“Sir, you can’t go down there?—”
I barely registered the security guard stepping into my path. “My— He’s my—” The words tangled in my throat. What was Seth to me? Roommate? Boyfriend? The person I’d spent months falling for despite every instinct screaming at me to run?
“Family only beyond this point.”
“I’m— Please.” My voice cracked. I hated how desperate I sounded, how young. “Please, I just need to see him.”
Something in my face must have registered because the guard’s expression softened slightly. “They’re taking him to the ER for evaluation. University Medical Center. It’s about ten minutes from here.”
“University Medical Center,” I repeated, the words hollow in my mouth.
“There’s a shuttle that runs from the east lot, or you can take your own car. The ER entrance is on the north side of the building.”
I was already moving, pushing back through the crowd that had started buzzing again now that the game was resuming without Seth. I didn’t care about the game. I didn’t care about anything except getting to that hospital.
The drive was a blur—traffic lights and turn signals and my hands gripping the steering wheel so tight my knuckles went white. I found the ER entrance, abandoned my car in the first spot I could find, and ran through the automatic doors like something was chasing me.
The waiting room was half-full, a mix of worried families and people holding ice packs to various injuries. I pushed past themto the intake desk, where a tired-looking nurse glanced up from her computer.
“I need— There was a player injured at the stadium. Seth Landry. They were bringing him here.”
She typed something into her system, frowning at the screen. “Are you family?”
“Brother.” The lie scraped my throat. She looked at me for a long moment, something skeptical in the set of her mouth, but whatever she saw in my face—the red-rimmed eyes, the barely contained panic—must have been enough. I watched her decide not to challenge it.
“Take a seat. Someone will be out to update you when we know more.”
I didn’t sit. I couldn’t sit. I paced the small lobby like a caged animal, counting tiles and light fixtures and anything else that might keep me from completely falling apart. My hands were shaking. My whole body was shaking, fine tremors running through me like aftershocks.
The lobby was too bright, too sterile—fluorescent lights humming overhead, the faint antiseptic smell that clung to every medical facility I’d ever been in. A water cooler gurgled in the corner. Motivational posters lined the walls, athletes in mid-stride with words likeDEDICATIONandPERSEVERANCEprinted beneath them. I wanted to tear them down.
This was why I didn’t go to games. This was why I’d kept myself at a distance, why I’d fought so hard against falling for someone who did this every week.
Because the moment I let myself care, the moment I let him in, I became this: a wreck in a waiting room, not knowing if the person I loved was going to be okay.
The person I loved.
The realization should have been a revelation, but it felt more like an admission. Something I’d known for weeks, maybe longer, that I’d refused to name because naming it made it real. Made it something I could lose.
And now he was somewhere behind those doors, and no one was telling me anything, and all I could do was pace and count and try not to think about the last time I’d waited in a room like this. The last time someone I loved had been hurt and I couldn’t do anything but wait. Dad’s face, slack and pale against hospital pillows. The beeping of machines. The way hope had curdled into dread over hours, then days, then the terrible final moment when the beeping stopped.
I pulled out my phone, pulled up our text thread, and typed with shaking fingers. I had no clue if someone had gotten his phone to him, but Ineededhim to know he’s wasn’t alone.
I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.
The screen blurred. I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand and kept pacing. And then I felt stupid because Seth’s phone was likely still in his locker back at the stadium. He probably wouldn’t get it back until he got out of here.
Somewhere in the building, they were running tests. Checking Seth’s spine, his skull, his brain. Somewhere behind those doors, Seth was either okay or he wasn’t, and I had no way of knowing which.
All I could do was wait.
20
SETH
The hit came from my blind side. One second, I had the ball tucked against my ribs, legs churning toward the first down marker. The next, something massive collided with my shoulder, and the world tilted sideways like someone had yanked a rug out from under the whole stadium.
Sound went first. The roar of the crowd turned into cotton, muffled and distant, and then there was nothing but the thud of my own heartbeat and a high-pitched ringing that drilled through my skull. The lights blurred into smears of white and gold. I was falling— No, I was already down, grass cool against my cheek, the smell of turf and sweat filling my lungs.
