How to Steal a Happy Ending

•thirty one• But every heist needs a wild card.

  "I am the killer of the sun,
   Just a glimpse of what I have become." 

       -Pressure, Youngblood Hawke.

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Eventually, Danny's gaze followed my open mouthed fascination to reach the interruption to tonight's scheduled downpour. "One of Nate's friends?" he asked, more out of curiosity than anything else. It made sense, Danny was already out of high school when it happened.

"Yeah, something like that." I made towards the approaching figure, meeting him halfway on the crowded driveway. We stood there sort of awkwardly, between the sports car Danny drove in from college and my mom's not so flashy Honda Civic.

The golden splay of the streetlight behind him colored his hair copper, but held the rest of the details shrouded. It didn't matter though. I didn't need them anyway; Vincent wore so much aftershave that you could smell him coming from a mile away. Besides, I think the heart has some sort of a tracking system, keeping a constant tab on the location of all the things that've gotten on its bad side.

I wanted to wait for him to speak first, but I knew I'd be waiting an eternity for it. Instead, I stabbed the air with an attempt at normal conversation. "I feel like I'm seeing you everywhere." I raised an eyebrow, "Are you stalking me?"

"Umm, no? Nate's on my team and we've got a game tomorrow. Wait...this is his house right?" He asked with little to no humor in the tone.

"Yeah, dude I was just kidding." Still, I could see his eyebrow knit together in confusion. "Whatever, forget it. Nate's not here by the way. So...yeah."

He groaned at the news, a curse close at its heels. "Are you sure? Because I really need to talk to him."

"Vince, why would I lie?"

"Look, the guy's not answering his phone. He's bailed on practice all week. AND we've changed the lineup. I mean, how the hell does he think we'll win against Brentwood if he keeps acting like a faggot? It's like he doesn't give a shit about this. All the other guys are busting their balls. But this kid thinks he can get away with being a lazy mother f-"

"Okay, okay. I get it," I cut him off before Danny could catch wind of his rant and punctuate it with a fist down the guy's throat. Nonetheless if what Vince was saying was true, his freak out was totally justified. 

Whenever we're up against Brentwood, be it football or a debate, people in this town take it way too seriously for it to just be a friendly competition. If they lost the game tomorrow, as the captain ,Vince would get the rap for it. 

"But I swear, I have no idea where Nate is. By the time my mom and I got here, he already left with James. I haven't seen him all day."

But clearly I said the wrong thing because, right then his face became rigid. "With James, huh?"

Vince was the kind of person to seethe and rage, not flow with anger and act. Besides, if he was really bent on it, he had others to do the dirty work for him. The guy's never been in a fight beyond the grassy green of the football field. But with the way he said James' name, you could tell that he wouldn't mind making an exception.  

And then, with a scoff hidden as a laugh, he added more to himself than to me. "Of course it's him." 

"If you see Nate, tell him he's off the team. Him and James can go screw themselves." Vince turned to leave with a stiff shoulders and a pair of clenched fists. In those few seconds, I didn't see the guy that tried to decimate my popularity. The guy I swore I would hate for the rest of eternity.