Why again?
Before I can start typing out my list of all the reasons I can’t fuck Cam Lowry again, the door to the roof flies open, slamming against the brick wall so hard I jump, my head snapping around, only to see Cam himself walk out onto the patio.
I hate that my first reaction is for my heart to kick up and butterflies to swarm my stomach at the way he looks in black athletic shorts and a Renegades T-shirt, his hair messy and his jaw shadowed with a day’s worth of stubble. Except I actually don’t hate it at all, and that’s a feeling I’m going to have to dissect later. Much, much later. Maybe never.
My second reaction is to be annoyed that he appeared right in the middle of my moment of Mexican food and orange soda induced Zen, and that I’m going to have to use energy I don’t currently have after the longest day in history trying to resist the irresistible pull I feel towards him.
And my third reaction, the one that overshadows the rest, is concern. Because the Cam standing ten feet away from me is not the Cam I know. This Cam freezes, glancing around the roof like he can’t quite figure out how he got there. His phone is gripped so tightly in one hand that his knuckles turn white, and heshoves his free hand into his hair, tugging hard at the wavy brown strands like he’s looking for something to ground himself.
From where I sit, his face is in shadows, but what I can see is all hard angles, his jaw locked and his forehead furrowed, his eyebrows drawn together. His posture is ramrod straight, his shoulders a tight line. I can’t see his eyes, but everything in his body language is the exact opposite of the easy-going, cheerful football player who has somehow burrowed his way right into my chest.
Something is very wrong.
I wish I could say it’s the psychologist in me who reacts. The part of me who sees someone so obviously in crisis and knows I can help.
But it’s not.
Instead, it’s the woman in me. The one who remembers the way Cam touched me with that unique mixture of reverence and possession during the night I spent in his hotel room. Who gave me a bag of six different kinds of M&M’s because they’re my favorite. Who agreed to just be friends but also told me he thinks I might be everything. The one who goes to his son’s hockey games and is proud of his daughter when she gets the lead in the school play and plays football with the enthusiasm of a kid at recess even though he’s been in the NFL for thirteen years.
It’s that woman who stands from her lounge chair, queso and orange soda forgotten, and walks across the roof to the man now pacing in a tight circle, free hand clenched at his side and eyes locked on his phone, like he’s willing it to ring.
I reach him in a dozen strides he doesn’t notice. Placing a hand on his forearm, I squeeze lightly, watching as he comes to an abrupt halt, his head turning quickly and his eyes locking on mine. The obvious anguish on his face, the way his breaths come in quick pants, like he can’t get enough air, has my heart squeezing, the psychologist in me recognizing the signs of a panicattack at the same time the woman in me wants to wrap up this sweet man and promise that nothing will ever hurt him again.
“Maddy,” he says, his voice raw and tinged with fear, and I find myself missing the way he calls me Wildcat with that happy smirk in his voice even as this vulnerable side of the formidable football player I know has every part of me softening.
“Hey, Cameron,” I say lightly, my eyes steady on his face, even as his dart around, unfocused and a little wild. But when I slide my other hand into his free one, lacing our fingers together, his breath comes stuttering out, his eyes snapping right to mine and holding, a morass of emotion swimming in the deep blue. “Focus on me, okay? You’re safe here with me. Can you tell me what you’re feeling?”
“I can’t breathe,” he manages, panic tinging his tone, his chest heaving as he tries to take a full breath.
I take my hand off his arm and reach up to lay it on his cheek. His fingers flex in mine as he closes his eyes and leans into my touch, and even though it shouldn’t, warmth cascades through me at the way he takes this comfort from me. The way I want him to. “I know it feels like you can’t, but I promise you can. You’re having a panic attack, and that’s really scary, but you’re going to be okay. I can help you, if you’ll let me.”
He opens his eyes and looks at me for a beat before he nods. The trust in his eyes practically undoes me as I tug him down onto the ground right where we stand, both of us sitting cross-legged so our knees touch. I try and unwind our hands, but his clamps down on mine, holding onto me like I’m his anchor in the storm. Laying my free hand over our joined ones, I wait until his eyes come back to mine.
“We’re going to take some deep breaths, okay? Just do what I do.” I start to take deep, exaggerated breaths, and after a few seconds, he does the same, his breathing matching the cadence of mine. “That’s really good. Do you think you can tell me some of the things you see? Try three things.”
“The pool,” he says quietly.
I nod, holding his gaze. “It’s really pretty. What else?”
“The stars. There are so many of them. It’s a really clear night here.” His voice breaks a little on the last word, and he closes his eyes again, taking a few shaky breaths.
“It is. Can you find a third?”
When he opens his eyes and looks at me, I feel the intensity of his gaze like a punch to the chest. “Your hair. I love the color. It makes me feel like I could see you anywhere. Pick you out in a crowd of a million. I like when I can see you.”
His unfiltered truth has my heart thudding, as if it wants to jump out of my chest and right into his hands. Looking at him, the way his breathing is slowing, his face softening as his panic attack ebbs, I realize I wholeheartedly agree with that traitorous organ, and I have no idea what to do about that.
“I used to hate it when I was little,” I say with a small smile, mainly to give him something to focus on other than his ebbing panic. “It made me stand out, and I never, ever wanted to stand out. But then when I was seven, I met my mom, and she had red hair and freckles just like me. That’s when I started to love it.”
“You met your mom when you were seven?” I’m happy he’s calm enough to catch that, to ask the question.
“I did. I spent my first seven years in and out of the foster system. My mom was one of my foster parents, and I lived with her temporarily until she adopted me right around my eighth birthday. She married my dad a few months later, and then he adopted me too.”
“That must have been hard. To move around so much without a real home to go back to.”
The statement is simple, but it packs a punch, and I have to stop myself from telling him exactly how hard. From showing him the scars I still carry from those early years of my life. Somehow, I know intuitively that he would treat that knowledge kindly. That he’s a safe place to lay my truths. “It was. It was really, really hard. I’m lucky to have been adopted by the best people in the world. To have a family like mine.”
I look down at our joined hands to give myself a second for the emotion storming through me to pass. “They gave me the greatest home I could ever ask for, but it’s sometimes still hard to remember all the way back to when it wasn’t like that.” Looking back up, I find him studying me intently, his breathing back to normal but his eyes still full of whatever it was that caused his panic. “A truth for a truth, Cameron. What happened to cause your panic attack?”
