My phone won't shut up. Seven AM on a Monday morning, and Mom's already texting me like crazy.
"Good luck today, honey! Richard is so excited that you're trying out for hockey. He says it's a Hayes family tradition!"
"I know you'll do amazing. You've always been so athletic. Love you!"
I'm standing outside the athletics building with a bag of borrowed hockey gear that smells like ass. This is the stupidest thing I've ever done.
But here I am anyway, because Mom sounded so damn happy when I told her about tryouts. She spent forever on the phone last night talking about how proud she was, how this would help me fit in, how Richard was excited about it.
Couldn't tell her the real reason I'm doing this. That I'm sick of being the guy everyone thinks will just f**k off if they
