I guess you were right again.
Chapter 44
Theo
Journal Day 7
Mercury,
Did you know you have some fans here? My favorite tech, Meryl, was talking about your championship game tomorrow, and she lost her mind when I told her you were my boyfriend. She said she and her husband are UT season ticket holders and try never to miss a game. Beau (that’s her hubby) swears you’re one of the greatest college quarterbacks in the last two decades. I didn’t have the heart to tell Meryl you aren’t going pro…I’m worried it would give poor Beau a heart attack.
She did ask for an autograph though, so I said I’d hook ‘em for her. Get it?…”hook ‘em?”
Oh fuck off, I have limited entertainment here. Let me have that one.
I wish I could be there tomorrow to cheer you on. There’s a lot of things I’m angry with myself about, but that’s one of thebiggest right now. If I wasn’t like this, I would have been there. It makes me sick to think that if things had gone wrong that night, I wouldn’t be here right now…and I’d miss everything.
I don’t want to miss anything else with you. I don’t want to miss a single kiss, or hug, or morning waking up to you, or a night falling asleep in your arms.
I want to build a life with you. I want to be there for your final game, our graduation, your first job, our anniversary, our wedding. I want it all.
We still have so much life to live together, baby.
And I can’t wait to start.
Chapter 45
Dawson
The air was thick with tension as my teammates and I rested on the benches during halftime, the sound of our heavy breathing and smell of our sweat permeating the locker room. Coach Walker came in and silently scanned the room with his hands on his hips, locking eyes with each of us as he went. I could almost feel the nervous energy coming off the guys around me as we waited for him to say something.
“This is it. This is the day you gentlemen have been working towards for months, some of you years. You have poured blood, sweat, and tears into preparing for this moment, pushed yourselves to the absolute limits, and proven your mettle against teams that have gone for your throats out on that field. We’re down by sixteen, but I don’t want to just make those points up. I want you to pull so far ahead of them that you can’t see them in your goddamn rearview mirror. You can do this. You have earned this. This win is yours for the taking. Get out there and let’s win us a fucking championship!”
Our roar reverberated around the room, vibrating our bones and firing us up. Coach called out our five minute warning as I opened my locker and checked my phone. I didn’t know what I was expecting to find since my and Theo’s no-phone agreementmeant I hadn’t heard anything from him in the week he’d been gone, and I wouldn’t for another three weeks. Possibly more if things didn’t go as planned with his treatment.
I locked it and went to put it back in my bag when the screen lit up with a missed call notification followed shortly by a voicemail alert. My heart flip-flopped seeing the unknown number because somehow I knew exactly who it would be.
I rushed to open the voicemail, plugging my other ear against the surrounding noise so I didn’t miss a single syllable, and when I heard Theo’s throaty timbre, my stomach somersaulted violently.
“Hey there, beautiful. Soooo I bribed my new bestie over here, Meryl, to let me borrow her phone so I could call you. We’ve been watching your game here and I couldn’t help myself. Even just seeing you on TV makes it fucking hard to breathe…and I might have popped an inconvenient boner when you threw that eighty yard pass in the second quarter. Have I ever told you how sexy your arms look when you throw? And those pants should be illegal because your ass could start a prison riot, damn. Wait—fuck, I’m rambling. Not enough time for that. I wanted to tell you how sorry I am that I’m not there, but know that I’m watching and rooting for you, babe. Just imagine that I’m there, front and center, cheering you on. You’ve fucking got this. Don’t let those assholes get to you out there. You are Dawson fucking Hayes, so go out like the champion you are. Bring home a win for me, baby. Fuck, I miss you so much, Mercury…and I hope you’re waiting for me. Oh, shit, halftime is almost over…okay, go kick some ass! I love you! Bye!”
I choked out a watery laugh, my knees going weak hearing the longing in his voice. I sniffed and discreetly wiped at my eyes as I tried to pull myself together. A bittersweet ache bloomedbehind my ribs, elation and heartsickness warring inside as I closed my eyes and tried to imagine him just as he said.
I pictured his flawless, white smile and the way one eyebrow always quirked up when he was feeling cheeky. I imagined him grasping my face and kissing me senseless before I ran out on the field, promising me a carnal reward if I won that would undoubtedly leave me hard and throbbing. And most importantly, I imagined his alluring rasp in my ear as he told me he loved me and he’d be waiting for me at the end.
Coach’s whistle cut through the din of the locker room, signaling us to line up for the team entrance. The guys clapped my shoulder or knocked my helmet with theirs as I passed through to the front of the tunnel. I twisted around to face them all as it sank in that this could be the last game we played together, the last time we walked onto that field as a team.
“Listen up!” I shouted, all eyes swinging to me. “Playing beside you all has been one of the greatest privileges of my life, and I am damn proud of each and every one of you. But this isourfield andourfucking championship. Let’s show them that if they want to mess with Texas?—”
“They’ll get the Horns!”
Their collective chant thundered in my ears and made my chest swell with pride. I slid my helmet on and rolled my shoulders back before bursting from the tunnel, our fight song barely audible through the cheers of the crowd. I ran out with fire in my veins, my team at my back, and Theo’s ring hanging right above my heart.
“Alright losers,”Nate yelled over the noise in the bar. “Please raise your shot glasses to the real winner of the night, Captain QB himself! To Dawson!”
Whistles and whoops of celebration exploded from the crew before they knocked their glasses to the table and tossed the shots back. Rhys and Micah erupted in coughs while Nate, Griffin, Bash, and Cal howled like drunken wolves while some of the crowd around us joined in. Kenji and Aly gave each other matching looks of wry amusement at their reaction.
It’d taken some pushing and prodding from Aly to agree to come out with everyone tonight after our big win.It had been an intense game in the second half, but the guys back out with a vengeance. I played my heart out and we ended the game against Texas Tech thirty-six to twenty-two. And when I’d been lifted onto my teammates’ shoulders, I’d looked right into the cameras to wink and blow a kiss, knowing without a doubt that he saw it as my silent message to him.
