Chapter 105: What Is The Deal? [FIXED!][01/08!]
Darren tossed Liam a beer from the fridge and dropped onto the couch across from him, still riding the high of retelling the spar story for the second time that evening.
“I’m telling you,” Darren said, “Toyes came in hot. Thought he had me in the first thirty seconds.”
“But he didn’t.”
“He did not.” Darren grinned, cracking open his own can. “Man’s fast, I’ll give him that. But speed doesn’t mean anything if your cardio’s trash by round two.”
Liam shook his head, still somewhat in disbelief. “You haven’t fought in over a year, and you’re out here embarrassing guys who train every week.”
“Muscle memory doesn’t disappear, Liam. It just goes quiet.” Darren dragged.
“Apparently.” Liam admitted.
“You should’ve seen his face.” Darren laughed, shaking his head at the memory. “Dude looked personally offended.” Darren was genuinely excited.
“I bet.”
They sat with that for a moment, the easy silence of two people who didn’t need to fill every gap with words. Darren took a pull from his beer, and when he set it down, his expression had shifted—still relaxed, but something more deliberate underneath it.
“So,” he said. “Rachel.”
Liam glanced over. “What about her?”
“What’s actually going on there? Like—what’s the plan?”
Liam shrugged, leaning back into the couch. “She’s good company.”
“That’s it? Good company?” Darren questioned with a suspicious brow.
“That’s it.”
Darren studied him for a second, unconvinced. “Liam. Come on.”
“What?”
“You’re not usually this vague about anything. You plan your grocery runs, man. You had a five-year plan before you were twenty-five. And now you’re just—good company? That’s the whole answer?”
Liam took a sip of his drink, buying himself a second before answering. “It’s not that deep, Darren.”
“You sure about that?”
The question landed with more weight than Darren probably intended, and Liam felt himself hesitate. For half a second his mind drifted toward the case—the divorce documents, the section Rachel’s lawyer incompetence that nearly messed with her own divorce proceedings, the trust she’d placed in him when she’d shared parts of that experience. It wasn’t something he could bring up. Not because he didn’t trust Darren, but because it wasn’t his information to give away.
Rachel had told him things in confidence, and confidence meant something, even in the middle of whatever this thing between them actually was.
So he kept it to himself.
“I’m sure,” Liam said instead.
Darren didn’t look fully convinced, but he let it sit for a moment before shifting the conversation in a different direction entirely.
“She asked about you, by the way. Earlier, when I got back. Caught me on the stairs.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Wanted to know if you were up here, how long you were staying. The whole thing.”
Liam huffed a small laugh. “That’s not surprising.”
“No?”
“We’ve got a relationship, Darren. Even if it’s mostly—” he gestured vaguely, “—physical. It’s not that strange for her to ask.”
“Right.” Darren nodded slowly, but his jaw tightened slightly, like he was choosing his next words with more care than usual. “Look, I’m not trying to be weird about it. But you sure this is a good idea?”
Liam raised an eyebrow. “Is that why you’ve been sitting there looking like you swallowed something wrong?”
“I’m serious, man.”
“I can see that. Which is exactly what’s making me nervous.” Liam set his drink down. “Talk to me. What’s going on?”
Darren exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’ve heard some stuff. About her ex-husband. About what he was trying to do—during the divorce, after. Just… stuff that doesn’t line up with the version of her you probably know.”
Liam’s brow furrowed slightly. “What kind of stuff?”
“That she wasn’t exactly the victim in that split. That she was the one who made his life hell. Abusive, apparently—not physically, but in every other way you can be. And there’s talk she tried to take him for more than what was legally hers. Like actually tried to steal from the guy during the settlement.”
Liam sat with that for a second, turning it over. “Where’s this coming from?”
“Around. People in the building talk. Her ex used to live two floors up before all this—some of the older tenants remember him. Nobody’s got great things to say.”
“That’s a pretty specific accusation for secondhand building gossip.”
“I mean, I’m just telling you what I’ve heard.”
Liam frowned, genuinely thrown now. The picture Darren was painting didn’t match anything he’d experienced with her—not the woman who cooked for him, who’d been quietly grateful for small kindnesses, who carried herself with the kind of fragile uncertainty that didn’t read as calculated. “That doesn’t track with what I’ve seen.”
“People don’t always show you the same version they showed someone else.”
“Sure. But abusive? Trying to steal from her own husband during a divorce? That’s not a minor character flaw, Darren. That’s a specific kind of person.”
Darren shrugged, but there was something slightly less certain in it now. “I mean—that’s what I heard.”
“You heard, or you know?”
“…Heard.”
Liam narrowed his eyes slightly. “You sound a lot less sure of yourself than you did thirty seconds ago.”
“I mean, look, I’m not saying I’ve got a signed affidavit on it, alright? It’s just what people in the building say.”
“So this is secondhand information from tenants who probably don’t even know the full story, and you’re presenting it like established fact?”
Darren laughed a little, catching himself. “Okay, when you put it like that—”
“That’s how it actually happened, Darren.”
“Fine, fine.” Darren held up a hand, laughing outright now, some of the seriousness draining out of the room as quickly as it had entered. “I just—look, I care about you, man. I don’t want you walking into something without at least having both sides of it.”
Liam’s expression softened slightly, some of the tension leaving his shoulders. “I appreciate that. I do. But you’re basing a pretty serious accusation on hallway gossip.”
“You’re right. You’re right.” Darren shook his head, laughing at himself now, clearly registering how far the conversation had wandered from where he’d meant to take it. “I don’t even know why I brought it up like that. Guess I got in my head a little.”
“A little dramatic, maybe.”
“Hey, I calls it like I sees it. Or heard it. Whatever.”
Liam chuckled, shaking his head as he reached for his beer again. “Just don’t go starting rumors about my situationship based on secondhand tenant intel.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Darren said, grinning, already moving past it. “Anyway—you want that suit fitted before or after your dinner with Mrs. Harriet, because if it’s after, I’m telling you right now, that’s a bad look.”
“Before. Obviously.”
“Just checking.”
–
Mateo kept his head down as he walked toward his locker, the hallway noise blurring into background static the way it always did by third period.
School was the one place he never quite managed to relax into himself. Outside, with Liam, he could talk without measuring every word first. Here, he measured everything.
His weight made him a target before he’d said a single word most days. Soft through the middle, round-faced, the kind of build that read as an invitation to certain people the moment he walked into a room.
He spotted them before they spotted him. Three of them, clustered near the gym entrance—Cody, Bryce, and a third boy Mateo only knew by sight. Athletes. The kind who moved through the hallway like it belonged to them, because at this school, it mostly did.
“There he is,” Cody said, loud enough to make sure Mateo heard it. “Hey, big man.”
Mateo kept walking, eyes forward, the strategy that had worked more often than it hadn’t.
It didn’t work today.
Bryce cut into his path, not quite blocking him, just close enough to force a decision. “We were just talking about you, actually. Trying to figure out what sport you’d even be good at.”
“Sumo,” Cody offered. “Kid’s basically already got the frame for it.”
The third boy laughed, the kind of laugh that existed only to confirm the joke had landed.
Mateo said nothing. Silence had become its own kind of armor, imperfect but familiar.
“Nah, nah,” Bryce said, grinning. “Shot put. All that mass has gotta be good for something.”
“That tracks, actually.”
“Right? Natural build for it.”
Mateo felt his jaw tighten but kept his expression flat, unreadable, the same face he’d trained himself to wear for exactly this purpose. Reacting only ever made it last longer.
“C’mon, man, lighten up,” Cody said, stepping closer. “It’s a compliment. We’re finding you a sport. Being built like that’s gotta be good for something.”
That was when Owen appeared, cutting between them with the easy confidence of someone who’d done this before. “He’s not interested. Move along.”
Cody’s grin didn’t fade, but his eyes shifted toward Owen with mild reassessment. “Relax. We’re just talking.”
“You’re just talking a lot for someone who’s not saying anything interesting.”
There was a beat before Bryce laughed it off, clapping Cody on the shoulder.
“Whatever. He’s not even worth it.” They peeled away, already moving on to whatever came next in their orbit, the moment already forgotten by them the way it never was for Mateo.
Owen waited until they’d rounded the corner before turning to him. “You good?”
Mateo nodded, though the tightness in his chest hadn’t fully released yet.
“They’re idiots,” Owen said. “Don’t let it get to you.”
It hadn’t escalated past words yet. Mateo understood, in the quiet part of his mind that tracked these things carefully, that it eventually would.