Finally Free -- JATP Luke x MaleOC

Chapter 56

So sorry for the delay on this chapter, but now that all my exams are over and summer vacation has nearly begun, I promise there will be some more regular updates until we're done with season one!

When Flynn had arrived at the Molina house, she passed by Jay's stagnant form in the living room. She had called out to him, asking if he was okay, but he was mostly unresponsive, only giving a nod and a shrug to answer her questions.

Jay's glass of water sat on the table in front of him, half-empty. Or maybe it was half full, he wasn't quite sure where his mental state was at the moment. After the events of the past month, he hadn't really taken any time for himself. He hadn't taken time to just relax, though granted they were running out of time. The boys were ticking time bombs and he had no idea when they would explode. He needed to get them a show at the Orpheum as soon as he could.

Jay shook his head and groaned, falling back against the couch. Luke said he needed to learn to be more selfish and Jay was starting to believe he was right. Jay gave so much of himself to the others that he barely had anything left for himself.

"Jay?"

Jay's head perked up at Carlos's voice. He was decked out in his baseball gear, cap and all. Ray wasn't anywhere to be seen, but Jay could hear his footsteps faintly.

"Hey Carlos," Jay greeted, putting on a confident front on instinct as he came up and leaned forward towards Carlos. "What's up? Just got back from practice?"

"Yeah," Carlos nodded, eyeing Jay. "You alright?"

"Yeah," Jay answered, a small scoff escaping him. "Why wouldn't I be?"

Jay wanted to facepalm. Asking that question was essentially confirming that there was, in fact, something wrong and that he wasn't alright.

"Okay," Carlos said, though his tone clearly indicated that he didn't believe the elder boy. "You wanna hear what happened at practice today?"

Jay shrugged and motioned for Carlos to go ahead with his story. Carlos took a seat on the couch next to Jay, taking his bag off of his shoulder and leaning it against the table in front of them.

Carlos was excitedly running through the events of his practice that day and Jay listened intently, though he really knew very little about baseball. There were specific terms that were lost on him, but he could figure out a vague definition of those words just off of Carlos's retelling of events.

"-so Coach got pretty mad at me, but it was an accident, y'know?" Carlos concluded. "I mean, it probably hurt a lot, but we were all laughing about it."

"That's really the only thing you can do in that situation," Jay said with a small chuckle. "But how in the world did you hit him down there?"

"I dunno, I just missed."

"Jay?"

Jay and Carlos both looked up to see Julie and Flynn carefully approaching them, though Flynn made sure to stay behind Julie.

"Can I talk to you?" Julie asked, eyeing Carlos. "Alone?"

"But I was telling him about practice," Carlos whined, though he still stood, swung his bag over his shoulder, and began to walk away.

"We'll keep talking later," Jay called out to Carlos before he left the living room. Carlos gave a thumbs up to Jay in response, though he didn't look back as he went up the stairs.

"So, what's up?" Jay asked, his tone having shifted significantly from his earlier conversation with Carlos.

"I wanted to say I'm sorry," Julie said carefully. "About earlier."