Long Pass Chronicles 02 - Canning the Center (17 page)

Jamal ran a hand over his head. “Man, this is complicated.”

“Yeah. Four guys could just be buddies, but I seem to remember that your friends gaze at each other like lunch, and I don’t exactly pass for the next quarterback of the Diablos.”

“How about we have dinner at my place?”

“Hmmm. At your lovely dining room set on your Limoges china?”

Jamal banged his head against the seat. “Damn!”
Wait. Inspiration
. “Hang on.” He grabbed his phone and dialed, then looked at Trevor sideways. “When are you free?”

“Never free, darling, just damned reasonable.”

“Wiseass. When?”

“Tomorrow night.”

He hit Send. It rang twice. “Jamal? Darling, hi.”

“Hi, Mom. I want to invite myself and some friends to dinner.”

“Of course. When?”

“Tomorrow night?”

“Sounds perfect. Ev will be here too. Who are you bringing?”

“A new friend of mine, Trevor, and I hope Will and Noah if they’re free.”

“I can’t wait. I’ve hardly seen those boys, and watching you play isn’t a substitute for having you asleep in your bed.”

“I agree.” Man, he missed his family.

“I’m very interested in your new friend.”

“I thought you would be.” He laughed. “I’ll see you tomorrow night. Six?”

“Can’t wait.”

“Love you.” He hung up and grinned at Trevor. “Will you have dinner with me tomorrow night?”

Trevor stared at him with giant eyes. “So you want me to meet your parents?”

“It’s not quite the trial it sounds. They’re really easygoing. They may not even ask you your intentions with regard to their son. Maybe.”

“Seriously, Bunny.”

“Seriously, I want you to meet my family.”

“Are you sure it’s a good idea?”

“Not a doubt.”

Trevor gazed at him, and Jamal’s heart beat hard. Would he say no?

“Okay. And I’ll go to your fucking football party too.”

“Are
you
sure that’s a good idea?” It would make it easier, but he didn’t want to say that.

“No.”

“Where shall I pick you up tomorrow night?”

Trevor stared again. Would he open up and let Jamal come to his place?

“Let’s meet at the same coffee shop. See you then.” He opened the car door and peeked out.

“Okay. See you.” Jamal wanted to grab him, kiss him, make him surrender like he did during sex, but he didn’t move.

Trev glanced back, smiled, and crawled out of the car.

Trust was not Trevor Landry’s middle name. Jamal wanted to change that.

He picked up the phone to call Will.

“I
LOVE
you, Mommy.” Trevor gently kissed his mom on the forehead.

She grabbed an edge of the flowered dress he’d put on. “I think this is one of your prettiest frocks, darling. You should wear this color all the time.”

“Thank you, dear.”

Her head fell back against her chair, and she stared at the game show on her TV—one of an endless flow of pap that seemed to keep her attention. Put on news and she started to scream. Maybe she was more with it than they thought. Her eyes drifted closed, and he slipped into the bathroom. Had to get to class, although some days he wasn’t sure why. He’d set up his college life to look as much like his idea of a normal guy as he could manage, but it wasn’t too exciting.

He pulled the dress over his head and slipped off his heels, then stuffed them in the backpack. Quickly, he put his jeans and T-shirt back on. A noise from the room brought his head up. Probably the orderly checking on her. Glad he’d made it out of the room in his dress. He turned on the water and left it on long enough to wash his hands, then flipped it off. Okay.

He opened the door and—Rance turned from peering down at their mother and stared at him.
What the living fuck?

His brother frowned. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Do you think no one comes to see her between your semiannual visits, for God’s sake?”

“They didn’t tell me you’d been here.” He pointed vaguely toward the door.

“Why would they? She has two sons. We both visit her. I just come more often.”

Rance frowned, which made his plain face downright homely. “They don’t tell me because they know I’ll stop paying her pricey upkeep if they let perverts in here.”

“Pricey? There are a lot nicer places she could be.”

His blue eyes narrowed. “You want to make her a ward of the state?”

Ice up the spine. “She’s your mother too.”

“For whatever it’s worth.” Rance flicked a hand in her direction. “She was so busy turning you into a pink powder puff, she didn’t have the time of day for me. I had a father. He died. I only pay for her shit because I told him I would. You know that.” He stepped toward Trevor. “And all I need is one excuse to quit.”

Evil truth. And what the hell would he do if Rance quit paying? Take care of her in his one room? “I’m going.”

“Good. Just looking at you makes me sick. And don’t come back.”

“Who’s going to visit her? You?”

“She doesn’t need visits from a sick fuck like you, Trevor. I’m going to warn them that they better tell me if you come back.”

“Jesus, Rance.” He fought the tears.

“Trevor, darling. Are you here?”

Shit, his mom had woken up.

Rance glanced back at her chair. “I’m here. Rance.”

“Oh.”

Her head lolled back again.

Trevor stepped toward her. “Mommy.”

His brother’s big body loomed over him. “Get the fuck out.”

He wanted to smash something, preferably his brother’s face. With a soft wail, he pushed out the partly open door.

Sitting across the hall beside an old lady in a wheelchair was Elmer, the big orderly who kind of reminded Trevor of Jamal. The man nodded, glanced at the door behind Trevor, and shook his head. Then he smiled.

T
REVOR
SQUEAKED
the marker on the white board.

“The gauge coupling and theta-angle can be combined together to form one complex coupling.” He glanced up at the six students sitting in front of him. At twenty, he was one of the youngest of them, but they didn’t know that. “Since the theta-angle is periodic, there’s symmetry, right?” He wrote again.

The students nodded and took notes.

“The quantum mechanical theory with gauge group G is also invariant under the symmetry while the gauge group G is simultaneously replaced—”

One of the girls raised her hand enthusiastically. “By its Langland’s dual group, right?”

She hopped up, grabbed another marker, and wrote below Trevor’s notation.

Trevor smiled. “Right.” He loved teaching the other students. It made the classes bearable.

Several of the students nodded, including the guy named Lou who had talked to him in the park.

Trevor set down the marker. Much as he enjoyed tutoring, it was hard to let go of the meeting with Rance. He’d gone to see his mom the next day and no one had said a thing, but he’d been scared shitless. What if Rance came back? Jesus, what if his brother caught him in a dress? He shuddered. “Okay, so you’re ready for class.”

The students started gathering their stuff. Lou looked up. “Hey, does anybody know a math student named Trixie?”

Trevor froze.
Don’t look panicked
. He erased the board slowly.

One of the guys responded, “Trixie? Nope. Don’t think I’d forget that name.”

A girl answered, “Me either. Maybe she’s in physics.”

Trevor put on his calmest face. “Where’d you hear about her?”

Lou shrugged. “A friend said she met a math student from SCU named Trixie. I told her I knew most of the people in the department and I didn’t remember hearing the name. Thought maybe she was new.”

A girl named Janice gave Lou a bump with her shoulder. “I’ll bet your friend said she was hot, so that’s why you’re interested.”

Lou grinned. “Uh, yeah. Well, she might have mentioned that this girl was pretty.”

Trevor’s hands trembled as he cleaned the board more than it needed. He wanted to ask so bad. Who? Who was his friend? But nobody would ask that, would they?

Janice, bless her nosy heart, said, “Who’s your friend?”

“Oh, just a girl I met at a party.”

The two of them walked out of the classroom still talking. Probably saying things Trevor desperately wanted to hear. He just kept wiping the already clean board.

J
AMAL
PULLED
the car to the curb by the coffee shop. Shades of meetings past. He flipped it into park and peered from the passenger window. The door to the coffee shop opened.
Well, okay
.

Trevor walked out the door and across the sidewalk. Trevor, not Trixie. He wore black slacks, a white dress shirt, and sneakers. The brilliant hair hugged his head and ended in a tail down his back.

Jamal checked the mirror, jumped out, and ran to the other door. Trevor gave him the “I’m a boy” frown, and Jamal ignored it. He opened the door and gave a little bow.

Trev seemed to be tugging on his smile to keep it from breaking free, and Jamal slammed the door, ran back around, and jumped in the driver’s seat.

As he pulled away from the curb, Trevor said, “Hey, aren’t you the one who doesn’t want to be outed?”

“Yeah. But hell, you’re at least as beautiful as Trixie. Gotta show my ’preciation.”

Trevor laughed, and the sound jiggled happily in Jamal’s stomach.

Still, Trev gripped his own hands nervously as they drove. Jamal glanced at him. “You okay?”

“Fine.”

“You’re not nervous about meeting my family?”

“No. ’Course not.”

Son of a gun
. He was lying for sure. Trevor flipped on some music, and they both didn’t listen to it all the way to Jamal’s house in Huntington Beach. Trevor stared out the window and fidgeted. Jamal watched him do it. Finally they pulled up in front of the old house. Maybe now Trevor would see just how much of nothing he had to worry about.

As Jamal crawled out his side, the door to the house opened, and Evangeline raced out like a heat-seeking missile. “Ferdinand!” In a few leaps of her long legs, she hurled herself around Jamal’s neck, and he caught her with a big swing around.

“Hey, ugly.”

“How you doin’, pipsqueak?”

“Good.”

She pounded on his shoulder as he lowered her to the ground. “I see they’ve been starving you and keeping you out of the weight room. Poor skinny guy.”

“Yep, I had to come home to finally get fed.”

She turned toward Trevor, who was still standing by the door on the passenger side of the car. She walked forward. “Hi. I’m Evangeline. People call me Ev. I’m the little guy’s next oldest sibling, his toughest critic, and his biggest fan.”

Trevor walked around the car toward her. His expression could only be called tentative. “I’m Trevor.”

“Come on in and meet the family.” She stepped beside Trev—they were about the same height—and folded her arm through his. “I’m guessing you don’t play football.”

“You would be correct.” That got a smile. God, he was so gorgeous when he smiled. No, make that even more gorgeous.

“What do you do? Movie star?”