Chapter Seven
930 Words
The whistle cut through the gym like a warning shot. Metal clanged. Sneakers shrieked. No music. No jokes. Just breath and impact and the sound of bodies doing what they were told.
Cade threw like he was trying to split the air in half. Every pass was precise, sharp, a little too hard. When a receiver missed one, Cade snapped, voice edged with something ugly that hadn’t been there last week.
Pierce ran his routes perfectly. Didn’t speak. Didn’t look at anyone. He caught everything that came his way and gave nothing back except clean execution.
Ward stretched along the sideline, eyes tracking the room instead of his own body. He clocked Cade’s jaw, Pierce’s silence, the way tension sat differently on each of them.
Soren pushed harder than anyone else. Hard enough that another player nearly collided with him.
“White!” the coach barked. “Slow the hell down!”
Soren didn’t.
Ward jogged over, lowering his voice. “You’re gonna tear something.”
Soren didn’t look at him. “Wouldn’t be the worst thing.”
Ward studied his face, unsettled.
Cade threw again. Harder than necessary. Pierce caught it clean and tossed it back without a word.
Their eyes met.
Something unspoken flickered, then disappeared.
After practice, Quinn Kingsley sprawled shirtless on the bleachers, sunburned and glowing, flipping a water bottle end over end.
Soren dropped beside him, breathing hard.
“You missed perfect surf for that?” Quinn said.
“You missed perfect surf because you were hungover,” Soren shot back.
Quinn grinned. “Details.” Then, hi grin faded, just a notch.
“You notice her arm?” Quinn asked.
Soren nodded, eyes on the field. “Yeah.”
“That wasn’t a party bruise.”
“No.”
They sat with it.
“You think she wants people asking?” Quinn said.
“I think she wants people not pretending they didn’t see it,” Soren replied.
Quinn flicked the bottle cap away. “We’re not heroes.”
“No,” Soren said quietly. “But ignoring it doesn’t make us good guys either.”
Quinn didn’t answer.
The apartment was quiet in a way that felt earned. Lights low. Curtains half-drawn. The day finally off their shoulders. Pierce sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, staring at the floor like it might offer instructions. Cade leaned back against the headboard, legs stretched out, watching him without pressure.
“You okay?” Cade asked.
Pierce huffed a laugh. “Define okay.”
"Fair enough."
Pierce dragged a hand through his hair. “I keep waking up like I did something wrong.”
Cade didn’t joke this time. “Did you?”
Pierce shook his head. “No. But it feels like I’m about to. Like I already have.”
Cade shifted, quieter now. “That’s just fear talking.”
Pierce swallowed. “It’s louder than you.”
Cade let that sit. Then, gently, “Come here.”
Pierce hesitated. Then shifted back, careful, like he might spook himself. Cade adjusted automatically, until Pierce’s head rested in his lap. It felt stupidly natural. Cade’s hand hovered, then settled at Pierce’s temple, fingers light, steady. No claiming. No rush.
Pierce closed his eyes without meaning to. “My parents would hate this,” he said softly.
Cade nodded. “Yeah.”
“They’d say I’m broken. Or confused. Or being influenced.”
Cade’s thumb traced a small, absent circle near Pierce’s hairline. “You don’t look broken to me.”
Pierce laughed weakly. “You’re biased.”
“Maybe,” Cade said. “But I know what broken looks like. This isn’t it.”
Pierce’s voice dropped. “What if I ruin everything?”
“You won’t,” Cade said, immediately.
“You don’t know that.”
Cade leaned forward slightly, grounding them both. “Okay. Even if you do—ruin everything, I mean—that doesn’t mean you’re wrong. It just means the world didn’t make space for you yet.”
Pierce breathed in, slow. Out. “I don’t even know what I am,” he admitted.
Cade smiled, soft and real. “You don’t have to. You’re allowed to just… be. You’re allowed to like who you like. You’re allowed to figure it out without punishing yourself for it.”
Pierce opened his eyes, looked up at him. “And you?”
Cade didn’t flinch. “I like you.”
No qualifiers. No pressure.
Pierce stared at him for a long beat. Then his forehead pressed more firmly into Cade’s stomach, like that was the safest place he knew. Cade’s hand stayed where it was. They stayed like that for a long time.
The water was gray-blue and flat, full of waves not worth catching.
Quinn and Soren sat on their boards near shore, legs dangling.
“Worst surf day ever,” Quinn said.
“Still better than last night,” Soren replied.
“The part where we all pretended nothing was wrong?”
“Yeah,” Soren said. “That part.”
Quinn kicked at the water. “You ever think maybe she doesn’t want saving?”
“I think nobody wants to be hurt alone,” Soren said.
For once, Quinn didn’t joke.
The Mangione estate was silent. No music. No warmth. Scarlet lay in bed, arm throbbing violently now. She tried not to cry.
Failed.
She reached for the pills. Hesitated. Took a handful without counting. Her phone lit up.
Ward Ellsworth is typing.
The bubble appeared.
Disappeared.
Scarlet closed her eyes. The pain didn’t.
- Writer
