I didn’t sleep much after that. Maybe an hour or two, tops. I kept hearing those four words over and over in my head like they were supposed to mean something more. They didn’t say I’m mad, or it’s over, or I’m scared, but somehow they said all of that.
By the time the football game rolled around, my stomach felt like it was full of gravel. I kept thinking he’d text again. Call. Something. But nothing came.
Ezra and I sat in the stands while the crowd screamed like everything was normal. It wasn’t.
Luca was already on the field for warmups, but he didn’t look like himself. He didn’t laugh with the guys or bump fists or do any of his usual routines. Just ran drills, locked in, silent.
“He looks like he hasn’t slept either,” Ezra muttered.
“Probably hasn’t,” I said. “Coach knows. His dad too.”
Ezra gave me a look. “Jace?”
I nodded. “Had to be. He didn’t post anything, but... he doesn’t need to.”
We sat there for a second. Neither of us said what we were both thinking.
Jace is gay too. Everyone knows, even if he pretends otherwise.
So why would he do this?
The game kicked off, but it didn’t feel like a game. It felt like watching someone try to outrun a burning house.
Luca played hard—too hard. His tackles were brutal. Every play looked like it came with a personal grudge. The crowd ate it up at first, cheering every time he knocked someone down.
But it kept getting worse. Sloppier. Like he was daring someone to call him out.
“Coach should pull him,” Ezra said.
“Coach won’t,” I replied. “He’s waiting for an excuse.”
Then came the late hit. The worst one yet. Quarterback down, flags flying, the entire stadium holding its breath.
Coach didn’t waste a second.
“Reyes! Sideline. Now!”
Luca didn’t argue. He didn’t say a word. He just walked off the field, ripped off his helmet, and slammed it onto the bench hard enough to make a few players jump. Then he sat down, head in his hands, breathing like he’d just run five miles.
Coach crossed his arms and barked at the bench. “Reyes, if you wanted to blow your shot at captain, congratulations. That was it.”
Jace walked past the bench a moment later, slow, casual, smirking. His new boy-toy Mason followed, barely meeting anyone’s eye. He looked uncomfortable. Jace didn’t.
“This is all him,” I muttered.
Ezra nodded. “He wanted Luca to crack.”
“Why? What does he get out of this?”
Ezra didn’t answer, and honestly, I didn’t have one either.
Maybe if Luca got labeled “too emotional” or “too unstable,” the attention would turn somewhere else. Anywhere else.
But watching him sit there, isolated, humiliated, wrecked—I couldn’t stop thinking one thing.
He texted me. We need to talk.
And I hadn’t done anything yet.