Page 48 of Make the Play
At Emerson’s raised eyebrow, he continues.
“They thought I had a girlfriend,” he explains before taking a huge bite. He can’t help chuckling to himself as he chews, recalling the absolute chaos that had been his third period. None of his damn seniors would do anything except try and find out who he’d been texting the entire time.
Emerson unpacks his own lunch, eyes on Jason as he withdraws his peanut butter sandwich. “Do you?”
“Have a girlfriend?” Jason chokes. “Hell no. You’d know if I did. I talk to you more than anyone. Besides they were just needling me because they caught me texting at the start of class. Which, by the way, was not a girl. I was texting you.”
Emerson’s eyes widen, the pale green nearly translucent under the shitty lighting in Jason’s office.
“What exactly made them think it was a girl?” Emerson asks. He takes a bit of his sandwich, fixing Jason with an unblinking stare.
Not long after they met, Emerson mentioned how stressful he found eye contact with most people, never sure how much to use. He said he tended to avoid it while talking but had been told he used too much when listening. Jason assured him that however much he looked or didn’t look at him was fine, and he meant it. Secretly though, he loves it when Emerson does the intense stare thing while he talks, the undivided attention lighting up the middle child part of his brain that loves to be sure someone is paying attention to him.
“You know how they are,” Jason shrugs, thinking about the way they’d tried to turn dodgeball into twenty questions. He knows a lot of people hate teenagers, but he loves their unfiltered curiosity and thirst to find themselves. “They said I was smiling at my phone like a lovesick teenager. Nosy little shit heads.”
“But you were just texting me?”
“Obviously,” Jason confirms, grabbing a piece of watermelon out of the fruit salad. “Did I ever tell you about the time when I was four and Charlie told me if I swallowed a watermelon seed it would grow in my belly—sprout vines and everything?”
Emerson takes a bite of his sandwich before shaking his head.
“I always believed Charlie, even when Andrew told me not to. Anyway, we were eating watermelon, and it was full of seeds we were supposed to spit out onto a napkin, and Charlie looked me dead in the eye and told me to be careful not to swallow one, or it would grow in my stomach and eventually kill me.”
“That’s illogical and also scientifically impossible,” Emerson points out, curling his legs beneath him in the office chair.
“I know that now,” Jason laughs, “but I was a kid. Anyway, I accidentally swallowed one despite my best intentions not to and cried all night. I couldn’t eat watermelon for years.”
“I think I’m glad I didn’t have siblings,” Emerson muses. “Although Landon was bad enough.”
Jason clenches his jaw so hard his teeth grind. Emerson’s cousin is the biggest piece of shit he’s ever heard of, and Jason sincerely hopes he never has the misfortune of meeting him. Despite the way Emerson has tried to play off the unkind words from Landon, it’s clear they left a lasting impression.
With a heavy sigh, Emerson sets his half-eaten sandwich on top of its tupperware before laying it on Jason’s desk.
“I talked to Mr. Caldwell on the way here.”
“What did he want?” Jason asks, trying to keep the bitterness from his tone. He’s downplayed how horrible he thinks he is, if only because as the head English teacher, Emerson is forced to interact with him far more than Jason, and he never wants to influence Emerson’s opinion or add to his stress.
“He wants me to take his place chaperoning the homecoming dance.” Emerson pulls his knees to his chest in a way that should not be possible given his height, but then Emerson is lanky and lean, his body able to contort itself into positions that Jason’s much thicker body could never. “I suppose want isn’t the right word. He told me he’d taken the liberty of putting me down to chaperone in his place.”
“Tell him no,” Jason grumbles. “Or better yet, to fuck off.”
“I would never,” Emerson gapes. “Besides, I don’t think saying no is an option.”
“I’ll talk to him.”
“No, it’s—no.” Emerson twines his arms around his legs until he’s made a little ball of himself, chin resting on his knees and his eyes on the edge of the desk.
“You don’t have to do anything you’re not comfortable with, Emmy.”
As he hoped, the nickname does the trick. Emerson turns his face in Jason’s direction, cheek resting on his knees. “You’re chaperoning.”
“I am,” Jason confirms. He told Emerson as much weeks ago, casually suggesting he come too, but Emerson had shut him down swiftly with an uncharacteristic bite, and Jason hasn’t mentioned it again. He’s not sure why the idea of going to a school dance upset him so much, but he suspects he’s about to find out.
“They’re pretty loud, but you’ve got your ear defenders, and you can step outside as often as you need.”
“It’s not that. Or it is I guess, but that’s not the—ugh.” Emerson turns his face into his knees, tapping his fingers against his leg.
Watching Emerson be uncomfortable makes Jason feel like there’s a rock lodged in his throat. He wishes he could take away everything that ever made him upset, wishes he could fix it all.
