Chapter 2
They had flown out to Washington D.C. then rented a car and drove for four hours to “backwater Virginia” (Coach’s words not his) to try to recruit the three kids. They were supposed to meet the man who had sent them the tapes, Declan Lynch, at a run-down looking pizza place. Nino’s said the glowing fluorescent sign at the top of the restaurant. Neil had no idea what would possess rich kids to eat in a place like this, but Neil had never claimed to understand rich kids.
A man was waiting for them outside in a suit. He looked a little bit older than Dan. He caught sight of them and an effortless smile spread across his face. It would have seemed genuine to anyone else, but Neil knew how to read people. Though when his eyes ghosted over Neil’s scars, or Andrew’s unsmiling face, his smile never faltered. Neil was not sure whether this was due to the man not being squeamish, being a good liar, having seen worse things, or all three. Neil, despite his best efforts, felt respect for the man. Anyone who could hide their true feelings that well deserved a bit of respect. The man was almost as good as Andrew. Almost.
“Hello, I’m Declan Lynch. Coach Wymack I presume,” he greeted coach. Then everyone else. They shook hands, a companionable handshake that reminded Neil more of closing a business deal than a greeting, but the man was probably used to that. He spoke with a slight accent, Virginia and… something else. Irish? His voice was like oil. A perfect businessman. Neil wondered what Declan did for the school. He was too young to coach, certainly too young to teach. But then again, maybe he was older than he looked. Some money and a good surgeon could do that to a person.
“You presume correct, now are we going in or what?”
“Of course, we’re just waiting on Gansey and Adam,” Declan ushered them towards his previous waiting spot.
“Actually we wanted to ask you something about that. Is there any possible way you could get the offensive dealer? From the clips?”
Declan’s face did a series of acrobatic tricks. “Heh, well, he won’t play for you, but as for if I can get him here? He’s already coming,”
“How do you know?” Andrew asked. The first words he had said since they arrived.
“That he won’t come with you or that he’ll be here?” Declan paused and shook his head with a laugh, a short, dark that made Neil feel like he was in on a cruel inside joke “Doesn’t matter, I should know my own brother,” Andrew looked skeptical and said nothing.
“They let you work at the same school your brother went to?” Dan asked.
“Oh, ha, no, though I see how it could have come across that way. No, I used to go to that school and I owed Headmaster Child a favor, so he called it in and asked me to meet ya-,” he cleared his throat “all of you,”. The slip in his words put a dent in his D.C. businessman facade. It humanized him. It struck Neil for that one moment that this man had been pushed into adulthood too quickly, forced to grow up. He remembered eyes ghosting over his scars and not reacting, his youth. What had this man been through?
It was at this moment that a car drove into the Nino’s parking lot. An impossibly orange one, shiny and old.
“Fox colors,” Kevin noted.
Andrew looked up at the sound of the roaring engine and nodded his head approvingly. Dan, also one to appreciate a good car, let out a low whistle. Out of the car stepped four boys. Gansey and Parrish, one wearing a soft yellow polo shirt, and the other a ratty red Coca-Cola shirt. The other boys were unfamiliar to Neil, one, Asian, his hair striving endlessly upward, looking reasonably unnerved by the car, there seemed to be something glowing and flying in lazy circles around his head. A bee? No, it was gone, must have been a trick of the light. The other however was familiar to Neil, a tall boy, wearing a black tank top, head shaved, arms adorned with a countless number of thin, black leather wristbands. Neil mentally dubbed him darkboy.
“Is that him?” He asked, pointing to the boy.
“Yes,” was all Declan said.
The boys walked, Gansey at the front, as he walked, his fingers laced through the Asian boy’s. He looked presidential. Neil almost thought he was the congressperson, not his mother. Parrish walked on one side and darkboy on the other. They looked like bodyguards.
“Look, Gansey-boy, I don’t care if I have to walk back home, I’m not riding in that bright orange death-trap. The only reason I even get in the other one is because it doesn’t have a damn engine,” The asian boy was saying. Darkboy punched his arm and he fell silent.
“Gansey,” Declan greeted.
“Declan,” Gansey shot back. Neil could almost see the tension between the two.
“Hello Declan,” Parrish said. Declan nodded at him, Parrish nodded back.
“You weren’t at church on Sunday,” darkboy said in lieu of a greeting. This surprised Neil, both that darkboy went to church and that he would admonish his brother for not being there. Darkboy’s accent was stronger than Declan’s and definitely Irish, though it took on some henrietta affectations too. Only slightly. The result was what would have been a pleasant sound, but the growl in his voice made it feel rough and angry.
“I took Matthew in D.C.” Declan said. Straight and businesslike. Neil wondered who Matthew was. Someone important to both of them, probably another brother.
“There’s no one here anymore, you can come down now,” darkboy protested. Neil wondered who had kept Declan in D.C. in the first place. Dan’s words echoed in his head, "they don’t exactly fit our ‘recruiting standards’, they don’t need second chances"
“The drive is four hours, Ronan, I apologize for not making an insane effort to do something you wouldn’t have appreciated in the long run,” the brothers were bolts of energy, clashing against each other.
The asian boy cleared his throat and cocked his head towards Neil and his group. Gansey shifted again. His shoulders squared, his demeanour shifted, he was once again regal. Neil had never noticed him change in the first place. It reminded him of the lay in the clip. Darkboy distracted while Gansey moved into a new position.
“Right, well, we’ll all discuss that later. Right now we’re here to talk exy yes?” they all made their way inside the restaurant. They were greeted at the door by a young woman who quite obviously did not want to be there.
“Hi and welcome to Nino’s, wait just a-,”
“Wait, Cialina, I’ve got them,” called a voice from the back. It came from a short waitress with an impressive amount of bangles on her arms and an even more impressive amount of clips in her hair.
“You and those Raven Boys,” Cialina muttered. Kevin stiffened and then relaxed. Neil felt himself doing the same. Gansey turned his head at the flinch. His face was unreadable. Then it brightened.
“Oh, right. You all had that scare with the Ravens last year right? Sorry about that. The Raven is the aglionby mascot, so boys who go to Aglionby are often referred to as Raven boys,” Gansey explained.
“Oh,” was all Kevin said.
The girl led them to a table large enough for all of them and squeezed both Gansey’s and the asian boy’s hands. Neil wondered how she knew them.
“Geez, get a room Sargent,” joked darkboy.
Neil didn’t know if anyone else had noticed, but the boys all unconsciously leaned towards the girl, not shielding her, like what they did with Gansey, but being drawn to her, like she was a magnet.
“Ha ha,” the girl drawled in her Henrietta accent. Then she addressed Declan. “So what’ll y’all be having?”
Declan smiled at her, a genuine smile, not like the ones he had offered them outside. “Thank you Blue, I think we’ll have a couple of large cheese pizzas a pitcher of iced tea, or do any of you want water? Soda?” Declan asked the group, they all muttered their dissent. “Okay then. Work your magic,” What had he called her? Blue?
“Light on the spit Jane,” Gansey told her. Oh, that was her name. That made more sense, the “blue” must have been a Virginia thing.
“Aw, but then it won’t taste as good,” Jane said. Kevin looked unnerved. “Inside joke sweetheart,” She said to him. It didn’t look like Kevin was reassured. After she left Gansey beamed at the group.
“Jane plays Exy too. She’s a backliner,” Gansey smiled. Dan raised an eyebrow at this and nodded approvingly.
“So, I don’t believe we know who you two are yet,” Dan stated gesturing towards darkboy and the asian boy.
“Oh, this is my brother, Ronan Lynch,” darkboy (Ronan Neil corrected himself) raised a hand in confirmation and said nothing.
“And I’m Henry, Henry Cheng, I don’t play stickball,” the asian boy said. Dan smiled.
“That’s a shame,” Kevin said
“Is it?” Dan asked.
Jane brought the iced tea to the table, trying very hard to look like she
wasn’t eavesdropping. Andrew poured three sugar packets into his.
“Oh, it’s already sweet,” Jane pointed out. Andrew looked up at her, looked down at the tea, looked back up at her, and took a sip of his tea. “Okay then,” and she was on her way.
“So you want to sign u-,” Parrish was cut off by a long, loud slurp that came from a straw when someone finished a drink. The ‘someone’ in question was Andrew. He set his drink on the table.
“I’ll be out back when the food gets here,” Andrew said to Neil, and walked out of the restaurant.
Gansey looked reasonably alarmed by this outburst. Ronan watched Andrew leave with raised eyebrows and an almost appreciative look on his face, as if he envied Andrew’s ability to be so carelessly rude. Parrish looked as if nothing was wrong, like he was used to this behavior. Neil didn’t know if he was used to being cut off, or rudeness, Neil hoped it was neither. Parrish looked up at him, as if he could read his mind. And sent him a small smile, it was the kind of smile people gave when they were given a gift that they don’t particularly want. "Oh! Um, thanks! You didn’t have to. You really didn’t have to." Neil could imagine him saying. Neil reminded himself not to pity this boy, he didn’t want it, and Neil suspected he didn’t need it. Neil had no problem with that.
He moved his eyes to study Ronan. The boy was currently leaning back in his chair and looking extremely bored. It was a calculated position which would have looked casual had it not been for the furrowing of the brow, or the particular crossing of the leg, it took a lot of practice to look this bored in a social setting, and this boy had almost managed it.
Lynch, Ronan that is, caught Neil staring and sent him a ferocious grin. Neil looked away.
“So, um, as I was saying before, you wanted to sign us?” Parrish said. He and Ronan leaned ever so slightly towards Gansey while he spoke. Angling himself to the best position to protect. Neil raised an eyebrow. He didn’t know if Adam looked like him after all. Seeing him in person, his eyes, the set of his jaw, his defiant way of carrying himself, everywhere Neil thought he had seen himself, he now saw Andrew. It seemed absurd now that anyone had ever thought this boy looked like him.
“Yes, but about that-” Kevin started.
“Order up,” Jane said, carrying an alarming amount of pizza for her size.
“Yes, thank you,” Kevin smiled at her, his T.V. smile. Jane did not look impressed.
“Look, I apologize for interrupting you and everything sir, but there’s no need to smile at me like that, I get enough of it from them,” Jane pointed to Gansey and Declan. “Not so much from them, but Adam is learning, you’d better watch out,” Jane pointed to Ronan and Parrish. Kevin looked perfectly alarmed. If Neil could frame this moment, he would.
“Ooh, I like this one, what did you say your name was? Jane?” Dan asked.
Jane winced, then shot a glare at Gansey, who put his hands up in a hey, not my fault motion, Jane sighed and smiled at Dan. “Sorry ma’am, no, my name’s Blue, Blue Sargent, this one just doesn’t like my name,” another point to Gansey who had an innocent look on his face. Oh, Neil thought. Okay then.
“So he just.. calls you by a whole different name,” Dan asked.
“That’s the idea ma’am,”
“Hey, no need for any ‘ma’am’s here, just call me Dan, I’m trying to get a scope of your boys here before we scoop them up to South Carolina,” Kevin glared at Dan, probably for assuming that the boys would just come without complaint, but maybe also because Dan had spoiled the point he had been building up to. Blue visibly deflated a bit.
“South.. Carolina,” she said, a bit wonderstruck. She shook her head, gave them all one last smile, refilled their glasses, and walked off.
“Right, well actually, about that, there was something we needed to talk to you about,” Coach started. “You’ve both definitely got a seat on our team, but we were wondering if Mr. Lynch here would be so kind as to join as well,”
“No,” was all Ronan said.
“No?” Kevin asked,. Neil would’ve thought with the amount of times that Kevin had been said no to, he would have gotten used to it by now.
Ronan’s face solidifies into all angles and edges “Sorry if you expected me to come rushing over to play Exy for you because you think I'm pathetic or that I ‘need a second chance’s or whatever your sales pitch is, but I'm happy where I am, thanks,” there is an edge of sincerity to his words, but it is smothered by the condescension dropping from them.
“Ronan, at least hear them out,” Declan protested. This was obviously the wrong thing to say. Ronan’s head snapped, to look at Declan and his gaze turned to ice.
“You did this,”
“What? Ronan, that doesn’t make sense,”
“You chose the clips, there were a thousand damn clips, I wasn’t in most of them, and yet, who shows up in Nowheresville, Virginia, asking if I’ll join the top fucking team in the league,”
“Hey, your brother was the one who told us that you wouldn’t come with us, don't get mad at him, this was all just a big coincidence,” Coach tried
“The word coincidence means something different to you than it does to us,” Ronan spat. Neil noticed that Ronan included the rest of his group in the statement. He got up, and made to walk out.
I don't like that word Andrew spat somewhere in the depths of Neil’s mind don't use it. If that was how it was going to be, then Neil had an idea.
“I’ll make you a deal,” Neil said. Ronan stopped walking. Coach and Kevin looked at him like he had just grown a second head
“What?” Ronan still didn’t turn around.
“I’ll make you a deal, you know, when someone agrees to do something for another person in return for the other pers-,”
“I know what a deal is, I’m not an idiot,”
In the brief silence that followed, Neil looked at the rest of his posse. Gansey was looking at him, a calculating look in his eye, gone was the golden facade, and Neil knew it was purposeful this time “Good to know,”
“No,”
“You didn't even listen to what I said had to offer,” Neil protested
“I'm not coming, whatever you offer me. There's nothing you could offer me that would make me,”
“What's the deal?” This was a new voice, Henry. A soft smile was on his face, but it did little to offset the set of his shoulders and tilt of his head, he was curious.
“Oh fuck off Cheng,” Ronan growled venomously.
“Hear him out Ronan, you don’t have to take the deal,” a soft voice called. Parrish.
Ronan turned around and walked back to the table, and sat down with a slam. “What,”
You have my attention, now keep my interest. Neil thought. What was he going to offer this boy? He thought back to earlier in the evening and went out on a limb.
“Blue,”
“The maggot? What about her?”
“Did she apply to the school?”
“No,”
“We wanted her to, but she said it wasn’t up to her,” Cheng added helpfully.
“Play for us, and we’ll give her a shot,” Neil said. “It won’t be a free ride, but if she can prove her potential, it would a chance to be part of the foxes and attend PSU,”
“No,” Four voices said at once. All of the Henrietta boys. Neil guessed his limb was wrong.
“It’s not that we don’t appreciate the offer, but uh..,” Gansey, ever the gracious one, tried to make a point, but didn’t seem to know how to finish it.
“Right, we know you mean well, but it’s not.. um..,” Parrish, a little closer to the truth, but still not quite what they were trying to say.
“We just don’t think that, geez, how do we explain this?” Cheng, looking almost confused.
“The maggot doesn’t want your pity and neither do I so you can take your deal and shove it up your goddamn ass,” Ronan finished. Ah, okay, that was what they meant.
“Well you all had no problem answering for her,” Dan observed, looking a little ticked.
“Things like this have happened before, and unless it was absolutely necessary, the answer has always been the same,” Gansey told her.
“Fair enough,” Neil said.
Gansey, however was not ready to let the subject drop. “Ronan, could I speak with you for a second. They stood and left the table for a bit. Neil could still see them. Gansey said something to Ronan and Ronan responded and it soon blew up into a full-blown argument. Then Gansey said something that made Rona collapse in on himself. They trudged back in and sat down.
No one said anything.
Andrew and Blue walked in together, Andrew sat down. Blue went into the kitchens.
“You didn’t call me when the food got here,” He said
“I saved you some,” Neil stated.
Andrew grunted and shifted back in his chair.
“One year,” Ronan said.
“What?” Coach Wymack
“One year, that’s it, that’s how long I’ll play for you. As for after that, I’m not sure, if I like it, I’ll stay, okay?” Ronan glared at Gansey while saying all of this.
“Really? Just like that?” Dan asked “No strings attached?”
“Yeah,” Ronan grumbled.
“Well okay then,” Coach said, surprised.
Neil caught sight of Blue, standing by the door to the kitchens, looking like they had just taken away her last hope. Then she shook her head out of it and a more determined look crossed her face. She grabbed a pitcher of iced tea and walked to their table to refill their glasses. Andrew looked at her and his brow furrowed. Blue looked at him like "I know, I know, I’m going, give me a second". She put the pitcher down and took a deep breath.
“I want a chance to play for you too. I don’t expect an automatic entry in, but I do want a chance,” Blue said, her accent twanging off her words “Now I know this ain't exactly orthodox, but well, you see-,”
“Okay,” Coach says
“Yes but- wait what?”
“I said okay, if Mr. Lynch allows us to use the Aglionby Exy court,” Coach looks at Declan, who immediately nods.
“Headmaster Child owes me a favor,”
“Yeah, he owes you a few favors,” Ronan mumbled under his breath, and Parrish giggled.
“Ronan,” Gansey chides. Looking very much like a father scolding a child. Cheng draped his arms around Gansey’s neck and kissed his cheek.
“Calm down, Gansey-man, he jokes sometimes,” Henry whispered into Gansey’s jaw.
“Th-thank you sir,” Blue stutters, takes her pitcher and leaves.
///////////
A few states away a pager beeped five times in a white Mitsubishi outside a tuna sandwich shop that wasn't as good as the one in Henrietta. The driver looked at the pager and smiles.
“Well look at that, we've got all of them,” the driver says, and looks out the window. The sound of the kinks fills the car. There are three sandwiches in the passenger seat and the driver regards them.
Three not-as good-as-in-Henrietta sandwiches later, the driver turned around to the man gagged and tied up in the back of the car. “You get to see Blue again,” she said, Bronx accent swarming around them like smoke. “Ain't that nice Mr. Gray?”
The gray man glared at the driver.
“Now now, don't look like that,” a pause “actually, carry on, it's the most reaction I've gotten out of you all day. You don't like me talking about her, do you?”
The gray man's face smoothed out.
“Oh, that's no fun,” She reached over, removed his gag, and narrowly escaped having her fingers bitten off.
“You'll have to try better than that, Mr. Gray,”
“It was worth a try, no?” his voice was calm, it always was. It always had been.
“I'll give you that, you know, you're being awfully rude to the woman who's the only thing keeping you from being kidnapped and tortured by the dream mafia,”
“Really, that’s what you’re going with? You kidnapped and tortured me to keep me from being kidnapped and tortured,”
“Okay, you got me with the kidnapping thing, you’re right about that, but there has been no torture,” The girl denied adamantly.
“Any time tied up and gagged in the back of a car with no seatbelt while you’re driving can be considered torture,” He stated. She mulled it over and conceded.
“Alright, fair enough, I won’t put the gag back on, that way you can backseat drive,”
“Thank you,”
“You’re welcome,”
“So, South Carolina,”
“I wasn’t kidding, you will get to see those kids again,”
The gray man smiled at her, she recalled a time when her knees used to go weak at that smile, she remembered a time where she would kiss it off him. That time had long since passed, but her knees still went a bit quivery. Damn you legs, he’s taken now.
“One can hope,” he said.
They looked at the moon.
And that was the end of it.