The Game Of Falling

Chapter 5: The sabotage

Asher woke to a ringing in his skull and the taste of blood in his mouth.

For a moment he lay still, staring at the ceiling of his dorm room while last night came back in pieces: Luna sliding down the wall, Clyde's fist, Damien's smile in the doorway. 'You'll wish you'd stayed upstairs.'

He turned his head and winced. His cheek was swollen, and his split lip had crusted over during the night.

His phone was buzzing on the nightstand. It had been buzzing for a while, judging by the way it crawled toward the edge.

He picked it up and frowned.

"417 notifications."

"What the hell?"

Instagram. Twitter. The Westwood student forum. His name was everywhere. He opened the first link, and the university news page loaded, headlined in bold black letters:

"LATE NIGHT NEWS: THE BLACK SERPENTS ATTACK A STUDENT AT A PARTY, AND NOBODY STOPPED THEM. ALMOST NOBODY."

Beneath it sat Luna's video, the one someone had filmed from the staircase. Damien pinning her to the wall. Clyde's punch. And then, clear as day, Asher stepping between them, his face hard with anger.

He scrolled down to the article.

"Westwood University has spent years pretending the Black Serpents don't exist. Last night, a group of basketball players decided to stop pretending. They put themselves between a drunk girl and a man who has been terrorizing this campus for years. Everyone else stood by and filmed."

"Maybe the question isn't why the Serpents think they own this university. Maybe it's why the rest of us let them"

His eyes dropped to the byline.

"By Avery Bennett."

Asher read it twice.

The girl who had called him desperate for a laugh. The girl who had walked out of Clyde's room with a children's book under her arm, as though he'd been nothing more than traffic. She had taken last night and turned it into a headline.

The comments were already a war zone. And somehow they were putting his name at the front of it.

"Asher Joseph is a legend, he beat up Damien"

"She just signed her own death certificate."

"They're going to come for all of them."

Asher's thumb froze over the screen.

"She just painted a target on herself."

He couldn't tell if he was furious or impressed. Maybe both. Avery had known exactly what she was doing when she hit publish, and she hadn't cared.

His phone lit up. The team group chat.

Tyler: BRO. YOU'RE FAMOUS FOR THE RIGHT REASONS FOR ONCE.

Marcus: Joseph the hero. I'm putting this on a poster.

Jordan: Don't forget Avery Bennett wrote it. Sooo how's the bet going? 😂

Tyler: Asher can't lose. He has until the end of the season.

Jordan: And I have a LOT of footage of last night. Insurance. 😎

Asher stared at the last message. Footage?

He typed: What footage?

The reply came as a laughing emoji. Nothing else.

He locked the screen, dropped the phone on the bed, and told himself it was nothing. Jordan filmed everything. It was a habit.

He pulled on a hoodie and walked out to the parking lot, hoping the cold air would clear his head.

It did the opposite.

His car sat at the far end of the row, and even from a distance he could see the problem.

The driver's window was gone, shattered into glittering pieces across the seat. On the door, in thick black spray paint, someone had drawn a snake coiled around a single word.

"NEXT."

Asher stood motionless as the cold wind raked across his face.

Damien hadn't wasted any time. Asher glanced around the parking lot, but it was empty except for a janitor sweeping near the gate who pretended not to notice him.

Also scraped on his car was a single sentence:

"Tell your friends to watch their backs."

His stomach dropped. If Damien had come for him this fast, then Avery, the one who had published the story, the one with her name printed right at the top, would be next.

Something hot and unfamiliar twisted in his chest.

He told himself it was just the adrenaline. He didn't care about Avery, but he wanted to win the bet.

His phone rang, and MOM flashed across the screen. He swallowed and answered. "Hey."

"Asher! Where have you been? I've called you six times."

"Rough night."

"Oh, sweetheart, are you okay?!"

"I'm fine, Mom. What's wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong. Something wonderful happened." She sounded breathless. "You know Michael Bennett, don't you? The one recruiting for that private basketball team?"

Asher leaned against his ruined car. "Who doesn't?"

"He has a daughter who spends every weekend at the hospital where I work. She reads to the children in the pediatric ward."

"She's wonderful, Asher. Kind, intelligent. If you started volunteering and got to know her, perhaps she could introduce you to her father. Do you know what that could mean for your career?"

Asher closed his eyes. Here we go.

"You want me to befriend someone because of who her father is?"

"Don't make it sound so terrible."

"Mom, it is terrible."

"It's an opportunity." Her voice softened. "I want you to get recruited early. I want you to start earning so I can finally rest."

The guilt landed exactly where she'd aimed it. He hated that it worked.

"Fine," he said finally. "I'll volunteer. But I'm not manipulating anyone."

"Of course not, sweetheart. I'd never ask you to."

She would, and they both knew it.

After the call ended, he stood in the parking lot with broken glass at his feet and opened the Westwood news page again.

The article was still climbing. A photograph of Avery sat in the corner of the byline: dark hair pulled back, chin lifted, eyes fixed on the camera as though daring it to look away.

Avery Bennett.

The girl who had humiliated him in front of the whole team. The girl who hadn't been impressed by a single thing about him.

The girl he was supposed to make fall in love with him.

Last night, it had been pride. A joke between teammates, a bet made with a beer in his hand.

"Not everyone considers your presence a life-changing experience, Joseph." He recalled her saying.

He smiled slowly, in spite of himself.

"Okay, Bennett," he murmured. "Let's see how long you can keep ignoring me."

His phone buzzed.

A text from an unknown number.

He opened it.

"Nice bet, Joseph."

Another message followed immediately.

"Does she know?"

Asher's blood turned to ice.

He looked up and scanned the parking lot, the dorm windows, the empty road beyond the gate. Nobody was watching him. Nobody was there at all.

But somebody knew.

And whoever it was, had to have been in that room. He needed to have a word with his teammates, especially Clyde.