Level Hands: Bend or Break, Book 4 (30 page)

He kept his eyes on the road, too nervous to look at Denny. “I mean, I like it and all. The team is great and it’s fun to compete, but…”

“But other things are more important to you and
push it till you puke
isn’t really your style?” Denny’s voice danced with the edge of humor, teasing him.

“Yeah.” There was that relief again. He was getting too used to feeling it around Denny. Too used to looking for it, to going to him when Rafi needed that comfort of being understood and not judged.

It made him nervous, how easy it was to be with this guy who didn’t have nearly enough in common with him to make things easy.

Denny shrugged, shoulder brushing against Rafi’s. “I get it. Crew is awesome, but it doesn’t have to be the end all, be all for everyone on the team.”

“But what about my scholarship?” That nagging worry never left him.

Genuine concern flashed over Denny’s face, followed by confusion. “I don’t know. You have to be on the team, right? But it’s not like there are, I don’t know, performance goals or anything, right?”

“I guess not.” He knew there wasn’t. He’d read that offer a hundred times. But there was a catch. “It’s only a one-year scholarship, though. I have to apply every year to renew, and there’s no guarantee. I’m not sure I’m safe if I’m not trying my best. Turning out to be the best.” He sounded like an afterschool special, damn it.

“But there’s ‘try your best like a regular person’, and ‘try your best like an insanely competitive crew fanatic who’d rather die than lose his seat in the boat’. And there’s nothing that says you have to do that last one, right?”

“I guess.” He kept repeating that. Even without being told that he needed to be the best, he’d have pushed himself to extremes. It hadn’t occurred to him that he didn’t owe the foundation extraordinary effort. They were giving him so much money—so much money, like, he couldn’t believe how much money they were giving him, or rather, the school, on his behalf—that he’d assumed he’d owed them his all.

“It’s only a scholarship, Rafi. They didn’t buy your soul.”

For most of his time at Carlisle, it had felt like they had.

“You know, most kids get scholarships and they’re happy. Then they go to college and live their lives. And they try to keep up their grades, or whatever they need to do not to lose that scholarship money, but they don’t spend their every waking hour wondering how they can be the best of the best. Or how to keep the peace between their roommates, or keep them out of trouble.”

Rafi didn’t say anything, brain churning. He didn’t think he did any of those things.

“Is this part of your ‘I have to take care of the world’ thing?” Rafi glanced at Denny, who pulled his eyebrows together. “Yeah. I noticed your obsessive-compulsive need to play den mother to everyone within arm’s reach was on volume ten this week.”

Rafi reared his head back. “I’m not mothering people.”

“Would that be a bad thing?”

“Yes!” Though his knee-jerk horror at the idea maybe wasn’t the most flattering statement about him. “I mean, not that mothering is a bad thing. Or something people, men, shouldn’t do. I just…I’m not trying to babysit anybody.” Although his behavior after Denny had been injured sure did look the tiniest bit obsessive in hindsight. Especially when followed by his push to quit school and move back home for Lola.

“I know. My babysitters never did half the things you do to me.” Denny dragged his gaze down Rafi’s chest until it landed in his crotch.

“Dude. Gross. My sisters babysat me.”

“Sorry, not sorry,” Denny said, smiling lasciviously.

Rafi shook his head. They were five minutes out from the airport. “So. You came because…”

“
You
take care of people.” Now Denny was the one who turned away to focus on the road. His voice got quieter, and he shifted back to face Rafi again. His gaze was like heat on the side of Rafi’s face. “Your boyfriend would like to take care of you.”

Rafi waited for the panic to hit. For the need to get away, to run far and fast in the opposite direction from everything Denny meant with those few simple words. A part of him expected panic even now.

But wrapped around him like a leash was the memory of reaching for someone in the night and finding Denny there. Of peacock-blue boxer-briefs dancing the bachata and frying salami in the kitchen. Of this new moment, when it turned out that Denny knew how to screw up and apologize for having been thoughtless on the morning Rafi had first heard about Lola’s accident, which was something Rafi should probably learn from him.

“You’re better at this than I am. Being together,” Rafi told him, needing to share this thing he was finally beginning to realize. Denny deserved to know that Rafi was figuring it out. Slowly.

“You think?” Denny drawled, but then dropped the teasing tone and spoke to Rafi seriously. Because this mattered. “You’ve dealt with a shit ton of new and scary stuff this year. That’s hard for anyone. But I think I could make some of it easier for you, if we try to deal with it together.”

“Okay,” he said, and looked over to find Denny watching him, biting his lip like he was trying to hold back a smile. Close enough. He turned back to the highway, nervous and happy in equal measure, feeling like they’d come to some new sort of understanding in this gap in time from his regular school life. “Okay. We can do that.”

“It’s not going to be that easy. You know that, right? We’ve been hiding out here, but back at school, all the same shit that freaked you out before is waiting for us.”

Rafi nodded firmly. “Yeah. I’m nowhere near figuring out how I’m going to deal. But this is it for me. The two of us. I want you to know that.” Guilt swamped him as he looked over his shoulder to merge closer to the curb in the drop-off lanes at Departures. “Man, I know this is anticlimactic as shit. Telling you in the car with my sister zonked out in the backseat. I’m sorry.”

Denny tilted his head, looking like he wanted to be happy but wasn’t sure he trusted the feeling. Rafi knew that was his fault. He parked the car and turned in his seat to face his boyfriend.

“Listen. I’m a fucked-up asshole sometimes. Most of the time,” he admitted at Denny’s short laugh. “But I’m not dumb enough to miss what this means. I’m in. I’m yours. If you want me, and I’m assuming you weren’t living at the hospital this week out of pity, you know?”

Denny nodded. “I do. And you know what would make this way less anticlimactic?”

“What?”
Tell me. I’ll do anything.

“The part where you actually say ‘I love you’, and then don’t, you know, leave.” Denny looked down at his hands in his lap, and then up at Rafi again.

Heat flashed over Rafi as he remembered saying those words. “Holy shit. I told you I loved you in a locker room, and then I left you.” He thunked his skull against the headrest. “I am the worst. I suck. Why do you even want to be with me?”

“Well,” Denny said lightly, but Rafi could hear the hurt running like an undercurrent in his voice. “When you’re not being the worst, you’re pretty much the best.”

Rafi leaned forward and put his hands on Denny’s face, holding him still and looking him in the eye. “I love you. I’m not going anywhere.” He leaned back for a second, sure enough now to tease. “I mean, except for the part where we’re getting on a plane soon and actually, you know, leaving.”

Denny smiled at him and tugged at Rafi’s jacket, pulling him close for a kiss that didn’t sizzle, but instead fired up a warm glow that burned like banked coals in his belly. Rafi didn’t even think about how loud his happy sigh was until Mari’s voice piped up from the backseat.

“Can I wake up now, please? Or are you two gonna skip that whole plane thing to blow each other in the front seat?”

“Oh my God. You’re my sister. Don’t say stuff like that, Mari.” Rafi stuck his fingers in his ears while Mari laughed at him and gave him more shit as she came around to the driver’s-side door.

Her hug nearly cracked his ribs.

“You call me or text me every day. Tell me the truth about Lola,” he commanded as he hugged her back.

“I promise. You make sure to do some truth-telling of your own,” she said back, which meant she’d been listening to more than just today’s conversation between him and Denny.

He kissed her goodbye and grabbed their bags while Denny got out of the car and said goodbye to Mari next. The ever-vigilant Chicago airport cops were shouting at them to move their vehicle by the time they stepped up on the curb and waved at Mari as she drove away.

Time to head home. And this time he wasn’t confused about where home was.

Chapter Fourteen

Back on campus, nothing was quite as simple as that however. The pressure had started grating on him as soon as they’d set foot on campus after the taxi ride from the airport, which Denny had insisted on paying for. Ignoring the money stuff was a no-brainer for their first day back, although Rafi was annoyed by Denny dropping a hundred and twenty-five bucks on a cab ride Rafi couldn’t help pay for. Back on the quad, Rafi had carried Denny’s bag up to his room for him, not quite ready to walk across campus by himself. A tingling pain had set up shop between his shoulder blades somewhere between the Hartford airport and their drop-off at Denny’s dorm.

Denny hustled him out the door in five minutes flat, however.

“Go. Nap. We can hook up for dinner. You’ll need every hour of sleep you can make up before tomorrow morning.”

Rafi braced himself to run into people he knew on the walk back to his dorm, but kept his head down and didn’t notice anyone. For ten whole minutes, he thought he might make it through the next month or two without a crazy amount of drama.

The first news to greet him when he set foot back in the suite was Austin’s pre-Thanksgiving bust by the RA for smoking pot in their common room. Their cox was up before the disciplinary committee this week, and was currently hiding in the library, Vinnie said, because Austin wasn’t an idiot. There was a reason he hadn’t mentioned the incident to Rafi or Denny in any of his dozens of texts this past week.

That news cut the happy reunion phase short.

Real short.

“With the fucking door unlocked,” Rafi fumed into his phone for the seventeenth time. Denny had been listening to him freak out and rage about Austin’s stupidity for half an hour already. “Bob and Vinnie already had to go in and get lectured by Coach about risking their spots on the team. I’m sure she’ll be ready to rip me a new one first thing tomorrow.”

“You weren’t even on campus when it happened. It’s going to be okay,” Denny reminded him. Again. Then he asked a new question. “Is Austin upset?”

“Austin?” Rafi heard his own voice rise to a shout. “I don’t know! Vinnie says he’s hiding from me. Oh, and get this. That it’s a first offense, so Austin isn’t too worried. Which means you know that fucker Boomer is going to be talking about how my ghetto ass brought drugs into our suite.” He’d been picturing it in his head ever since hearing about the bust, imagining every shitty thing Boomer was definitely going to say about him now.

“Listen, Austin fucked up, no doubt. But you don’t have to be paranoid.”

“Maybe you’ve forgotten about the whole “island piece of ass fucking his way onto the team” shit he talked, but I haven’t. I’m hanging up now.” He bit off the words. “I need to sleep. I’m fucking exhausted. Good night.”

Before Denny had a chance to say a word, Rafi ended the call. He stared at the phone in his hand.

Bad. Move.

He knew that was a mistake. But he didn’t have it in him to call Denny back right then and there and apologize. They were supposed to meet up for dinner. He could show up, hat in hand, and…say he was sorry.

For being totally realistic and right about Boomer and his fucking trash talk.

He closed his blinds, dimming the light, and crashed on his bed. Dinnertime would be better.

When he woke up, it was pitch-black in his room. He fumbled around for his phone, finally managing to illuminate the face.

2:03 a.m.

Fuck.

He showed up at Denny’s dorm at five thirty in the morning, a literal hat in his hand. He’d dug a plain, pale blue ball cap out of his closet and written on it with a Sharpie.
Sorry I’m an Asshole
. When Denny saw him standing under the halogen light outside the dorm entrance, his smile after reading the cap was pretty grim, but at least it was a smile.

Rafi didn’t wait for Denny to say a word. “Blowing you off for dinner was an accident. I overslept. I’m sorry.”

“No, it wasn’t.” Denny’s voice was flat, but at least he was talking to Rafi.

“So, how long was it between when we got back and when I started fucking up?” Acid churned in Rafi’s gut.

“About an hour. You know hanging up on me because you were pissed wasn’t cool either, right?”
No mercy
was the flag flying in Denny’s eyes.

Rafi sucked in a deep breath. “I apologize for that too. I’m gonna do better. Just, don’t give up on me.”

Denny shook his head, his lips pressed flat. “That’s not how this works, Rafi. I don’t quit just because you’re a pain in the ass and make me feel like shit sometimes. But I don’t have to put up with your crap either, you understand?”

They hopped on their bikes and headed to the boathouse, Rafi following Denny because he didn’t quite trust Denny’s judgment of his own ability to ride one-handed down the curving streets to the boathouse. The frigid air sliced through his fleece like an icicle knife. He was glad this was one of their last weeks on the water. Spending the winter working out indoors and sprinting on the ergs might be boring, but it was better than hypothermia.

Rafi spent the time before practice officially started updating teammates he looked on as friends and ignoring the ones whose voices got suspiciously quieter whenever he passed by. Coach Lawson pulled him aside for five minutes to check on him, and—thank the sweet baby Jesus—reassure him that he wasn’t in trouble for anything Austin had done.

Denny didn’t do anything differently than he had in the past few months. Nothing, that is, except deliberately move from where he usually dressed to an unused locker right next to Rafi’s.

Statement made.

Rafi was almost one hundred percent sure he managed to hide his flinch. But in case he hadn’t, he made a point of grabbing Denny’s hand when they walked into breakfast together.

Baby steps.

Two hours after practice ended, class began, and Rafi was slammed with the realization that he had a shit ton of work to get done before the semester’s end. He shot Bree a text message asking her to block off time on her calendar every week from then until winter break. He was gonna need it. Another panic snake threatened to tighten around his throat at the idea of managing all the work, but he didn’t let it take over.

Rafi was trying. Trying to put up a good show at practice, worried about whether or not his lack of superhuman commitment to the team was going to cost him his scholarship. Trying to focus on getting his schoolwork done, using all the things he’d learned about managing his time and his planning since arriving at Carlisle. Trying to ignore the gossip he could feel swirling around him everywhere he went, like sloppy currents in a river after a heavy rain. Trying to make sure Denny didn’t see him at anything other than his happy, affectionate best. The tension coating his bones had him so on edge he started snapping at anyone foolish enough to ask him, “Hey, how’s it going?”

Trying not to worry every time a morning or an afternoon went by without him hearing from Lola was the hardest. His need for constant updates on her physical therapy was getting on her last nerve, she’d made it clear, but he couldn’t help himself.

The comments in the boathouse weren’t as bad as he’d feared, but the general disinclination of most of his teammates to give a crap about Rafi’s personal life threw Boomer’s constant, subtle—and-not-so-subtle—digs into sharp relief. Rafi knew he should ignore that asshole. Shouldn’t let him get under his skin, but he failed at that over and over again.

A disco ball of emotions was spinning in him, shooting out anger and exhaustion, frustration and depression, at random moments until he wanted to take a sledgehammer to it and smash those feelings into tiny, mirrored bits.

Two weeks later, right before the end of the semester, he did.

Rafi never wanted to be the kind of guy who grilled his boyfriend about who it was whenever his phone beeped. But every time Denny got a text message from his ex, his face did this whole thing where it got soft and he smiled and Rafi wanted to dump Louisiana into the Gulf of Mexico. Accidentally.

Seeing it happen in his own room just reminded him of how deep Denny’s safety net was. And how Rafi’s wasn’t.

“I can’t take it anymore. This isn’t worth it.” He slammed his latest library book and threw it, not into the wall like he wanted to, but onto his bed, because he wouldn’t smash up a book.

Denny was studying on Rafi’s bed while Rafi sat at his desk, so the book-cum-projectile weapon was an extra bad idea.

“What? What isn’t worth it?” He’d jerked back from where the book smacked into the mattress near his feet.

“All of it. I’m going out of my fucking mind over here. I worry about everything. All the time. Every day. I worry about what’s going on back at home. I worry about deserving my scholarship by giving my all to the team. Then I worry about losing it because I’m not giving enough to my classes. I worry about Lola and Mari and Sofi and Nita, and I can’t fucking take it anymore.” The words spilled out of his mouth like vomit he’d been swallowing for days. Rafi knew he was out of control and tried to wrestle it back. He held up a hand, staring at the floor, needing a minute of silence to get his shit together.

“Maybe I can—”

No. He couldn’t, could not, take advice from this golden boy with the money and the grades and the life that made this all so fucking easy for him. “Denny, please.”

“Just—”

“You’re the worst of all.”

Whitening face like Rafi had slapped him. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Everything is easy with you. For you. And I’m having a hard time dealing with how shitty it makes me feel to fucking struggle with everything in front of you.” Which wasn’t what he’d meant to say, but now that the words were out, he could hear the truth in them. He’d been hiding how much of a challenge it was for him back at school, hoping Denny wouldn’t notice.

He’d been fooling himself all along, but this, this was honest. This was Rafi, totally overwhelmed and out of control.

“What’s easy for me?” Denny slid his feet off the bed and onto the floor, sitting up ramrod straight now. “Rehab? Watching you take your place on a team I love and can’t even row with?”

“Everything. You already have your place. You got an ex who’s just dying for me to fuck up so he can take my place, and friends who weren’t assigned to your room or forced to welcome you on their team. You’ve already done half the shit I’ve never even heard of. You’re, like, most of the way done with college already. I’m just fucking starting, man.” Which wasn’t exactly true. He’d felt that way early on in the semester, but things had been different before Lola’s wreck. That didn’t seem to matter right now, though, when he was floundering for a reason to take out his frustration on the nearest, safest target.

“Wow. Ouch.” Denny eyes were darker than usual, like the lake before a storm. “Okay. Maybe I should’ve seen this coming, but I didn’t.”

Frustration was burning off Rafi’s skin in waves that crashed against the walls of his tiny room. He knew he wasn’t making any sense. Denny was the same year as him at Carlisle. And the louder he got, the stiller Denny grew, until he stood up, looming over Rafi like a marble statue in the middle of the room, and his voice sounded brittle like stone when he talked back.

“We need to take this down about seventeen notches, Rafi.”

“And this!” Rafi threw a hand forward like he was pitching a curve ball at Denny’s chest, so hard his ribs would crack. “What’s wrong with you? Do you even get fucking angry?”

“Just because I’m not having a tantrum doesn’t mean I’m not angry.” Denny crossed his arms, which only pissed Rafi off even more.

“We don’t fit, Denny. We never did.” Admitting that, saying it out loud, felt like ripping a Band-Aid off. He’d braced himself for this, it turned out, but he wasn’t ready for the hurt. “Sometimes it feels like we were crazy to think this was going to get any easier.”

He could see the struggle on Denny’s face to act like Rafi’s words didn’t drag him down. “I told you it wasn’t going to be easy. You said you were going to try harder. That we would both try harder.”

“Fucking you is easy. Kicking your ass in video games is easy. This? This is too hard.” And now he was being mean on purpose, digging, pushing with the words because he would never push with anything else. But he needed a fucking reaction. Needed to see Denny give enough of a damn about something to lose his cool, damn it.

In the furthest corner of his mind, someone was shouting that he was pushing too far, but Rafi couldn’t stop himself.

He hadn’t known that Denny would stop him. Could stop him. By the simple expedient of packing up his backpack and putting it on while slipping into his unlaced running shoes.

“Where are you going?” Rafi snapped.

“Home. This isn’t my idea of a good time. I don’t like how you fight,” Denny said flatly.

Rafi snorted. “Back atcha, buddy. Except you don’t even fight, do you? Just get all superior and high and mighty.”

“I don’t yell and shout and throw things, no.” Denny’s lips were thin, pressed together.

“Dude, I ain’t thrown shit at you.” And wasn’t that fucking great. Him sounding like a banger while Denny sounded like a…like a fucking banker.

Denny stared pointedly at the book on the bed. “Whatever. You know exactly what I mean.”

“Yeah. ’Cause you don’t even give a shit, deep down, really. Except now it ain’t exactly that fucking deep, is it? Let’s get all this shit right up at the surface, shall we?” He twisted his voice at the last second, making a mockery of the restraint that had Denny acting like a damn robot.

“I don’t think so.” A white line edging his lips where they pressed together. Denny shook his head tightly. “I think I’m done here.”

And turned and left Rafi’s room, closing the door quietly behind him.

As soon as Denny was gone, the anger in Rafi’s chest went out, like he’d been pushed overboard from a shell while on fire. One minute he was ready to spit and scratch and slap, and the next he was sitting on the edge of his bed, sick to his stomach and knowing he’d lost control in a way he never had before in his entire life.