“Hello?” I answered.
“Is everything okay?” Lamar asked.
Blinking rapidly, I put my hand over my heart. “I’m okay. Is everything okay with you?”
“Yeah. I’m about to crash, but I wanted to hear your voice. But you sound like something is wrong. Talk to me.”
“I was just thinking about Aunt Addy.”
“How’s everything going? I mean, I know, but… how is she?”
“She’s been sleeping a lot, so the meds are doing their job because she doesn’t seem to be in any pain. I was talking to her earlier, and it got me to thinking about this summer.” I swallowed around the lump in my throat. “I’m really glad I met you.”
“I’m really glad I met you, too. I thank God for that wing craving every single day. And I’m here. For anything, anytime. I hope you know that.”
My stomach fluttered. “I do.”
He was quiet for a moment. “And the way you say I make you feel is how you make me feel. You know that, right?”
“Yes.”
“You make sense. From the moment I met you, you’ve just made sense.”
My cheeks heated. “Good. So do you.”
We said good night, and his warmth coated me. His words were as powerful as any hug.
But I wanted to see him.
Searching for Lamar’s postgame interview, I smiled when I saw a clip with Sports Athletes News Station.
“Lamar, you played a great game today,” the interviewer started. “Even though things didn’t go the Monarchs’ way, you had eight tackles, two of those tackles for a loss. The defense keeps getting better and better each week. You keep getting better and better. What do you think about the offensive performance today?”
“We are a team. Offense, defense, special teams, we are all Monarchs, so if we lose, we all lose. I think we’re going to go to practice tomorrow and make sure we handle business next week.”
“Good answer,” I murmured proudly.
“There are videos of people begging for more information about you,” a different journalist asked. “For instance, they are really interested in your relationship status. What are your thoughts about that?”
“My only thought is for all of you to leave anyone you think I’m with alone.”
“Does that confirm you are in a relationship with her?”
“It confirms that I want you to leave her alone. Some of the comments I’ve seen pissed me off to be honest.”
“Because she’s your girlfriend?”
“Because she doesn’t deserve to be dragged like that just for standing next to me in a picture,” he countered. “She’s beautiful, smart, funny, passionate, tough… She’s not any of the negative things that are being said about her. She’s the person I most look forward to hearing from. She’s the best person I know. And disrespecting her is disrespecting me.”
My stomach flipped.
“So, she is your girlfriend?”
He hesitated. “She’s… What if she was? What then? I’d be blessed to have someone like her in my life. And to imply otherwise would be some dumb shit.”
“Do you think this negativity surrounding your… friend is fueling how you dominate the field?”
“No.”
