Down to the Bone Read online

  Liddy was fairly glowing now. Jarrett had never seen her so illuminated; he was almost jealous, wishing he could make her look that alive.

  “The DNA from bones can reveal an entire genetic history,” she finished up. “All that, the history of an individual, of a species, there in the bones.” She sighed and took note of the old alarm clock. “Damn. I’m going to have to get going. I’m hosting the PAC meeting tonight.”

  “Pack?”

  “P.A.C. Prehistory Anthropology Club. There are four of us crazy enough to want to spend the rest of our lives piecing together old skull fragments. Don’t suppose you’re interested in joining us? Tonight we’re talking jawbones.”

  “Um...maybe next time.”

  “Thought you’d say that.” She found her panties and wiggled into them, and then got her bra on. “There’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you as well, meaning no offence...but what do you want to be when you grow up?”

  Jarrett frowned, uncertain whether to be insulted. “I’m a football player.”

  “Yeah, I know.” She handed him his shirt. “But you have some other interest, right? A major?”

  He finally got his briefs and jeans all the way up. The crowded little closet made it hard, but he managed to adjust himself and get zipped up.

  “I’ll decide on some major along the way, sure, but after I graduate, I’m going into the big leagues. Football to me is what your skulls are to you. And the money’s damn good.”

  “True. But unless I go blind or something, I can study skeletons till I’m ninety.” She dragged on her sweater. “In football, players get broken bones, torn ligaments. Some end up with spinal injuries paralyzed for life. Your career could end in the middle of your next game. And even if it doesn’t, you’ll probably be out by the time you’re thirty.”

  Her words made him go cold even as they left him strangely touched. So. That’s what this was all about. She’d done her research and now she was worried about him. He wasn’t sure whether to be moved or annoyed. His plans—or lack of plans for the future were, after all, none of her business.

  “That’s life,” he said tersely, lacing up his shoes. “You gotta take the risks to succeed.”

  “It’s not life. It’s a constructed competition.” She was eying him now as if he were an idiot. “And it hardly seems successful if you come out of it suffering through years of surgery and post-concussion syndrome.”

  Fear gripped him, and anger. It was the truth she was talking and every guy who ever played sports knew it, but it wasn’t something you talked about. Not while you were still young and in your prime. You didn’t even think it, not if you wanted to keep playing.

  “Everything I’ve ever gotten,” he said a bit sharply, “was thanks to that constructed competition. Including this college education.”

  “So use what it has given you.” She got on her skirt, reaching back to zip it up. “See what else there is out there for you.”

  “You’re one to talk. All you ever do is sit in this library and stare at pictures of fossils. You never go out, never participate in anything outside of class. Your whole world is this damn Geek Retreat.”

  Given the snide tone he’d used, he expected her to get angry back, but she just looked perplexed. Especially when she put her glasses on and gave him that “what species are you?” stare.

  “Never mind,” he said, pushing up and releasing the hook from the door. “Thanks for the fuck, it was great. Maybe we’ll do it again sometime.”

  “Jet—” Liddy cried as he strode out, and tried to figure out what the hell had just happened. She was still going over his words, stunned and trying to make sense of him when she heard his steps hurrying down the wooden stairs. Should she go after him?

  She wanted to. She wanted to dash after, grab him and beg him to wait, to talk, but she felt frozen in place. Frozen and confused by his unexpected transformation. They’d had a wonderful time, talked of bones. He’d seemed so open and bright, and it felt like they were close to connecting, to really understanding each other. Then, out of the blue, he’d turned mean.

  No, not out of the blue. Obviously, she’d said something wrong. Very wrong in her geeky way. God. She went cold inside. How mad had she made him? What if he no longer wanted to be friends? What if he never wanted to see her again?

  She needed to figure out how she’d fucked up and how to make it right. How to apologize. If there was a way for someone like her to apologize to someone like him.

  NOVEMBER

  The sidewalks were thick with excited fans, their breaths misting in the frosty, November air. They shouted out to each other and to the cars that honked their horns and flashed their lights.

  “WE’RE NUMBER ONE!”

  Frat boys brayed the sentence, and waved flags featuring the school mascot while Sorority Sisters clapped and sung it.

  Eight games down and they’d won seven. The coach, the college, everyone but Jarrett was elated.

  “Top of the world!” Bobby crowed as they made their way to their favorite steakhouse. “God I feel great! Don’t you feel great?”

  “Yeah.” Physically, Jarrett did. There was no workout as good as expending all that energy and aggression out on the field. It was an endorphin high followed by jubilation, a hot shower and a ravenous appetite.

  Tonight, however, he was also depressed. It’d been over a week since his argument with Liddy and he had to admit that it was his own fault they hadn’t reconciled. He’d sulkily refused to take her calls or answer her e-mail. Yet when he’d looked up tonight to see her stadium seat vacant, it’d been like a punch in the gut.

  “Thank God for Carl, huh?” Bobby nudged Jarrett as a group of fans jay-walked between honking cars chanting: “Del-a-rose! Del-a-rose!”

  “Yeah, thank God.” The big divisions had overlooked Carl Delarose, and were likely kicking themselves for it now; the freshman was turning into a superstar. With every game, it became more evident. He moved like lightning and caught passes with ease. Carl was the team’s winning ticket and after this season, Delarose would be on everyone’s short list.

  Jarrett couldn’t quite hold back his envy, or fear. When he looked at Carl, he got a glimpse of his future, the feel of younger, more talented players at his heels, racing after him, racing past him.

  Maybe...maybe Liddy had been right. He really didn’t want to end up washed out of football because he wasn’t the fittest to survive. He should e-mail her. Apologize. Fuck it. He missed her and he missed their talks about grand things like ice ages and supercontinents. He missed her physically, too, her body so warm and compact in his arms.

  “Jet?” Bobby nudged him.

  “Huh?”

  “I said the town is ours, buddy.” He waved to a car of girls hanging out the windows, blowing kisses at them.

  “I dunno if I’m up to celebrating tonight,” Jarrett demurred.

  “Why? ’Cause your geek girl didn’t show?” Bobby scoffed. “Just as well. Come on, man, there are plenty of hot ladies ready to give you a night to remember.”

  Jarrett paused under a streetlamp. That wasn’t anything he’d considered before. Liddy was probably with her Prehistory Anthropology Club arguing over teeth and skull ridges. Would he really rather be there than out dancing? Would she rather be out dancing than discussing bones? Thinking about it, Bobby had a point. Liddy was completely wrong for this environment, unsuited to his usual crowd and lifestyle.

  Maybe it was a good thing she hadn’t shown up tonight, as Jarrett couldn’t imagine inviting her along to celebrate with him and his friends at the steakhouse. Hell, the very idea made him uneasy.

  And why was that?

  “Jet! Bobby!” Some of the other guys were waiting under the awning of the restaurant. Bobby was already dashing through the crazy traffic to join them. Jarrett saw a break and jogged after.

  People shouted, horns honked, headlights flashed…and blinded Jarrett. He heard the screech of tires, felt a sudden jarring pain through his l
eg and a hard push, as if he’d been tackled. And then the asphalt was under his body. He smelled tar and blood before the pain. Then he felt it, felt it screaming up and down his leg: a shattering vibration of agony. It was as loud and blindingly noisy as the shouts of the people around him, as the howling yells of his teammates now running his way.

  Ah, shit! he swore, feeling that excruciating pain in every bone. Extinct already.

  Drifting again. They’d originally had him on a morphine drip and that had really fucked him up. Jarrett was off that now, but the regular painkillers still had him flowing back and forth in time.

  “We used to have to wire and pin fragments together,” he remembered a snatch of conversation from when he’d been brought in. “But now we’ve a special adhesive. We fit the pieces back together like a jigsaw puzzle.”

  His mind paused. Funny. Wasn’t that exactly what Liddy wanted to do? Spend her life gluing fragments of bone back together again?

  “He’s young and healthy,” the voice continued in his head. “He’ll heal up just fine.”

  “But will he be able to play football again?” His father’s anxious voice.

  Hesitation. “That I can’t predict.”

  Meaning, Jarrett translated, that the doctor wasn’t about to guarantee anything. He dropped even further back in time, vaguely remembering the red lights of the ambulance, the paramedics tending him, the siren as he was driven to the hospital. He recalled wanting painkillers more than anything else. He’d taken plenty of injuries on the field but none had hurt this bad.

  They’d moved fast. Modern medicine did not wait. X-rays and an MRI. Even as his father and brother arrived, pale with fear, the doctors had prepped him for surgery. Anesthetic had been local, Jarrett’s body numb from the hips down. The operation had taken nearly three hours. Next thing he knew, he was in a hospital bed, leg elevated and on the road to recovery.

  That was...what? Two days ago? Three? They said he’d be leaving soon. Fix ’em and get ’em into physical therapy. That was the way now.

  He’d also been allowed visitors: his dad and Frankie, Coach and his teammates.

  “You’re going to be fine!” they’d all promised.

  All save Mr. Lawyer-Man. Mr. Lawyer-Man worked for the college. He appeared when players tested positive for drugs or were accused of assault or taking bribes. So when Jarrett saw that stern brown face, he’d had a moment of guilt. What had he done to gain the attention of Mr. Lawyer-Man? But Mr. Lawyer-Man hadn’t chewed him out. Instead, he’d pulled over a chair and gazed at Jarrett with paternal concern.

  “Hey, Jet,” he’d said kindly, which was weird because Jarrett didn’t know Lawyer-Man’s name. “I’m here to let you know that everything’s taken care of, so you don’t have to worry.”

  “Taken care of?” he’d ventured warily.

  “There’s the driver’s insurance, and everyone on the team is insured through the college as well,” Lawyer-Man went on, “so you don’t need to worry about any hospital or physical therapy bills. And then there’s the contract you signed for your scholarship. You’re obviously not going to be playing any more games this season, but the doctors are hopeful that you’ll be back, good as new, for next season. If you’re not, however, you still get to stay in college. That was the deal. No matter what injury you sustain, or how it happened, you get a four-year education.”

  How...reassuring, Jarrett had thought with a sick, sinking feeling. God. He rubbed at his eyes. He didn’t want to drift anymore. He was so tired of lying in bed, napping or watching the television or eating the hospital food. So tired of having nothing to do but circle around and around that one question that no one but his father had dared to ask: Would he be able to play again?

  “Jarrett?”

  He opened his eyes, saw first, as always, the raised leg in its brace, then the flowers and football-shaped “Get Well” balloons decorating the room. Then he became aware of himself, of the soreness, his scratchy face.

  “Jarrett?” Square glasses, eyes dark as flint, an elfin face.

  “Liddy.” God. He was in a hospital gown, unshaven, hair greasy. There were healing scrapes on his cheek and one eye was partially blackened from hitting the asphalt. He tugged, embarrassed, at the thin blanket the hospital had given him. Maybe he could pull it over his head?

  “I saw your dad outside. He said I could come in,” she remarked uncomfortably. “I’d have been here sooner, but no one told me. I had to read about it in the school newspaper. Then again, I don’t suppose anyone but you knew how to get in touch with me. The doctor showed me the x-rays. You really fractured your patella.”

  “I didn’t. The bumper of a car did.” Emotions churned. A part of him was elated to see her. He even felt a stirring between his legs, which was embarrassing, and mystifying. His teammates had brought in three of the most gorgeous cheerleaders to kiss him and “make him feel better!” He’d thanked the ladies, but begged off, insisting that he was still in too much pain. Yet one look at Liddy had him tenting the sheets.

  “Must have hurt.” It was sweet really. She had no bedside manner at all.

  “Yeah. A busted kneecap hurts.”

  The eyes flickered away and back, darting behind her lenses like fish. “The doctor said they used that new bio-adhesive to piece together the fragments.”

  “Uh-huh. It gets absorbed back into the body as the bones reconnect and heal. Pretty cool.” Jarrett said, but he was feeling unsettled now. There was something on her mind, something she was afraid to say aloud, and he had a pretty good idea what it was. “Why don’t you just come out and ask, Liddy?”

  “Ask?”

  “Ask me if this puts an end to my career in a constructed competition.”

  She pushed at her glasses. “The knee should heal well enough for you to—”

  “That’s not the point is it? It doesn’t matter that this happened off the field. It still proves your point. One misstep and my future is in the toilet. So maybe I should take this as a sign to find something new?”

  “I—suppose—” she stuttered, and flushed guiltily. She had no poker face either.

  “Well, I’m not going to,” he told her defiantly. “This accident has confirmed it: football is everything to me. Everything. I don’t want to lose it. I’ll give up anything else before I give it up.”

  She got the message. He could tell because her face went a bit gray. So, now she knew which way he’d jump if she pushed.

  “Anyone who wants to be my friend,” he added, “is going to need to cheer me on. Not try to change my mind.”

  She looked sick and sad, which stabbed him right through the heart, but he wasn’t going to relent. He rested back on his pillows and waited.

  “I shouldn’t have just dropped by like this. I thought—” She hesitated, then seemed to change her mind. “We’ll talk when you’re out of here and feeling better, okay?”

  He was being an asshole and she was being...Liddy. And, dammit, his dick was still interested. It twitched, knowing how close she was. Hell, his hands were interested as well, desperate to touch her, and his mouth—Christ, he felt like he really would be healed if she’d just lean in and let him kiss her.

  He wanted to feel her warmth, to smell her. He could, if he just stopped being so pigheaded and said the right thing.

  Yet he couldn’t seem to help himself.

  “If you don’t want to talk now, then I don’t think we have anything more to discuss,” he observed coldly. “Do you?”

  “I guess not.” She conceded and then, to his surprise, she bent and gave him that kiss, a quick, painfully chaste one on the forehead. In the next heartbeat, she was gone.

  Ah, hell. He winced and pressed a hand to the undamaged side of his face. Why had he gone and done that? He hadn’t wanted to fight with Liddy, he’d wanted to make up with her. Crap!

  His cock, still half-stiff under the sheets, rebuked him and waited, ever hopeful, for her return.

  There was a water fountain down
from Jarrett’s room. Liddy paused for a drink, then leaned against the wall, emotionally wrung out. Jarrett had looked delighted to see her at first, then embarrassed and then...then she’d hadn’t been able to tell what he was feeling. From what he’d said, however, it had probably been annoyance or anger. Or maybe not. Maybe he’d been waiting for some particular response from her, one she hadn’t given him and so failed the test. It was frustrating, and absurd. She could look at a skull and see its whole history, but she was dyslexic when it came to reading faces.

  All she knew for sure was that she’d upset him. And he had certainly upset her. When she’d seen his picture on the front page of the school paper her heart had nearly stopped. I knew it! I knew it! It didn’t matter that it had been a car accident. All that had gone through her brain from that moment on was that she didn’t want him hurt or dead.

  She hadn’t been able to hide that from Jarrett, how intolerable it was to imagine him hurt or lost. He could read faces and, apparently, those feelings had pissed him off.

  She sighed, took another drink, and wondered if she ought to go back in, demand they talk it out. She was about to do just that when she saw one of Jet’s teammates came down the hall with a girl. A long-haired, long-legged girl. One-million-year B.C. Babe! Shit. Liddy turned to run, then froze. Jarrett’s dad and brother were coming the other way. Beside the fountain was an alcove with the bathrooms. Liddy ducked in there.

  “Mr. Evans,” she heard B.C. Babe greet Jarrett’s dad, “how are you doing?”

  Damn. She hadn’t addressed Mr. Evans that way, with such sympathy and concern. She’d just asked for the facts, like the anti-social geek she was.