Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 116254 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 581(@200wpm)___ 465(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 116254 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 581(@200wpm)___ 465(@250wpm)___ 388(@300wpm)
“It’s important to me.”
“Why? Why’s she gotta go to this? Can’t you take her to movie or—”
“He’s a guy.”
His dad stilled. “What?”
Breck’s heart sped up. “The person I met,” he stated directly. “He’s not a girl.”
Silence lingered as his parents swapped looks, his mom having paused with the ham and cheese to eye Breck curiously, too.
“What exactly are you saying?” his dad finally asked. “That you wanna bring a friend?”
“No. That I’m dating a man.” He held their gazes. “And I like him a lot.”
More silence. Again, his parents swapped glances, his dad looking way more rigid now and his mother perplexed. Both of them, however, looked equally thrown for a loop.
Jaw tight, his dad regarded him. “So, you’re telling us you’re gay.” His voice was cool, controlled, and yet his demeanor gave him woefully away.
Breck’s hands went clammy. He shifted his weight. “Well, technically I’m bi.”
“Since when!” his dad exploded, arms flying up. There went his cool.
“Ben, relax,” Breck’s mom interjected. “Let’s just figure this out.”
His dad’s jaw muscle ticked, eyes locked with Breck’s. “Fine. You like both genders. But now you’re dating a man.”
Breck’s heart raced faster, his stomach twisting. “Yes.”
His dad just stood there, palpably wrapping his brain around every aspect of Breck’s words.
Was he disappointed? Angry? Disgusted?
Finally, he muttered tightly under his breath, “And you want to take him with you to Draft Night. As your date.”
Breck’s throat constricted. “Yes,” he rasped.
“For the love of God, why?” his dad all but bellowed. “Of all the fucking places—”
“Ben!”
“Because I want it out in the open! I don’t want to hide who I am anymore!”
“But Draft Night?! That’s the worst possible place!”
“No! That’s the best possible place!” Breck countered passionately. “It has to be there! I don’t want to be signed by a team that’s run by bigots! This is my career! I’ll be in it for years! I don’t wanna have to pretend I’m something I’m not for my whole fucking life!”
“You won’t have to, Breck, because you won’t get signed!”
“Ben, calm down.”
“You don’t know that,” Breck insisted. “It’s the twenty-first century. Gay athletes get picked up all the time. It’s no big deal.”
“That’s not true.” His dad shook his head adamantly. “They come out after they’ve been signed, Breck. Because they know it’d never happen otherwise.”
Surely, that couldn’t be right. But even if it was, Breck couldn’t bear doing the same. Aside from the notion of prolonging the torment, it felt deceitful. Dishonest. Like selling a lie. A fabricated image of what others wanted, rather than who he was.
He stood his ground. “No. I need to be me.”
“But you’ve worked so hard,” his dad vehemently reasoned. “You’ll be throwing it all away! All those years of practicing day and night. All your efforts will have been for nothing if you go down this path.”
“I don’t believe that.” Breck lifted his chin. “I refuse to believe that.”
His dad groaned a curse and dragged a hand down his face.
Breck’s heart clenched. He frowned. “Do you love me, Dad?”
His father paused. Then frowned as well. “Of course I love you. Don’t you see? All these years, everything I’ve done. It’s been for you. To make sure you get the life you want. To make sure you’re happy.”
“Are you sure it’s not you you want happy, Dad? That all of this hasn’t been to get what you want out of life?” His dad stiffened and opened his mouth, but Breck kept going. “Because what you’re asking of me won’t make me happy. And it sure as hell isn’t what I want. I don’t want to pretend. I want to be me. Not some poster-perfect athlete that doesn’t exist. If I can’t be who I am in the NBA, then maybe I don’t want to be part of that club. I mean, I sure as hell don’t support discrimination. And if fame and fortune won’t allow me to be happy, then what’s the point?”
His dad exhaled and gripped his hips. Shook his head. “I can’t believe this.”
Breck’s chest squeezed. “Shouldn’t you of all people understand? When you were dating Mom, you were in a similar boat. Back then, interracial relationships weren’t exactly smiled upon.”
His parents exchanged a look of bleak remembrance.
“The world was much crueler then.” His mom nodded with a sigh.
“But did you care?” Breck asked his dad. “Did you give Mom up because the world around you didn’t approve?”
His dad peered back at his wife with heavy-hearted eyes.
“No,” Breck’s mom answered for him. “He didn’t give me up.” Her tone sounded suspiciously sad. “But in doing so, Breck, your father did pay a very high price.”
Breck frowned, not understanding. “What do you mean?”
His parents traded yet another unhappy look.
“Just like you, your father was an incredible basketball player. One of the very best in both high school and college. But back then… as you said, society wasn’t as accepting… and when the Draft came… because of our relationship… he didn’t get signed.”