“Basketball?” I ask hopefully.
“Oh, Jesus,” Benji mumbles.
“Not really,” Harper admits, fluttering his hand across the deep scar over his left temple. “Football really, sometimes baseball.”
“Oh. Why?”
“Tighter pants,” Harper explains with a teasing lilt to his voice.
Well, that does make sense. “Best quarterback of all time?”
Harper looks thoughtful for a moment as Andy sighs mournfully from beside him. “Jimmy Garoppolo.”
What the fuck. “Are you serious?”
“Yes,” Harper replies as he reaches over to take a cookie off of Andy’s plate. I swallow hard as he chews thoughtfully on the cookie.
“You think the best quarterback of all time is… Jimmy Garoppolo?” I ask, voice a little high pitched because I’m truly astonished.
Benji’s laughter rattles through my bones and I shoot him a seriousshut the fuck uplook, which he promptly ignores. The way he’s looking at Harper has me weirdly uncomfortable, so I puff out my chest.
“He’s hot,” Harper answers with a shrug of his shoulders.
Well, yes. But I have profound issues with picking a quarterback solely based on their beauty. It’s not… legal, and it's not fair.
“You can’t rank quarterbacks solely on their hotness,” I point out. Sweat is starting to prickle even more at the nape of my neck. Rubbing my hands over my forearms, I watch as Harper’s eyes track the movement, his throat bobbing on a hard swallow. Got him.
Harper’s eyes narrow. “Says who?”
An awkward laugh bubbles out of me just as Benji makes this weird explosion motion with his hands. I’m going to absolutelypummel him the moment we get into the car. The way Harper’s eyes sparkle each time he gives me an answer has me wanting to step closer, makes me want to ask him if he wants to get a drink to keep arguing about the technicalities of ranking athletes on hotness.
“You rank all football players on hotness?”
Harper’s grin is devilish, and warmth blooms in the pit of my belly at the sight. “I rank all athletes on hotness.”
All athletes on hotness. Not skill. Jesus Christ.
“I think you’ve 404 errored Jackson,” Benji notes with a mouthful of chips.
“Sounds like an accomplishment,” Harper quips as he aims his gaze back toward the crowd.
It is an accomplishment. No one unsettles me. But something about Harper… yeah, I want him. But I can’t get the guy to even look twice at me. All my chances to get him alone are dashed when Trevor finally appears and has his huge romantic moment with Beau. Cool, happy for him, but Harper disappeared before I could get his number.
And that is the biggest travesty of the night.
Not even arguing with Benji fixes my mood.
1
HARPER
Why are doctor’s offices always freezing? The ugly fluorescent lights on the white tiled ceiling glare down at me while I lie flat on my back in the frigid office contemplating the state of my life. Honey sits directly beside my dangling feet, a steady comfort as usual. With each passing second, the urge to walk out claws at me.
If I leave the office before Dr. Whitman can share the results, then nothing can be wrong, right? If I don’t hear the news, then everything’s fine.
Nothing’s wrong.
“Howdy, Harper.” Dr. Whitman strides into the office with a happy-go-lucky smile.
