“I’m getting the impression you’ve attended a few of these?”
Zoe blushes. Actually blushes, something I never thought to witness. “Only the goalie can touch the bottom. The rest have to tread water for four quarters, which are each eight minutes long. And most of the time they last even longer.”
Both teams file out of the aquatics building and with the way the crowd goes wild you would think we’re at a One Direction reunion concert.
Among the rabid fan base are Zoe and Blake who raise their arms and shout at the top of their lungs, “Go Sharks!” Then they smash together to take a couple of selfies. When they try to wrangle me and Dora into taking one with them, I steal the iPhone out of Zoe’s hand and snap away. I’m an introvert. There’s a reason I live behind the camera and not in front of it.
In the meantime, the teams go to their respective benches and start divesting themselves of their clothing. Some of the guys are wearing rip-away track pants and each time a pair comes off the girls around us scream. If I had any doubt whether this was by design, watching the guys smile broadly answers that question.
“Was I right? Am I right?” Zoe squawks over the ruckus, a perfect grin prying her bee-stung lips apart. Her mad enthusiasm has me grinning from ear to ear.
My eyes move to the home bench of their own volition, taking cursory stock of each and every player until they reach the last one. Reagan’s head comes up and our eyes lock. For a moment I’m trapped in that gaze, unable to move a muscle as some heavy-duty vibes fly between us. Well, this is inconvenient.
A knowing grin cuts his face in two and I’m jolted out of my trance, my gaze flitting sideways, finding something else to stare at. I’m a coward. I fully admit it. Those go-green eyes have the power to pluck every thought from my head and seeing as some of those thoughts involve him I’d rather keep them to myself.
One by one, the guys jump in the water. Reagan is last. I catch sight of the body Zoe was raving about and holy hell I really need to give the girl some credit. He’s a diamond, cut to exacting precision. Broad shoulders, a powerful chest smattered with hair that tapers down to a set of cobbled abs, narrow hips, and muscular thighs. My entire body bursts into flames and it has nothing to do with the blazing SoCal sun.
The players begin swimming warm-up laps, raw power cutting through the water with grace. The screams reach an eardrum-shattering level.
The camera comes out. I hold it up, snap away indiscriminately. Some of my favorite shots have been happy accidents and between the colors and all the kinetic energy this moment is rich with possibilities. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this but you’re right,” I begrudgingly admit.
“Of course, I’m right.” Zoe grins, full of herself.
“Look at Red––” Blake snickers and hooks a thumb at Dora whose eyes are pinned wide open. “She’s in a trance. Can’t even answer. Red––”
Leaning over, Zoe snaps her fingers in Dora’s face. Dora swats her hand away and laughter breaks out. “Red, are you breathing? Do you need CPR?”
“Beat on her chest, Zo,” Blake yells.
“Those swim trunks are s-small,” Dora mumbles.
“And tight,” Blake adds, her sculpted eyebrows waggling.
“No Jiffy P-Pop,” Dora adds.
“Like the popcorn?” I query, confusion stamped on my face as I picture the tin pans my dad used to use to make popcorn on movie night when I was a kid.
Dora flushes red to the roots of her long auburn hair. “You know…” She chews on her lips, eating away all the gloss. “When you have too m-much hair down there and the suit…”
A dry burst of laughter rips out of me. The ability to visualize in high definition can be a curse sometimes. “Ohhhhh.”
“Some of them shave their entire bodies,” Zoe remarks with an expression of maniacal reverence. The image this elicits instantly floods my face with heat.
Reagan’s silky-smooth junk.
Eyeballing me, Zoe snickers. “You’re picturing it, aren’t you? I know you are. Don’t bother denying it, you filthy animal. I can see it on your face.”
Which makes me laugh, overriding any embarrassment.
“I guess I-I’m filthy too, then.”
“Ramos––” Zoe holds up a palm and Dora high-fives her. “Welcome to the club.”
Reagan
As soon as the buzzer sounds, I jump out of the pool and head to the bench to towel off with the sonic boom of the cheering crowd trailing after me. I am bone-tired. The goal I scored plus Warner’s and Dall’s led us to beat Cal by two. Part of the reason may or may not have been that I played with a little more motivation than usual.
Alice Bailey.
I never expected to see her at one of my games. Not today, not ever. She doesn’t strike me as the type to enjoy athletic competitions of any sort. And yet what did I find as I absently scanned the crowd? The girl who’s been keeping me up at nights sitting in the first row of the bleachers with a Yankees ball cap pulled low over her eyes, and those long bare legs stretched out before her. Nice try with the hat, but I’d recognized that face anywhere.
I’m having a hard time closing my eyes at night without her flashing dark eyes and heart-shaped ass invading my personal headspace. Which is a major fucking inconvenience since there’s no way I can scratch that itch. If I don’t find a distraction soon, my dick will go on strike.
I’m in the midst of throwing on a t-shirt and shorts when a commotion at the opposite end of the pool gets my attention. The crowd is slow in leaving the stadium, the usual Speedo chasers hanging around waiting for the guys to leave the aquatics building. A group of people part and a guy stumbles through. My lungs arrest. I can’t draw a single breath because it’s not just any guy––it’s my brother.
He stumbles around in a state of anxious confusion while I’m frozen, rooted to the cement beneath me in shock. My hands shake from an adrenaline rush, the only sign that I can still move my limbs. I can’t tear my eyes away from him. His t-shirt, torn and stained. His jeans, worn-out and filthy, look ready to fall off his hips. He’s shoeless and dirty and thinner than I’ve ever seen him.
I haven’t seen Brian in three months and not for lack of trying. I’ve been chasing him all over the damn city. I’ve got people I’ve developed relationships with, some I pay to call me if they spot him. And according to them they hadn’t seen him either lately. Which was making me think the worst had happened. It’s always there, the fear, lurking in the back of my mind.
“Rea…” Dallas murmurs from somewhere behind me. Every set of eyes left in the stadium is staring at him. At my brother the junkie.
“I know,” I tell him. He’s got my back if I need him but this is my burden to carry. Snapping out of a daze, I make my way over to him, taking with me all the attention in the stadium. Of the spectators. The Speedo chasers still here hoping for a chance to talk to me. The coaching staff. It’s about as comfortable as getting a tooth drilled without Novocain.
Brian staggers past them, and on cue the glares and sneers start. His blue eyes are wild as he searches for me amongst the crowd. Hushed whispers and giggles build into open ridicule.
“Who’s that?”
“Gross.”
“Oh, God. He smells.”
“Total junkie.”
“Crack kills.”
“Lay off the bath salts, dude.”
It no longer upsets me the way it used to when I was in high school. I’ve learned to tune them out––the haters. I’ve learned to stop throwing punches.
These people don’t know him. They don’t know that my older brother used to be my best friend. That he was an honor role student, a world-class swimmer, and an exceptional water polo player. Brian’s the reason I got into polo in the first place. I wanted to be just like him. Until he met Jessie and everything went to shit. These people have no idea how he got to be a junkie and yet they judge him.
“Brian.”
At the sound of my voice he glances my way and relief spreads over his face, which is looking worse for wear these days. His eyes are sunken in and skin leathery from living on the streets. Beard heavy and hair matted. Twenty-four going on a hundred and five.
“Rea––Rea, I need money, man. I need it bad,” he says talking fast. He fidgets with his hands, alternating between running them through his matted brown hair and stuffing them in his front pockets. He shifts on his feet. Pupils blown out.
I’m not surprised that he’s high. I’m only surprised at how gut-wrenchingly painful it still is to see him like this. After all these years you would think I would’ve grown accustomed to it.
“Okay, Bri. Come with me and we’ll talk.”
“I need the money,” he insists, his eyes nervously shifting around. Never landing on anything or anyone for too long.
I go to grab him and my hand swallows up his bicep, my fingers completely curling around his arm. It’s another stab of pain. A gut check. This time it’s coupled with the knowledge that time is running out. That I may not be able to save him from what is starting to look like the inevitable.
I lead him away from the pool, toward the back of the aquatics building where my Jeep is parked. The collective attention of the crowd follows us until we’re out of sight, the feeling palpable.
Brian comes reluctantly, mumbling that he needs money, while I keep reassuring him that I have some in the car. I need to get him back to my house and fed. Maybe with a little luck cleaned up…if he’ll let me.
“Come home with me and you can have something to eat. Maybe take a shower. I’ll give you my clothes…”
He shakes his head and scratches his neck. He’s twitching, in need of a fix. “I got people waiting. Maybe next time.”
I can’t keep the fear out of my eyes. I know it’s there as blatantly as I know he doesn’t see it. “Brian, c’mon, man. Do it for me. I’m worried about you.”