To mark the milestone, I’ve pulled those chapters into a collected eBook.

This edition is exclusively for paid subscribers, as a way of saying thank you for supporting Line & Verse from the very beginning.

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It was Eli’s second real line-up, at the Annex of course, just far enough away from campus to give the feeling that the brothers could do anything they felt like.

“Hey, wait up, man,” he heard Jason call from behind.

“You OK?” he said panting when he caught up.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Eli muttered, “just need some sleep.”

“I get it, I’m too wired though, want to hang out?”

The hallway still smelled like bleach and sweat, the same as Eli’s in McClintock. Down the corridor, someone’s stereo leaked a muffled laugh-track, canned voices echoing through concrete walls.

Jason shouldered open the door to his dorm room and held it open behind him. The air inside was warm, almost thick. Jason slid the window open and switched on the fan.

“I wish Luke would just leave the damn window open,” he muttered.

Eli followed, moving stiffly, his white dress shirt streaked with mud and a faint smear of blood at the collar where a brother’s ring had caught him. He dropped onto his bed without untying his tie. For a long moment, neither spoke. The radiator hissed in the corner like it was angry for them.

“Speaking of, where’s Luke?” asked Eli, breaking the silence.

Jason sat on the edge of his desk, head tipped back against the wall. His ribs still ached from the line-up, from Sullivan’s clipboard jabbing each mistake. He’d laughed through it—everyone did—but the laughter had felt borrowed, thin.

“You won’t believe this—he’s at the library, he and his lab partner will be up all night trying to cram in a whole semester of lab work they skipped. He’ll probably crash there.”

“Fucking sucks.”

Eli rubbed his hands over his face. “I don’t think I can do this again,” he said finally.

Jason glanced over. “Don’t let them get to you, it goes by fast.”

“I don’t care.” Eli’s voice cracked on the word care. “I didn’t come here to get screamed at by guys who can’t spell their own names.”

Jason let the silence sit. The clock on the dresser ticked too loudly.

“You thinking of quitting?”

Eli laughed without humor. “You sound disappointed.”

“Just asking.”

The light from the window was the dull orange of a campus lamppost, flickering against the blinds. Eli’s shadow trembled on the wall—long, bent, tired.

He said, quieter, “You ever think maybe we’re not built for this?”

Jason studied him. “Built for what?”

“This.” Eli gestured vaguely: the ties, the crest pinned crooked on his chest, the entire performance. “All the shouting, the rules, the way they make you prove you belong.”

Jason thought of Sullivan’s smirk, of the older brothers slouched on the couch while pledges cleaned up around them. “I think they’re just scared of what happens if someone stops pretending.”

Eli looked up at him, surprised by the honesty. “You talk like someone who’s already quit.”

“Maybe I did,” Jason said. “I just never left.”

The words hung there. The radiator popped. Outside, rain began to tick against the window, soft at first, then steady. The room seemed to tighten around the sound.

Eli leaned back on his elbows. “You ever feel like you’re faking it all the time?”

Jason snorted. “You mean being a pledge or being alive?”

Eli smiled—small, real. “Both.”

They laughed, the first real laughter of the night. It slipped easily into quiet. The kind of quiet that usually came after truth.

“I almost told my parents I was done,” Eli said. “I even practiced the call in my head. But then I thought about what they’d say. How my mom would tell people I couldn’t cut it. How my dad would ask why I’d waste the opportunity.”

Jason nodded. “So you stayed.”

“For now.”

“Good.”

Eli looked at him, suspicious. “Why good?”

Jason searched for an answer that didn’t sound soft. “Because you’re better than they are. And you leaving won’t change anything except you.”

Eli stared at the floor. “You really think it can be different?”

“It can be if we decide it is.”

That earned him a long look—one of those assessing stares Eli had, like he was weighing whether to believe him. The rain deepened, running down the glass in crooked paths.

“You always this sure about everything?” Eli asked.

“No,” Jason said. “Just this.”

He stood, crossed to the window, and tugged the blind cord. The room fell darker, the rain louder. Behind him, he could feel Eli watching.

“Thanks,” Eli said.

“For what?”

“For not saying I’m overreacting. For not laughing.”

Jason turned. The lamplight caught the hollow under Eli’s eyes, the smudge of dirt on his jaw. Without thinking, Jason reached out and wiped at it with his thumb. The gesture startled them both. Eli froze, eyes flicking up.

“Paint,” Jason muttered. “From earlier.”

“Yeah.” Eli’s voice had dropped, quieter now. “Paint.”

Jason didn’t move his hand. He could feel the warmth of skin beneath the grime, the faint tremor of exhaustion. For a heartbeat, the air between them felt alive, charged with something neither could name.

Eli exhaled, shaky. “You ever just—” He stopped himself, shaking his head. “Never mind.”

“What?”

“Forget it.”

Jason didn’t. He saw the question still there, raw and dangerous. And before he could decide against it, he said, “Sometimes, yeah.”

Eli blinked. “Sometimes what?”

“Sometimes I feel different too.”

That landed like a confession. The room held still around it. The radiator hissed; rain pressed harder against the glass.

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Author’s Note

One of the things about writing Line & Verse is that the setting itself keeps daring me. A communal shower at the end of the hall, four heads lined in a row, no curtains, no privacy — it’s practically a character on its own. In a world like Westmore’s, moments of risk and secrecy weren’t just possible, they were inevitable.

This bonus chapter is one of those moments. Ethan never saw it. He only caught a glimpse — a door closing, two brothers slipping away. But here’s what could have happened after.

It’s risky, it’s raw, and it belongs to the margins of the story. Paid subscribers get the whole scene; for everyone else, it remains part of the unseen world Ethan will never know.

Ethan only caught a glimpse. Tyler disappearing into Jason’s room at the far end of the hall, the door clicking shut fast behind him. Ethan kept walking. He didn’t stop to think what that meant, didn’t ask himself why.

But if he had lingered, he might have seen more.

Jason leaned back against his desk, arms crossed, the lamplight hitting the polished wood of his paddle collection. His room always looked neater than most — a legacy thing, polished edges and quiet pride. The faint scent of cologne and cigarettes hung in the air.

Tyler stood just inside the door, shoulders squared, face unreadable. He had that swimmer’s posture — straight spine, broad chest, body humming with energy even in stillness.

“You keep looking at me like that,” Jason said, voice steady.

Tyler tilted his head but didn’t answer. Silence was part of his arsenal.

Jason pushed off the desk, stepping closer until they were nearly chest to chest. His grin stayed faint, careful.

“You sure about this?”

Tyler cracked the door, peered down the hall, then shut it again. Final. He didn’t speak — he didn’t have to.

Jason’s eyebrows lifted slightly. He grabbed a towel off the back of a chair.

“Come on.”

They slipped into the hallway, their pace casual, measured. Jason carried the towel draped over his shoulder. Tyler followed, hands loose at his sides, eyes fixed straight ahead. To anyone else, they looked like two brothers heading for a shower after a long night.

But their silence was too practiced. Their shoulders brushed once, briefly, then separated.

The house was quieter at this hour, but the little noises carried — doors opening and shutting, laughter echoing faint from downstairs. No one noticed when Jason pushed open the door to the communal bath.

Inside: white tile, a single fluorescent light buzzing, the air damp with that permanent film of moisture. Two toilet stalls, one missing a door. Two sinks with cracked mirrors. Beyond them, the shower room — four heads along one wall, no curtains, no partitions.

Jason turned the knobs. The pipes groaned, spat rust, then rushed hot. Steam rose fast, curling up toward the buzzing light.

Tyler peeled off his shirt without hesitation, tossing it onto the counter. His shorts followed, landing in a careless heap. His body was lean, hairless from habit, a swimmer’s frame sharpened by hours in the pool. When the water hit him, it sheeted down his torso, catching in the lines of his muscles. He didn’t hide from Jason’s eyes.

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