Coaching the Nerd (Nerds Vs Jocks #2) - Eli Easton Page 0,54
was practicing with Dustin when I arrived. I watched Dustin lob a ball that sailed straight over Sean’s head. DeWan, who was trotting by me, saw it too and huffed, “Pansy-assed Poin!”
I bit my tongue and ran to Sean. He gave me a smile that looked pretty worried, but I figured I’d give DeWan something to really complain about. I picked up Sean and gave him a spin. He laughed as I put him back on the ground, and said, “I gather you haven’t been run out of ALA on a rail?”
“Nope, and even if I had, I’d be happy.” That wasn’t one hundred percent true since I did love living in the ALA house and really liked my brothers, but hell, I’d gotten this far on my own, and now I had Sean to help me.
Dustin jogged over. “Hey, I hear you guys are an item. Congrats.”
“Thanks.” I shot a look at DeWan and Rex who were glowering at us. I raised my voice. “I really appreciate you being nice about it.”
Tray called us all over, divided us into teams, and handed out the flags. As he gave me two blue flag belts, he snarked. “I’d say you two are definitely playing for the same team.”
For a second, I stared at him, but then he laughed and gave me a slap on the shoulder.
We started playing, and Sean wasn’t really on. He missed a pass and tried to grab Rex’s flag as he carried the ball, missed, and wound up on his face. Rex laughed.
During a short water break, I trotted over. “You okay?”
Sean frowned. “I wish everyone would stop asking me that.”
“Okay. You just seem a little off your feed.”
The crease between his eyebrows deepened. “I’m aware. Your concern only makes me more self-conscious.”
I backed off and play resumed. Even though nobody threw anything to Sean, he managed to trip over his own feet one time. Poor guy was definitely having a bad day, and the dirty looks from DeWan, Rex, and Tray weren’t helping him. I wanted to tell them to knock it off, but if I said something to them, it would only embarrass Sean more.
We were coming up on the sixty-minute mark and everybody was kind of winded and tired. Dustin threw a pass, and it went wild, straight to the far end of the field where Sean was. Sean looked up, saw the ball arcing toward him, and ran backward to catch it. The ball came down and landed right in Sean’s hands. For a second, he had a really happy smile, but then he overbalanced and started staggering out of bounds. The guys who’d been practicing over there had stopped to watch the ball, and Sean plowed right into the biggest guy.
Even from that distance, I could hear the dude snarl, “Get the fuck off me, fag!” The asshole must have seen me hug him. He pushed Sean toward one of the other guys, who barked, “Ewww, fag,” and shoved Sean on to the next guy.
I was already running toward them, but I was on the opposite side of the field. DeWan and Rex were right near where the guys were abusing Sean. Oh great. Just what he needed. Those two.
I picked up speed, but DeWan grabbed Sean as one of the other guys shoved him hard.
My fists clenched, I ran full-out, ready to fight them all!
But as I got close, I heard DeWan growling, “Did you put hands on my teammate on purpose, motherfucker? Because if you did, you’re gonna need a team of surgeons to remove that football from up your ass.”
DeWan wasn’t the biggest guy in the house, but he was big enough, and when he was pissed, everything about him read mean.
The largest of the strangers, the one Sean had run into, said, “Hey, he ran into me.”
Rex pulled Sean behind him and said, “Right, while he was making a heroic effort to catch a ball. All you had to do was move out of the way. Right?” He took a step closer. “Right?”
The guy frowned, but he backed up. “I guess so.”
I moved up beside DeWan. “And if you want to call somebody around here fag, why don’t you start on me?”
The three guys looked at each other. One of them held up his hands. “We didn’t mean anything by it. Figure of speech, man.”
“Yeah, well, there’s a lot of people who don’t like how you figure.” I walked to Sean and put my arm around him.