Chapter 23 #3
playing well, and it’s sent you off the rails. With yourself. With me. It explains the baby thing. I’m a distraction from
what’s really wrong. Otherwise, you’d never think of any of this.”
“You believe you’re only a distraction to me?”
She set down her bowl. “Clint, what do you want?”
She sounded as tired as he felt, and he hated that. “What I want is for us to stay in each other’s lives, not for you to run away because we’ve had the best sex two people could have. And, okay, maybe the baby thing is crazy, but how do we know if you keep disappearing?”
“Fine!” She didn’t sound as if it was fine. She sounded pissed. “Exactly how do you think this ‘staying in each other’s lives’
would work?”
The counter between them felt insurmountable, and he proceeded carefully. “We talk, text, be together as often as we can.”
“In other words, be fuck buddies.”
“No!” He shoved his bowl aside, spilling chili over the rim. “Is that all you think of me? Of us?”
She crossed her arms over her chest as if she needed to protect herself. “Right now,” she said, “part of me wants to run out
the door. But the bigger part of me wants to strip naked and jump you. It’s what I’ve been saying all along. Sex screws up
clear thinking. It screws up everything.”
He dug in. “So far, I’m not impressed with your clear thinking because you’re missing what’s most important. We belong in
each other’s lives.”
“To what end?”
To her beautiful little ass. Which proved her point and which definitely wasn’t what she needed to hear. “We figure it out as we go along.”
“That might be a good plan with you and your twenty-year-olds, but it’s not a good plan for me.
I have a show to do. I’ve poured my heart and soul into it, and I’m terrified because I’ve almost certainly created a disaster.
I need to fix that. Fix my career. Figure out how I’m going to live my life for me, not for anyone else. ”
“I want to help you, not stand in your way.” As he stood there gazing at her, it was as if he’d been hit with an electric
shock, and suddenly everything that had been murky was obvious. The truth was so simple, it should never have taken him this
long to figure it out. “Dancy, I love you.”
He’d known this for weeks, but he’d kept pushing away the truth, clinging instead to his image of her as his closest friend.
The reason he couldn’t keep his head in the game was because his heart was somewhere else. Now, however, his thinking was
crystal clear. He wanted her with him forever. “I love you, Dancy. I want to marry you.”
If he thought his proposal would send her into his arms, she instantly proved him wrong. “So what? I love you, too, more than
I could ever have imagined loving anyone, but it doesn’t change anything.”
Hearing her say she loved him didn’t feel like the victory it should have been.
She grabbed a paper towel and began mopping up his spill. “I’m touched that you want to marry me, but the life you need and
the life I need are too different.”
No matter what, he’d keep his cool. “Explain that to me.”
“You need to be married to someone who’ll put you first in her life.
One of those decent, uncomplicated women who’ll always be sitting in the stands cheering you on instead of being off in LA trying to build a career for herself.
Or dropping everything for an opportunity in London or Lisbon or Louisiana, for God’s sake.
” She tossed the paper towel in the trash.
“I don’t know what I’m doing, where I’m going, or how I’ll get there.
But I’m doing it. I’m putting myself first, and that’s not the right wife for someone like you who deserves a sweet stay-at-home woman who’ll revolve her life around your career. ”
He stood up from the barstool. “You make me sound like a throwback to the 1950s, and I don’t like it.”
“You’re a man who casts a giant shadow. I lived in a man’s shadow for years, and it nearly killed me. I won’t do that again.”
He’d been backed into a corner, and he hated it. “I’d never ask you to give up anything.”
“Of course you wouldn’t. That’s not who you are. But you take up a lot of oxygen, Clint. You have a big life, a big career.
I’ll always want the best for you, but what’s best for you isn’t what’s best for me.”
He strode to the end of the counter. “So you want to quit? Is that it? Turn your back on me—on both of us—and run away?”
Her gaze softened, along with her voice. “I think you’re the one who’s running away.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Fix your game, Clint. That’s where your focus needs to be. Not on me. Not on us. On fixing your game.” She moved from behind
the counter back toward the great room.
He charged after her. “And how am I supposed to do that?” He’d spoken too loudly, given away too much.
She stopped between the rooms, her forehead creasing with consternation. “Clint, tell me what’s wrong.”
Nothing was wrong. He was fine. Of course, he was fine. But that wasn’t what came out of his mouth as he stormed past her.
“I’m an entitled asshole, that’s what’s wrong.”
She followed him, her voice soft and caring. “Tell me why you feel that way.”
“People are throwing million-dollar checks at my head, and I’m doing what I love, so why am I not happy?”
“I don’t know. Explain it to me.”
He began to pace. “I’m tired of it all. I’m tired of smiling and acting like the slurs don’t hurt. I’m tired of being available
to everyone who’s decided they want a piece of me. And I’m tired of giving the same fucking answers every time I’m interviewed.
‘Well, Chris, Tony, Marv, whoever . . . It’s all about the team. We have to execute. Not make any mistakes. It’s one play
at a time. One game at a time.’ And my all-time favorite . . . ‘It all comes down to who wants it more.’ Which is total bullshit.
It comes down to whoever plays the best and makes the fewest mistakes. And I’m making too many! I’m failing!”
She was listening so intently that he couldn’t stop himself, and it all kept pouring out. “Everybody who plays Madden football
thinks they can be a pro quarterback. Like, how smart do you really have to be? But if it’s so easy, why are there less than
a hundred people in the whole country who can do the job? When people are playing a fucking video game, they’re seeing the
whole field, not looking through a helmet at a line of beef that wants to end their season. They forget how much information
you only have a few seconds to process. Read the defense, read the blocks, the blitzes, remember the routes of every receiver.
There’s no fucking margin for error!”
She perched on the edge of his big coffee table, her gaze intense. “That’s a lot of pressure.”
“Damn right it’s a lot of pressure. And it’s obvious from the way this season is going that I can’t handle it.”
He expected her to tell him how wrong he was. But she didn’t. Instead, she folded her hands in her lap.
“Have you talked to anybody about all of this?”
“Like who? I’m the team leader! You think I can talk to any of the guys about how burned out I am without them losing confidence
in me?”
He was towering over her, but she didn’t flinch. “I’m not talking about your teammates. I’m talking about your team.” She looked up at him patiently. “Your personal team, Clint. You told me you have a close relationship with Rory’s husband
and with Thad Owens, both of them experts in the game. Then there’s your sister, your mother. None of their feelings for you
depend on whether you win or lose. They’re the people who’ll be there for you long after your career is over. They’re your
real team.”
“I’d feel like an asshole talking about it,” he muttered.
She slowly came to her feet, speaking to him gently. “You’re kind of an asshole for not talking about it. And what you call
‘complaining’ is the type of conversation close friends have with each other. The conversation we’re having.”
“You don’t understand.”
She moved closer, brushed his jaw with her fingers. “You’ve convinced yourself that you’re too big and too important to need
help when you clearly do. That’s ego talking.”
“Now I’m egotistical?”
“Are you?” She’d never regarded him more seriously. “Every NFL team has a sports psychologist. Take advantage of that.”
“Yeah right,” he scoffed. “I can imagine what the guys would think if they saw me coming out of our shrink’s office all red-eyed.”
“Maybe they’d think, ‘If the big man can ask for help, so can I.’”
There was a flaw in her logic, but he couldn’t figure out exactly what it was. “You don’t understand.”
She nodded slowly, looking at him with something like pity. “You could be right. But what if I do understand? Think about
it. What if I’m right?” She snapped her fingers at her side. “Let’s go, Watch. It’s bedtime.”