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Chapter 71: Delayed gratification
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Keeping Score Chapter 72: Making promises we can't keep
QUINN"This is the best pasta I've had south of Philadelphia." I laid down my fork and sighed. "And the company's not bad either."Leo flashed me a smile, but there was something under it, something not quite complete. All night, his laughter hadn't seemed to reach his eyes, and he'd been preoccupied. "All right." I rested my elbows on the table and leaned my chin in my hands. "Tell me what's going on. You've been giving me lip service all night. Did I not live up to your shower expectations?" This time, real heat flared in his eyes. "Hardly. As a matter of fact, you exceeded them. I'm lucky I can sit still here with the boner you gave me.""Hmm. Okay then, what is it? Don't forget, Leo, I've known you forever. You can't hide this shit from me."He fiddled with his knife where it lay alongside his plate. "I got a call today from a guy who works for Football Sunday.""What's that?" I frowned. "It's an online sports magazine. I think it still has a monthly print component. Any
Keeping Score Chapter 73: Temporary?
QUINNThe next morning, I woke up with gritty, swollen eyes, a pounding head and a sense of doom I couldn't shake. Leo was already awake, sitting on the edge of the bed, his clean T-shirt in his hands. He stared down at it, turning the gray cotton over in his hands. I pushed my back against the pillow, sitting up and wrapping my arms around my knees. "What time is it?""Just after seven." He stretched the shirt wide, the way he always did right before he pulled it over his head. I watched the interplay of muscles on his back, tempted to trace the ridges and ropes."Leo." I took a deep breath. "I think ...I think we need to take a break. I'm going to head back up to New Jersey. I should spend some time with my mom anyway, before classes start again.""What the hell are you talking about?" Leo turned around, his eyebrows drawn together. "Quinn, what are you saying?""Everything is so screwed up." I flexed my feet, intent on the movement of the sheet over them. "What they want fr
Keeping Score Chapter 74: Friends. Whatever.
NATEJUNIOR YEARFALLOne thing most kids who are sick a lot have in common is that we don't take for granted long stretches of health. For the first seventeen years of my life, a regular hospital stint was part of life, just as much as my birthday was-only less predictable about when it would fall. I'd gone almost four remarkable years without a serious illness, from the autumn of my junior year in high school to late summer before my junior year in college, but I never got used to it. Every time I had a tickle in my throat or an odd pain in my legs, I waited for the inevitable.When it finally came, the timing wasn't as bad as it could have been. In early August before our third year of college began, I woke up at home and realized I was running a fever. Before the end of the day, I was in the hospital, and by the next day, I was in the ICU. Quinn had come home early from her summer with Leo. She'd told me a little about what everything had been like down there, and how it had
Keeping Score Chapter 75: Girlfriend by default
QUINNSENIOR YEARSPRING I wasn't sure exactly how it had happened, but by the beginning of senior year, it seemed that Nate and I were in a relationship.It began at the homecoming dance, and then things happened slowly and gradually from there. Nate held my hand as we walked to class. He kissed me good-night when he left my apartment at night. His kisses weren't long or involved, and they didn't feel like they were leading anywhere more complicated, but still, I was uneasy. I tried to ignore all that, until one day, when I was meeting him at the student union after a class, I heard Nate talking to someone I didn't know. "Yeah, I'm just waiting for my girlfriend, and then we're going to the movies."For a brief second, I actually thought, Nate has a girlfriend? And then I realized he was talking about me."Honestly, Quinn? You and Nate have been dating since last fall." Zelda shook her head at me as she dried a pan. "You're just the last one to notice." "And maybe you didn'
Keeping Score Chapter 76: The dying friend card
QUINNNate's recovery was slower this time. He spent a week in ICU, a week during which I hardly slept and missed every class. Once they moved him to a regular room, he was in the hospital for another ten days, fighting off further infection and recovering.On the day Nate was released, Sheri texted me at noon to let me know she'd brought him home. He was going to spend at least two weeks at home, where Sheri and Mark could monitor his meds and take him to follow up appointments with the doctor. As soon as classes ended, I drove to the Wellmans' house, giving a quick knock as I opened the front door. "Is there an escapee from the hospital around here?" I called, stepping into the living room. "God, yes." Nate lay on the couch, covered with a quilt. "And I don't plan on going back any time soon. Want to be my partner in crime?" I grinned. "Always. Always have been, always will be." I pulled a footstool over next to the sofa and leaned up to kiss his cheek. "Nice and cool, by t
Keeping Score Chapter 77: Gone
LEOSENIOR YEARAPRILI hadn't had a hangover like this for a long, long time. My head was pounding, and my mouth was like a roll of cotton. For a long disoriented moment, I couldn't remember where I was or why I was awake. One hand groped out, reaching for Quinn, before my traitorous mind remembered the truth. She's not in your bed. She hasn't been in your bed for over a year. And she's fucking marrying someone else.The pain stabbed again, just as sharp and fresh as it had the first time I'd heard the news. Quinn had made sure it came from her, and she'd actually called me, explaining what was going on. I'd run through the gamut of emotion from grief over Nate's news to anger over what he was asking of Quinn to hurt over the fact that she'd agreed. Quinn was engaged to Nate. They were getting married in two months. I didn't have to do much mental arithmetic, because the countdown ticked away in my brain on a daily basis. On the bedside table next to me, my phone sounded, an
Keeping Score Chapter 78: The masochist
LEOMatt Lampert had never been much of a planner, but he'd managed his suicide with a precision that would've changed his life, had he applied it there. He'd cleaned his room, as I'd noticed, and when I opened his closet, I'd found his clothes bagged. In his duffel bag were all the personal items that might mean something to me, to his grandparents and to Gia.At the motel room where he'd ended his life, the police had found only two notes. The first was the one Coach had referenced, a polite missive requesting that the authorities notify Coach Demby, who would then know how to proceed. The second note was a piece of paper with Gia's name written on top, and it had only two words on it. I'm sorry.The coach had offered to help me with anything I needed, but I tried to do everything myself. I owed that much to Matt. I called his grandparents and broke the news, and with their guidance, I made arrangements for Matt's body to be cremated locally. And then I brought him home. M
Keeping Score Chapter 79: Limitations
NATESUMMER AFTER GRADUATIONMy wedding day dawned clear and warm. I was awake as the sun rose over the ocean, sitting up in bed to watch the colors spread over the blue water and shoot rays of gold onto the sand. Today was the happiest day of my life, and I wasn't going to miss a single minute of it. My mother had worried that having both graduation and the wedding in the same week would be too much for me, but I knew that nothing was going to stand in the way of me marrying Quinn. I briefly considered not walking at that ceremony, just sitting in the audience to cheer for Quinn, Gia, Tuck and Zelda, but it was important to my parents that I walked onto the stage to receive my diploma. I wanted to give them every memory I could, because I knew they were going to need those someday soon.We'd driven down to the shore the day after graduation, and I'd settled into the same bedroom where I always slept. Quinn popped in now and then, bringing me updates about how preparations were pr
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