Playing Hurt - By Holly Schindler Page 0,25

smile that, back in my junior year, first won Gabe Ross’s heart.

Before he snaps the picture, Clint smiles back.

Clint

odd man rush

She answers the door that night in a pair of jeans and a blue tank top. And instantly I start to sarcastically congratulate myself: Great job, Clint. You and your bright ideas.

I hadn’t even really meant it when I said it—We’ll have to celebrate at Pike’s tonight. I was just talking, the same way I told Kenzie she was welcome to come out with me on the fishing launch. Mrs. Keyes, though—she acted like I’d sent Chelsea an engraved invitation in the mail. What a good idea, she shouted. Of course Chelsea’d love to go!

So here we stand, face-to-face in the doorway, and I can’t quit thinking about the way she looks in that tank top.

Good grief, Morgan, what’s wrong with you? You’re acting like that twelve-year-old girl with the crush.

This was a really bad idea, going out with her tonight …

“Look,” I tell her, “You don’t have to go, if you don’t want—”

“Of course she wants to,” her mother says, popping into the doorway. “Just what you need,” she says to Chelsea, running her fingers through Chelsea’s blond hair. “A night to yourself, right?” She glances sideways when she says it, into the living room of the cabin, where Mr. Keyes sits glaring at the back of Chelsea’s head.

“What kind of place is Pike’s?” Brandon asks, popping into view behind his mother’s shoulder. They look almost exactly alike, Brandon and his mom, with their skinny bodies and big glasses and brown hair sticking out in a hundred different directions.

Chelsea looks like her dad, though—light-haired, tan, athletic. But I get the distinct feeling something’s wrong there; it’s pretty obvious by the way they frown at each other, by the weird force between them. Kind of reminds me of trying to push two magnets together.

“It’s my mom and pop’s place,” I tell Brandon. “In Baudette. Fried food, live music. You know the kind.”

“Live music?” Brandon’s voice goes up at the end, almost like a girl’s.

“Sure. Greg and Todd—the fishing guides? We all grew up playing together. They play music at Pike’s, but they—”

“Wait. Wait. A band. A live band?”

“Couple of guys jamming,” I correct him. “Real informal.”

Brandon claps his hands together once. “Does one of them play bass?”

I shake my head. “N—no—”

“Whataboutasinger?” he asks, smashing his words together in an ecstatic rush.

I bristle reflexively, remembering a hundred different packed-tight hot summer nights at Pike’s, Rosie up there on the makeshift stage, singing to Greg and Todd’s music. “No singer.”

“Do you mind if I play? I sing, too—”

“Well—I wouldn’t mind, but it’s not my thing—they do the music,” I say quickly.

Chelsea frowns. “I thought you said you all grew up playing together.”

I flinch. “Not—not music.” Without meaning to, I’ve let hockey drift out into the open. Actually, hockey and Rosie both.

“What did you play, then?” she asks again. “If it wasn’t music.”

“Mostly they just do instrumental stuff,” I tell Brandon, ignoring Chelsea’s question. I don’t feel like going into hockey, and why I don’t play anymore. Not any more than I feel like talking about the mic Rosie left empty. And why Greg and Todd never tried to fill it. “Sometimes, during the dinner rush, customers will take turns belting out a couple of tunes while they’re waiting for a booth to open up,” I manage.

“You really want to be backup for karaoke night, Brand?” Chelsea says.

Brandon sticks out his tongue. “I sing,” he reminds her. “They’d let me sing. They’re hungry for a singer, I bet. Come on, Clint. What’re you driving? Can you fit my amp in?”

“A truck—yeah—I—” Brandon’s already dragging me toward the back of the cabin, barking instructions.

We load the amp. When it’s time to pile in, I try to tell Brandon to sit in the middle of the bench seat—“You haven’t had hip surgery.” I try to reason with him … three times, in fact.

“That wedge in the middle’s pretty uncomfortable. Let Brandon straddle the gear shift,” I tell Chelsea. “You’d be better off with a seat of your own.”

But Chelsea only shrugs, letting her eyes trail across the rust spots on the tailgate of my ancient GMC pickup, then the sun-bleached bench seat, torn and full of broken springs. It feels like she’s saying, I don’t really think I’d be comfortable anywhere in that thing.

And, in all honesty, she probably wouldn’t be.

“I’ll sit in the middle,” she says. “Brandon’s got to hold his bass.”

“We could put