"I'm falling for you," I confess. My heart is beating fast.
His breath catches audibly. "Yeah?"
"Yeah." I prop up on one elbow and bring his face into focus. "Is that okay?"
He looks so serious that I'm surprised when he says, "More than okay, because I'm falling too. I have been for a while now. How could anyone not love you?"
My eyes well up. If he only knew how easy it was for some people. I sigh, "Oh, Si..."
The kiss he presses to my lips tastes different, soft and sweet, nothing like the desperate hunger of the past week. This feels deeper, scarier and thrilling in equal measure.
When we finally get so sleepy that neither of us moves or talks, I realize that I can't remember the last time I checked the Twinge app. Two weeks? Three?
I reach for my phone, and Silas glances over at me. His voice is raspy when he asks, "Everything okay?"
"Yeah. I just need to send something quick."
I open the app and navigate to my messages with StatMan12. The last conversation was weeks ago. It’s funny. Around the time that Silas and I got together, StatMan went dark. Life is weird like that sometimes, like a convergence in the space time continuum.
Scrolling through our last few conversations, I don't feel guilty about the silence. I don't wonder what he's doing or if he's thinking about me.
I just feel... done.
I type quickly, not overthinking it.
Yoga4Lyfe
Hey. I'm seeing someone now. It's going really well. I wanted to let you know I'm not interested in continuing our friendship, if you can call it that. Thanks for the conversations. Take care of yourself.
I hit send, then immediately put down my phone without waiting for a response. I don't need one. In a few days, I’ll probably delete the app. Whatever I was looking for when I downloaded Twinge, I’ve found something way better.
"All good?" Silas asks.
I toss my phone back on the bedside table and snuggle closer into his side. "All good."
Lying in the dark next to Silas, I take a moment to feel lucky that I’m dating someone who seems to genuinely like me, is willing to be seen in public with me, and generally doesn’t lie or hide behind a sexy profile pic.
A girl could get used to this.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Silas
Everything about the training room is stressful. The air smells faintly like antiseptic and Windex. Fluorescent lights hum overhead. While head trainer Sam prods at my shoulder with all the warmth of a mechanic inspecting a broken machine, I sit on the vinyl seat and try not to spiral.
When I woke up this morning, I felt a familiar pins and needles sensation in the front, top, and back of my shoulder. The Havoc has played hard this week, going to Miami, Atlanta, D.C., and Charlotte. After a week of bliss with my girl, I felt good enough to push myself through the five days away.
Then I played too aggressively. We won two games, lost the third, and I had to watch the fourth from the bench as my whole shoulder throbbed. I got out over my wings, as they say.
"I need to conduct a range of motion test," Sam says, not bothering to look at my face.
He lifts my arm, tweaking it this way and that. He's moving it slowly but pain still rips down to my fingertips likesomeone dragging a serrated blade through muscle and tendon. My teeth grind together hard enough to make my jaw ache, but Sam just keeps moving my arm until I can't take any more.
"Stop," I grate out. I pull my arm from his grip and rub the top of my shoulder, my thumb digging into the sore spot along the deltoid. "It hurts."
"Sorry, Silas." His pen scratches across the clipboard as he makes notes. "It seems like you took too many hits to your already-injured shoulder. You're compensating. Guessing that you have scapular dyskinesis, rotator cuff strain, and capsular restriction seems accurate. If you keep playing with an injury like this, you'll need surgery."
Surgery would mean the end of the season, maybe more. His words land like a body check to the ribs.
