“You weren’t cleared. I was waiting on confirming the diagnosis,” I said. “I couldn’t?—”
“You could’ve told me,” he snapped. “You should’ve told me.”
I felt it in my chest. The way his voice broke. The way he looked at me like I’d failed him. Like this was my fault.
“I didn’t want to tell you before we knew for sure,” I said. “I needed to protect you.”
He laughed once, short and bitter. “You didn’t protect me. You left me in the dark.”
It was like he slapped me, and the ice around my heart thickened. Everyone always blamed me for their issues. My parents, my brother, now… him. Rationally, I knew he was reacting to the news, but that didn’t make the words hurt any less.
Mac stepped in, a deep furrow between his brows. “Leave her out of this. Doctor Mercer is on strict orders, and its company policy to not share what-ifs with players. It’s my call when to tellyou, not hers. You have a few options now if you want to keep playing.”
Oliver didn’t look at him.
“Option one,” Mac continued. “Cardiac ablation. You’re off for six to eight weeks. Full monitoring. Cardiac clearance before you return. It’s low-risk but invasive.”
“And option two?” Oliver asked, voice sharp as his icy glare moved from me to Mac.
“Medication. Daily monitoring. Limited playing time. You’d have to be cleared game by game.”
“That’s not an option,” Oliver said immediately. “What kind of shit is that?”
“You need to decide by Monday,” Mac said. “If you want to play again. I know this is hard, Oliver, and you need to think about options.”
Oliver focused on me again, no less anger there but his voice smoothed out. “What do you think I should do?”
I opened my mouth. Closed it. I didn’t know how to answer him without making it worse.
“I think you need to take care of yourself,” I said finally.
He exhaled hard and fell back into the chair, elbows on his knees, head in his hands. Mac shared a look with me, and I stepped forward. “Oliver, you aren’t clear to play Sunday, so you can take the next few days to think about it. I’m happy to talk through the pros and cons with you, if you need to.”
“What if I don’t want to choose?” he asked, snapping his head up and those beautiful intense eyes boring right into me.
Mac’s voice softened. “Then you don’t play.”
The silence came back, louder this time.
Oliver looked down at his hands. “I’ve worked my whole life for this. Every second. Every fucking rep. How can… how can I just…” he trailed off, his voice breaking a second time.
“I know,” I said, and it was the truth. “It’s not over, Oliver, but it’s different.”
He looked at me again. This time his expression was empty. “Then why does it feel like it’s already over?”
God, the ball of emotion in my throat felt like a whole sock. He was hurting. My eyes prickled at the pain and confusion on his face, and I dug my nail into my palm to try to hold it together. I needed Mac to leave, to let me talk to Oliver one on one.
“Doctor Mercer, why don’t you let me and James talk for a minute? I’ll send him to you after,” Mac said.
“Of course.” I stood taller, watched Oliver, and waited for him to meet my gaze, but he didn’t. “I’ll see you soon.”
I left them in the room, my heart pounding against my rib cage as I made my way back to my office. And only once the door was shut, did I let myself cry. This hurt. This hurt in such a way I wasn’t prepared for. His anger at me, his indecision and devastation.
As someone who cared for him, I thought he needed to stop playing football. Even with being cleared every game, he could spike back up with one play. With the surgery, it could be okay long-term, but what future did he have? He’d be flagged for the rest of his career. still requiring routine follow-ups
I dabbed my eyes, devastated that the man Ilovedwas having to make a tough choice. Not even before I threw away my tissue, there was a knock on the door.
“It’s unlocked,” I said, quickly grabbing a sip of water to hide the emotion from my voice.
