Daylight, page 10
I thought I’d be able to make it out to Jacksonville with the team, but that was immediately a no once it was clear the healing process was a lot worse than I had originally thought. I knew it was going to be tough, but these first few days are fucking killing me.
Elle is on a call with Carrie Manthaw in the other room. They were supposed to meet the next time she was in New York, but I threw a wrench in her plans and stranded her in Chicago. She told me she thought that maybe Carrie was calling for more than just a hello-how-are-you, but couldn’t be sure. It’ll be interesting to see what kind of news she emerges with.
I start physical therapy tomorrow, which I’m nervous as all hell about. Learning how to maneuver around the apartment with the giant brace on my leg, the crutches, and the general immobility has been a chore. How I’m supposed to start doing exercises on it is beyond me, but the sooner I figure it out the better, I guess.
I’ve noticed I’ve taken on a rather negative mindset the last couple of weeks. Kind of hard not to, given the circumstances, but something I don’t want to make a habit of.
The door from Elle’s room opens, and she emerges with a sly smile on her face. “So, are we ordering something for dinner?” She asks, not mentioning the call with Carrie. She walks to the kitchen, checking out the fridge even though she already knows what her options are.
It’s been slim pickings the last few weeks. My assistant brings groceries on a schedule, and it’s always whatever my nutritionist needs for meal prep that given week. Elle has made do cooking for us herself, but
“That’s up to you,” I nod. “What did Carrie have to say?”
“It is embargoed,” she smirks, shaking her head. “I cannot say.”
“What do you mean, it’s embargoed?” I ask incredulously.
“I will tell you when I can tell you,” she giggles, happiness radiating off of her.
“Well, I’m gonna hold you to that one, O’Connor,” I laugh, confusion falling over me.
She smiles happily, sauntering into the kitchen. “You have no food in this apartment. We will have to order,” she sighs. I laugh, shaking my head in agreement. She bypasses me, walking to the couch with her nose in her phone.
The last two weeks have been weird between us. On the day of my surgery, she was there when I came out of the anesthetics. She ambushed me with questions about a seemingly random night in college, but I remember it plain as day.
There was a dive bar that had shitty beer, but surprisingly decent food just around the corner from my house. Club Q’s had become a bit of a tradition for the two of us to meet up at the night before I left for an away game, where she would drink two beers— one for her, one for me— and we would get enough appetizers to feed an army.
The week leading up to our game against Maryland, I had been waging a war against myself. It was the first time my feelings for Elle had ever felt so… consuming. I tried everything to convince myself that it was too late to admit I had feelings for her, but that afternoon, a teammate said something to me and it stuck.
“All we’ve got going for us is football. If you’ve got the chance to create meaningful relationships, don’t hesitate,” He was a preachy son of a bitch, and I found a lot wrong with his initial statement, but create meaningful relationships felt like a slap in the face after what I’d been internally debating all week.
I remember sending Elle a jumbled thread of texts, telling her we couldn’t skip out on dinner. Knowing what I had to do, nothing was going to stop me from asking her out that night. At least, not until she brought a date.
It felt like all the air had been kicked out of me when I saw her approach our table, her arm entwined with the guy she brought with her. I plastered on a fake smile, and mechanically made it through the dinner. It couldn’t have been worse.
I didn’t think she caught on, though. That was surprising to learn. We didn’t talk about it much, nothing beyond me admitting to my initial intentions.
That’s not to say that we haven’t been blurring the lines between platonic and romantic these last few weeks— we certainly have— but stuck in the confines of my place, neither of us has felt the need to address it. Every night, she slips in next to me on the recliner, and that’s that.
Within the walls of my apartment, time is a construct and reality is whatever we make it. No one has forced us to address it, and we are comfortable keeping it that way.
Unfortunately, we can’t live like that forever. Reality is going to be a swift kick in the ass, and we need to talk about where we stand sooner, rather than later.
She scrolls on her phone, looking for a place that’ll deliver on one of the busiest nights of the year when the home team is playing in the championship game. “I found a sushi place with only a 60-minute wait. That’s the lowest one. Wanna go for it?” She asks.
I nod, and we go over the menu together before placing an order. Elle rattles off menu items and I nod half-heartedly when I recognize the name of something. My mind is elsewhere right now, and as the clock approaches game time I feel my chest restrict.
Reluctantly, I turned on the NFL pre-show. My heart aches for both of us. We both should be out there, but we’re stuck twelve-hundred miles away in my living room.
It sends a searing pain through my chest as Joel Dodson, my backup, does the promotional shots that should be mine. Elle frowns as she realizes the death glare on my face, one that I can’t seem to control at the moment. “Alex, no one is going to be mad if you decide you can’t watch it. It fucking sucks,” she sighs. “Catch the highlights tomorrow and save yourself the pain tonight.”
I shrug. “I’ve gotta make a couple of tweets, contractual bullshit. According to my agent, anyway,”
He said I should do a couple of live reactions to plays of the game, and retweet the final score post from the team account when the time comes. I think it’s all bullshit, but like a lot of scenarios this week, I didn’t have the energy to argue about it. He even suggested I take a picture of my leg propped up with the game on in the background. I told him he was fucking crazy.
“We can channel flip? I bet there’s something just as good on.” She suggests.
We settle on watching something else until the actual game starts. I decided no matter how hard I tried to convince myself to watch the pregame show, it was just making me miserable. We sit and talk about anything that isn’t related to football, trying to take our minds off of what should’ve been.
The sushi arrives just after kickoff, and in the first five minutes, Dodson threw an interception that was returned for a 73-yard run. I fight the urge to stick a chopstick in my eye.
“Do you think that it’s okay for me to have a drink tonight?” I sigh, bringing my fingers to my temples.
“You’ve been off the painkillers for ten days. I’m surprised you didn’t ask sooner,” she laughs. “What do you want?”
“Something strong,” I shake my head. She laughs softly, the sound warming my insides. She wanders into the kitchen, opening cabinets and clinking glasses around.
My attention falls back to the game. I just feel sorry for the guys who’ve put their all into it just to end up like this. It’s all my fault, if I wouldn’t have gotten hurt we would’ve stood a decent chance at this game. Instead, they’re getting obliterated on prime-time during the biggest game of the year.
I hear Elle coming back around the corner, holding two glasses in her hand. “Spiked hard seltzers,” she smiles.
“Isn’t the charm with hard seltzers the fact that they are already spiked?” I laugh, taking the glass from her.
“You would be right, however, you need something a bit stronger if you plan on getting through the rest of this game in one piece,” she shakes her head, sitting next to me on the couch.
“Ouch, Elle,” I feign offense but know she’s right.
“You’re telling me that you haven’t almost crushed the remote with your fist five times in the one-quarter of the game that’s been on?” She eyes me suspiciously.
“I plead the fifth,” I declare.
“Shocker,” she says, her voice thick with something I can’t quite pinpoint. It’s not until I retrain my eyes on the TV that I notice her former colleague, Maria Tyson, is doing her midgame report. The midgame report that should’ve been Elle’s.
I wrap my free arm around her, sighing. “Oh, sunshine. You’re gonna show them all that you’re bigger and better, and worth so much more than they chalked you up to be.” I brush a strand of hair behind her ear.
She sighs sadly. “Same goes for you, Alex.”
“We’ll both be back there next year, mark my words,” I say, my voice thick with yearning.
Chapter Seventeen
Elle’s Point of View
“Do you really only have one day left?” Alex whines. I laugh.
“You’re just going to miss having someone waiting on you hand and foot,” I shake my head. For the last month, I’ve spent all of my time helping Alex through the worst of his reconstruction surgery recovery. It’s been testing, the physical therapy has been putting him through the wringer. He’s finally able to move on his own again, for the most part.
He frowns. “That’s not true. I’m going to miss you, too,”
I pretend that his words don’t strike my heart in the way that they do, and continue doing the dishes. “Well, you could always come visit in New York for a few weeks,” I shrug. “I’m sure that Quinn would love to see you.”
“Aw. I do love Quinn,” he contemplates. “I don’t know that I can just up and leave my physical therapy like that, though.”
I sigh. “It was just a dumb idea, half baked idea,” I say half-heartedly. I don’t know why I feel such a sinking weight in my heart or a pounding in my chest at the idea of leaving him for so long. Pushing it back, I stick my hand further in the sink and robotically load the dishwasher. Alex slinks off the chair and hobbles toward me, using the counters as a crutch.
“I don’t think it’s a dumb idea, Elle,” he shakes his head.
I huff, not wanting to get into all of this right now. “Why are you unnecessarily standing?”
“Why are you changing the subject?” He frowns.
“I’m just trying to do the dishes,” I sigh, unable to control the storm clouds that have settled over me.
“Elle,” he says quietly, pivoting so I have to look at him. I grab the dish towel off of the counter and dry my hands, turning so our bodies are parallel with one another.
“Alex, I don’t know what you want me to say,” I cross my arms, leaning against the counter.
He sighs. “Just talk to me, Elle. Obviously, something has gotten into you in the last five minutes, I’d guess it has something to do with the fact that you’re going back to New York tomorrow?”
I shrug, not wanting to admit to the feelings that have taken over. It makes it all too real. The feelings I’ve been trying so hard to shove down, the moments between us that can no longer be written off as strictly friendly. Trying to ignore him, I go back to the sink full of dishes. He’s not having any of that.
He cranes his neck around me, putting himself back in my line of sight. “Elle, I just think…” He trails off, trying to find his words. “I think that maybe we need to talk.”
“Talking would be good,” I nod my head, my voice dangerously close to the edge of tears.
Using his crutches, he makes it back to the couch as I trail behind. I pat dry my hands on my jeans, the soapy water from the sink dripping from my hands. He takes his spot on the couch, and I opt for the opposite end. Putting distance between us feels like the responsible decision right now.
“Elle, talk to me. Lay it all out. Let me into your head, and I’ll let you into mine. I hate seeing you like this,” Alex shakes his head, a searing look on his face.
I let out a deep sigh, slumping into the couch. “It’s scary, Alex,” I shake my head, bringing my knees to my chest. “I don’t want to jeopardize anything. I can’t.”
“Elle, we have nothing to lose!” He exclaims. “This is the lowest either of us have ever been. We can only go up from here, and I have a feeling this conversation is on the cusp of something that’ll point us back in the upward direction.”
“You don’t know that!” I counter back. The pounding in my chest intensifies.
“Why did you ask me about that night at Club Q’s?” He asks, his eyes drilling into mine, searching for an answer. I feel like, deep down, he already knows his answer. Getting me to admit it out loud is half of the battle.
“I told you, bad spiral of thoughts,” I say quietly, scared to divulge anything more than that in case I’m reading the situation wrong.
“That doesn’t answer my question. How many years have passed since that singular, isolated event? Why did it suddenly jump out to you?” He asks, pressing for more information.
Ignoring him for a beat, I pick at the hem of my shirt. My eyes dart from my shirt to the coffee table, back to my shirt, to his eyes. Once our eyes lock, my gaze doesn’t falter. With my eyes locked on his, I don’t hold back. “I was thinking about my past relationships, how every single guy I’ve ever dated had opposite personalities than I have. It works in my friendships, but not romantically. Yet, all of my friendships operate that way. Every single one of them, with just one glaring exception. And the exception?”
“You,” I say softly, at the same time he mutters, me. “It got me thinking about our friendship, back in the earlier days. That specific event stood out to me. Now I know why,” I nod.
“I would do it again,” He says, lifting his head to match my gaze.
“Do what?” I ask incredulously, with a bite to my voice I didn’t intend on having.
“This all sounds so juvenile,” He shakes his head, and I can feel his eyes bore into mine as he tries to find the right words. “I want to be with you, Elle. God, every day. I’ve never stopped wanting to you.” His admission shatters the air around us, and it feels like we’re the only two people in the world. I would’ve believed it if someone said time actually stopped.
It makes me feel like I’ve gotten the wind kicked out of me, hearing him admit that.
“Alex, with our jobs, you really think…” I shake my head, trying to find any valid excuse. My brain is on a tripwire where Alex and romantic feelings are involved, and my automatic defense mechanism is to use our jobs.
Deep down, I know I can’t justify that as a valid excuse anymore. A few weeks ago, on the day of the Super Bowl, I took a job with Carrie Manthaw. She is set to be the next president of GoSports, the biggest sports news company in the world.
I’ve taken a position as the Midwest correspondent, meaning I work out of the regional headquarters, the Midwest location being Chicago, while traveling to designated events— located in the Midwest— as assigned. GoSports is in the transition period right now, and Carrie won’t be announced for another two weeks. They’re keeping the leadership changes under tight wraps until they go public with them. People like me, who have been approached with positions under Carrie’s authority, have signed airtight non-disclosure agreements.
I haven’t even told Alex that I’m employed.
“It’s something we can work with, Elle. People have careers that require much more secrecy than ours and make it work. If we want to make this work, we can. We just have to try,” he pleads.
After contemplating what he just told me for a split second, I have to throw him a bone. I want this. I can’t keep pretending that I don’t. “I’m employed again. I really can’t give you any more details than that, not until the embargo is lifted. I think, hypothetically speaking, I would be completely protected,” I confess, a blush creeping over my face.
“What!” He exclaims, a grin taking over his face. “Elle, you should’ve led with that!” That earns a laugh from me.
He uses his arms to shift his body one seat over, putting himself right next to me. The happiness that overcomes me is enough to wash away any doubts or second thoughts I was having about this.
Wrapping an arm around my shoulders, he pulls me in close. His embrace feels welcoming and warm, and I let my eyes close for a beat while I savor the moment.
“Your date be damned, I should’ve asked you to go out with me years ago. So, this is me formally asking, if you’d give me a dinner?” He asks, his lopsided grin going straight to my heart.
“Just a dinner?” I say trying to maintain the serious face, but losing desperately as a smile overcomes me. “I think I could arrange that.”
“Good, very good,” he nods, wrapping his arm around my waist and securing me against his embrace. “Any good movies out right now?”
“There are always good movies out,” I state.
“Oh, right. Of course. Could I interest you in an at home dinner-and-movie night?” He asks.
I smile. “That sounds perfect.”
His eyes lock on mine, and without a second thought, I lean into him. His hands fall to either side of my face, his thumbs brushing the hair away from my eyes. “I’m going to kiss you now, if that’s okay,” he says softly.
Instead of answering verbally, I use my actions. Brushing my lips against his, he wraps an arm around my waist, pulling me to his lap.
Something about the sheer upper body strength he so casually displays leaves me awestruck every time.
His lips find mine, and I’m overcome with a million different emotions at once. The one at the forefront of my mind screams, Why did it take us so long to come to this conclusion?
Chapter Eighteen
Alex’s Point of View
“Ease into the squat, Alex,” Doctor Hashim says.
I groan but try my best. I feel a sweat break out into my forehead as I try and ease into it, the pain in my knee not subsiding. All the guys I’ve talked to, teammates and former teammates alike, have seemed to have much easier recovery journeys than I have. Here I am at week five, struggling this badly with a simple squat.
We go through the rest of the session, it gets easier eventually. The dull pain never leaves, but he says to have faith. Within the next week or two, I’ll see a lot of my mobility come back.
