The test was negative.
My brain had processed the information, but at the same time, my brain couldn’t process the information. I needed to dipoff by myself for a minute, even though I really didn’t have a minute to dip off by myself.
I walked out of the locker room. I had no idea where I was going, because we were in the Londynville Lightning stadium and I didn’t know shit about their stadium. I happened to find a semi-empty hallway around the corner from the locker room. I put my back against the wall and a few seconds later, I slid down it. That was how CJ found me—sitting on the floor with my head on my knees.
“BX, you good?”
CJ was the only person on Earth who referred to me as “BX” instead of Brix.
“Nah.”
“What the fuck is so serious that it has your big ass on the ground? Is it Beaux? Is it Grandpa Tony?”
“Nah. It’s Ry. The test came back negative.”
Next thing I knew, his tall ass was right next to me on the floor.
“Fuck!” he whisper yelled. “Fuck!”
He was speaking my exact thoughts, and I appreciated him for expressing the emotion that I couldn’t express at the moment. I knew that if I let myself feel everything I was going to feel, I wouldn’t be any good to my team. I needed to compartmentalize the information and the feelings into a vault, do my job, and deal with the disappointment afterward.
“I can’t sit in this right now and neither can you,” I told him.
“You’re right. Let’s go get this win, so we can get the fuck outta here and head home. My sister’s hurting. She needs us.”
The game was a blur, but we won it. Christian rode everybody’s ass about getting out of the locker room and on the bus that would take us to the airfield. I was glad he took the lead on that, because I was too in my feelings to even deal. Once wewere loaded on the jet, I leaned my head against the window and zoned out until I dozed off.
A little while later, well into the midnight hour, the jet touched down in Chicago. I jumped in my truck and made one stop before heading to Ryann’s. It was late, I got that, but I wasn’t concerned about the time at all. I needed to lay eyes on her. I needed to be with her. I felt the pain, the despondency in the text.
I walked up the front steps of her modest home and rang the doorbell. It took a minute, a couple more presses of the doorbell, but finally, she appeared. She was dressed in a furry robe. Her sleep bonnet covered her hair. It was the puffiness of her eyes and the redness of her nose that told the story of her heartbreak.
She opened the screen door, and I pulled her into the arm that wasn’t holding the bag. “Rowdy Ry, baby.”
We moved into the house, and I shut the front door with my foot so I wouldn’t have to take my arm from around her.
“Ry.” I wasn’t sure what else to say.
Turned out that I didn’t need to say anything else because loud sobs eased out of her mouth, drowning out anything I would’ve said. Her body trembled in my hold. I set the bag on the floor, picked her up bridal style, and headed up the stairs to where I presumed her bedroom was. Ryann and I weren’t on it like that. I didn’t know her house, but I was a smart dude. I knew I could figure out which room was the primary bedroom.
Ryann loved pink—considered it her signature color. The bedroom wasn’t pink like a child’s room. It was sophisticated and minimal with touches of pink. It looked like Ryann. I knew it was her lair. I placed her on the bed while I started to strip out of my street clothes. I watched helplessly as she balled into the fetal position in the middle of the bed.
Once I was down to my drawers and wife beater, I climbed in beside her, gathering her in my arms. As an athlete, I was all toofamiliar with the things that people said to try to make you feel better. I didn’t say none of that shit. It never helped me after a tough loss. I doubted it would help Ryann. Instead, I said what I knew to be true.
“I got you, Ry. I got you.” I held her body close to mine as she racked with sobs.
Once her breathing evened out and the rise and fall of her chest was steady, I made my way back downstairs. I grabbed the bag of food that I’d set on the floor and took it into the kitchen. At some point, when I wasn’t paying attention, CJ had given his wife the news. We weren’t able to have our phones during half-time, so I didn’t see the text she’d sent until after the game.
Gensie:
Stop by and pick up this package I have for Ry. I’m guessing you’re seeing her tonight.
Me:
What kind of package is it, Gensie?
Gensie:
Dinner.
