Once I take a seat on the blanket, Ford’s body sits to my right almost immediately. His arms are covered in a black long sleeve henley and his scent comes breezing through as soon as he settles in next to me.
“Hi.” He nudges my body with his and I tuck a piece of hair behind my ear before giving him a quick smile back.
“Hi.” It’s physically impossible not to look at him whenever he’s close by, it’s like he just pulls me into his orbit. I study the veins on his hands and think about how it’s been days since he’s properly touched me. I miss feeling him grip my waist or run his fingers through my hair. There are easily hundreds of people down here, but I can’t focus on anyone or anything other than him.
There’s a stage for a band set up down by the river and food trucks line the street.
“Want to take a walk?” Ford reaches his pinky and hooks it into mine as I nod my head and stand up with him.
“We’re going to go find some hot chocolate,” Ford yells out to Chase and the rest of the group, they just nod their heads and continue in conversation. Once we’re out of eyesight from the group, Ford leads me to a parking garage and pulls out his keys.
“Where are we going?” I take his hand as he helps me climb into his truck and he shuts the door behind me before answering and walks to the drivers side.
“I just wanted to get some alone time with you.” He smiles at me and pulls me over the center console to sit closer to him. I nuzzle myself into his neck, letting him wrap his arms around my body. The sense of security I get in his arms is something I can’t explain.
He asks how my day was and I ask about his day in return, I can tell he’s excited about the playoffs, who wouldn’t be?
“It’s looking like it’ll be Minnesota, but we’ll see.” He kisses the top of my head and I feel his heartbeat steady as I’m laying my head on his chest. The conversation with Dolly replays in my head and I want to ask him about Grace. I’m not mad that he didn’t mention her, after talking with Dolly, I’m just curious.
“So funny story, I ran into Dolly today at the craft store.” I sit up and turn to look him in the eye,
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yep, we were in the checkout line together. It was like a mile long, so we had some time to chat.” He looks at me lightheartedly,
“Uh oh.”
I don’t respond right away, I just sit and try to think how to word the next part of my sentence.
“Wait, uh oh for real or?” His expression turns worried when I don’t respond immediately, but I shake my head as I gather my thoughts.
“No, no… everything is good,” I say.
“I just… it’s weird. She did say something and you don’t owe me any explanation, I’m honestly just curious about something she said.” Ford’s jaw clenches before he relaxes.
“Whatever you want to know, Abby, I’ll tell you.” I put my hand on his thigh and bring my eyes up to his.
“Who is Grace?”
Ford turns his head to face forward, breaking our eye contact. His body stiffens and he lets out a giant blow of air before running his hand in his hair.
“God, I haven’t heard someone say that name in a long fucking time.” I cup his cheek in my hand,
“If it’s too much, you don’t have to—” Before I can finish my sentence he’s shaking his head.
“No, no. It isn't too much. I just haven't talked about her in years. We dated in high school and college. Like I said I’m from here, so I stayed local, thankfully, when I got my scholarship. Her and I always talked about the future and what it would look like for us when I made it to the pros. I thought I’d marry her, if I’m being honest.”
He looks over at me but I can’t read his expression. He doesn’t look sad, in the sense that it happened, but he looks embarrassed, maybe? If this was someone he considered marrying, this can’t be easy to retell.
His voice doesn’t waver as he speaks about their relationship, he’s firm in his words and everything he says is in the past tense, probably to assure me that it isn’t still how he feels.
“On draft day, after we found out I was staying in Tampa, we talked about getting married. Thinking about it now, I can’t imagine being married at twenty-two, but she was the only girlfriend I’d had my whole life. People thought we had the perfect fucking relationship. On paper we did. A cheerleader and a football player. High society families. It just made sense.”
I sit and listen as he recounts pieces of that time, keeping my hand placed on his thigh.
“We were just two stupid kids, completely naive to the realities of the world.” He clears his throat before continuing. “Anyway, a few weeks after the draft, right before we were going to sign a lease on an apartment, in your apartment building actually, she told me she couldn’t do it. That it wasn’t her dream to play doting NFL wife, she didn’t want to put her own dreams on hold, even though I’d never asked her to do that. I tried to replay all of our conversations in my head, to make sure I never even hinted that I wanted her to do that. For the longest time, all we ever talked about were our dreams together and as far as I knew we were on the same page.” My eyes well up as I’m watching him shake his head. I’m sure the moments still feel hard for him to relive even after the years have passed.
“Hey.” He rubs a thumb over my cheek.
