Page 20 of Make the Play
“Sorry about that.” Jason runs a hand through his hair. “So lunch, you know where my office is? You know what never mind, of course you don’t. I’ll meet you at your classroom and walk you there. Don’t leave without me, alright?”
Standing in a sea of students, people still calling Jason’s name while the first bell rings in the background, all Emerson can do is nod.
“See you later,” Jason grins, leaving Emerson alone with his confused thoughts and a strange warmth in his chest at the memory of two dimples and warm brown eyes.
* * *
At exactly twelvethere’s a knock on Emerson’s door. It’s open but Jason knocks anyway, giving Emerson that little bit of warning before filling the doorway with his bulk. Like this morning, there’s an easy smile on his face as he leans against the door jamb, crossing his arms over his chest. He’s wearing a Santa Leon High football shirt that stretches just this side of too tight across his chest and a pair of basketball shorts.
“You ready, Mr. Miller?”
“Oh no, you can’t call me that,” Emerson blurts with a firm shake of his head. He grabs his lunch bag off the floor under his desk, crossing the room. It’s not until he’s standing in front of Jason that he realizes how abrupt he was. “I mean, uh, please don’t.”
“No, Mr. Miller?” Jason asks, taking a step back from the doorway so Emerson can sneak through. His expression is hard to read, his eyes studying Emerson, though for what he can’t fathom. “Just Emerson then?”
He nods, unsure how to explain that Mr. Miller is reserved for the students and class time. This is lunch time, and his brain delineates that very differently. If the principal or someone else from the district who was technically his boss called him Mr. Miller, he’s not sure he’d care because that would make sense but Jason is, well, not his boss.
“I know it’s weird,” Emerson mumbles.
“Not weird,” Jason shrugs. “Do all your friends just call you Emerson then?”
“Why?” Emerson asks, eyes darting between the line of Jason’s jaw and the stray students running late to lunch. None of them seem to be paying nearly as much attention to him or Jason as he is to them so he tries to relax. In his classroom it’s easy to fill his role, but once he steps into the hallways with all those teenagers, especially ones who aren’t his students, the little safe lines his brain has drawn are less sturdy.
“Just want to make sure I call you what you like.”
The thoughtfulness catches Emerson off guard, and he has no idea what to do with the rush of feelings swirling inside him. If Jason is like this with everyone, and he must be because Emerson is nothing special, then it’s easy to see why he’s so beloved.
“What, uh, what do your friends call you?” Emerson asks rather than answer that his own friends don’t call him anything because he doesn’t have any.
“Usually just Jason, but I had a handful of nicknames in high school which—we do not need to go into. Do me a favor and don’t ever ask my brothers, especially Andrew. He’s got a memory like a fucking hawk.”
There isn’t a single scenario Emerson can imagine where he might talk to one of Jason’s brothers, but he keeps that thought to himself. There’s something reassuring about the way Jason just offers up tidbits and future scenarios like he simply assumes he and Emerson are going to continue being friends, and this isn’t some kind of strange forced social nicety between coworkers. Even if it is, even if Jason is this nice to all his coworkers, it’s still the closest thing to a friend Emerson has had since, well, ever.
“Everyone just calls me Emerson, you know, back—” he pauses, unable to call it home. It was never home. There was no home after his mom died. Only family that didn’t really want him and a place he never fit. “Where I’m from. I don’t think I ever had a nickname.”
“You never had a nickname?” Jason echoes, stopping in his tracks. He turns to face Emerson, genuine surprise written across his face.
“Um, no? Unless you count like mean ones but I don’t think you meant that kind.”
Jason’s smile fades swiftly. “I fucking hate bullies.”
“Yeah,” Emerson mumbles, not sure why he said that out loud. He hadn’t planned to. Jason probably didn’t wanna know that, and more to the point, Emerson doesn’t want to remember how unkind kids had been, how unkind his own cousin had been.
“This means we’re starting at ground zero,” Jason says. “Just so we’re on the same page, how do you feel about nicknames?”
While Emerson’s brain attempts to process the question, the rest of his body hones in on the warmth at his lower back. It takes Emerson a few seconds to realize that warmth is coming from Jason’s large hand, placed there to make sure Emerson doesn’t take the wrong path when the walkway ahead of them splits, something he’s embarrassed to admit he was about to do. There was definitely a question he’s supposed to be figuring out an answer to, but all Emerson’s brain is capable of doing is focusing on the way he can feel that touch through the cotton of his shirt, on how unexpectedly safe it feels to know Jason isn’t letting him get lost or berating him for almost going the wrong way, like a lot of people would have.
Without preamble or words, he’s ensured Emerson takes the right path.
“Down this way,” Jason announces, hand lingering.
Emerson can’t remember the last time someone touched him. His aunt and uncle weren’t affectionate, and his cousin only touched him to shove him out of the way or mess up his hair, the kind of touches meant to irritate Emerson, not soothe. Back in high school, Landon spread a rumor about Emerson that he had some kind of venereal disease, as if desperate to ensure that no one would ever go near Emerson. Not that he’d needed to, people have never flocked to be his friend, or date him.
When Jason removes his hand a few seconds later, Emerson feels the absence acutely. It’s pathetic how desperate his body is for a bit of touch that’s not demanding or forced.
“So nicknames?” Jason prompts. He doesn’t look annoyed or frustrated about having to draw Emerson’s attention back to the conversation and that too soothes something in Emerson, so used to feeling a step out of line with other people in conversations. So often he has to work extra hard at thinking ahead for how to answer, or practicing the right amount of eye contact, or getting distracted by other thoughts that he ends up losing the thread of conversation. Other times he gets too excited and dominates, forgetting to let the other person talk, though this is rare, since Emerson learned to tamp down his desire to infodump and keeps most of his thoughts safely inside his own head.
Only, when Jason offers him an easy smile, Emerson forgets why it's safer to keep his truths hidden and answers honestly. “I don’t know how I feel about them to be honest.”
