“Yeah, he’s got Hollywood calling. Yo, do you think you could get me Addison Rae’s number? She’s so hot.” Scott imitates a puppy trailing after a bone.
Gannon makes a what the fuck face. “Uh, no. I’d never subject Addison to that.”
“But you’re on a first name basis?” Wesley perks up. “Next time you go to a cool party, can I come?”
I sigh and pinch the bridge of my nose, knowing I should never have tested this out with these idiots. “Hello! Can we focus please?”
All three turn to me, and Scott salutes. “Yes, drill sergeant!”
I roll my eyes at him and aim a ball at his head, which he catches deftly.
“Okay, it’s called the Dragon’s Nest. There are balls inside this square of cones, and three people guarding them called Nest Watchers. The rest of the kids are dragons, marked by wearing gym pinnies as ‘tails.’ The objective is to get an egg out of the nest, and back to your own nest. But the Watchers can ‘tag’ you by taking out your pinnie, at which time you have to retreat to your nest until you get your tail back on. You can’t be tagged inside your nest or the large nest, so it’s possible you could get trapped in the big nest if a Watcher is tracking you and not letting you leave.”
“You’ve said nest too many times for me to understand,” Scott complains.
Gannon is on his phone, taking an Instagram story of all of this. “I’m so going to win this game.”
“These two idiots are definitely going down.” Wesley chuckles quietly next to me.
I sigh, my patience wearing thin. “The game goes on for twenty minutes, but for the sake of this circus, I’ll only set the timer for five. Once time runs out, we see who has the most eggs in their nest, including the Watchers, and that is who wins.”
“What do we get for winning? Come on, those kids probably get a prize,” Scott laments.
“Those kids get an A in gym class. Is that what you want?” I shake my head like he’s the stupidest person alive.
“If this could get me an A in my integrated marketing solutions class, I’d take it.” Gannon smirks.
“All right, let’s just do this. Gannon, you’re the Watcher. You two, these are your nests and pinnies.”
When they’re all set with their “tails” and lined up, crouched and ready to go, I blow the whistle.
The guys take off like rabid dogs, jarring at each other and trying to steal the eggs out of all kinds of places. Gannon tackles Scott to the ground with a loud oomph, and I realize my students won’t be this violent. Hopefully. Scott pilfers an egg out of Gannon’s nest, then grabs one from Wesley’s on the side and brings them both back to his to guard. He takes a break, letting Wesley and Gannon fight it out. The two are trying to trip each other before Wesley fakes Gannon out to grab one of his eggs, but Gannon grabs his pinnie tail.
Wesley pulls out his phone and starts texting as he stands at his nest, not even attempting to put the tail back in.
“What’re you doing?!” I’m incredulous.
“This girl I hooked up with last week is sexting me. Have to answer, dude.” He looks at me like I’m the crazy one.
I make a note that each student should have no more than twenty seconds to get back to their own nest and put their tail on, because I could see the kids getting sidetracked.
The game goes on for a couple more minutes, and I’m surprised these guys haven’t broken a bone between them with how hard they’re going at each other. By the end, they’re just boxing each other rather than going for the eggs.
I call it early. “Ugh, enough. You guys aren’t even playing the game!”
“You should have just done it yourself. You always look out for what you want.” Gannon makes the comment totally offhand, but it hits differently.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I’m hesitant to ask.
“You’re kind of a selfish guy, Cal.” Scott says this is as if it’s just a common fact we all know.
“No, I’m not,” I disagree, shaking my head while I go to retrieve the cones that marked the middle nest.
“Are you going to go out with that girl again? The one you introduced to no one.” Scott looks skeptical.
I grab another ball and shoot it into the garbage can that doubles as a collection bucket for the equipment in here. “Probably not. I don’t know. Dating is weird. And I didn’t feel much. She texted me but I haven’t texted her back.”
“See what I mean,” Gannon points out, but I don’t see what he means.
My hands fly up in outrage. “And what is that supposed to mean?”
“It means that you had your first date in years, brought her back to our party, and then dismissed her without even talking to any of us. Not to mention you moved out of the house and barely spoke to us for almost two years. You do what you want to do most of the time without regard for anyone.”
The room is so silent, I think I could hear an ant fart.
“Holy shit, I think that’s the most rational, serious thing I’ve heard you say in the entire time I’ve been friends with you.”
Scott brushes his shoulder off. “You all think I’m a moron, but I sit back and watch everything go down. You want good advice? I’m waiting. I’ll fix your life up before you can even sneeze properly, and you’ll thank me, too.”
My jaw is on the floor. “Who are you?”
“I’m like the Dr. Phil of this campus, it’s just nobody knows it.” He points at me. “But back to you, stop blaming so much of your breakup on Bevan. Yes, she’s a fucked-up chick and we all know it. But you weren’t Mr. Perfect. I seem to remember many nights of jealousy and unnecessary fights due to your selfishness. And with this new girl … she texted you, what? Days ago. And you couldn’t even give her the courtesy to let her know you’re not interested?”
The mention of Bevan has my stomach dipping with hot shame. It’s scary how accurately Scott is pinning me right now, and I’m both freaked out and pissed off.
“As if I’m the first guy in college to ghost a girl or leave her hanging for a few days.” I roll my eyes.
“You’re not, but you like to think you’re this stand-up gentleman when, really, you have the same problems as the rest of us. Respect this girl and let her off the hook. And if you’re at all respectful of Bevan, you’ll stop treating her like she’s Satan. She’s flawed, yes, but she’s still a good person. You’re acting like a weirdo in the house, and it’s almost worse than when you guys were fighting all the time.”
“Shit.” I look to the side, worrying my lip. “I know it’s been weird. I just don’t know how to act around her.”
“Because you still love her?” Gannon quips.
Just like Gretchen’s question the other night, not touching that one with a ten-foot pole.
The guys help me clean up the rest of the equipment, and then I take them to the dining hall for ice creams on me. We’re too old to have meal plans, since we live off campus, but they get the ice cream in here from a real creamery near campus and it’s worth paying for a one-day pass to eat as much as we can.
A selfish guy wouldn’t pay for his friend’s ice cream, right? I can’t be that bad.