Page 66 of Don't Hate the Player
“I don’t want to be stuck in a contract with him if we win,” Jake muttered. He’d put up with Muddy’s asshole schtick for years, thinking it was an in-joke. Like “hey, Jake, you’re dumb, just kidding!” Knowing that Muddy actually thought he was useless and stupid would make it so much harder to play alongside him. Going into Round 3, liking Emilia was one thing, but going into it hating Muddy was another.
“Whenwe win,” Bob corrected, “we’ll have to get over it. Wizzard knows the league announcement might change the teams’ strategy, so they’re cool if people bring in alts for Round Three, as long as they’re finalized a week out. After that, whoever plays the final match is locked into the contract. We don’t have alts; we have Muddy, one of the best DPSes in the game. We don’t have a chance of beating Fury without him.”
Bob was right. The Guardians League was too much to give up on account of one prick. Jake had told Emilia not to give up, so he wasn’t going to give up either. He had two weeks to rally and/or stuff his now-seething Muddy hate deep down where he couldn’t feel it. Two weeks without being able to talk to Emilia about it. Or anyone else. Jake felt insanely good about that. Spectacular, really.
“This is my fault,” Jake said again. Not everything was his fault, but this particular snafu was totally . . . ?mostly on him. “I’ll get it together for Round Three.”
“What about KNOX?” Bob asked, for sure using Emilia’s Fury name to remind Jake what was at stake.
“P’s right. Two weeks isn’t that long, and she’ll understand. I solemnly swear not to talk to, text, or otherwise communicate with Emilia while she’s still our competition.”
Two weeks wasforeverin Jake years. He wished he knew how long it would feel for Emilia, or if she’d still want to look at him after Unity wrenched away the dream Jake loved to see her chase.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Emilia, Monday
IT’S ONLY TAKENMr. Grimes two weeks to turn his fish tank of an office into what I’m sure he imagines is a den of Zen but is doing way more to stress me out than calm me down. The last time I was here, the most egregious things were his wooden-beaded bracelets and my mom. Today, it’s everything. The macramé dreamcatcher-looking hangings stuck to the glass wall with suction cups. The bamboo mat on the floor. The crystal collection on his desk, which includes a tiny faux-jade Chinese lion the size of my thumb, a patchouli oil diffuser, and one of those mini sand gardens in which someone (I’m hoping another student) has meticulously raked the outline of a . . . ?Is that a dick? I think it’s supposed to be a dick.
“You can rake that out,” Grimes says. It’s not awkward at all that he caught me looking. “I try not to dissuade students from expressing themselves creatively, but if you wanted to make something new while I grab the folder you need, I would appreciate that.”
Poor guy. How many dicks have people drawn in his garden in the last two weeks? Going by the defeated look on his face, I’m going to guess a lot. Out of pity more than artistic impulse, I pick up the little rake on my side of the desk and scratch some wiggly lines in the sand. There. Now it’s an amoeba wearing a mushroom-shaped hat.
“Lovely,” Grimes says when he straightens up from going through the cabinets under his desk. The folder he dug up for me looks dusty. It’s not common for students at Hillford West to request what’s inside it, so I hope the information inside is up to date.
“It’s thinner than I thought it would be,” I say to get his attention off the Zen garden.
“There’s more, but this is just the list of requirements and general starting paperwork,” he admits. He hasn’t actually handed me the folder yet. “Miss Romero, it’s my job to ask questions. Before I give this to you, I have to ask a few. Can we start with why?”
I take a deep breath and think back to what Penny and I rehearsed yesterday. “So there’s a scholarship program my parents would, like, die to know I got accepted to that would require me to intern after graduation. If I wait until the summer after senior year, I’ll lose the money. I just found out I’m a finalist, so I’m going to tell my parents about it soon, but when I do I want to show them I have everything planned out. You’ve met my mom; she’ll want to know I have everything covered before I make a move.”
By my ultrafast calculations, that explanation was about 40 percent true in reality, with a bump to 80 percent if we count the spirit of the statement over a more literal translation. Hopefully it dissuades him from lighting the beacons and bringing my parents into this before I’m ready to tell them.
“I remember your mother very well,” Grimes replies with a little too much wistfulness in his voice. “Can I ask which scholarship program you’re a finalist for?”
“I’d rather not say right now,” I reply. “I think my mom would be hurt if I told you before I said anything to her.” Penny and I came up with the half-lie scholarship excuse to get me the paperwork, but Matt was the one who told me to bank on my advisor having a crush on my mom to make it easier. When Matt’s right, he’s right.
“I understand.” He smiles. I’m begging him with my eyes not to wink, but he does. “Miss Romero, I’m all about the youth of today finding what gives them purpose. Your generation has inherited a broken world. If you’ve found something that might drive you to do your part to fix it, I respect and admire your spirit,” he intones. “But I wouldn’t want you to rush headfirst into leaving high school. You’re only young once; you should enjoy it before entering the working world.”
I don’t know; I think I’ll enjoy literally playing video games for money more than going to prom, but go off, Louis. I do not say this out loud.
“I’m going to give you this folder.” True to his word, he hands me the file across the desk. “But if anything happens with your internship, I want to discuss this further with your mother. I mean your parents, both of them. You . . . ?She did say she’s still married, right?”
A tap on the glass wall saves me and Grimes from having to continue this conversation. I can now proceed with Step 2 in my plan, which is going to be a lot harder. Grimes makes some apologetic noises to let me know my time is up, and I’m careful to be very, visibly thankful for his help.
“Change the world,” Grimes calls out as I leave, “and tell your mom I said hi!”
I’m halfway out the door of the advisors’ suite when I hear him welcome the student into his cube with a gentle “namaste.”
I riffle through the papers in the Department of Education folder while I walk over to the auditorium to prep for Step 2. Thanks to my parents toploading me in the first two years of high school, I’m well on my way to being able to graduate early without even trying. All I need to do is grab some summer requirements, pass a few Regents, and demonstrate full-time employment waiting on the other side of eleventh grade. Easy check, easier check, and significantly harder check, considering I still have to kick Jake’s ass to get the league spot.
A part of me knew that we would have to stop hanging out before the finals, but I still checked myGLOinbox yesterday to see if Jake had anything to say after the match. He left me a message saying he thought it was best we went no-contact for the next two weeks, which sucks but makes sense. It’s my turn to be a good secret friend.
But thatkiss, though. Did kissing Jake transport me to Missandei’s home island of Naath fromGame of Thrones? Because I got major butterflies and also felt like I was about to straight up die of happiness. Keeping it 100, I didn’t even know kissing could do that. Literally haven’t stopped thinking about it. I’m thinking about it right now. Yeah, that’s the good shit. Whew.
The first thing I did when I got home on Saturday was text Penny and Matt everything that happened at the tournament. Matt already knew about the Guardians League because he was following the competition on a stream, but I had to fill them in on the pre-match and backstage action. Their reactions, in order, were (1) let’s pick Bob up and throw him in a dumpster, (2) holy shit, that’s so much money, (3) good thing Jake was there to stop you from doing something stupid, Emilia, oh my god, and (4) sorry, you and Jakewhat?
Waiting on the triple dots to resolve after telling them I kissed Jake Hooper was thrilling. Penny waived her God-given right to say “I told you so” and expressed regret that she didn’t take Matt up on his bet, and Matt cobbled together an impressive emoji hieroglyph that included brown-girl-kissing-white-boy, video game controller, heart with smaller hearts inside it, interrobang, blue heart, red heart, robot head (?), and a party hat.
