A championship he never got the chance to play in.
Instead, he watched it from a hospital bed as he faded in and out of consciousness. But in his memories, he saw himself and Luke on that TV. Watched himself throw a game-losing interception, letting the team down one last time.
Stassi sat down on the opposite end of the couch, spun her legs around, and positioned them over Cooper’s lap. He massaged her leg through the thick fabric of designer sweats as he continued to watch the rookie make mistake after mistake.
He hit the pause button and turned to her, taken abackby her beauty. A beauty he only seemed to notice when she was gone for a little too long. She looked just like her brother, but with sleek, long black hair. Same nose. Same emerald eyes.
“How was L.A.?” he asked.
“The same it always is.” She smiled, forced as it may be. “Which is to say it’s always better than here. Especially this time of year.”
“Remind me why we never left?”
“Because the football Gods decided this was where you were meant to stay, forever.”
She could have left at any time. The only thing tying her down in Columbus was Cooper, and up until signing the contract to coach the rookie, there was nothing tying him down either.
But in that hospital room, he made himself a vow.
That he would finish what he started.
That he’d win a Superbowl someday. Not for his family who wanted him to earn his stripes like his father had decades prior. Not for himself or his team, but for Luke. His best friend. His teammate. The one who didn’t make it out of the hospital alive.
A quiet fell over the both of them as he pressed play, just in time to watch throw an interception. And as he watched, he continued to massage Stassi’s leg.
To the world, she was Cooper’s beautiful girlfriend.
To him,
in that quiet home,
she was the only person who knew what he lost.
Because they both lost the same person.
Chapter Three
Cooper paced insidethe front doors of the training facility, occasionally checking his watch as the minutes crawled by. By the time Nico sauntered through the door, it had been fifty-seven minutes of waiting. In that time, Cooper had more than enough time to do the math in his head.
“You’re an hour late and in that time, I have earned almost two thousand dollars.”
Nico peeled the earpods from his ear and tucked them into a case. “Got paid to do nothing. I don’t see how that’s a bad thing.”
“Because I’m not lazy and my time is far too valuable to wait around?—”
“And yet you’re still standing there.” Nico chuckled. “How much money have you made since I walked in the door? Can you do that math in your head?”
Cooper wanted to discount the rookie’s bad attitude on generational differences, but they were only five years apart in age. There wasn’t a time in Cooper's young careerhe ever dared to utter disrespect to his coaches. The rookie was pushing him, and he decided to not take the bait.
He followed Nico down the hall, the overhead LEDs above activating one step at a time.
Something lurched in Cooper’s gut, a potent combination of feelings familiar and feelings strange. Walking familiar corridors, but without all the same faces. In there, it was just him and the rookie, but the ghosts of yesterday tore through his gut.
Nico pushed open the door to the locker room and did the unexpected—he held it open for Cooper. “See, I can be a nice guy. Helps with the ladies. Chivalry, you know?”
“Noted.”
Either the rookie somehow knew Cooper liked nothing more than being pushed, or he just enjoyed playing with fire. He wagered on the latter.
