It felt a bit redundant to visit the photography club when I planned on quitting the second Zoey came back, but as Jaz’s friend I couldn’t just leave her out to dry after everything. At the very least, we needed to give her time to find replacement club members so that they wouldn’t get in trouble with the school. In any case, now that I was here, I sat alongside, or rather, between my two friends Lance and Naomi, who seemed to want nothing to do with one another.

  “You two really love fighting, don’t you?” I sighed.

  “Maybe if Naomi wouldn’t be such a pouty baby, then we could talk about things like adults,” Lance said. “But she won’t even admit that there’s anything wrong.”

  “There isn’t, though? Why are you making such a big deal out of it?”

  “Because YOU’RE making a big deal out of it.”

  It’s not that I didn’t blame Naomi for getting the wrong idea, but if she just spoke about it then I’m sure things could be resolved peacefully. After all, Jaz aside, I have no doubt that Lance isn’t interested in Jaz in the least.

  “Um, guys… is it cool if I start the meeting? Or like, do you need a minute…?”

  “Just go ahead,” I said, with a resigned smile.

  Jaz shifted her gaze along the three people seated at the couch and nodded. My anxious grin had apparently rubbed off on her as she eventually decided to just press forward.

  “So, I’ve been waiting to talk about this when we’re all here, but it seems like Zoey won’t be coming today either, so I’ll just let you all know now. The truth is, we were contacted by the film club of Peach Gardens High in Atlanta. Their basketball team is our school’s opening game in the season next week, and they’re interested in shooting a mini documentary with us on the game.”

  “A documentary…?” I asked.

  Jaz nodded. “Apparently, they were impressed with our short film so they were interested in collaborating. They actually ended up contacting us about this through Gwen.”

  When I heard her name, my heart pounded against my ribcage with the thunderous force of a tidal wave crashing against a wall.

  “Oh right, I forgot to tell you about that, Trist.” Lance said, taking a bit of his sandwich. “Wonder what she thought about my crazy acting?”

  “Your acting wasn’t that good,” Naomi said.

  “Wha- you take that back!”

  “Guys, let’s focus here! The game is next Tuesday. We gotta get this sorted out.”

  The two of them pouted and went back to staring off in different directions. When had things gotten like this? I feel like they were hanging out just fine yesterday, so what changed?

  “Anyway,” Jaz continued. “They’ll be coming over with the basketball team, and Gwen’s gonna be tagging along with them for the game. We’re going to be handling the post-match interviews with our own players and the editing whenever Zoey gets back, but they’ll be doing most of the shooting on the day of the actual match.”

  “Do they know about it?” I asked. “Our basketball team, I mean.”

  Jaz shook her head. “I thought I’d tell you guys first.”

  “Oh what the hell, so not only am I not acting but we don’t have to do anything,” Lance said.

  “Well, I’m thinking of having you do the interviews. Gwen agreed to writing the questions since she’s familiar with both schools, so you won’t have to do much. Just… be friendly, okay?”

  “Why would you have him do it if that’s what you needed?

  Naomi asked. “Wouldn’t literally anyone else be better?”

  Jaz scratched her cheek. “Ahaha, well I don’t know. I feel like guys would feel more comfortable being interviewed by other guys, I guess?”

  “I guess…”

  “What, first I can’t act now I can’t interview?”

  She shrugged, and Lance took another bite of his sandwich in frustration.

  “Ah hey, you’ve got crumbs on your face again. Stop eating like such a pig.” Jaz sighed and leaned forward to wipe them off with a napkin she’d produced from her jeans pocket.

  “Huh? It’s fine. I can get it myself.”

  “You don’t though, that’s the problem. And it bothers me when you don't, so let me get rid of it.”

  “Whatever man, just quit complaining about it if you’re gonna do it anyway.”

  I had to admit, the sight was so strange that even I was taken aback.

  And if I thought that, then it made sense that Naomi’s face was as hard as a rock when I turned to look at her.

  Her eyes, facing her legs, were wide as a full moon.

  Her hands were clenched into fists.

  She was holding it in.

  The distress she felt at the situation.

  She was definitely holding it in.

  But why? Why couldn’t she just say something about it?

  Why couldn’t she be upfront about how uncomfortable this made her?

  “You’ve still got some over here too,” Jaz said, reaching over again with the napkin.

  “Hey Lance, come outside for a second.”

  The voice did not come from Naomi.

  No, it was my own voice.

  I hadn’t even realized that I’d said it, but it appeared that I was fine with slicing through the atmosphere in the clubroom for the sake of Naomi, who was quietly shouldering her own darkness alone.

  “Huh? Now?” he asked.

  “Now.” I stood up.

  “Huh? Uh, sure man. Here, let’s go.”

  The two of us took to the outside of the photography club, where I sighed and leaned back against the wall. I couldn’t believe that Lance was so daft even though he was supposedly the one with more experience than me.

  “What man? What’s up?” he asked.

  “Naomi’s jealous of how you and Jaz get along,” I blurted out.

  “What?” He scoffed. “What the fuck? No she’s not. She said she never gets jealous.”

  “She said that?” I asked.

  “Yeah. When we dated years ago she was fine with me talking to other girls and everything. And she was fine with the thing yesterday too. She doesn’t care about stuff like that. It’s all bullshit.”

  “I dunno Lance, it all just seems kind of…”

  “Kind of what?”

  “Like you get along with Jaz better than with Naomi right now.”

  Lance raised an eyebrow, giving me a sort of concerned look “Really?”

  “Really, really. I’d be weirded out too if I were her. Especially after that selfie you took last week.”

  “That was… you know. I just wanted to…”

  “Make her jealous?”

  Lance sighed. “Okay fine, I get your point. I don’t know how I’m supposed to fix this, but I get your point.”

  In a rare show of vulnerability, Lance removed his hat and leaned against the wall with me, hands hanging limp. The bangs of his brown hair fell down to his face as he let out a silent sigh.

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  “You’ve been a lifesaver for us this past week. You know that, right Trist?”

  “Uh… are you okay? You’re being weird right now.”

  “Shut up, man.” He placed his free hand on his eyes. “Just let me say what I need to say.”

  Lance was being unusually vulnerable. I had to be honest; it was beginning to make me somewhat uncomfortable after years of his nonchalance and bravado. But I decided to suck it up.

  “Sorry, man.”

  “No, it’s fine. It’s just… Yeah, I can’t read people as well as I thought. I’m not some relationship expert just because I happened to date Naomi. I just… I thought I could be someone you looked up to, I guess. Someone like a role model or something? But with how much you’ve been helping me lately, I just feel like a fucking dumbass for even thinking that.”

  “You’re not.”

  “Yeah? I haven’t gotten anything right, man. It’s okay. I’m not upset about it. In fact I think I’m kinda accepting it now.”

  A self-aware Lance was a terrifying thought, but I hoped that these thoughts he was having wouldn’t change him too much. After all, Lance wouldn’t be Lance unless he spouted whatever it was that came to his head.

  “Thanks for telling me this,” I said. Being this open couldn’t have been easy for him, but I liked that he felt safe talking like this to me. “You have something that not a lot of people have, man. So believe it or not, I still look up to you. I admire how free and open you are.”

  He looked up at the ceiling, then rubbed his face with both palms, breathing in heavily. Once he was done, he sighed and stared back at the empty hallway to our right.

  “Aw man, this sucks. Just one week with Lawrence and you understand people so much better than I do.”

  “Lawrence?”

  “Yeah, dude. Guy’s the pussy whisperer. I’m surprised you learned from him this quickly though. Why can’t you apply some of that willingness to Dota, huh?”

  “Don’t call him the pussy whisperer, man.”

  “What? He is, though?”

  I supposed that it made sense. To him, that’s the only variable that could have caused this change in me. If I told him that I’ve lived multiple lifetimes worth of experiences within the past month, he’d probably start checking my head for bruises.

  “Haaa… alright, let’s head back in. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do right now, but I’ll figure it out. It’s better than not knowing. Thanks Trist.”

  I looked up, and found his fist hovering above my head.

  “No problem, dude.” I met his fist with my own.

  “But still, I don’t really have any motivation for this new movie we’re making. Like who’s gonna enjoy this? What’s even the point of making it?”

  “What’s the… point?”

  “Yeah, it’s just a random game at the start of the season. I don’t really see how there’s going to be like an interesting story here. Are our schools even rivals? What do we have to go with here? It just feels forced, y’know?”

  A story?

  Isn’t there a huge storyline concerning our basketball team right now?

  And… and wouldn’t conveying that storyline be a good chance to let everything get fixed up neatly?

  “Man, oh well. It’s not really our problem since we’ll be quitting soon, right?” As he circled over to head back to the door, he paused for a moment and looked down at me. “You coming?”

  “Huh?” I was so lost in thought that I was caught off guard by his question. “Um, I think I'll let the basketball club know privately before Jaz does. There’s something I need to confirm with them.”

  “Oh? Oh, oh right. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Alright man, you do that. Tell Lawrence he can eat shit for me. I’ll keep your seat nice and warm for you, alright?”

  “No, you don’t need to do that.”

  “Too bad.”

  The door to my side had closed shut just as quickly as it had opened, and my friend Lance was no doubt already inside, doing his best to rectify the situation with him and Naomi in a way that only Lance could. As much as I’d like to look over him and make sure he doesn’t mess it up too much, there was something I needed to talk to Lawrence about the idea I had just come up with.

  It had only taken me about three minutes to walk all the way to the school gym where the squeaking of sneakers and the thuds of the basketball against the polished floor were king and queen. I found Warren and an underclassman playing a two on two match with Lawrence and another underclassman.

  I didn’t want to disturb their game, so I walked off to the side and took a seat near the bleachers on the bench. From the two points I watched, it appeared that, while Lawrence was the more fundamentally consistent player, Warren’s ability to steal and move around the court gave him an edge, especially in a two-on-two situation where it was easy enough to get underneath the basket to score layups. It appeared that his weakness didn’t mean much in matches involving less players.

  “Ahh, damn. You know all my habits. This isn’t fair at all,” Lawrence said with a resigned smile.

  “Sorry.”

  “No, don’t apologize man, I’m complimenting you. Playing you makes me think more. It’s good practice. Especially when I’m on defense. The way you pull away for a screen always catches me off guard.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah? That’s all you can say?” Lawrence slapped his back playfully. “Have a little more pride in yourself, huh?”

  As he said the words, he finally looked my way and realized that I had come to visit his little corner of Deer Valley High.

  “Woah, Tris. This is a surprise. What’s up, man?”

  He headed my way, wiping the sweat on his face off with his jersey.

  “Oh, hey. That looked like a good game.”

  “Yeah right, don’t lie to my face. We got thrashed.”

  “Yeah, you did,” I said.

  Lawrence looked like what I said had upset him, but sucked it up and sighed instead, falling back onto the bench next to me.

  “So what’s up? You just come to hang out? Oh, did you finally quit the photography club?”

  I shook my head. “Nah, not until Zoey’s back.”

  “Zoey, huh?” He stroked his chin. “I’ve been terrified of seeing her, so I’ve felt nothing but relief knowing that she hadn’t come to school for the past two days. But now that I think about it, it really is weird, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. “All we know is that she’s alive. Apparently she followed Lance on Instagram last night.”

  “Hmm…” He pondered for a moment longer, then sighed. “Okay, so if this visit’s not about our mutual friend, then what is it?”

  “It’s about the photography club’s next project.”

  Lawrence furrowed his brows.

  “Uh… like what, taking pictures at the game next week? What about it?”

  “No, not that. It’s about the other school. Peach Gardens High’s film club saw the short we made and they wanted to work on a joint project with our photography club. And the subject is a documentary highlighting the match between our two schools.”

  “A documentary?”

  I nodded. “There’s going to be player interviews and all that after the game, so I thought I’d let you know.”

  Lawrence leaned back and sighed. “Maaaaan, we are not at the level where we should be doing press shit right now.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Of course not, man. Without Benjamin our team’s in deep shit. Warren and I are the only senior year starters. We have a decent junior, but the two sophomore players, bless their hearts, really aren’t experienced enough to be able to fill the hole Ben left.”

  I looked over at his team. “Do you think you guys’ll finish the season off strong?”

  “I don’t know. And it’s our last year so recruiters are going to be eyeing our performances with more scrutiny than before, so our college ball chances are riding on this.”

  “I had no idea you wanted to play college basketball,” I said. “I thought you played just for Laura.”

  Lawrence shrugged. “I mean, I’ll take the scholarship. And besides, I like the game. I probably won’t be able to compete with the absolute freaks that I’ll be up against in college, but I’ll try my absolute best. And if I don’t cut it, then I can at least keep the bench warm and ride the cash to lessen the burden on my family.”

  “I can see why you’d want it then,” I said.

  “Naturally. I’ve been thinking about my future for a long time. Of course, Ben getting barred from playing kinda threw everything for a loop. I wish he would’ve thought about how he would be affecting everyone when he did what he did. He’s really lucky the school hasn’t expelled him between that and the mall incident.”

  Pangs of guilt bludgeoned my chest without remorse. The rippling consequences of my actions were beyond what I possibly could have imagined when I came up with the plan involving Ben. It wasn’t only that I had ruined homecoming for everyone, it wasn’t only that I’d ruined his future. No, it affected the entire basketball team, and the school’s reputation at large.

  “Sorry man, I’m sure it’d be fun, but I don’t think our team’s in any state to handle press right now.”

  I understood where he was coming from. If the photography club wasn’t in its best state, it would be weird for people to sit in on our filming process. But the truth is, that was exactly why I came here in the first place.

  “Isn’t this the perfect time to do press stuff?”

  “Huh?” Lawrence looked at me in surprise. “You’re joking, right? I just told you; we’re a mess.”

  “I think this would be the perfect opportunity to redeem Ben in the eyes of everyone, don’t you think?”

  “Redeem… really dude? He hasn’t even redeemed himself to his friends. How’s he supposed to redeem himself to everyone?”

  “I don’t know.”

  My flat words gave Lawrence no hope. He only ended up staring at me with a twisted, confused expression.

  “I don’t know,” I continued. “But that’s just the reality of what this is. I’ve thought about it a lot. For a long time. But there’s nothing we can do to help Ben. The only way for him to change is if he decides that he himself wants to change. And I think that, if you’re his friend, then the least you can do is provide him with a chance to prove that he’s willing to change.”

  “Easier said than done after everything… Dude is barred from playing. How is he supposed to…”

  “Do you know what I hated the most about Ben?” I interrupted. “More than how he treats me, more than how he treated Zoey, more than how he treated Gwen?”

  Lawrence’s mouth, which had been opened mid conversation, slowly shut.

  “It’s that, even if Zoey had rejected him, there was still something in his life he could fall back to. His life was full. He had a goal. He had ambition. He had something he loved even if his love for Zoey didn’t end up going anywhere.”

  That’s why, deep down, I felt joy when I ripped that ambition away from his life. Why my plan had involved sabotaging the game and ruining his career. I hated that he was the main actor of his own amazing film. And it felt like he knew as much.

  “But what was left of my envy kind of crumbled away when he spoke to me yesterday… I realized just how much he’d been ruined since the homecoming game. And it just reaffirmed my desire to fix this.”

  “Why, Tristan?” He looked down. “Why do you want to fix this so bad? This is crazy, man. After everything? Are you just that good of a person?”

  No Lawrence, I thought. It’s because it’s my fault, not his. It’s because I’m that bad of a person. Because using underhanded methods like these are the only way I can think to alleviate my guilt. To use this power for good, to mend the wrong I’ve done. The wrongs I’ve done to Ben, to Gwen, Laura, and everyone else I’ve hurt thanks to Zoey and myself.

  Yes, there’s no point in blaming her.

  I’m the one who’s responsible for my own actions.

  I’ll handle it,” I said, standing up. “Just be sure to welcome him when he plays with you guys on Tuesday.”

  I was determined. Just like with helping Laura, I wanted to help Ben. I wanted to mend the things I broke and make the world better.