Page 54 of The Assist
She lets out a little huff that’s her adorable version of being appalled. "My family is ditching me this year. My brother and sister-in-law invited my parents on a Disney cruise. I think I'm gonna go home to see Gabby, though. Plus, it’ll be good to get away for a week." Her tone has bite, and I wonder why she’s so anxious to go home to an empty house.
I can’t bring myself to feel too sorry for her. Judging by her annoyance, I'd guess this is the first time she hasn't seen her folks during a holiday break. I was probably like that the first time my parents bailed too. Now I’m just indifferent. Well, I’m trying to be. After years of my parents planning vacations that in no way work around my schedule, it's clear they don't care if they see me for Thanksgiving or Christmas.
“Let’s do this,” Joel calls out as he and Z enter the gym. “I have a date in an hour.”
The stuff we’re going over tonight doesn’t lend itself that well to my usual basketball analogies, but it’s good to be on the court with my boys and my girl. When Nathan shows up, clearly bored and looking for something to do, we give up statistics altogether and start running through plays. Blair fills in the place of our power forward, Malone. She’s about a foot and a half shorter and a buck fifty lighter, but she’s way better to look at.
Damn, it feels good. Nah, feelsrightto be playing around with my roommates and to have Blair here.
“You guys wanna hit The Hideout?” Nathan asks the rest of us as Joel hustles off the court to get ready for his date.
“Negative ghost rider,” Z says and shakes his head.
“We could have a pool party,” Blair pipes up, looking beyond excited at the possibility. “I’ve been carrying my swimsuit in my backpack for weeks waiting for an opportunity to get in that pool.”
“Pool party it is.” Nathan claps his hands together. “I’m gonna invite a few people.”
“I’m out.” No surprise that Z isn’t interested in swimming.
“What about if we set up the projector, put on a movie poolside?”
Z narrows his gaze. “My pick?”
Chuckling, I rack the balls. “Yeah, you can pick.”
He hustles off the court, and I reach for Blair so I can wrap my arms around her. “Twenty bucks says we’re watching something with Tom Cruise.”
She laughs and then we head up to my room to change, and she slips into a hot pink bikini that makes me hard on sight. I don’t know how word got out so fast, but when we get down to the pool it’s already filled with people. Nathan is in the pool, a cigarette hanging from his lips and a beach ball raised above his head. Z’s taken up residence in one of the lounge chairs pulled up in front of the projector and has attracted a circle of girls who are faking interest inMission Impossible.
I lead Blair to the shallow end of the pool, and she wriggles her butt into my crotch and leans against me. We’re more spectators than active members of this party, which suits me just fine.
“Last year, where would you have been right now?”
“With V. Before Mario, we were inseparable.”
“And what sort of trouble would you two have been getting into on a night like this?”
“We’d have been at one frat party or another.” She sighs. “I dated David for most of last year, so we usually went to Sigma.”
“Dude seems like an asshat, how’d you two get together?”
“He can be very convincing when he wants something. He showed me what he wanted me to see, and I gobbled it right up. He was sweet and charming at first.”
“And then?” My chest tightens with all the shitty things he might’ve done to my girl. I saw a glimmer of what he was like pissed, and I didn’t like it. “He didn’t hurt you or anything, right?”
“No, he was never physical. It was little things like he talked shit about everyone, even guys he was tight with. He got mad when I so much as said hello to another guy, and he didn’t like me going out with V if he wasn’t there, stuff like that. When I’d try to talk to him about it, he made me feel like it was my fault.”
“I’m sorry.”
She shrugs and turns to face me, wrapping her arms around my waist. “I don’t want to waste another second regretting my time with him. I can’t take it back, any of it, but I would if I could.”
There’s more hurt than she’s shared, judging by the dark look in her eyes, but far be it for me to push her to relieve her painful past. “Come on, let’s dry off and then grab some food. Joel’s mom brought by enchiladas and she made me a gallon of sweet iced tea.”
“You can’t make your own tea?”
“I can; just don’t.” I pat her ass as she steps out of the pool in front of me.
She grabs her towel and drops onto a lounge chair as she wrings out her hair. Her nipples salute me through her top and when she realizes what I’m staring at, she quickly wraps the towel around her chest. “Perv.”
