“Really fucking good. I have a plan for everything right now. My anxiety, the team, Mia… I finally feel focused and sure and I haven’t felt like this in such a long time. The hit that Barns threw at me was the wake-up call I needed to just take a fucking beat.”
“We sure have missed you, man. Chase and Ford are tired of my shit, I can tell.” He laughs and I would bet thousands that he’s right about that.
“Next week I’ll be back. I have to meet with Coach Aarons first and go over some things.”
“And what’s the plan with all of this?” He motions his hand around us as we stand in front of a pile of debris.
“This,” I say with a deep exhale. “This is all for Mia.”
Liam smiles with a nod, slapping his hand on my shoulder as he picks up the hammer to start knocking away at the rest of the desk in front of him.
“You know, I’m proud of you.” Abby’s voice takes me away from measuring the now clean area for a new desk.
“Well, that’s all I’ve ever wanted. To make little Hunt proud.”
“Come on, I’m serious.” She nudges me with her shoulder and I decide to give her my full attention.
“It’s brave to admit when things aren’t right. When something feels off and you don’t even understand it, but you know deep down you need to heal. I feel pretty stupid saying this, but I guess I just never associated athletes with mental health struggles. I know anyone can experience them, but I don’t know… you just never hear about it within professional athletes, at least not much. After everything happened with you, I researched. Well, Mia and I researched. Well, let me rephrase, she assigned me something specific to look up. Sheactually assigned us all minor tasks.” She laughs, but my facial expression is pure confusion.
“What do you mean she assigned you minor tasks?”
“All of us, except Chase, for obvious reasons. She wanted as much information on anxiety as possible, specifically in athletes. She found podcasts and articles, but she also wanted to know more about how they overcome it, how they handle it on a daily basis, triggers even. Believe it or not, I actually think it helped Ford and Liam learn a little bit more about themselves too.”
“Hang on,” I say, wiping my forehead with a towel. “Mia asked you guys to look up ways to help me with my anxiety?”
“She wanted all of us to be safe places for you. She said you needed more people than just her in your corner. She wanted to learn how to help you. I have the most random text messages from her at all hours of the night to prove it.”
“Abby’s right,” Liam chimes in as he walks back to the front of the building. He’s been such a help today taking all of the old shit out of this place. Tomorrow, I can come in with fresh paint and some new flooring and then we can get the new furniture added.
“Which is usually the case with this one.” He fluffs her hair as he walks closer to me and extends his hand out to shake mine. “Can you go get your girl now?”
It’s no secret that Mia’s been wanting to help me through everything. I never expected her to rope in the rest of the group, or for them to actually be willing participants.
Once I walk out of the building and close the door behind me, I feel the cooler air against my face. The time change is about to happen within the next week since I can already see the effect as the sun is hanging lower this evening against the water across the way.
For the first time in a really long fucking time, I’m seeing clearly. Things aren’t blurred. Voices aren’t in my head tellingme I can’t or I shouldn’t. What I should have done was tell Mia every single thing I’ve been feeling the moment I started feeling them. Because now, it’s just going to come out like word vomit the second I see her. The moments shared with Mia in the last few weeks were some of the realest feelings I’ve ever felt for someone. My adrenaline starts pumping and I take off running.
“Excuse me!” I shout, jogging through the crowds downtown, weaving in and out of people.
“Shit, sorry,” I say, bumping into someone on the sidewalk. Everyone has somewhere to be tonight, apparently, and I do too.
I turn, jogging backwards as I wave my hand to the poor guy I almost just tackled. “I have to go see my best friend!”
I’ve planned my evening around the food I’ll be eating tonight and that seems very on brand for me. I’m watching reruns ofFriendsand I just loaded a banana bread into the oven. If my timing is right, it’ll be done right around the time that the episode comes on when Ross and Rachel kiss in Central Perk so I can eat my feelings.
The baseball game was on earlier, so I caught an inning or two while I was prepping it. I saw Connor make a really good play at shortstop and when they flashed to his face, he sported a giant smile. That guy doesn’t need me. He’ll be just fine.
Now I just need to figure out how to handle these feelings for Nate. The way I feel about him is clear, but also confusing. I know that I have feelings for him, but the fear of messing up what we have as friends is still very present.
“Mia!” Loud banging comes from my door, and I hear Nate’s voice right away.
Wow, universe… Okay, I need a million dollars—where’s that when I think of it?
“Mia, it’s me!” he shouts again as I’m getting up from the couch. My hair looks like a giant bird’s nest on my head, I’m wearing the same leggings I wore yesterday and the oversized t-shirt probably makes me look so sloppy. I’m just going to ignore the fact that I look like I live under a bridge right now.
“Coming!” I say as I open the door, and Nate comes flying in. His cedar scent overtakes me as he rushes past the entrance.
“You can’t go on a date with Hughes,” he commands. “Please don’t go on a date with him,” he begs.
