Playing By The Book by S. Chris Shirley

Author:S. Chris Shirley [Shirley, S. Chris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Christian, Young Adult, Gay Fiction, YA Gay, Gay
Publisher: Riverdale Avenue Books
Published: 2014-02-16T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

Back home, Tracy and I hurried down Tarsus High School’s main hallway, lined with dull grey steel lockers, while Principal Law’s voice boomed through the school’s public address system, covering every corner of the building. “I repeat, this is a tornado warning. Walk, do not run, to your designated area, and do not go outside under any circumstances. Again, this is not a drill.”

“Let’s get to the cafeteria,” Tracy said, grabbing my hand and pulling me behind her before I could argue.

We pushed our way around a few phone zombies and students whose clamoring and locker door slamming bounced off the brown tiled walls and floor. When she shoved on the steel bar of the exit door, the wind sent it slamming open, causing a few girls to scream, then bolt up the hallway for safety.

Tracy dropped my hand and dashed down the breezeway towards the yellow cinderblock cafeteria with its high-pitched roof.

“Tracy!” I hurried after her.

She darted into the cafeteria, grabbed the steel bar of the door with both hands and pulled back on it.

“Wait for me!” I yelled, high-tailing it towards her and waving real big.

Something like the sound of a broken piano chord boomed all around me.

I felt my body tense up. I turned around just as the entire breezeway roof above me went airborne, then disappeared into a green swirl of sky.

Something plowed into my shoulder. I instinctively shielded my face. “Aaah!!” I yelled.

“Jake! Wake up!” someone shouted. It sounded like Phoebe but she was back in New York.

My eyes shot open.

Phoebe sat on the corner of my bed, shaking me. She was ghost-white and looked older than I remembered. “Jake, it’s time to get back to school. You promised.”

There was a bottle of Mylanta next to the bedside clock. It was seven forty-five in the morning.

She stood and opened the blinds. “Someone needs a shave.”

Suddenly, everything came rushing back.

The Julie disaster date.

Sam at Heaven Bar.

The bottle of sleeping pills.

On Sunday, I forced myself to call Phoebe to say that I’d spent the weekend at her apartment because I was sick, even though I wasn’t (at least not physically). Despite my reassurances, she came right home from the Hamptons. I think she was afraid I’d die on her watch or something.

I told her it must be a stomach bug, and she immediately looped Momma in and started me on a diet of Jell-O, saltines, and chicken soup. That was a welcome change from the Diet Coke and cereal bars I’d eked by on. Every time she came in my room, I held my breath, afraid she’d say something about the dent I put in her bottle of vodka, but she hadn’t so far.

My limbs had gotten heavy, like my bones were morphing into rebar and my flesh, concrete. Even eating was a huge effort. I’d missed the Monday deadline for my final project pitch, but it took every ounce of energy I had each evening just to call Carman Hall security—as required by school policy—to let them know I was still alive.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.