I just started seeing more of Trey.
In the one class we shared, Chemistry II, he no longer bolted for the door when Prof. Chang concluded a lecture. Instead he’d arrange his notes, sigh, and place his books one at a time into his bag. In the regular cafeteria in Parker Hall West he’d face my direction rather than show me his back or worse just get his cheeseburger to go. I’d even seen him shooting hoops at Jasper during my scheduled karate classes. He never said anything.
Back home in Bixby, we’d had a barn cat–we had plenty–but we had this one in particular that habitually sat on the fifty gallon drum that held grain for the horses. His perch warmed in the morning sun and stayed cool in the shade of a long overhang in the afternoon. Entertaining mice congregated in the spillage. Other barnies’d scatter when I threw the latch on the back gate from the house. They went leisurely, not like a rabbit might, but they did go. This one I had in mind’d stay curled up pretending sleep. I brought bits of store bought cat food when I watered the llamas in the evening.
One day when it was dark early he sat upright on the drum in the porch light. I pulled a few bits of kibble from my Carharts to place on the drum in front of him. “Dammit!” He snapped my hand like it was a bird taking flight in front of him. He pulled the food from my fingers. He purred after that.
Trey pulled his old Corolla into one of the good spots near the dorm and right on the edge of Chamber’s Lawn where we played Frisbee. He arranged his sunshade carefully and took time cleaning out the Taco Bell cups and wrappers that built up in the floorboard of the passenger’s side. Tweep. He finally set the alarm and headed the long way past us to the entrance.
“Trey!” I called out. “If we had one more person we could play Frisbee football instead of just throwing it in a circle.”
“Sure. What the hell.”
He ran up to me. I said, “Hey man. Sorry.”
“Pussy. I knew you’d cave first.”
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