Jaided

by Rose, Ashley

  They all just smiled at her from the ground.

  "Fine."

  She grabbed a ball and got a little closer to the goal. She threw the ball high in the air, and at just the right moment, did a powerful jump, whipping herself around in the air in a sort of back flip. The ball connected with her foot and shot into the goal at an amazing speed.

  She landed in a crouch while the boys cheered.

  "Nice, Jaide."

  "Yeah, yeah, I'm a goddess, worship me. Can we go eat now?"

  The boys peeled themselves off the ground and they all headed inside. Jaide strode along, feeling rather cocky. Well, that’s soccer, she thought, now if I could only find a mental bicycle kick to get Blaize out of his Maddy quandary.

  Chapter 4

  Blaize and Jaide grabbed a quick dinner with the boys, then everyone headed off to their room. Jaide entered the bathroom to change into the sleeping clothes that she planned to wear for rest of the night, knowing that she would probably be stuck in her room doing homework. She changed into her little sleeping shorts and tank top.

  Blaize had already changed into clean shorts and a T-shirt and was sitting on his bed. She stood in front of him, placing her hands on her hips. "You ready for this?"

  He looked up, eyes widening at her scantily clad form. He turned away, coughing and blushing a little.

  "What's wrong?" she asked, puzzled. "Oh! Oh no, sorry! I meant, are you ready for Trig? We’re gonna do our homework. Remember?"

  He nodded and his blush faded. He grabbed his bag and heaved it onto the bed, pulling out his Trigonometry book.

  She grabbed her own bag. "Mind if I sit on your bed?" When he shook his head, she crawled into his bed and sat close beside him, leaning her back against the wall.

  "Uhh ... Jaide?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Your shorts are ... uh ... short."

  "They're for sleeping. Do you want me to change?"

  "No.Uh, its fine, but what if one of the guys comes in?"

  "Umm, nothing?"

  "They'll ... think stuff."

  "Like what?"

  "You know, stuff."

  "So? Let them think what they want."

  "Ooookay."

  "Sorry, I've just never had to worry about that kinda stuff before."

  "Why not?"

  "Well, I never used to be around guys, just Trem. I barely ever got out of the house and whenever I played sports, I never got to play on the coed teams."

  "What about school?"

  "Homeschooled."

  "How come?"

  She shrugged and looked away. "I dunno ... I had issues."

  "Oh ... sorry."

  "Nah, its cool. Let’s hit this Trig."

  He smiled a little and they dove into the homework.

  There was a knock at that door. They had finished about fifteen minutes earlier but still sat there, letting their brains cool down. "Who is it?" Jaide called from Blaize's bed.

  "Alex and Bhrade."

  "Door's open."

  When they opened the door, Bhrade immediately broke out into a grin, and Alex whistled. "Go B!"

  Jaide rolled her eyes. "Shut up. We were doing homework."

  "Yeah, I bet that wasn't all that was getting done."

  Bhrade winked.

  "Can we do anything for you?"

  "Uh ... " Bhrade looked at Alex. "Why did we come over here?"

  Alex was drawing a blank too. "Uhh, I don't remember."

  "Well in that case, me and Blaize were right in the middle of a hot and heavy make out session, so if you don't mind leaving ... "

  "Yeah, yeah. See ya tomorrow." They left, rolling their eyes.

  Jaide got up and locked the door. "Sorry about that. I'll straighten that out tomorrow."

  "Don't bother. They know I wouldn't do anything with another girl."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I have a girlfriend."

  "Oh?"

  "Yeah."

  "Where's she live?"

  "She lives across town."

  "Blaize ... " She could see it was hard for him to speak about it. "Are you talking about your girlfriend who is in a coma?"

  His head snapped around and he glared. "How do you know about her?"

  "News gets around, Blaize."

  "She's still my girlfriend."

  Jaide hesitated, wondering if she should say it, then, "Blaize ... I heard she's brain dead."

  "Shut up!" His voice cracked. Jaide saw he appeared on the verge of tears.

  "Blaize ... " She stepped toward him.

  He threw up his hands, as though warding off blows. "Don't! Just leave me alone."

  "I'm sorry." She grabbed a blanket off her bed and wrapped it around herself on impulse. "Do you want me to leave? I can go to one of the guy’s rooms if you want."

  "No ... just turn the lights out and turn the TV on, please."

  "Yeah, sure." He had slipped under his blankets now, his back to her. His shoulders were shaking slightly. She suspected he was crying. "Blaize? I'm gonna go to sleep now, ok? I'll see you in the morning?"

  A hoarse whisper uttered, "Night."

  Jaide crawled under the covers, but lay awake pondering the situation. In the dark, the TV that she’d left on for him flicked shadowy images across their shared walls, and with the sound barely audible, she heard a weird and distant chatter. She closed her eyes, pulling a sheet over her head. Eventually, the sound of snoring penetrated her half-sleep. She thought she’d risen to shake Blaize out of his negative nostril music, but she stumbled instead through a swamp with jagged black tree limbs clutching at her as she ran into that repetitive haunting horror.

  She splashed through the flooded swamp-like Exeter soccer field, pursued by a large, ugly man who wore no clothes and extended his enlarged private part ahead of his slogging legs like a baseball bat. Only when Tremaine executed a perfect bicycle kick that knocked the monster’s head off, did she pause. Suddenly sunlight flooded a high hill covered with a delicate canopy of wild flowers, and the beauty of it all made her wish never to wake up, but to stay safe forever in this marvelously beautiful and secure dream.

  But morning arrived in all its awkward ordinariness. Blaize appeared deeper in his shell than before. He had slept right through his alarm. Jaide got up and hit the snooze on it before getting into the shower. He was still sleeping through the annoying beeping when she got out.

  She shut the alarm off and shook his shoulder. "Blaize. Blaize, wake up."

  His eyes flew open and he sat up rigid. Even though they had gone to bed fairly early last night, he still looked exhausted. His tired eyes were bloodshot and he just didn't look good at all.

  "You ok?"

  "Why'd you wake me up?" he asked groggily.

  "You slept through your alarm, twice."

  "Oh ... thanks."

  She nodded and moved away from his bed.

  He took a long shower and looked a little better but he hadn't shaved, so he had a cute 5 o'clock shadow going on.

  He looked at her uncertainly. “You know, you don't have to wait for me every day."

  "I know I don't, but I like to."

  "Why? Why are you so nice to me?"

  They left for breakfast. "What do you mean? I'm a nice person. I'm nice to everyone. Why shouldn't I be nice to you?"

  He was starting to look annoyed. "Because I'm not nice to you. I don't talk to anyone. I'm anti-social, and I cry like a little bitch." His muttering trailed off to where she wasn’t sure he’d finished.

  Jaide stopped abruptly and grabbed his arm. "Blaize, don't think that way about yourself. That’s not fair. Crying isn't a weakness. You’ve been through a lot in the past year and I'm willing to bet you've never really talked about it to anyone. Boys can get emotional too, you know. It’s not a weakness."

  He pulled free and kept walking. "Whatever."

  "Blaize, I've seen lots of other guys cry."

  "Oh yeah? Like who?"

  "Tremaine."

  Blaize
was silent.

  "Blaize, it’s natural. You cared about her."

  "Don't say it like that! I care about her, not cared. She's still my girlfriend. She's still here."

  Jaide felt emotionally crushed, absolutely terrible, but something inside her made her push back against the overwhelming sadness. "Blaize ... it's the machines keeping her here, you know that. She wouldn't want you to be stuck on her, she would want you to move on."

  "Screw moving on."

  Jaide gave up for the moment. She didn't want to push him too much. "Blaize, I'm sorry if I upset you. I know it’s none of my business."

  He ignored her and headed straight to class, skipping breakfast.

  She sighed and watched him go. She grabbed some water and an apple before heading toward the table.

  "Where's Blaize?" Matt asked.

  "He went straight to class."

  "He looks pissed."

  "Yeah ..."

  "How come?"

  "I'm stupid," she muttered. She bit into the apple and stared down at the tabletop. There were little orange juice stains drying in front of her. She scooted over to a cleaner spot, but that didn’t ease her dejected feeling one bit. Her mind flashed back to her nightmare but now she couldn’t remember the details, except for the bicycle kick and slogging through a swamp.

  “Has the soccer field ever flooded?” she asked everyone.

  “Nah. Did Blaize say that?”

  Chance quickly changed the subject. "I called Tremaine last night. He said he's been trying to call you, but you never answer your phone."

  She remembered shutting her phone off and putting it in a drawer and shrugged. "When's he coming this weekend?"

  "Saturday some time. He said he's gonna try to make it to our practice. He says he can't wait to see his little sister playing with the boys."

  She laughed. "Saturday’s scrimmage day, right?"

  "Yep."

  "Awesome. I'll see you guys later, ok? I'm gonna go see if Blaize will eat something." She grabbed an apple from Chance's tray and stood up.

  Alex downed his milk and stood with her, and they headed to class. "So Jaide, what's up with you and Blaize anyways?"

  "Nothing."

  "Were you guys really making out last night?"

  She shook her head. "No, we were just doing homework on his bed."

  "I figured you were probably kidding, but those shorts were pretty short."

  "That's what Blaize said. What's the big deal?"

  "Well I dunno, you are really pretty and you have nice legs and nice ... other things that guys like. Doesn't make a difference to me, though."

  "It doesn't?"

  "Nah."

  "So, if I stripped right now, you wouldn't be fazed?"

  "Well ... I would be concerned for you and a little worried that a pervert hetero guy would see you."

  Jaide stopped in her tracks. "Wait ...are you saying that you're not hetero?"

  He grinned. "Straight up homo. No pun intended."

  "No way. But you seem so very straight."

  "I'm a good actor."

  "And ... Grr's gay, too. And you guys are roomies?"

  "Sure are." He kept walking. "Come on, we're gonna be late."

  "Do any of the other guys know?" she asked after she caught up.

  "Nope. Well, I think Chance might suspect something. He’s a smart guy."

  "You don't want them to know?"

  "Not really. Maybe later, but it's not a big deal. Most of the school doesn't even know about Grr. Can you imagine a gay guy attending an all boys school? There's a lot of homophobes at this school."

  "Well, I think it's great! Gay rights all the way!"

  Alex chuckled.

  She grinned at the revelation as they reached the classroom. She suddenly felt today might turn out to be a very interesting day.

  Chapter 5

  The period flew by. Blaize was still being anti-social. He hadn't even shown any emotion when she informed him that Tremaine was coming that weekend. The next class she had with Garret, and she wanted to talk to him about Alex.

  While Jaide was totally supportive of equality, she was surprised too. Alex didn’t strike her as the least bit homosexual. Just by looking and talking to Garret, you could tell he was in touch with his feminine side, but Alex would be the last one she would have guessed. She knew it must be hard to be a gay couple having to keep it secret and having no one to be able to talk to if they had problems. She wanted to let Garret know that she was there for them if they got in a fight or anything and they needed someone to talk to.

  She found Garret in the corner, doing work on a computer. "Hey Grr, you busy?"

  He looked at her and grinned. "I'm never too busy for you, baby. What can I do for ya?"

  "Well, actually I wanted to talk to you about something."

  "About what?"

  "You and Alex."

  "What about me and Alexander?"

  "Well, he told me about you guys."

  "Oh ... look, I didn't turn him gay. He went there on his own, ok? So I'm sorry I took one man from your selection of hundreds, but ..."

  "No, no, you misunderstand. I fully support you guys and I want you to know that."

  "Oh ... well thanks, that means a lot. It is kind of an awkward situation in an all boys school."

  "Yeah, I know it must be kind of hard to have to keep it a secret and everything. I just wanted to let you know that if you ever have like any issues with your relationship or anything that you don't think you can really talk to about with any of the guys, you can talk to me about it. I mean, if you want, I'm here for you guys."

  "Thanks Jaide, that's really awesome. It is kind of tough. Like, we just got together pretty recently, but I can already tell that it's going to be hard to keep a strong relationship when we have to keep it on the down low."

  She smiled. "I know you guys can do it. I have faith."

  Garret laughed. "Yeah, we'll see. So how's Blaize?"

  She frowned. "Not you, too. I told you guys, me and Blaize aren't doing anything. We’re just roomies."

  He laughed. "That's not what I meant. That's you guys' business. I just meant that he seemed down this morning."

  "Oh. Yeah ... last night I sort of brought up his girlfriend ... ex-girlfriend, whatever."

  "Oh ... "

  "So what's the deal with her exactly? I didn't really get the full story."

  "She's brain dead."

  "One hundred percent?"

  "Yeah, no brain activity at all. It’s sad to say but ... there is no hope. There never was. They have run tests. If there was even just a little spark going on in her brain, there would be a little hope, but there is none. There wasn't from the time she ‘died' in the emergency room. Don't get me wrong, it was really sad, it is really sad, but ... it’s been a year. Of course it's going to be easier for us to move on because we weren't dating her but he really needs to move on. It’s not healthy for him."

  "So the only thing keeping her lungs moving and heart pumping is the machines?"

  "Yeah, that's all. I mean it depends on your personal beliefs I guess, but I consider her dead. If she was taken off the machines, she would be at the end instantly. I personally think that she should be unplugged and allowed to rest in peace. That’s what she would have wanted. Her spirit has moved on and it’s time that her body does, too. If there was even a one in a millionth of a chance, I would be all for trying to help her and give her a chance, but there is no chance. It’s zero in a million. Blaize just ... I don't know, he blames himself, but he has no reason to. He hates it because she loved him but he didn't love her. He cared about her a lot, like they were the best of friends, but he didn't love her in the way that she loved him. He tried, but you can't control who you love."

  She nodded. "How come she hasn't been unplugged already?"

  "It’s a combination of things. The law - the parents haven't given the doctor consent. He can't do anything. It’s just killing Blaize to see her 'alive.' I
don't think he will ever be able to move on until he believes she is truly gone."

  The bell rang to dismiss them.

  "I'll see you at lunch, Jaide. And ... keep an eye on Blaize, ok? He’s ..."

  "I know, and I will."

  Garret nodded and they parted ways. She sat beside Blaize in Creative Writing, which seemed over before she could blink.

  Next came lunch and a crowded table with a couple of the guys who didn’t make the team. They were just sort of hanging around the team players. Jaide figured they were trying to look “in”, as it were. The main course was spaghetti with fresh fruit or veggies. Jaide thought the spaghetti tasted odd. The lunch table was filled with small chat but Blaize said nothing, and Jaide didn't say anything unless someone asked her a question.

  In Trigonometry, Mr. West loaded them with homework. By the time she hit Advanced Biology, her brain was exhausted and even more homework was added to the load.

  At practice, Jaide suddenly began to feel peculiar and sort of wobbly. She just wasn't feeling well. Practice became hell for her, even though she knew it shouldn't be. They weren't doing any more than normal, yet she was feeling dizzy and a little nauseous. They were doing some distance running toward the middle of practice and Jaide lagged at the very end, while normally she led the pack.

  She stumbled and fell, lying splayed on the grass for a second, trying to get her head to stop spinning. Because she had been running at the back, none of the boys saw her fall. They just kept running.

  When she struggled up, Coach called her over. "Miss Williams, you don't seem yourself today. Are you sick?"

  She hung her head. "I'm sorry, Coach. I don't know what's wrong with me."

  "Why don't you sit out for the next couple of drills?"

  "No way, Coach. I have to catch up."

  Coach Thacker commanded her. "Williams, sit out this drill."

  "Coach, I can't do that."

  "Why not?"

  "If the guys start to think that I'm weak or that I get privileges, then I am over. I'm really ok. I'm just a little spacey. I'll get it right."

  She jogged off without giving him time to answer.

  She caught up, but was immediately dizzy again. She tried to ignore it but it was really frustrating. Just as she caught up with the boys again, she was aware that they were watching her. A few looked concerned.