Faith peeked inside. “This is as big as my second story.”
And it was. In the corner, under a slanted roof, was a bed with a navy bedspread. The headboard was carved out of the same oak as the dining table. Definitely handmade, probably also by his grandfather. A window seat was cut into the slanted wall. On the other side of the room was a desk, a couch, and an entertainment system that rivaled the one in her living room.
She patted Kyle’s arm. “I’m so sorry you have to live in such squalor.”
“I know.” He nodded solemnly. “But I make do.”
She slipped inside and went to the couch. He followed more slowly and didn’t sit until she patted the seat next to her. “Okay, I’m here. What did you want to tell me?”
His knee started bouncing. “It’s kind of hard to know where to start.”
“Maybe the beginning?”
He nodded and took a deep breath. “That would be seventh grade, but we’ve talked about most of that. It really started in eighth grade, the worst year of my life.”
“Eighth grade was hard for me, too,” she said. “But what was awful about yours?”
“Cameron Zimmerman.”
He said it with such bitterness that she leaned away, breath stolen from her lungs. Just how horrible was Cameron? “Worse than the stuff you’ve already told me?”
“More stupid middle school stuff,” Kyle mumbled. “Not important.”
God, guys were so buttoned-up sometimes. Especially this guy. “You can’t say he made your life hell, then tell me it’s not important.” She put her hand on his. “You said you were going to tell me everything.”
He closed his eyes a moment. “You didn’t go to Perkins for middle school, did you?”
“No, I went to Rosewood.”
“Well, if you’d gone to Perkins, you’d know. It’s blown over for most people, but not for me.”
His shoulders were hunched around his ears, and his expression had a tortured pinch to it. Faith reached out, slowly, and took his hand. “Whatever it is, I won’t be shocked.”
He laughed in an unfunny way. “Oh, I don’t know about that.”
She shook her head. He obviously needed to talk about this. “I won’t.”
His body went slack, like he was either giving up or giving in. Faith held completely still, gripping his hand so he had a lifeline. Finally, he said, “Like I said, it started in seventh grade. Cameron played on a different Little League team, and my team killed them every time. Cameron was a second baseman then, before he settled on football. One game, I had to slide. I came in hot, and he missed the tag, so I was safe. For some reason, that set him off. One insult too many from our team, I guess.
“He started with petty stuff. His friends pestered me, pulled nasty pranks.” From the look on his face, Faith wondered just how nasty those pranks had been. “Made a fool of me in front of the girl I liked, taped my homework and tests all over the school like I told you, crap like that.”
“But that’s not all,” Faith said, sure of it. “They cratered you at one point, didn’t they?”
He nodded, looking away. “It was the week of baseball tryouts in eighth grade. Most of the guys at Perkins saw me as this shrimp—I was a lot shorter then—and someone to beat on. Cade and I were bullied all through middle school, not just by Cameron, but by everyone with a bone to pick. So by then, I was pretty worn down.”
She squeezed his hand. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s over now. You need to understand what happened, though. They all knew I had an arm on me, even then. They’d seen me play in Little League. So when I went out for the Perkins team…”
His voice cracked, and he paused. Faith edged closer to him, sensing his pain. It was so close to the surface, her own heart ached, and she didn’t even know why he’d been hurt. “What happened?”
“For the first two days of camp, I smoked the guys trying out for outfielder. I outhit, outcaught, and outthrew every last one of them. Including Cameron. I made that jackass look like a fool. If you wonder why he only does football and track, I’m why.” Kyle’s face broke into a brittle smile. “King of the grass. That’s what the assistant coach called me. And it pissed the jocks off. This shrimp, this nothing, coming in and blowing them all away.”