Page 80 of Iron

“Nine more holes, then we're done for the day. No arguing.”

“Fine.”

“Fine. Ten to eighteen is a hell of a stretch, by the way. Whoever designed this back nine hated golfers personally.”

“Great. Something to look forward to,” I groan.

“You'll be fine. You're better than you think you are right now.” He says it simply, no exaggeration in it, just fact, the same way he tells me the truth about everything else. “You just need four more days for your legs to remember what they're for.”

I want to believe him completely, and mostly I do, except for the small, cold thread of worry underneath it. The worry that does math on points standings every time I'm not paying attention. Two missed events. A win in Boise that feels like it happened a lifetime ago. A card that's still not guaranteed, no matter how many people keep telling me I'm close.

“Hey,” Gavin says, catching whatever's crossing my face before I can hide it. “Whatever happens this week. You already did the hard part. You got back up.”

“That's not how the points work, Gavin.”

“I know how the points work.” He shoulders my bag again, nods me toward the tenth tee. “I'm not talking about the points.”

Thursday is typical hot Oklahoma humidity. I slog through the front nine with three birdies and one fucking bogey. Gavin is steady at my side, hand on my shoulder as we walk down the fairways.

Fourteen is where the round almost turns on me.

“Trust the read. Firm through the break, don't baby it,” Gavin says.

I trust it.

The ball catches the slope halfway home, bends left exactly the way he called it, and drops dead center with a sound that still gets me every time, no matter how many I've made this year.

“That's a birdie,” Gavin says, like he wasn't sure until the ball actually fell, even though his read was perfect.

“That's a birdie,” I agree, and something in my chest unclenches that's been tight since the tee box.

Four more holes, four more solid swings, nothing spectacular, just clean golf, and when I sign my scorecard in the tent afterward, the number staring back at me reads ten under.

Gavin's waiting outside, bag already over his shoulder, watching my face for the verdict before I even say it.

“Ten,” I tell him.

He doesn't say anything right away, just pulls me in against his chest, bag and all, and I feel him exhale like he'd been holding his breath the whole back nine right alongside me.

“Three more rounds,” he says into my hair. “You've got this.”

We eat dinner in the clubhouse. I’m too exhausted to do more than shower off and climb into bed, mashing my face into Gavin’s chest as I fall asleep.

44

GAVIN

TJ tees off in the last group of the day, name posted at the top of the leaderboard where it's been sitting since Friday, twenty-seven under and one shot clear of the field. I've caddied a lot of final groups in my life, just never from this side of the bag, and it's a different kind of nervous, watching someone else's hands do the trembling instead of my own.

He comes out swinging instead of playing it safe, birdies the first three holes in a row, and when we walk off three, I can feel the whole tournament tilting his way, the gallery buzzing every time his name climbs another spot on the board. Thirty under. A three-shot cushion nobody expected this early.

Then we get to four.

Short par four, should be an easy birdie look, but TJ's second shot catches the front bunker instead of the green, and the sand shot comes out heavy, leaves him fifteen feet short with a putt that doesn't want to break the way he reads it. It slides by on the low side. Bogey.

He doesn't say anything walking off the green, jaw tight, shoulders pulled up around his ears in a way I haven't seen since Boise, and I know exactly what's happening in his head before he says a word. He's doing the math. The whole three-birdie cushion he'd just built suddenly feels like it evaporated in one swing.

“Hey.” I catch his arm before he gets to the fifth tee, keep my voice low enough that it doesn't carry to the gallery lining the ropes. “Look at me.”