Football and Ballet - Jason Collins Page 0,59

his blunt response.

“I’m just saying!” Lou chuckled before he finished with his thoughts. “Just keep going with it. I want to see those moves of yours when it’s time for the playoffs. The team’s going to need you, kiddo.”

“Wait, are you saying—”

“You’re officially off the bench.” Lou beamed. “Hunter Perry, welcome back to the Green Knights.”

“Why are you building a home dance studio?” Elana asked as she leaned closer to me. “I thought you were sticking with dancing at the youth center.”

I sat at my dining room table across from my sister as I looked over suggested layouts from the design team that I’d hired to install the dance studio. Elana had insisted that we have dinner together tonight, but I’d told her that I needed to figure out whether or not I liked the blueprints for the studio before we left for a night on the town. The design team was working on a strict deadline for their company’s calendar, only barely being able to squeeze in my project last minute.

I glanced over at Elana before I replied, “I’m not dancing at the youth center anymore.”

“Seriously? Why not?” Elana pouted. “Do you have any idea how much people liked you dancing there? It always gave us a good PR bump with social media. Plus, people are starting to think of you as family-friendly again, which means you’re going to get a lot more opportunities to be on TV, maybe even cameo in a few movies—”

“Patrick didn’t have time to teach me anymore, he’s way too busy with his new ballet,” I cut into her response. “But I still want to work on my dancing, just so I can keep up with my agility and flexibility.”

“Ah. Well, that makes sense, I guess. Is Patrick dancing the lead again in the show?”

“No,” I admitted. “But I’m sure whatever role he got is still pretty intense.”

“Probably so.” Elana lightly laughed. “Fuck, that means we need to get tickets ASAP. Usually when Patrick’s name is on a production, tickets sell out super fast. But now that he’s been in the news as your teacher, I bet his tickets sell out double time. How many should I put you down for? You and Dakota would—”

“I don’t think Patrick would want me at his show.”

“Why not? Is there bad blood between you two or something?”

“Because he never liked me, Elana,” I murmured out the lie. “I think he just… tolerated me until he found something better to do. Besides, it’s not like we were friends or anything. I was just another one of his students.”

“You just want to get out of going to the ballet, don’t you?” She grinned. “You can just tell me that, you know, that you’re not interested in going. I can always come up with a good excuse for you.”

“Elana…” I let out an exasperated sigh. “Don’t you ever get tired of it?”

“Tired of what?”

“All the smoke and mirrors bullshit.” I sighed again. “Trying to decipher what’s real and what’s fake?”

“Hunter, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Elana frowned. “Is there something I’m missing here?”

I stared back at my sister for a moment as my head filled up with static. “No. You’re not missing anything, Elana. I was just thinking out loud.”

Fuck.

I wanted to tell her the truth.

I wanted to tell her that I was gay and that I was absolutely mad about Patrick McEntire and that I was building a dance studio in my home as a sort of fucked up beacon of hope, quietly praying that he’d one day grace these same halls.

I wanted to tell her that I missed him so much it felt like I was missing a part of myself.

I wanted to tell her that I was a half-complete jigsaw, filled up with nothing but unanswered questions and pent-up regrets.

But instead, I casually changed the topic of our conversation. “Oh. I got off the bench today. I’m back on the team.”

“Oh my God, Hunter!” Elana excitedly clapped. “That’s such good news! Does that mean you’ll be on the field for the playoffs?”

“Yeah. It does.”

“Holy shit!” Elana clapped again, her hands steadily increasing their pace. “Holy shit! Do you know how many endorsements we’re going to get for half-time? You’re going to be fucking drowning in sponsorships if we play our cards right!” Elana then rose away from the table, her fingers scrambling to collect her purse and laptop.

I shot her a confused look before I spoke again. “Wait. Where are you going? I thought