorade. They murmur to each other, elbowing one another like they’re all sharing some secret. Jason, the steroid-abusing freshman, whispers the most earnestly out of them all. Of course he does. He’d love to start a nasty rumor about me as payback for dumping coffee on him. He’d love to do anything to get back in the good graces of the team and the school. And even though the team’s shunned him up until now because of his red-card, they start to listen to him. I direct my glare right at them, daring any of them to say something. And of course, there’s always one guy stupid enough to dare. A senior who loves to give me shit whenever he can.
“So,” He treads water beside me. “You and the scholarship girl, huh?”
“Don’t,” I warn.
“Don’t what?” He smiles. “C’mon, man, you can tell me. We’re a team. Shit, I wouldn’t blame you for tapping that – she’s a little frumpy, but if you look real hard you can tell she’s got some amazing tits under all that. I’d do her too. Just once, though, and then dump her on the curb.”
I see red. Before I can control myself I throw a punch at his jaw, and it connects with a sickening crunch. The senior comes up gasping for air, and lunges for me. We tangle underwater, my eyes and ears full of chlorine as he punches me in the stomach, the air shooting out of my mouth and molten pain replacing it. The sound from above is muted, but I can still hear it - the team starts shouting, Coach blows her whistle, her hands fishing madly underwater for us. She sends in half the team after us, pulling the two of us apart in the shallow end.
“What the fuck is your problem?” The senior snarls at me. I spit water mixed with blood from my split lip. He isn’t any better off – his left eye socket is starting to bruise.
“If you talk about her like that again,” I growl. “I’ll ruin more than just your face.”
“Why do you care?” He shouts. “She’s just the scholarship girl!”
“Enough!” Coach bellows. “The two of you – in my office, now. The rest of you, in the showers. Practice is over.”
The senior and I begrudgingly enter her office, the only thing keeping my fist from his face the fact that Coach is staring right at us from across her desk.
“What seems to be the problem, gentlemen?” She asks.
“I said something about that girl who came in and he fucking flipped!” The senior protests. “He flipped on me just like he flipped on that Mark guy!”
“Don’t say his name,” I flinch.
“I’ll say whatever the fuck I want!”
“Language,” Coach warns, then looks to me. “Here’s how this is gonna go; Harris, you keep your nose out of Blackthorn’s business. Blackthorn, don’t go punching people, no matter how bad they piss you off. If I hear or see this one more time, you’re both off the team, and I’m warning your parents.”
Harris glowers at me. “Like it’ll matter for him. His dad runs this place.”
“No one’s getting any favoritism, Harris,” Coach warns. “Now get out of here. Go change. And try to talk about your problems like grown-ups instead of flinging poop at each other like monkeys, alright?”
We both echo ‘yes coach’, and head to the lockers. I let him go first, just to make sure he doesn’t turn on me and try to start something. The urge to red-card him is strong, but there’s no point – he hasn’t done anything ‘wrong’ in the ultimate sense. He pissed me off, that’s all. That isn’t worthy of a red-card. If I did red-card him I’d basically be a dictator, and that’s the last thing I want people to see me as.
Every guy in the locker room falls silent when I walk in. I change as quickly as I can and get out, riding my bike a little faster than normal, like it’ll leave the stares behind. I know what they were thinking behind their silence – Wolf Blackthorn, never once seems to give a shit about a girl, and then all of a sudden starts a fight over one. I know the rumors that’ll spread like wildfire tonight, and the stares that will follow tomorrow. When I get home and open my computer, it’s confirmed – Twitter and Facebook are ablaze with what went down today. Speculations fly - scholarship girl and Wolf have slept together, she’s pregnant and Harris is the real father – stupid shit that only makes me angrier. Pent-up energy blazes through me, half fury and half something else I can’t name, something that leaves me sore in the chest and utterly confused in the head.
I don’t start fights. I haven’t touched someone purposefully since Mark. But at the single mention of Beatrix, the thought of someone like Harris touching her, I flew off the handle. All my reservations, all my avoidance of physical touch, flew out the window. For a split second, I forgot myself. She eclipsed my fear – something no one else in my life had ever done.
Mark came close. As much as I hate to admit it, he came close. But with him it was slow, gradual. With her, it was instant. I lashed out in an instant, without thinking, without hesitation.
I get up, unable to take a moment more of this storm of energy. I knock on Burn’s door, but he isn’t home. Of course he isn’t. Part of me wants him to be – he would listen to my problems. Or, he used to. Since Mom died he’s never really been there for me, or Fitz, not like he used to be. I want to open the door and see him there, smiling patiently, waiting for me to tell him whatever awful secrets I’d been keeping inside. His advice was good. Would be good, if he was here for me anymore. But he’s not.
So I settle for the next best thing.
Burn’s punching bag hangs from the ceiling, a heavy column of sand covered by plastic. I punch it, as hard and fast as I can, willing all the confusion in me to drain out with my fatigue, willing my physical efforts to clear my head. I punch until sweat drips down into my eyes, until my knuckles sting like someone’s poured lemon juice in open wounds. And the words – everyone’s words clamber over each other, like a chaotic tornado in my mind.
She’s just the scholarship girl, why do you care –
- You think you know everything about my life?
- you can tell she’s got some amazing tits under all that. I’d do her too.
I feel stupid. I feel weak. I feel powerless. Just thinking about the look on her face when I offered the twenty makes me feel even stupider. Thinking about how gentle her fingers were on my cheek makes me feel even weaker.
People aren’t supposed to affect me like this. I thought I was over this. After Mark I swore to myself I’d allow no one to make me feel things ever again. And then Beatrix came and ruined everything. I’m powerless all over again, and it scares the ever-living shit out of me.
So I keep punching, until my knuckles bleed and my body screams at me to stop.
“Wolf?”
I look up through my haze to see Burn standing there. The exhaustion hits me like a truck, and I feel myself staggering. Burn is there, his strong arms holding me up, and for a split-second when I look up at him I see him as his nine-year-old self, smiling warmly and telling me everything will be okay. And then I snap back to reality, and his face is older and barely has any emotion to it at all. But if I look hard, I can see a tiny spark of concern in his eyes.
“Wolf, are you alright? What are you doing in here?”
“I had to punch something,” I manage. “And you have a whole bag devoted to it. I thought to myself ‘why not?’”
“Your lip –” He cuts off. “Did you get in a fight?”
I can’t have him asking questions. It’s too shameful to admit that I lost control. I push out of his support and stand on my own.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not,” He insists, following me as I collapse on my bed in my room. “Jesus, Wolf, your knuckles –”
“Stop pretending to give a shit,” I snarl. Burn says nothing, retreating after a while. Just when I think he’s left me alone for good, he comes back with hydrogen peroxide and gauze.
“I don’t need any of that. Get out.”
Burn ignores me, kneeling beside the bed and dabbing my knuckles with something wet. It stings, and I hiss.
“Would you stop trying to play the concerned older brother part? You outgrew it a long time ago.”
“Be as angry as you want,” He says softly. “But I’m not leaving until everything bloody is taken care of.”
I entertain the thought of getting up and forcing him out, but then I remember just how tall and built like a brick wall he is. I glare at the ceiling as he wraps my knuckles in gauze.
“Who punched you?” Burn asks.
“No one.” I grunt.
“Why did they punch you?” He asks again, patiently. So patiently it pisses me off.
“It’s done, okay? It doesn’t matter who or why or what did it. Drop it.”
We’re quiet. We both know he’ll just hear about it tomorrow. I exhale, quick and hard.
“I punched some senior. Harris. He was making stupid comments about a girl.”
“What kind of comments?”
“Like, ‘hurr hurr I’d fuck her’. Stupid shit.”
“Who was the girl?”
I gnaw the inside of my lip. “The scholarshipper.”
Burn’s expression doesn’t so much as twitch. But I’ve been his brother long enough to know he’s surprised.
“You…defended her?” He asks. I fling my gauzed arm over my eyes so I don’t have to face him.
“No. It wasn’t like that. He was just pissing me off.”
“You punched him.” Burn asserts.
“I know.”
“You hate touching people.”
“I know.”
Burn falls silent. To my utter relief he finishes gauzing my other hand and gets up.
“Rinse your lip out with saltwater before bed.”
“Yes, Mom,” I grumble.
“I’m serious, Wolf. If it gets infected we’ll have to tell Dad you got in a fight.”
“Fine. Okay. You’re right. Now just leave me alone.” It feels harsh and I feel like a dick, considering he bandaged me up. He moves to the door, and I call out.
“Thanks.”
Burn pauses, nodding over his shoulder, before he closes the door behind him.
I let my whole body relax, finally. Finally alone. The twisted energy in me is gone – depleted – leaving behind an empty husk. An empty husk who can’t do much more than lie on his bed and wince at the thought of school tomorrow.
At the thought of facing Beatrix Cruz.
It’s easier to read her writing. I take out the essay from my bedside table and read.
My dad isn’t in the best condition. He’s sick with depression. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from researching, it’s that it isn’t his fault. That’s just how things are, in his brain. No matter what, he’s still my dad. No matter what, I’m his daughter and I have to do everything I can to help him get better. That’s what being family means. That’s what love means; it means helping. It means supporting someone, defending someone, giving them your best effort. Flowery poetry and candied cherries one day a year isn’t love.
Love is sacrifice. And I intend to sacrifice a lot.
Us teenagers want a lot. We want a social life, we want friends. We want a boyfriend or girlfriend. But we can’t have it all. I mean, some of us have it all, but those are the lucky ones. The rest of us just make do, fumbling around in the dark for something, anything to keep us going. But in reality, all those things are temporary. Being a teenager is just a blip on the radar of the rest of my life. It’s a few years. A few years I’m more than willing to sacrifice.
I have all I need to keep me going, right here, in my family.
For the hundredth time I’ve reached this point in the essay, I think about what a moron she is. Her intentions are so pure and blazing they practically radiate off the page. Yeah, so she wants to help her Dad – but what about her? Everything she’s saying is a mirror image of my thoughts two years ago, when I was trying to help Mark. It practically stings to read them here, again. Another lamb to the slaughter. Another lamb willing to sacrifice themselves with no intention of getting anything in return.
It took me two years to figure out I was worth more than nothing. And yet here she is, convinced her time and energy are better used for her Dad, not her. It burns me up inside.
This isn’t how things are supposed to be, I want to say to her. It’s alright to be a kid, for fuck’s sake. Think about yourself for once, before you think about other people. It’s okay to have your own dreams, and go for them.
Except I’ll never be able to say that to her. Not now. Not after the way she touched me, the way I reacted.
So I settle for her words. Her words don’t scowl at me. Her words don’t make me feel ashamed, or confused.
Her words don’t touch my cheek.