I re-rack the bar with a chuckle.

“Sorry, man. She’s not an under-the-bridge dweller.” I push aside thoughts of Elizabeth’s perky nipples in my shirt last night. Don’t need a semi at the gym. “She’s kinda sexy, for an uptight nerd.”

“You’re the luckiest little shit I’ve ever met. First, you get that fucking scholarship when you can’t catch for shit—”

“Fuck you!” I interject.

“And now you’re getting paid to get nasty with some chick,” Devin quips in mock indignation. My luck is relative. He knows more than enough of my fucked-up past.

We swap places and he lies down on the bench. “So, is she into the super-kinky shit or what?”

“Nothing like that.” I laugh at the thought of ‘kinky’ Elizabeth. “She’s just shy as hell. Super inexperienced. She needs a little help.”

Devin pauses with the bar on his chest and glares up at me, his face morphing into a terse scowl.

“What?” I ask, despite having a pretty good guess at what’s coming.

He’s got that big-brother look on his face. He’s going to spout some nonsense and call it wisdom.

“Nothing. Just thought you’d outgrown this savior bullshit.” He shakes his head disapprovingly.

“What are you talking about?”

“You know…what I mean…” he says between presses. “You’re…little fucking…Bo Peep…with your…damaged…little lambs.”

“I think you mean lost lambs, fuck nut,” I deflect.

“Nah, you want the damaged ones.” I cross my arms, waiting for him to continue. “When we got new foster kids at the home, the first-timers, you were always the one to hold their hand, tell them it was going to be okay and all that cheesy shit. You love fixing the broken ones.”

“Come on, we all did that. Fuck, you did that shit for me. You’re a big fucking softie.” I shove him playfully. No one would ever think it looking at the giant, tattooed, brooding asshole, but he’s got the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met.

“I helped you. Once. And only because I had to share a room with you and you smelled nasty. Couldn’t even figure out how to use the damn shower by yourself!”

“Fuck off. I was only six.”

“You were seven. And you wouldn’t stop crying for your momma. So, yeah, I took pity on your pathetic ass. But you? You did it. Every. Fucking. Time. It was a sick fucking game for you, some test we all had to pass.” Devin re-racks the bar, only completing half his set.

He sits up on the bench and turns to face me before continuing. “You’d play big brother, let them get all attached. Then, you’d shit all over them just to see how much they’d swallow before they’d walk away.”

Before my mom died, I needed to know if people were worth it, worth loving. Turns out they aren’t.

“I was just bored. I didn’t mean shit to those kids. And they don’t mean shit to me.”

“Sure they didn’t.”

I shove him out of the way and take my spot on the bench again.