All The Glory (23 page)

“Help with understanding the whole process is what I meant when I said I could help. It can get very complicated and bewildering sometimes. Don’t you have any questions? Any concerns about where this process will take your friend next?”

Friend
. Now there was a concept.

“Yeah, I have a question.” The statement burst out of me before I could stop it.

She grinned and folded her hands. “Okay, shoot.” Her eyebrows were up, like she was anticipating my question more than Christmas vacation.

At that point, I was mad enough at her, at Jason, and at all the idiots who’d been whispering about me today in the hallways and classrooms to just speak without even trying to put a filter on my mouth first.

“What would it mean if Jason wasn’t the only person there when the coach was killed?’

Ohhhhh shit. Did I really say that?

Yes, I really said that. Talk about feeding the monster. Now I was never going to get out of that room.

She blinked a few times and then leaned back a little. Her hands slipped away from each other. She kind of stuttered. “Do you mean … if there was a witness to the murder?”

“Yes,” I nodded, almost afraid to hear her answer, now that she’d put a familiar name to that alleged third person.
Witness.

“What would that do to his case or his trial or whatever?” I was suddenly nervous.

She nodded, as if considering it, back in control of her facial expressions.

“Well, I suppose it would depend on what this witness had to say.” She looked up at me. “It could help his case or hurt it. It could send him to prison or set him fee.” She tilted her head to the right. “Did he tell you there was a witness?”

I shook my head emphatically. “No. Not at all. It was a hypothetical thing, completely. Totally.” I was getting a headache from all the rattling around of my brain matter.

I knew Jason didn’t want me even thinking about that, let alone talking about it. It was like I’d betrayed him by making this woman think that there was something to his story that wasn’t being talked about in the news. I’d never forgive myself if I was the cause of a new rumor going around about him.

She continued. “Hypothetically speaking, if there were a witness, it could be really good or really bad. But frankly, I don’t think it’s possible that there is one in this case.”

“Why?” I hitched my bag up higher on my shoulder, no longer as interested in the hallway and my escape as I was in hearing her explanation.

“Because there’s been no mention of it in the news. That’s a pretty big piece of evidence, so I can’t believe it’s been kept out of the public eye. Reporters follow detectives around, they’re at the police station, they have sources … they know when witnesses are interviewed. If there was one, we would already have a name.”

My face fell. Even though Jason had completely rejected me and my lame friendship, I’d still been holding out hope that maybe there could be something or some
one
out there to save him.

“Unless of course this witness has not yet presented himself to the police…” She leaned in closer to me. “That does happen you know. People fear the publicity, the backlash … they fear that they’ll become embroiled in the charges, which is a very real possibility, by the way.”

“What do you mean?” I stepped closer even though her breath kind of stank, wishing she’d stop talking so loud. People were starting to slow down in her doorway, trying to listen in on our conversation.

She glanced at the door and lowered her voice. “If a person witnesses a crime and does nothing to stop it, that person can be held liable as an accomplice.”

I swallowed with difficulty, my throat suddenly dry. “So, if there
was
another person, it would help Jason’s case, right?”

She shrugged. “It depends.”

Her answer pissed me off. “Does everything depend on something else or what?”

She laughed. “Yes. ‘It depends’ is always the answer in a legal situation.” She put her hand on my shoulder and left it there for a few seconds. I felt like I was being knighted by a very fashion-challenged queen. The Queen of Cummerbunds from the Land of Flowered Polyesters.

“Depending on who that person was, what that person was doing, what that person’s involvement was, what his relationship was to the other people in the room … it all depends. It could help or it could make things worse…” She leaned down and stared into my eyes. “…
It depends.
” Her eyes crinkled up in the corners and her expression clearly said she pitied me. She was trying to be nice, so I didn’t feel the need to hold it against her.

I stared at the floor, once again battling tears. “I don’t see how anything could possibly make Jason’s situation worse.”

“You’d be surprised.” She let my shoulder go and stood. “You’d better get to class before you’re late.”

I nodded and turned to go.

“Do you want some advice?” she asked.

I stopped in my tracks, knowing that the answer
hell
no, I’ve heard enough from you today
would be rude but also not wanting to waste my time saying the polite answer I didn’t feel.

She continued without waiting for my response. “Keep your mind, your eyes, and your ears open. Things happen in cases like this that can completely turn a situation around. Nothing is over until it’s over.”

“Easy for you to say,” I quipped as I walked to the door, feeling more bitter than I ever had in my entire life. “You’re not the one on trial for murder.”

I left before she could reply and spent the entire next period crying in the girls’ bathroom.

Chapter Thirty-Six

THREE DAYS LATER I WAS on my computer clicking through photos when I came across the folder of shots taken by that photographer vulture guy. Football players and their fans flashed across my screen in various poses, caught in moments of candor interacting without knowing they were being watched.

The ones of Jason made my heart swell. My chest was filled with the sea and my heart was floating on top of it, a terrible inner storm tossing it around. It was sickening how just a photo of him patting a kid’s shoulder could make me cry these days.

A text came to my phone making it buzz, and I glanced over at it.

I’m not taking no for an answer. Confess.

I hadn’t yet told Bobby what was going on, and he’d been very un-Bobby-like in his patience at waiting for my explanation. It made me kind of sad actually, how willing he’d been to give me the time I needed. Normally he force-fed me his love, but this time he was letting me decide when it was the right moment to share. Suffice to say, absolutely
nothing
was right in my world.

I figured there was no use candy-coating it or avoiding it anymore, so I texted him back right away.

Jason told me to F off so I Fd off.

My phone rang almost immediately.

“He did not,” Bobby said.

“Yes, he did.” I was angry that Bobby was playing silly games, acting as if this were a joke. “And I don’t want to talk about it or whatever. Believe me, I’ve cried enough tears. I’m totally dehydrated.”

Bobby’s tone immediately changed; pity filled his voice. “Was he rude about it?”

I’d gone over the situation in my head a thousand times, but it always came out the same in my analysis.

I sighed before replying, “No. He was just being cool. He doesn’t feel like he deserves friends and I was kind of pushing him, so he cut me off. No big deal.”

“Do you really think that?” Bobby’s tone went all soft. “That it’s no big deal?”

That was my undoing, Bobby being tender when normally he was as much a smartass as I was.

“Goddammit, Bobby, I told you I don’t want to cry about this anymore!”

“Baby, baby, baby, don’t crrrryyyy! I’ll come right over!”

“No! Do
not
come over. I don’t want my parents freaking out. My mom thinks it’s my period and my father’s completely oblivious. Just let it die.”

“Die. That’s an interesting choice of words.”

I choked on my tears. “Give it a rest, Bobby, please. I’m not kidding. Don’t analyze me, okay? I’ll live.”

“Live and die. Both interesting choices of words. I’ll talk to you soon.”

The line went dead, all the background noise of his television ceasing in an instant.

“What?”

Nothing.

“Bobby? Hello? What did you say?”

Nothing.

“Bobby, are you there? I think I lost you.” I looked at my phone and saw the welcome screen. I tried to call him back, but it went straight to voicemail.

Figuring he was probably trying to call me at the same time, I put the phone down, a little confused about what had just happened but too upset over the resurfacing memories to fix anything. Instead of worrying about it, I went back to paging through the pictures on my computer.

I was buzzing through them pretty quickly until I came to one of Jason smiling. He looked amazing and obviously hadn’t known that the camera was on him at the time. He was talking to a young boy with a poofy afro, maybe about twelve years old or so.

I went back through the photographs before it and after it to verify the scenery I was seeing, determining pretty quickly that this photo had been taken at that club or charity or whatever it was that the coach was involved in. This kid was probably one of the boys who got sponsored by a player for the year or for the season or whatever.

I frowned as my mind wandered. Jason never talked about that place, but it looked from the photos that he was friends with this kid in particular. I paged through all of them again and found four pictures of Jason with this one particular boy. Jason had his arm loosely over the kid’s shoulders in two of them. In every single one, they were both smiling. A lot. If they’d had any physical similarities, I would have said they were brothers the way they seemed so at ease with one another.

My finger tapped the key that would scroll through the pictures. Back and forth, forth and back. Where was this kid now? Had he visited Jason? Had he been at the funeral for the coach? Was he as devastated as I was over what had happened to Jason?

I hopped online and searched all the news I could find on the coach’s death. I didn’t see the boy in any of the pictures. It wasn’t really that surprising, though. He was only a kid. How would he even go to those things if he couldn’t drive? And if he was part of that program Jason and the other players were in, it could have meant he really didn’t have much in the way of parents who could drive him places.

I wasn’t sure why this whole thing, why this
kid
, was sticking in my head, but he was, and the thoughts wouldn’t leave. Jason said that no one really liked him, but surely this little kid did. And what twelve year old has ulterior motives? They don’t care who a person is really, just so long as that person will throw a football with them every once in a while. From the pictures, it sure looked like that was the basis of their friendship. So if this kid was Jason’s one true friend, where was he now?

My phone rang again and made me jump, cutting off my train of thought. I picked it up without looking at the screen.

“Bobby, I told you, I’m done crying, I don’t want to talk about him anymore.”

“Talk about who?” said the voice on the other end.

I pulled the phone away from my ear and saw a name there that made me cringe.

Chuck Bradley
.

“Mister Bradley?” I asked, hoping against all hope it actually was him and not the person I suspected.

“No, this is Jason.”

Heart … sinking. Embarrassment. Pain.
Ugh
, I so wanted to hang up, but I didn’t.

He sighed. “Listen … Bobby called me and told me everything. I’m really sorry. Can you come over?”

I immediately hung up the phone and threw it onto my bed. Freaking out is probably the best way to describe what I was doing right then. It was like the phone was a snake all of a sudden, and I sure as hell didn’t want to get bitten.

Reflecting back on what I’d said on the phone with him just now, I cringed all over. Had I just admitted to Jason that I’d been crying over him for, like, days on end?
Ergggh!! I hate myself!

The phone rang again.

I threw three pillows on top of it and ran into the bathroom. No way in freaking hell was I going to have that conversation. I could just imagine it now:

“I heard you were all broken-hearted about losing me.”

“No, I wasn’t. I didn’t cry at all.”

“Then why is it all over the news that your eyes are puffy and you haven’t eaten in four days?”

No. Way. No. Thank. You.

I plugged my flatiron in, deciding that putting a few hundred twists into my hair would be the perfect way to burn an hour of time and forget how much I missed being with Jason.

I was halfway done with the medusa-like mess when a knock came at my door.

“What?” I yelled, figuring it was my mother with another plate of food, trying to tempt me to eat.

“Honey, it’s me,” she said through the door.

Go away.

“I’m doing my hair. Come back later, okay?”

“There’s someone here to see you.”

I sighed with annoyance. Sometimes my BFF’s love could be suffocating. “Tell Bobby he’s supposed to call first before he comes over. I’m not in the mood.”

I could only imagine how put-out he’d be over that statement, but oh well. I was done with tears and done with crying over Jason. Game over.
Be a winner, not a loser, Katy.

The door opened and then shut, which pissed me off. I waited for Bobby’s singsong voice to come around the corner as he pretended to not care that he’d totally just begged me for a fight.

“Bobby, if you so much as show your face in here, I swear to God I will straight-iron and back-comb your hair until you look like the nineteen eighties Tina Turner.”

“That sounds serious.”

I fumbled the flat iron in my surprise, and it burned my neck on the way down to the floor.

“Mother fudger!” I yelled as sweat popped out under my armpits.
 

The room went silent.

“Jason?” I prayed for an answer I knew I wasn’t going to get.