Everyone at school knows Andrew Jennings. Missing an arm. Openly gay. But when he meets star athlete Ryan Sullivan in therapy, can friendship lead to more?
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When Andrew 'Jack...
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"When Dr. Burns walked in, I thought you were gonna shit yourself," Ryan said.
The two boys had exited from their respective sessions at the same time, leading to an awkward walk down the hall to the elevator, until Ryan had spoken.
Andrew choked a little laugh. "His name is Doctor Burns?" he said. "Oh my god. That's perfect for him, actually. Wow."
"He's not so bad. What's Dr. Greene like? She's pretty hot."
"Hot? Ew. She's, like, my mom's age."
"Some guys like older women," Ryan said with a shrug. "Cougars."
They stepped inside the elevator and Andrew jabbed the button for the ground floor. He gave Ryan a sideways look. Didn't he know?
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As the elevator doors squeezed shut, sealing them inside, Ryan wondered if he'd laid it on too thick about Dr. Greene. It always made him feel a little skeevy doing it. His teammates would've been all over that, but Jacky just gave him that look...
Shit.
Ryan had a vague memory of Jacky dancing with some kid, a boy, at the eighth grade dance. Remembered being surprised. The other kid, Billy, was so gay everyone had known since about the third grade. He liked to wear red sparkly laces in his converse sneakers, and had dyed his hair red, too.
Jacky, on the other hand, hadn't seemed gay at all. He was on the soccer team. He liked skateboarding. Not that these things even mattered, since Ryan himself was the same way. Obviously, gay guys could like sports. Still, it had surprised him. Just as it had surprised him a little bit when no one made fun of them. Jacky and Billy. Monica and her friends had been cooing that they were "such a cute couple!"
Ryan didn't remember much else about Jacky from middle school. All he remembered, when he saw the two boys dancing together, was thinking, I wish I could just ask Alex to dance with me.
Instead, he'd been at the dance with Monica. He liked Monica, he did, he just didn't like her that way. And the cool thing about Monica was that she didn't mind. She just liked hanging out with him and liked that he didn't pressure her to do the stuff her friends were all talking about. And when he finally told her he didn't like her that way, she said, "I kinda figured, but I have fun hanging out with you. I hope breaking up doesn't mean we can't sometimes go to the movies together?"
