I tilt my head to the side and ask him something I’ve never had the confidence to broach with him. “Do you ever miss it? Football?”
“Want the genuine answer or the one I tell to everyone?”
“You mean there’s more than one?”
He refills my water before handing it back to me. “Oh yeah. If a reporter asked the same question, I might answer by saying that I miss the training, the team, and especially the fans.”
“And the real one?” I take a cautious sip.
His candor surprises me. His chin drops into his hands. “I enjoyed the parts where I could give back to the people who came to cheer us on.”
“You mean things like the charity work?”
“Exactly. I mean, the game gave me the drive to do more. Be more.”
“That’s—”
“What?”
“Sweet.” Clearing my throat, I ask, “Is there anything else?”
He gives it some consideration. “Definitely mentoring the new players into becoming excellent role models. I liked that part of it.”
My voice is sardonic when I mock, “Bryce excluded.”
“Bryce is always the exclusion.” His voice is wry in return.
“And your injury?”
“Well, I certainly wish it hadn’t happened.”
“Troy,” my voice is exasperated.
“It aches sometimes. I’m certain it would if I ran the vineyard, worked as a coach, or sat around on a yacht.”
I lift a hand and tease him. “You never mentioned yachts were an option.”
He reaches out and bops me on the nose. “You’d be bored in about a day.”
“You know me pretty well,” I concede.
“I’d like to get to know you better,” he counters.
His words hang between us, amping up emotions that are swirling so fast from friends to more. It’s all blurring together until I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins.
Sensing my discomfort, Troy steers the topic back to something safer for me—the aftereffects of his injury. “Reminds me that I survived, I guess. But the hardest part wasn’t the pain. It was the silence afterward.”
“No cheering fans?” I tease.
“Very few people remember what happened to me unless it’s with some special or I appear on camera.”
I frown. “Sounds like you had the wrong friends.”
“You’re not wrong about that.”
“What does the vineyard satisfy in you?“
His answer is immediate. “Family. Teamwork and camaraderie. I’ve learned the rhythms and—much like in the plays of a game—can predict what happens next. The only difference is I’m playing on one team—Mother Nature’s.”
