Page 35 of Make Me Mean It

CHAPTER TEN

THEO

The tape pulls tight around the blade, tacky against the pads of my fingers as I wind it around, bring it to my mouth and bite through it.

I smooth the end down with my thumb before starting another pass.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with the tape already on there, but my hands need something to do, and this is better than sitting here listening to the shower running.

Another pass around the blade sits wrong, loose where it should be tight, and I yank the tape harder on the next turn to compensate. It pulls crooked instead, overlapping the edge and leaving a ridge beneath my thumb.

I know how to tape a fucking stick.

My heel taps against the floor until I plant it flat and pull another length of tape around the blade, concentrating on the familiar drag against my fingers, the stretch, the press of my thumb smoothing it down.

The shower hisses behind me.

I hear every second of it.

Water sprays against tile, running into the drain, the steady rush changing every time Connor moves beneath it. Louder for a second, then softer, then steady again while I wind another strip around the blade.

The water shifts again and my hand stalls halfway around.

For fuck’s sake.

Why the fuck am I still here?

I should’ve given him the clothes and left. That would’ve been the normal thing to do. Shove them at him, tell him where the showers are, get on my bike and let him deal with whatever the hell was going on with him without me sitting outside waiting.

And yet I’m still sat here, wasting half a roll of tape on a blade that didn’t need touching in the first place while Marcus’s little brother showers behind me, apparently determined to prove I’m capable of making worse decisions sober than I usually make drunk.

I pull another length from the roll.

Apparently I’ve lost my fucking mind.

I throw the stick aside, letting it crack against the locker before it drops to the floor between my feet.

“Fuck’s sake.”

I scrub both hands over my face and push off the bench, crossing the narrow strip of rubber flooring before turning back, only to stop halfway when pacing starts to feel even more stupid than sitting there taping the same blade for the third time.

I wrench my locker open instead, reaching inside. My hand closes around my hoodie, let’s go again, drifts uselessly towards the shelf above it, and I end up standing there with one arm buried in my locker and no idea what I came over here for.

Water hammers against the tile behind me while I work my thumb around the battered edge of the puck, until a foot squeaks against the wet floor and I’m already turning, shoulder pulling away from the locker, before I stop myself.

The puck slips from my hand as I turn back, planting both palms inside the locker and dropping my forehead against the cool metal.

“Fuck,” I groan, closing my eyes. “You fucking idiot.”

I shove a hand into my hair, catching a fistful at the roots and giving it a sharp tug.

The water cuts off, and my hand stills between the strands.

One drop hits the tile, then another, the gaps stretching longer until even those disappear and fuck me, the silence is worse.

The cubicle door clicks.

I straighten, dropping my hand from my hair and shoving the puck back into the locker before folding my arms across my chest and leaning into the metal, forcing the tension out of my shoulders as I cross one ankle over the other.