Page 24 of The Locker Room

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water and power bars—in Xander"s case, two.

Xander was too out of it to be proud. He ate both power bars and

guzzled the water, and then stopped, aware that the only sounds in the

office were him eating, and Christian"s careful breathing.

“I"m sorry, Coach,” Christian said after a really awkward moment.

“I got nothin" but respect for you, yanno? I shouldn"t have yelled at you

like that.” Christian stood then and offered Xander a hand.

The Locker Room

21

Xander had taken it and was leveraging himself up when Coach

said, “Karcek, Edwards, sit the hell down.”

Christian"s eyes locked unhappily with Xander"s, and Xander

shrugged. He wasn"t sure how much longer they could have kept it up.

“Why you starving, Karcek?”

Xander looked at Christian, and Christian shrugged, and then

picked up the burden.

“I didn"t get him enough food,” he said, and that pissed Xander off.

“That"s not fair! You been feeding me for two months!”

“Yeah, but I didn"t bring you more bread this morning. I"m sorry,

man. I slept late, and I forgot. I mean, I know you get free lunch, but

that"s your only meal—”

“Wait wait wait wait—”

Xander looked up from his furious argument with Chris, and they

both subsided.

“Christian, why the hell you bringing him food?”

Chris flushed. “He doesn"t have much left after rent, Coach. He

eats dinner with us a couple nights a week, but, yanno, he can"t work

more hours because he doesn"t get enough sleep as it is.”

Coach let out a big long sigh. “You paying rent at your house,

Karcek? What"re your parents doing?”

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