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PROBLEM XLIV : Half Time Disaster
When I reached the boy’s locker room, it was empty. I could hear one showerhead running, so I knew Houston was still in fact here.
I planted myself on one of the polished wooden benches and waited. I couldn’t figure out the reason why Houston wasn’t playing the second half of the game. He loved this game. More importantly, this was one crucial game since I knew there were scouts in the audience. Ryan had told me. If Houston was pinning for a scholarship, it was mandatory for him to be out there on the court.
My thoughts broke away when I heard the shower stop and the door click open. “HoneyCakes?” Houston cocked an eyebrow, “I always knew you were a guy underneath all those layers of clothes,” He laughed.
I frowned, “It’s not funny Houston. Why are you not playing? Aren’t there like scouts out there? Ryan said tonight was a big deal.”
“Oh, you’ve been talking to Ryan? I thought you two were enemies.” Houston said, searching for the neck hole of his tee.
Frowning, I snatched the tee from his hand and passed it's hole through his head and huffed, “Don’t change the subject...I know you know that we sorted out our differences already Houston. Tell me.”
Houston slammed his locker shut aggressively, turning away from me as he picked up his duffle bag, “There is nothing to tell HoneyCakes, I just didn’t feel good. Come, I’ll give you a ride home.”
“You’re not even going to watch the rest of the game?”
He did not turn to face me but answered after a while of silence, “Like I said, I don’t feel good. But if you want to stay and watch, you can always hitch a ride with Crazy Grace?”
“Hey don’t call her Crazy. She’s mine.”
“Alright,” He laughed, “So are you staying?”
I grinned, “No, take me with you,” I said, catching a hold of his hand and pulled him towards the exit. I made it into the empty hallway which may I add felt very weird. I had never seen the LakeVille High hallways this empty at this hour of the day, considering this was the first ever game I’ve attended. I had never been inside LakeVille High past the school hours. And boy, was it serene.
“So how do you feel?”
“Fine,” He replied absentmindedly. I stressed my steps abruptly making him jerk stop in his steps since we were holding hands. “What?” He asked quizzically.
“I just remembered the time when I answered the same question with a fine, do you remember what you did? You blew up in my face...But that’s okay. You don’t want to tell. So we won't take about it. I mean it's not like you know everything about me...Oh wait, you do. You just don’t trust me and—”
His lips. Against mine. The feeling was spreading like a wild fire through the core if my body. The warmth, the urgency. Before I could take a breath, Houston pulled back.
“I’m sorry. I will never answer a question like that with an answer like that. Ever.” Houston said, taking slow steps towards me, making me back away to a point where he was able to cage me in between both his arms with my back stuck to the blue metal of the cold lockers. After staying frozen in such a state for a few moments, he sighed and dropped his head on my shoulder softly, “After Maeve, it has always effectively freaked me out for people to answer that particular answer with a Fine. I don’t know if I will ever get over it or not, but that doesn’t mean you have to be scared for me if I answer your question with a Fine. It will never have undertone of sadness in it.”
His eyes were meeting mine, green to brown. It’s like we were meeting on the battlefield, eye to eye. Everything stayed the same, it didn’t feel as if the air even shifted for a while.
“If there is a moment when I am sad, unhappy or unsatisfied, I will tell you face to face, voice to voice, eye to eye. I won’t bother with masks because I know they’re cause pain that is most of the times unnecessary. If I have a problem with you, I will tell you. I will starive for us to fix it. To fix you or to fix me if we ever fall short of ourselves and our ambitions of what we dream of becoming like as humans.”
His hands creeped up, cupping my face from both sides, “At this very moment, I am standing at a place that has all of this written in gold, like promises and vows. My question to you is, are you there with me?”
Someone please remind me what is air. How to breathe, because my lungs are needy.
I’ve been lost in a sea which has pulled me down deeper, into it’s pits. I’ve dronwed and barely made it out alive. And in the midst of it all, I’d never heard this depth in my life.
I caught a hold of his large hand in my small one, and a smile cracked on the surface of my lips which I couldn’t help, “Right there beside you.”
“I love you,” Houston confessed, leaning in while I completely froze. Snapping back into my senses, I pushed back at his chest, “Woah Mister! A little too fast there!”
Houston cocked an eyebrow at me, “What?”
“You can’t just say something like that so nonchalantly!”
“HoneyCakes, I think we passed that flight of steps when I asked you if you were there with me in a place with promises and you agreed. I’m sorry to let you know but you’re stuck with me.”
I closed my eyes and mumbled, “I must really have the attention span which is equivalent to Zero. Like I don’t have it. Nada. Zilch.”
Houston laughed hearing my words as he draped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me with him as we walked out the school building to his car. Being the gentleman he was, he opened the door to my side and let me slide in when his cell phone blared out a seriously obnoxious song—Don’t tell him I said that.
Now, I did not want him to answer that call. Not that I had a gut feeling he shouldn’t. Okay. A gut feeling might be involved. But I just didn’t want him to leave me alone or drop me off at home. He hung up the call which seemed pretty damn serious because his face had lost any ounce of evidence of humor that was there. And then he looked at me and I swear I knew I wasn’t going to like it.
“I’m not going to like it, am I?”
I expected an answer that I never got. Houston averted his eyes, twisted the key in the ignition, put it in gear and zoomed off at a velocity that I was not a big fan of.
