Winner Take All

by Laurie Devore

  The ego is staggering. I don’t look at him. “I think you’re a little proud of it,” I say, watching my finger draw circles on the dark wooden surface of the bar.

  His eyes flash up at me, catch me. Pretty blue.

  Lois sets two glasses in front of us with bright, colorful liquid splashing against the edges.

  “Go on,” Lois tells me, and I slowly take a sip, ready to gag like I did on the beer yesterday. But the concoction touches my lips and it’s sweet but a little tangy and goes down easier.

  I nod with a smile.

  “Okay, then,” Lois says, sounding as close to satisfied as I can imagine her getting. She points at Jackson. “Don’t get me in trouble, Hart.” With that, she leaves us alone, heading to the other end of the bar.

  “Is it really good?” Jackson asks, looking at my glass doubtfully. “I don’t even know what this shit she gave me is.”

  “You want to talk about last night?” I ask him.

  His jaw tenses as he drinks from his glass. “No.”

  “That’s not true,” I tell him. “If you didn’t, you would’ve gone and gotten some random girl to come drink with you, but you picked me.”

  His eyebrows go up as he takes another swig before setting his glass down. “Yes, you’ve found the flaw in my plan. I should’ve gone and gotten literally anyone else.”

  “But you didn’t. So if I were you, I’d reflect on that.” I don’t know why needling him gives me so much satisfaction.

  “You’re a lot to take,” he says, scraping at the bar. “But you wouldn’t have come if you didn’t want to. You know that as well as I do.”

  I don’t like it that he’s right. “Before this all started,” I say, outlining a pattern into the condensation on my glass, “I wondered a lot. About what it must be like to be you. This idea that people like you, that you get to be successful and smart and mean and everyone still wants a piece of you. That’s incredible.”

  “Nell,” he starts.

  “But it gets boring, doesn’t it? Getting whatever you want all the time?” I sip my drink, watching him with interest. When he doesn’t answer for a beat, I go on. “I think that’s why you act the way you do. You know, with the girls and all the games you’re always playing? You don’t want to admit it but you’re filling some empty space in your life where you need a challenge. I mean, even school is easier for you than it is for me, and God knows the teachers like you better.”

  “Oh good. More conspiracy theories.” He downs his drink.

  “What good do you think it does when you pretend you’re something you’re not? I mean, that stuff with your dad and Doug. You’re a mess, Jackson, and you just act like everything is f—”

  “I just don’t think about that part of my life that much, Nell, all right?” he says, and it’s weird. Before, Jackson always looked so comfortable, so completely in control of every situation, but lately, I can’t help but think he’s fraying at the edges. Even now, his fingers dance across the bar and his eyes shift back and forth.

  “Why wouldn’t you think about it?” I ask, and I wonder if he can hear how invested I am, how completely fascinated I am with who he is and how he is. How I want free of this fixation. But he’s achieved this impossible ideal of perfection I’ve been chasing all my life, and I don’t see how I can let a thing like that go, even if he is faking it.

  “Do you think about why you’re so obsessive?” he asks me very seriously. He watches me over his water-streaked glass.

  “Yes,” I say, meeting his eye. “If I didn’t think about why I am the way I am, I wouldn’t be me.”

  “You wouldn’t,” he says darkly.

  “I hear that tone in your voice, you know. But I would never treat people as collateral damage.”

  “Goddammit, Nell,” Jackson says, banging down his glass against the table. “Can you just leave it alone? I know! I compartmentalize the fuck out of everything so I can do whatever I want. There, are you happy?”

  “You told me I was miserable, remember?”

  His eyes don’t leave me. “You could get whatever you wanted. You know that, right?”

  I half smile. “That only happens to people like you, Jackson. With nice hair.” I twirl a piece of my own long auburn hair around my finger, my eyes going to his perfectly tousled dark hair. I think it looks soft, and then I think that I’m appalled at myself for thinking it. I take a sip of my drink and let it sit there a little longer, tasting the liquid swirling around in my mouth. My limbs feel looser already, my mind whirring pleasantly.

  “I like that you don’t take my shit,” Jackson says instead after a minute. “Nothing’s ever boring with you. It’s, like, when I realized you could see right through me or whatever … I hadn’t realized up until that moment how transparently obvious everything in my life had become. How much I had stopped seeing the point in anything.”

  I laugh a little.

  “What?” he asks. “Spilling my guts here, Becker.”

  “It’s just funny to think about,” I say, smiling at him. “We’re both so good at our roles and who are we trying to impress?”

  “I assumed it was each other,” Jackson says, and we both laugh. Then he asks me, “You think this is a bad idea?”

  “What?”

  “Us.”

  “There is no us,” I tell him. I know it’s not exactly true. We keep pulling together like opposite poles—part of us wanting nothing more than to fight every bit of pull we feel. The rest snaps together like it’s nature. Magnetism.

  “Of course there’s an us,” he says.

  “It’s definitely a bad idea,” I admit at last, and he smiles and clinks our glasses together.

  It goes down so easy.

  * * *

  “ANOTHER!” Jackson calls, and I destroy the disgusting shot of tequila, slamming the shot glass upside down on the edge of the deck.

  “Shit. God, I’m good at drinking!” I yell, turning to face him. He looks very nice, I think then. I rub my thumb over the fabric of his Polo shirt and he watches it. I look up at his eyes, glassy in the fading sun.

  He gives me an almost smile as if something has made him sad. “You’re good at everything.”

  “Exactly.” I remove my hand from his shirt-sleeve but then immediately swat at him. “How did it take you this long to figure that out?”

  He grins. I gaze out over the river, the sun making its descent on the horizon. The bar is built up on a hill in the trees like a hideaway. Birds dip into the water, hungry, and off in the distance, I can see some kids kayaking. “Alcohol makes me happy.”

  He stares for a moment, and then says, “You won’t be saying that tomorrow,” as he picks up my empty shot glass. We have amassed a couple of them that he has stacked on the table—they are starting to list dangerously to the side.

  “I will,” I tell him, my eyes refocusing. “I feel so light. I feel so … not like myself. It’s nice.”

  “But I like yourself,” he says in a very serious voice that I don’t believe.

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Because I know you’re drunk right now—”

  “I’m not drunk,” I interrupt him, my words slurring into one another.

  His expression doesn’t change. “Because I know you’re drunk right now, I’m going to tell you something.”

  I sip at a water. “Tell me.”

  He tips back his seat—one of those brightly colored barstools that looks like a day at the beach—and tangles his feet up in the slats of the deck railing in front of us. “I really like you, Nell.”

  I laugh so hard, I spit a little water out, a loud guffaw that makes Lois turn around and glare at me from the outside bar where they’ve stuck her for the evening shift. I keep giggling and Jackson is watching me with his stupid neutral expression, so I try to pull myself together. “You do not like me, you disillusioned rich kid. And I am one hundred percent not going to fall for your shit.”

  He rubs his jaw, still looking at me all tho
ughtful, as if this isn’t the most ridiculous conversation of lies two people have ever had. “I like that you don’t know your own depths.”

  Something courses through my veins. Something dark and fully alive. “Depths,” I repeat.

  “You’re dark somewhere deep down in there, Becker. Like the hidden parts of the ocean. You’re not sure what’s lurking beneath the surface and you’re not sure if you want to find out.”

  The metaphor clears my head slightly, the precise way he strings the words together. A shiver goes up my spine. “I don’t think that’s a compliment.”

  “It is from me.”

  “I want,” I start, glancing over to be sure he’s watching, then turning back out to the water, “to be you, I think. To … I don’t know, touch you. To beat you. To crawl inside of you and have your power.”

  “My power,” he repeats, his voice slightly strangled. I stare straight ahead because I don’t want to see the way he’s looking at me. “I hear it, you know, what you won’t say. You hate me so much, Becker.”

  “That’s the sad part,” I say. “I don’t actually hate you at all.” I face him then, his dark-blue eyes catching mine, knowing he’ll pull me under like a current. But that’s not the whole story; there’s something else here. Something more real than I let myself imagine.

  A sad lady is singing about her broken heart over the speakers, and I watch Jackson’s long fingers as he runs them along the railing of the deck. I see the way they’re constantly moving, as if they can’t stand the stillness, the idea that they may not touch every molecule of oxygen floating here in the sunset.

  “Dance with me, Nell,” he says in some gruff voice he’s been hiding all along, and I don’t really have a choice then, do I? He pushes off from the deck, sure that I will follow, and I don’t know, I’m pretty sure I will, too, because there’s a breeze blowing off the river and even though he’s so sure, there is something so profoundly sad about him.

  Maybe there’s something sad about me.

  He takes my hand and I let him, and then I put my other hand on his shoulder so we’re not too close. Everything is happening fast and slow all at once, as if the alcohol has given me more clarity than I normally have, but less time to plug it into my brain and understand what it means. It’s so easy not to think and only to feel for that one moment.

  “I meant what I said before,” he says at last, leading us in a circle. The dance is so proper, like he’s been trained to do this, and I think he probably has because he pulls our clasped hands over our heads and spins me around and then pulls me back, closer to him than before. “About you.”

  “I don’t remember,” I tell him because it is all getting kind of hazy.

  “I like you, Nell. I like the stupid way you obsess over everything and how intense you are and that you never fucking let up, no matter how badly I want you to. I thought this was just some stupid thing to get under your skin at first and now I keep wondering when I’ll see you again and what you’re doing and why your mouth is constantly in that line like you’re thinking about something important, only not every little thing can possibly be as important as you make it look.”

  I blink and keep my eyes closed for a minute, feeling all of it. The smell of his cologne and the pulse underneath his wrist and the way my fingers graze the fabric of his shirt. “I’m terribly sorry,” I say at last, opening my eyes again.

  He barks out a laugh then, his eyes shifting to a spot over my shoulder. “Why?”

  “Because you don’t know how to turn a feeling like that off.”

  “You do?”

  “Of course,” I tell him. I couldn’t survive if I didn’t.

  “It’s so messed up. For me to want this. It won’t work.” He spins me again and I swear he pulls me back even tighter, where neither of us can escape the reality. And it’s all a dance—not just the way we’re moving with each other but our words and our bodies and everything in between.

  “Jackson?” I say.

  “What?” he replies.

  “You talk too much,” I tell him, and then my mouth is on his, all sharp lime and slow boats on a summer breeze.

  It registers with him like a shock to the system. His body falls into mine and his fingers tangle up in my hair. I could crawl inside the feel of this kiss, the perfect symmetry of our mouths. And I’m drunk, anyway, so what does it matter if I let myself enjoy it? And I mean, really enjoy Jackson Hart without obsessing about all the rest.

  He pulls back.

  “Don’t say anything,” I tell him, keeping my voice clear.

  He laughs. “Wasn’t going to.”

  The songs ends and we both stop, moving away from each other. The fairy lights come on then, strung over our heads across the deck. People are coming in to eat at the restaurant. I want to call what just happened something like magic but I know it’s really the alcohol.

  “So what now?” Jackson asks me, his dark hair glowing in the light.

  “Now nothing.” I shrug. “The day’s over, Hart. Sometimes, it’s just over.”

  He nods, glancing toward Lois behind the bar. “Yeah,” he says at last. “I guess it is.”

  19

  Coach Prince—our club volleyball coach—blows a whistle and the sound is so shrill, it can only realistically be happening directly inside my head, which is pounding in such an unpleasant way, standing up doesn’t even seem like something my body is made to do and vomiting has to be preferable to not vomiting right now.

  “Becker!” Coach Prince screams. “Look alive.”

  I try as I left-right-left to hit the ball. It falls pitifully into the net. Lia’s eyes catch mine right before she goes for her next set. It’s way too low and Michonne doesn’t stand a chance as she tries to hit it.

  “That’s it!” Coach Prince hits her whistle again like the sound is my punishment. “Everyone get in here,” she says, and all the balls roll away as we huddle around her. I can only half listen as I try to keep my breakfast in.

  “This is pathetic,” Coach Prince tells us. She’s so right. “We have our first big tournament in two days and you look worse than your first day of practice. Do you think this shit is going to get you into the top five teams? Do you think you can win any matches like this? This group I see won’t even make it through an elimination match, much less win a championship. This isn’t about you as a player or who you impress or what honor you get. This is about the team. And the team I’m seeing will be wiped off the floor by any other team in Charleston. Is that who you want to be?”

  “No,” everyone else says with conviction. I can’t even force the word out.

  “Then get out there and work like it,” she tells us, her voice poison. “Becker, Reagan,” she calls to the two of us as the huddle disperses. “I expect you to be leaders out there.”

  Lia nods resolutely and I follow suit, feeling like the absolute lowest person on the planet. People are expecting things from me, and I’m letting them down. I blew off all my responsibilities so I could hang out with Jackson Hart yesterday, of all people. That isn’t the kind of person I want to be.

  I go back to my hitting line, clenching my teeth.

  I pick up the pace considerably then, hangover be damned. We break off into teams and I yell the younger girls into place, making sure their formations and coverage are perfect. I’m not one hundred percent but I can give it all I’ve got.

  I have to.

  A ball goes sailing onto our side of the net right at Lia, and even though she’s supposed to take the second pass if at all possible, she has no choice but to take a shot at this one. Only, it goes sailing away in the other direction. She calls out “Help!” and I spring into action, taking off in the direction of the ball, running as fast as my body can carry me. I make a desperate dive at the ball, pushing it over my shoulder and hopefully back toward my teammates. As quickly as I can, I roll back over my shoulder, jumping onto my feet and running back to the net so I can block as we make the absolutely phenomenal save. Th
e second-string team does their best but can’t return it and the point is ours.

  That’s when it happens. I hit my knees and throw up on the gym floor. And it’s really horrible, as if my guts are coming up from inside, and my head is pounding even harder than before, and once it finally stops, I fall back onto the floor and hold my sweaty palms on my sweaty forehead.

  Dear God.

  Coach Prince and the team come running over as I push my hair away from my face. There’s echoes of “Nell” from all of them, but then Coach Prince is keeping everyone back, giving me my space or protecting them from hazardous materials, I’m not sure which.

  “Nell,” she says, sinking down next to me, “are you all right?”

  “Just dehydrated, I think,” I tell her. True enough. Lia is right over Coach Prince’s shoulder, watching me with an unreadable expression.

  “You need to go home,” Coach Prince tells me.

  “I don’t…,” I start to argue.

  “Now,” she says over me. “Can you walk?”

  I nod, allowing her to pull me up. “I’ll just clean up and get out of here,” I say, the words floating around my brain like a haze.

  “Let me walk you,” Lia says.

  Coach Prince nods. “I’m going to talk to the team and send everyone home so I can get this cleaned up.” My face burns. “Thank you for working so hard, Nell. I don’t want you to be sick, obviously, but I know the girls felt your energy. You always push everyone around you to be better. Rest up, okay?”

  I nod and she walks away from Lia and me, back to where the other girls are standing around, looking concerned. Lia grabs my arm, steering me toward the locker room. She doesn’t say anything until after she’s opened the door and let it fall closed behind me.

  “What’s wrong with you?” she asks at last. “You look like hell. What did you do yesterday? My dad’s in The Post and Courier again and I don’t even get a text from you?”

  “I’m sorry,” I say quickly. I really don’t want to talk about it. I push past her and into the bathroom, letting water run onto a paper towel and holding it against my forehead. When I open my eyes, she’s standing to my left, her back leaned up against the counter with her arms crossed.