He shrugged and pushed the towel in wide circles across the glass. “It was all right. Boring without you.”
Sometimes I hated when he said stuff like that, because it was always just what I wanted to hear, but not with the intention I wanted it to have. “Nothing spectacular happened?”
“Not really. Some people got pretty shit-faced.”
I snorted. “Stanton Perkins.”
“Yeah. Jordan and Ezra left pretty early, took most of the party with them. Good thing they did, too, or else I would’ve told Ezra to get his ass out of there. Stanton’s angry enough when he’s sober.”
“Why does he hate Ezra so much?”
“More of the same, I guess. Just in a greater intensity than everyone else.”
In a way, Ezra was a true celebrity, disliked just as much as he was admired. Half of the school revered him for taking the varsity football captain title this year, and the other half resented him for exactly the same thing. Cas didn’t like to admit it, but until Ezra came, the captainship had been down for him. Ezra was clearly the better player, but people liked Cas—that was the problem. You don’t always want what’s better. Sometimes you just want what you want, the familiar, the dependable, the accessible. There was nothing accessible about Ezra Lynley.
When Cas spoke again, his voice was strange. “Forty-five touchdowns in one season. It’s ridiculous.”
“Do you think Stanton’s right about him?”
“No. No, of course not. I just…” He paused, his towel resting on the back windshield across from mine. “Sometimes I can’t help but think it should be me, you know?”
I didn’t know what to say, so I just made some incoherent sound of sympathy.
“It’s a fucking classic,” he said. “It’s a fucking TV movie in the making. The charismatic underdog and the brooding prodigy he’ll never be able to catch up to, no matter how hard he tries.”
“Charismatic might be a bit of an overstatement.”
“Shut up. I am so charismatic.” He gave the windshield a final swipe. “He’s a jackass, sure, but he’s better than me. I can’t hate him for that, right? It’s the same old story, so it’s, like, what is there to do?”
I shrugged. “Give it a different ending?”
“You mean, like, push Ezra into a pool of laser sharks?”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I meant.” I threw the towel at him. “Or you could just … be the good guy. Be the one that everyone roots for.”
“So I should run up and down the bleachers a thousand times, throw the football through a tire swing, and then the big championship game’ll come around and Ezra will screw up and I’ll save the day? Win Temple Sterling’s heart? Get the girl?”
“Yeah. And the girl might even let you keep the laser sharks.”
Cas grinned.
10
I took Foster to training with Ezra the Sunday afternoon succeeding Temple Sterling’s victory over Freeport Senior High. I didn’t want to go, aware that both my mom and Foster expected me to stay the whole time, but I tried to see it as an opportunity to read, take in some fresh air, and appreciate the last of the lingering summer sun.
As we approached the empty varsity field, Ezra came into view. I peeled off toward a bench on the sidelines, not wanting to face a conversation with him, and Foster continued on to where Ezra stood in the middle of the field, a football in hand.