Campus King | 18+

Chapter Fourteen

"Would you rather have mustard in everything you drink or tuna in everything you eat?"

I scrunched my nose — I hated both of those things with a passion.

"That's disgusting. Neither."

"Come on, you have to pick one."

"Then I'll go with the mustard one. I love food too much to ruin it with tuna."

Jason laughed and made a noise of agreement.

We were sitting on a park bench watching dogs and their owners run around while eating massive scoops of ice cream in sugar cones. These were already our second cones and we were both nearly done.

Last night I'd managed to convince my mom to let him spend the day with me. It took a lot of begging and emotional manipulation to get her to agree — but only if I promised to have him back by nine that evening. Which was fine; I wasn't planning on taking my sixteen-year-old brother to any parties or clubs, though I'm sure he'd love that.

This morning, when I'd surprised him with two tickets to go and watch the Knights play in Boulder, he'd lost his fucking mind. He'd run a celebratory lap around the house, yelling the entire time. Even my mom had cracked a smile at his excitement.

And so, for the whole of the day before the game, we'd chilled together. I took him to go have waffles for breakfast, a bucket of fried chicken and fries for brunch, burgers for lunch, and now we were eating ice-creams. And you bet we were still going to chow down on a lot more at the game. Our arteries had to be screaming, but we didn't care.

Together we watched as a small wiener dog chased a black Labrador around the park, only for the Labrador to turn around and tackle the smaller dog. They rolled, a blur of black and brown.

Jace's eyes were glued to the pair. "When I'm out of the house, I'm gonna get a dog. I don't care what type, I just want a dog."

My heart squeezed in my chest. "Yeah?"

He nodded and we both laughed as the smaller dog leaped in the air, yapping like a mad thing as the Labrador ran circles around it.

Our dad had gotten Jace a dog for his tenth birthday, but when the puppy chewed our mom's vintage dresser and broke a whole bunch of kitchenware by running into the table, she got rid of it. I could still hear my brother's heartbroken sobs as the new owners drove away with his best friend. I don't think I could ever forgive my mother for doing that to him.

"They are stinking cute." I grinned when the Labrador ran away from the rabid wiener dog chasing him and nipping at his heels.

We watched for a couple more minutes and then I looked down at my phone. The game started at six and it was currently fifteen to five. We had a pretty long drive ahead of us.

"We should get going, Champ."

He stood up and dusted off his clothes. He was wearing a dark blue shirt with a generic brand's logo on it. The important part was that the logo was silver because blue and silver were my college's colors. He might not have had any shirts from my college's football team, but he had the spirit. The only support they were gonna get from me was my dark blue skinny jeans and grey and black crop hoodie. The colors were close enough for me.