“Shit, really?” I tried to get ahold of time but her fingers on my skin were making it hard to think. “I started seeing this guy a couple of months after because I couldn’t reconcile the loss. It wasn’t—it didn’t make sense to me. It didn’t add up.”
“You did choke pretty hard in the third quarter.”
“I thought you didn’t watch my games.”
“It was like you forgot how to read your coverage and couldn’t find your receivers on the field.”
“Love you too,” I said. She gave me a smirked smile that made me think of lemony sunshine and sinking my teeth into her thigh. “He helped me think about things differently. To separate out all the things I’d packed into football and figure out which ones I need, which ones I don’t.”
“Has it helped?”
“I signed a contract extension, didn’t I?” I asked. “I could’ve walked away. I thought about it. I had enough money for my whole family to live comfortably the rest of their lives. I didn’t need anything else from the game.”
“Then why did you?”
“Because I realized I don’t hate football,” I said simply. “It was possible I never did but it’d all grown so cluttered and complicated.”
“So, you chose it. For once.”
“Yeah.” I shifted to wrap an arm around her waist. “You’re the only person who ever noticed that it wasn’t my choice. I never forgot that, even when I did the exact opposite of what you wanted.”
“I just wanted you to—gah. Never mind. I’m happy it’s better for you and I’m happy there are good things waiting for you in the future.”
You’re the only good thing that matters.
“Did therapy help with everything at home?”
A stitch pulled too tight in my chest. That was always the spot. My therapist liked to say big emotions took up space inside us, and while I’d rejected that theory for longer than necessary, I knew now that my grief lived under my breastbone. I felt it swell every August as the memories of his final days crowded around me and again every time Mom and Gramma CeCe lobbied for me to come home for the holidays. Things were better when I kept my distance.
And I could afford to take them and my sisters on tropical holiday vacations so it all worked out.
“Yeah,” I said, though it sounded halfhearted even to me. “Still working on it.”
“That’s okay.” She gave me the same reassuring smile she’d given me all through high school but especially that last year when most days I couldn’t remember how to breathe. “I haven’t figured out things at home either.”
“We’ll figure it out together.” I burrowed into her belly again. I loved how soft and luscious she felt. “We always do.”
She ran the backs of her fingers from my forehead to my chin and up again, and I thought I was going to float away. I hadn’t been this chill in a decade. Longer, probably. “It’s fun being your fake fiancée,” she continued. “I’ve missed hanging out with you and now I get to do it while glaring at anyone who shakes their boobs in your face.”
“I don’t think that…happened,” was all I could say.
“I know you’re not blind, Ryan. You’re fully aware it happensallthe time.”
I shrugged. I wasn’t debating this while her nails scraped at my scalp. Certainly not touching the fake fiancé comments.
“We make a good team,” she said, reaching for her glass on the nightstand. “And drinking absurdly expensive wine in fancy hotels with you isn’t bad either.”
“We are a good team,” I said, watching as her tongue peeked out to catch a drop of wine. “I always knew we would be.”
Emme wasnotin a good mood when she woke up the next morning.
She emerged from the shower wearing a hotel robe that didn’t look like it fit too well and her hair twisted up in a towel. A cloud of steam billowed out behind her like a personal army of fog.
She barely spoke to me as we packed for the airport, and tossed a few pillows to the floor that’d angered her in some way. I figured she was hungover. After nonstop liquor and not nearly enough food or water to soak it up this weekend, anyone would be in rough shape. And we’d made the genius decision to top it all off with red wine last night.
“I’m cold,” Emme said, snatching a hooded sweater out of my hands. “Need to borrow this.”
She returned a few minutes later wearing the sweater with a pair of leggings. She looked…amazing. So good I couldn’t speak. I had to turn around while she dried her hair so she wouldn’t see the smile on my face.
