A Jocks Tale Reunion (ManxMan)

Chapter Eight

Jake

“Don’t I know you?”

Ugh! As if that wasn’t the most cliché thing-

“Excuse me?” Daniel looked up from his to seat over to his right.

Danny was tense, that much I could tell from his backside. Daniel on the other hand, his fingers cracked and flexed. Annoyance took place instead of that laid back expression he wore earlier. I wasn’t very happy with the sudden turn of events either.

“Josh.” My teeth were clenched when I said the name. I was standing right behind Danny with my hands automatically reaching for his shoulders. My fingers rubbed in tiny circles to rub the tension away.

The story was simple, Josh was Danny’s ex. As in the guy Danny dated before me. He up and vanished in the middle of the night one day, many months before my arrival. He left no word or contact. He had Danny confused and more than a little sad. Who did stuff like that to other people anyway?

So, as it turned out, the guy had problems, and he could have gone about it a better way. He went to rehab, or rather, unwillingly went to rehab. The guy was strung up like a Christmas tree. And not in the good way.

He was a liar and he is very manipulative. Even when he got out of rehab, he confronted Danny at school one day trying to apologize. He was lying for the most part. We eventually learned the rest of the truth through Lillian.

We were warned not to trust anything that came out of his mouth. Judging by the bags under his eyes at this very moment, he was still caught up in nasty habits. All he really wanted, was Danny’s money. Or his parents money for ‘help’. It didn’t matter who he hurt.

If only I hadn’t jumped to conclusions the last time we met. That caused a huge fight between Danny and myself. One I’d rather not think about.

“We’ve got nothing to offer you,” I said with my teeth still clenched tight.

Josh looked horrible for his age. You’d think it was his fiftieth high school reunion instead of his first. Gray hairs were streaking in his full grown beard and hair. His skin that gray and yellow tinge coloring too. How did he survive this long? That had to be some kind of super power.

That’s when Josh really looked at me, and I saw real Josh. His brown eyes reminded me of mud as they narrowed at me. Yeah, last time we met, he wasn’t even aware of my existence. It didn’t look like he recognized me though.

“And you are…?” He said with an air of indifference.

“The Husband.”

That’s when he took a swipe at me. I didn’t have to do much of anything to deserve that. All I knew was, a fist swiped right past my face. The idiot was unhinged and it was only going to get worse. People like him, when they don’t get their way, blow up over tiny things.