Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 90217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
He bit his bottom lip, holding back a smile that had mischief behind it. “Of course not. But if you did follow the paper, or the website, or any of the stupid KMU blogs, you’d know that I’m definitely not straight.”
I was frozen in place. I blinked once at him. Then twice.
He held out a finger. “Here, hang on a sec,” he said as he disappeared back into his room.
Brody wasn’t straight?
A star football player at KMU?
Had I somehow fallen asleep while reading and I was now having some sort of fantasy-land, bizarro-world, upside-down dream?
“Where the hell did I put it?” I heard Brody muttering to himself as the sound of shuffling and clunking all over came from the room.
A minute later Brody appeared again in front of me, pushing a copy of the KMU Daily into my hands.
“Here,” he said. “This is last week’s paper. That’ll give you a better idea than I could. I’m going to head to bed, but it’s good to finally meet you, roomie.”
He gave me a small squeeze on the shoulder before heading back around to the hall.
I looked at the headline on the front page of the paper.
Wolves’ Tight End Brody Bryant Continues on LGBT Advocacy Path Despite Donor Pushback.
The small blurb beneath was even more descriptive. “I’m proud to be gay, and I’ll never be ashamed of who I am,” Bryant said Thursday, making more waves after conservative alumni cut ties with the Wolves team. Last season, Bryant shocked fans as he played multiple games with a small pride flag affixed to the back of his uniform. Bryant is widely known as the first openly gay member of the team.
“We support Brody in all he does,” Wolves quarterback Vance Shaw said after last year’s season. The Wolves’ regular fall schedule begins again this Saturday.
2
Brody
I sucked in a sharp breath of air as I broke from the huddle and jogged back into place at the end of the line. KMU fans cheered from the stadium bleachers, trying their best to give us some encouragement down here on the field. My thighs ached like hell. My shoulder throbbed from being tackled in the second quarter. We were at the end of the fourth quarter now, after a game where we’d fought tooth and nail just to stay afloat all night.
I’d been off my game all season so far. A few weeks had passed since the start of the school year, and tonight was already our third game. We were playing the Marydale University Bobcats, one of the best teams in the division right now. I couldn’t even catch the ball in bounds early on in the second quarter, screwing up third down. We’d had to turn the ball over.
I still felt hot with embarrassment thinking about it. I was playing like an amateur. If we were going to win against the Bobcats, we had to play better. I had to play better.
The Bobcats were also home to Aaron Henson, Marydale’s star quarterback, who had made an offhand comment about “taking down the rainbow team” on social media earlier online.
I knew what he meant.
A lot of other college players had a problem with me being out and proud, even if they were secretive about it. Henson was dubbing us the “rainbow team” because I wasn’t afraid to be gay, and I’d avoided his judgmental glances on the field all night. But if Henson had a problem with me, he was going to have to settle it here on the field. I desperately needed tonight’s win.
The crowd was doing their best to keep us going, chanting from the bleachers as we fell into formation.
At least our quarterback wasn’t an asshole. I glanced over toward Vance. He’d been our QB for two years now, and he was one of the best I’d ever played with. Last season, we’d found a rhythm, working as a unit out on the field. We trusted each other, and I always wanted Vance to know I had his back.
But so far, this year, it had been off.
Tonight I knew what I had to do. We were so close to the endzone, and as long as we could get this last touchdown, we could scrape out a win.
I breathed in brisk air deep through my nose, laser-focused on my teammates as we launched into action.
Adrenaline surged through me. Immediately the Bobcats were on our wide receivers. They tunneled hard, and as I shot a glance over to Vance, I realized there was no way he’d be able to make a clean throw to them now.
We had to do something as the clock ticked down. I made a snap decision, choosing to make a run for it, going far so that Vance might be able to get the ball to me. It wasn’t what we had agreed on, but it was the only way forward. As I ran out, I saw the Bobcats react fast, one of their defensive ends Shane Nicholson going in hard on Vance. I was supposed to have been covering Nicholson.