Heart and Soul - Chapter 55: Chapter 55

Neither of Johnny's bullies showed up to school on Friday. Over the weekend, Carter even forgot about them. On Monday, he only remembered when he saw Chaz Wheeler cross the cafeteria alone, heading for the football team's lunch table.
"Anyone know what happened after Principal Trevino called you all to his office?" Lauren asked.
After Carter's little stunt the week before, there had been some slight changes on the sitting arrangements during lunch period. Carter and his friends no longer sat with the other football players and cheerleaders. Bella, Lauren and Roy didn't sit in a small corner table either. And, most notoriously, Johnny wasn't eating in the library. At least, not that day. Carter had asked him to sit with them, and he did.
They did leave the dumpster table for Frankie's group of self-appointed rejects, though.
"I heard their parents were called in and they got suspended," Jenna said, lifting her eyes from her phone briefly.
"Clearly not," Bella muttered sourly, directly across from Jen.
Sitting directly to Bella's right, Carter followed her line of sight to lay eyes on Wheeler. Chaz was already looking his way, but he averted his eyes immediately, as soon as he saw Carter look at him.
"He only got a day's suspension," Joey said, in front of Carter. "Gonzalez and Meyers got three. They won't be back till Wednesday."
Carter glanced at Johnny, to his right, before turning to Joey.
"How do you know that?"
Joey shrugged. "Wheeler told me."
"They should've all been expelled," Bella said.
"The principal didn't want to do that, since it's so close to the end of the year," Joey explained. "They're all still graduating, but Coach kicked them out of the team. He was pretty firm about that."
He glanced at Johnny, who was still yet to meet anybody's gaze. Of course his own dad would demand some form of justice.
"What is that going to do?" Roy asked, to Joey's left, with Lauren by his side. "The season has been over for a while."
"I'm guessing it's mostly a formality. But not without consequences. They had football scholarships for college next year," Mel pointed out, next to Jenna.
"Yeah, I hear USC already pulled their offer," Joey told them. "Bobby's still waiting to hear from Notre Dame, but it's not looking good."
"What about Chaz?" Bella asked.
"His father is a Princeton alum and his mom went to Yale," Seth said, next to his girlfriend. "Legacies don't need football scholarships."
"So he gets away with basically nothing?" Bella asked. "Why was his suspension shorter?"
"Because I told Principal Trevino he never actually did much," Johnny spoke up for the first time. He shrugged as everyone looked at him. "He was mostly just a witness. Quiet and useless."
"Which is still not okay," Lauren stated.
"His biggest punishment is that he'll need to get a personality now, to find new friends," Seth mused.
"Meow," Jenna teased, putting her phone down at last.
"That's mean," Mel said.
Jenna grinned. "Kinda true, though."
"He'll be fine," Mel said with a little too much faith in her voice. "College will make him grow up."
"Not if he goes as a legacy, with a golden carpet laid out in front of him," Seth remarked.
"You would know the ways of the rich and favored," Bella mused.
Seth raised his eyebrows. "Exactly."
"Aren't the others going to be really mad when they get back?" Roy asked carefully, with a tentative glance Johnny's way. "I seem to recall, from middle school, that bullies hate being punished."
"I doubt that," Joey said firmly. "Chaz said Scott looked ready to bolt when his dad heard about the three-day suspension and the expulsion from the team." He shoveled down a mouthful of food. "The guys on the team worship the ground Carter walks on, so they'll stay on his side. Especially now the others were kicked out. I think they'll come back with their tail between their legs."
"About damn time," Bella mumbled.
"Yeah," Joey cleared his throat. He shifted uncomfortably, glancing between Carter and Johnny for long enough to catch the latter's attention.
"By the way, Johnny," Joey started. "Carter said something to me over the weekend."
Johnny looked at Carter, who kept his eyes on Joey, urging him to go on.
"It's about a rumor I might've accidentally started about you," Joey said.
Johnny's lips parted and he glanced at Carter again. When he turned back to Joey, he tried to keep a straight face.
"I honestly don't remember doing it, but I'm sorry," Joey spoke softly. "I say a lot of shit without thinking. That's why most people don't even listen to what I say anymore."
Carter raised his eyebrows, and Joey noticed. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
"Still, it wasn't cool and I'm sorry. Honestly," he finished.
Johnny looked a little taken aback. He glanced at Carter, noncommittal.
"Thanks, Joey."
The sandy-haired boy smiled at Johnny's words, nodding once. To his right, Jenna yelped when Mel nudged her with her shoulder a little too harshly. She shot her a questioning look and Mel nodded her head toward Johnny. Jenna rolled her eyes.
"I kind of have something to say to Johnny too, I guess," she declared flatly.
As soon as she had the table's attention on her, namely Johnny's, she sat up straighter.
"It has come to my attention—and by that I mean Mel spelled it out for me—that I might not have been the nicest person to you in the past," she said, a little more seriously. "If I ever made you feel like you weren't welcome in this school, or aggravated that feeling for you, I'm sorry. The truth is I didn't consider how what I said could make you feel, because I'm not really the most considerate person."
Mel swatted her arm and Jenna huffed.
"Which I realize is not the most charming trait," she rushed out. "So you should be happy to hear Mel has taken it upon herself to help me change it." She smiled cynically. "She's like the little cricket from Pinocchio, preaching in my ear about thoughtfulness."
Johnny snorted. "Thanks, Jenna," he said somewhat awkwardly.
Carter smiled.
Johnny bit his lip, turning his head to the side and leaning over the table to catch Seth's gaze, past Carter and Bella.
"Since we're apologizing," he said, making Seth raise his eyebrows. "I think I owe you an apology too. For my... er, preconceived opinions of you," he said, sounding unsure. "I was kinda judgy."
Seth's eyebrows had yet to come down. "I didn't realize you had any 'preconceived opinions' of me, but thanks," he mused.
Johnny frowned. "Carter didn't tell you that I didn't like you?"
Seth bit back a smile, daring only the briefest of glances at Carter. "No. He did not."
Johnny turned to his boyfriend. Carter smiled sheepishly. "I was hoping you'd come around and he'd grow on you," he confessed.
There was general laughter around the table.
"Right... Well, regardless," Johnny said. "I'm sorry. I didn't have the right to make assumptions, I guess. It was kind of hypocritical of me, actually."
Seth shrugged. "It's cool."
To his side, Bella smiled, giving him a pointed look. Seth sighed and leaned forward on the table to maintain the eye contact with Johnny.
"I'm sorry you had to go through what you did with the football team," he said. He sounded a little reluctant at first, but when he continued, his tone was a little more sincere. "While Carter didn't know about a lot of the shit those guys do, I did... Which kind of also made me a quiet, useless witness."
Johnny raised his eyebrows and Seth was quick to clarify.
"I never knew how bad it got with you until Carter told me," he rushed out. "Probably because I never cared to know more," he added a little more meekly. "But I should have maybe done something to nip the situation at the bud."
Seth looked at Bella and she nodded once to urge him to continue. Seth blew out a long puff of air.
"The truth is, I'd kind of accepted that some of those guys on the team were just dicks, and that was that," Seth admitted. "I never did anything about it because it didn't feel worth the trouble. I knew how important the football team was to Carter, and I didn't want to fuck that up for him... And because of your dad, too."
Johnny's eyebrows furrowed. "My dad?"
"Coach Mason is the only teacher in this school who knows about my home stuff," he said. "That's why he covers for me with the attendance, and the attitude, and the grades... Not to mention he's been sort of a twenty-four-seven emergency support."
"I didn't know," Johnny said.
"A lot of Coach's players have some really shitty situations at home to deal with," Joey mused aloud. "That is why he constantly has our backs. And why the football team's got a reputation for getting away with shit others don't."
"Yeah, but Coach never lets a single player get away with just being an entitled brat," Jenna retorted. "Ain't that right, Joe?"
"True." Joey nodded vehemently. "Coach never let me get away with anything. Literally. The first time he heard I talked back to a teacher, he insisted they gave me detention, even though the teacher let it slide. And, and—Chaz Wheeler once skipped an English assignment two years ago and Coach threatened to bench him if he didn't turn it in. Didn't even allow Miss Villin to grade it."
"English did kind of became his best subject after that, though," Mel pointed out.
Johnny shook his head in disbelief. "I had no idea."
Joey laughed. "A coach disciplining his players isn't as juicy gossip material as the cliche football team that gets free passes on everything."
Johnny smiled. "I can imagine."
A single clap from Lauren, on the far right end of the table, had them directing their attention at her.
"Okay—all these awkward sorry speeches are staring to feel a little too talk show-y for me," she said.
Bella and Jenna snorted simultaneously, and Lauren grinned.
"Now that apologies are all on the table, how about we just accept that there's a lot we didn't know about each other and agree to trust first-hand knowledge over our prejudice, from now on?"
The reaction wasn't probably as enthusiastically favorable as she expected because her shoulders slouched, before she sat up straighter to try again.
"It's normal to have bias on people we've never met in person, but there's no reason to let that ruin what I, personally, thought was heading toward a killer senior year crowd," she said.
Roy melted into a gushing grin. "Well said, babe."
Bella laughed, pointing her fork at everyone around the table. "My best friend is clearly better than all yours," she declared.
"Hey," Roy protested.
"Best friends," Bella corrected, innocently. "I meant plural."
Roy narrowed his eyes, skeptically. "You said 'is'."
Bella pursed her lips to hide a guilty smile. "My English isn't so good. Descendant of immigrants."
"Your dad's English is stellar," Carter commented.
Bella rolled her eyes. "Nobody fucking asked you, golden boy."
"Right," Lauren spoke up again. "And when our differences start feeling like too much to handle, we can all take comfort in the fact that, at the end of the day, we're not forced to live together. Like Bella and Carter."