03 | Cornell Man

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One of the ways to really secure your social standing in Fairfield county was how much you could show your face at parties and "country club socials" throughout the summer. Luckily for me, the neighborhood my family lived in was basically a cesspool of polo shirts, BMWs, and vintage Rolexes.

The upside of today's party was that it was the Wagner's turn to host some sordid summer affair, which meant I could get justifiably wasted and only have to stumble the 20 steps home from their backyard to ours. The downside? It meant my parents were also in attendance, playing a rousing game of who can humble-brag about their kids the best with the other parents...hence the justifiably wasted.

I'd come back from my run to see the party already in full swing, so I quickly showered myself with my Tom Ford cologne before making my way next door. Better to arrive sweaty than late...and with beer.

Chris helped me dump a case of Bud Light in one of the empty coolers tucked away under the build-in bar on the deck. Thankfully it was too tasteless for most in attendance, so Chris and I had almost guaranteed mutually assured drunkness.

"Welcome to the shit show," he said with a chuckle. He handed me a beer, already dripping with perspiration in the August heat. Chris's cheeks were almost as red as his hair, and I knew he was several beers ahead of me.

I popped mine open and took a long gulp, contemplating jumping into the crystal clear stillness of the pool below and pretending to drown just to see who'd jump in after me. A hand on the sleeve of my t-shirt pulled me out of my little fantasy. My mom whipped her Gucci sunglasses off and stared up at me with the same intense, dark eyes I inherited from her. She wrapped her arm around my shoulders and led me down the deck and away from Chris, who I just looked back at with a grimace.

"That's what you're wearing," she hissed through a smile as we walked by a group of blonde, botoxed PTA moms, making gross attempts to smile back at us.

"I didn't know it was so early, I would have changed." I pulled at the black Nike football t-shirts we'd gotten for summer practice last year. Since all our logos and gear had gotten an update with last year's "generous donation," it was generally a sin to wear old stuff, but I still wore mine to run.

"Your father is looking for you." I was nearly a foot taller than my mother, but she still reached up and fussed with my hair as if I was a toddler. "The least you could do is act presentable, please."

"Alright, alright, alright," I groaned. She lifted the can of beer out of my hands before shooing me away across the yard to what I imagined the innermost circle of hell looked like - my father and his friends, clad in Brooks Brothers shirts with whiskey glasses in hand. Thankfully Chris and his shock of red hair stood out, a whole head taller than the rest of them.

"Dallas!" Chris's dad was the first to spot me, his level of inebriation even more exposed than Chris's with his tomato red cheeks.  I swooped in beside my dad, giving him a quick nod and then jumping into the conversation before he could fully assess me and my sweaty mess.

"You whipping these boys into shape for this season?" Derek Evans was the next to jump in. He looked like a beetle, and he was so much smaller than me I was sure I could actually step on him. I wasn't drunk enough for this.

"We got two of the sophomores to puke after drills yesterday, so I think we've got it under control," Chris leapt to my rescue with a grin.

"What about scouts?" asked Warner Mickey, who was a professor at UConn who lived down the street from us. "Have you and Coach Knox been in touch with who will be coming in the next few weeks?"

"Well, you know Dallas will always take care of his boys, even though he's already set." My father clamped down on my shoulder. "A Cornell man just like his father."

I grit my teeth into what I hoped resembled a smile and shook myself out of his grip. "A bunch of SEC schools are sending some scouts, although I doubt Saint Nick will make an appearance all the way up here."

Collective drunk laughter again. It kind of reminded me of the laugh track that would play in the background of 1950s sitcoms. While an appearance by the great Nick Saban himself wouldn't have actually been that unusual, considering Chris was on Alabama's radar, we didn't need a pack of haughty New England fathers knowing that. Sports parents were bad, but drunk sports parents were a different breed entirely.

"Dallas is conspiring with Coach Knox to get Tony Elliot up here for a game," Chris chimed in with another grin.

"The Clemson offensive coordinator?" Mr. Mickey raised an eyebrow.

All at once, everyone turned toward me, and it felt like the heat of the sun beating down on me had just shot up 20 degrees.

"Yeah uh..." I cleared my throat. "For some of the guys on offense. Linemen and stuff. I doubt it though, we're pretty far outside of their usual scouting area."

It seemed to satisfy the vultures for the time being, but I glared daggers at Chris.

"Daddy, can I borrow my bestie Dallas for a second?"

Another voice entered our circle, and I exhaled a breath I didn't even know I was holding. Rochelle Evans bopped up to her father, practically shedding glitter from her hair and cheeks. I gave Chris one last glare before Rochelle pulled me away.

Chris might have been my best friend (despite nearly just sabotaging me), but Rochelle was my oldest friend. The diapers and daycare, eating worms and climbing trees kind of shit.

"Thank fucking god," I groaned as we walked out of ear shot.

"You looked like you were about to spontaneously combust." Rochelle smirked at me, twirling a lock of dark hair around her finger. I lifted her and her tiny cheerleader body up into my arms, even though I was sure I'd come away with glitter all over my shirt.

"Now why do I get yelled at for wearing Nike shorts, but you don't get yelled at for looking like a bona-fide cheer slut?" I put her down and gestured with my free hand to her cheer camp getup, all glitter bows, spandex shorts and a tiny white tank top, exposing her perfectly toned legs and abs that put half of my football team to shame.

Rochelle scoffed and flipped her ponytail over her shoulder. "I haven't even unpacked yet. Mom ushered me over here the second I got out of the Uber. Besides, I am a cheer slut."

We shared a laugh, and she wrapped her arms around my waist as we did another lap around the yard, sharing my now lukewarm beer and dodging glances from our parent's friends. The Wagner's had the ultimate setup, between the built-in pool and the massive wooden deck, their yard easily fit over 100 people. Tall shrubbery dotted the edge of the yard for privacy, because obviously secretism and elitism went hand in hand. Ivy wormed its way up the dark brick sides of the house, disappearing behind the pristine white window shutters.

We were living in a postcard. The kind that hopefully I'd get sent after I'd been whisked away to a Power 5 football school 1000 miles away. Wish you were here.

"So how was camp?" I asked Rochelle.

She sighed dramatically and fanned her face. "Well, I didn't miss a half-turn and miraculously land into the arms of my future wife so...dismal, at best."

I was pretty sure kissing me in the 6th grade during a game of seven minutes in heaven in her basement was what made Rochelle realize she liked girls, but it really only served to solidify our friendship. She was the only person I trusted with my football jersey on Friday's, and no matter who I'd been screwing around with or who I took to homecoming or winter formal, Rochelle always got the jersey.

"You know I kind of meant the actual cheerleading part," I chuckled. "Like...since you're the captain of our cheerleading team, and I'm the captain of the football team I do have a responsibility to make sure you know what you're doing."

Rochelle jabbed me in the side. "Dal, if I didn't know what I was doing by now, would we be here?"

Here was a loaded word. Here could have meant my place as reigning king of the New Livingston Day School social hierarchy. Or here could have just meant here, standing in the middle of the Wagner's lavish backyard, listening to all our parents talk about us as if we were ghosts.

My phone vibrated in my pocket, and I knew who it was without even having to look. It was like clockwork, and I could practically feel her looking down on me from her bedroom window.

JORDYN WAGNER: come upstairs.

Rochelle leaned over my shoulder and scoffed. "Princess is summoning you up to her tower?"

"Yep," I nodded, running my tongue over my bottom lip.

"I thought this was just a summer fling." Rochelle raised an eyebrow at me.

"Well, the summer's not over," I casually retorted. "Besides, I have needs."

"Oh, I'm aware." She rolled her eyes. "Denise Conrad and Kira Song made sure to ask me all about your needs at camp."

I barked out a quick laugh. Rochelle and I shared a quiet moment, the kind of quiet that comes before you jump off a cliff.

"Cover for me?" I asked with a faint grin.

"Always." She leaned up on her toes and kissed my cheek before shooing me away like a bug.

I slipped through the back door underneath the deck that led to the unfinished basement of the Wagner's house and bolted up the steps two at a time until I reached the door at the far end of the hallway upstairs, careful to avoid all the creaking spots on the hardwood floor. It was a trip I'd made too many times this past summer.

I inched the door to the bedroom open slowly, immediately hit with a wave of lavender perfume.

Jordyn Wagner was the kind of effortless beautiful that other girls paid to look like, but could never quite achieve it. Her long legs were outstretched on the purple cushion of the window seat on the far end of her bedroom, the hem of her white lacy dress barely brushing the top of her knees. I leaned against the door to gently close it behind me, but she still didn't turn around, her long blonde hair gently swaying in the cool breeze coming off of her ceiling fan. 

"Hey Rapunzel," I said softly.

She finally turned around and gave me a faint smile, her honey eyes glinting in the sunlight. "I sent for a knight, and this is what I get?"

"Knights are overrated," I shrugged. "What Disney doesn't tell you is that the dragons usually eat them."

"Then I suppose you're the dragon?"

Jordyn swung her legs around off the window seat and turned her whole body to face me, pursing her perfect lips together as she looked me up and down. Dragon sees prey. Dragon eats prey. Maybe I was a knight after all.

"I missed you," she said, the smile pulling at her lips ever so slightly. I kicked my sneakers off and slowly padded across her plush rug.

"Well we can't all go galavanting off to Turks and Caicos for a week," I chuckled, leaning over her and gently brushing my hands up the sides of her thighs.

"Technically you could have come," she shrugged.

"I didn't want our parents getting the wrong idea."

We were so close our lips brushed together as we spoke, and I felt her dip her hands under the hem of my shirt, tracing lines with her fingers up my chest.

Jordyn was - in most people's eyes - flawless, and exactly the kind of girl my parents expected me to marry, which was all the more reason to have kept our summer fling a secret. Jordyn was the anchor that would have sunk me into the life I didn't want.

"Dallas..." she sighed.

I could taste the words before they even left her mouth. I tilted her chin up to look at me, gently running my thumb along her bottom lip. "Just kiss me."

So she did.


but everybody's gone
and i've been here for too long
to face this on my own
well i guess this is growing up

damnit / ruston kelly

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Dallas's parents are Ellen Pompeo and Patrick Dempsey and you CAN'T TELL ME OTHERWISE.

It's still summer, we're still kicking, and I feel like this was the chapter I NEEDED to really propel this story forward into the next gear. I took a long break with this story but I think we are back in action, and I'd love to know your thoughts!

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