Chapter 25
SARAH
I’m behind on a bunch of errands I need to run—a meeting with my accountant, a trip to the grocery store, an appointment with my eye doctor—so it’s after dinner before I finally make it to Anna’s.
I’m still floating when I get there—it’s only been eight hours since the kiss to rival all kisses—but all thoughts of Carter are pushed from my mind as soon as I reach Anna’s front porch. I can hear Fiona crying from all the way out here. The sound makes me hurry a little faster.
I let myself in and kick off my sneakers before following the sound of Fiona’s cries to the living room.
Anna is pacing in front of the fireplace, Fiona cradled in her arms. She’s trying to get her to take a bottle, and Fiona doesn’t seem very enthusiastic. The older girls are on the couch, watching an episode of Bluey, though I can’t imagine how they’re hearing it over Fiona’s crying.
“Hey,” Anna says when she sees me come in. “I’m trying to get her used to bottles, but she’s really not having it.”
“Here. Let me try,” I say. “I might have more luck since I don’t have boobs full of milk.”
She sighs. “Please. But if she doesn’t figure it out fast, I’ll just nurse her.”
I sit down on the couch with Fiona and the bottle and slowly brush it against her lips. Fiona fights it at first, but only for a moment before she manages to latch.
“Finally,” Poppy says as Fiona gulps down the breastmilk.
“Good work, Fi,” I say as I look down at her perfect little face. She’s bigger than she was the last time I saw her, but I remember feeling that way about Olive and Poppy too. They grow so fast when they’re tiny.
Anna drops onto the couch beside me. “I’m surprised it worked,” she says. “It’s a little early to introduce a bottle, but she’s already such a good nurser, I hoped she’d figure it out.”
“What’s the reason for waiting?” I ask, and Anna shrugs.
“Some people say it can impact your milk supply if you aren’t breastfeeding regularly or interfere with the baby’s ability to latch.
But I’m not worried. I have enough milk to feed an army of babies.
Her taking a bottle isn’t going to matter.
Plus, this way, maybe I’ll be able to go to the last home game. ”
I lift my eyebrows. “Are you serious right now? You want to go to a hockey game three weeks postpartum?”
“I mean, I won’t take her,” Anna says. “Assuming you’d keep her for me. But Miles plays better when I’m there.”
Something about her statement makes my heart pinch. I love that she loves watching Miles play. And that she’s so willing to be there for him, even so soon after having a baby.
It just makes me wish I could do the same thing. Be there for Carter enough that he feels like he plays better when I’m watching.
“Of course I’ll watch her,” I say. “You know I will.”
“Mommy, can we watch another episode?” Poppy asks.
Anna tosses Poppy the remote. “Just one more,” she says. “Then it’s bedtime for you both.” Anna shifts her attention back to me. “What was that face for?” she asks.
“What face?”
“The face you made when I said I wanted to go to a game. Are you thinking I shouldn’t? I really don’t think it’s a big deal. It’s not like I’ll do anything but sit there.”
“That’s not it,” I say. “I was just…” I scrunch my eyes closed, then peek one open to see Anna looking at me, expression curious.
“I think…” I start to say. I look down at Fiona, readjusting the bottle.
She’s almost finished, and her eyes are getting heavy.
“I think I’m ready to work through my panic attacks.
I want to watch Carter play. I want to show up for him like he shows up for me. ”
Anna’s expression softens. “I wondered if you might wind up here. The fact that you have—I think it means you love him, Sarah.”
My face flushes with heat at the thought.
I put the bottle down and lift Fiona to my shoulder, patting her on the back to help her burp.
“Maybe I do? That feels like such a big word. I just know I can’t stop thinking about him.
Also, he kissed me this morning before he left and…
Anna, I’ve never had a kiss feel like that.
I think…he might be really special. And suddenly the sadness I feel over not being there for him feels worse than the fear making me stay away. ”
“That’s a really big deal,” she says softly. “And I’m really, really happy for you.”
“Yeah?”
“Of course! He’s a great guy. And the two of you seem really good together,” she says. “So what are you going to do?”
“No clue,” I say. “Call my therapist? Practice watching games at home? I don’t even know where to start.”
“I think your therapist is a great place to start,” Anna says.
“Yeah. I just feel like it shouldn’t be this hard. Intellectually, I understand that Miles is fine. Fighting is a part of the game—”
“But not every game,” Anna adds. “I think they play more games without fights.”
I nod. “Right. I totally get that. But even when they do fight, I know Miles is never actually out of control. It’s not the same as…” My voice cracks, and I close my eyes, suddenly grateful to have the grounding presence of Fiona in my arms.
“As it was with your dad,” Anna says, finishing the sentence I can’t finish on my own.
I nod. “If I know that, why can’t I get through this?”
“Because your nervous system doesn’t care what you think you know,” Anna says gently.
“Triggers don’t always make sense. Especially when they’re rooted in trauma.
And Sarah, your childhood was really traumatic.
Don’t berate yourself over this. It’s honestly a miracle that this is the worst of what you’re dealing with. ”
Tears spring to my eyes. “But how is Miles okay? Dad never hit me. It was always Miles. He’s the one who really suffered.”
Anna reaches over and squeezes my knee. “That doesn’t mean it wasn’t also traumatic for you.
Besides, Miles hasn’t always been okay. You were too young to really see or understand, but he had a hard time when he first joined the league.
He struggled to keep his anger in check, had terrible impulse control.
Eventually, it started to impact his play.
If not for Coach Kimzey, I’m not sure he would have made it through. ”
“Coach Kimzey? The Jaguars coach?”
“He was a player then. Captain of Miles’s team in Boston.”
I sniff. “How did I not know that?”
“I didn’t for a long time,” Anna says. “This was all before we met, and it’s taken me years to pry all of the details out of him.
But the long and short of it is that Kyle—Coach Kimzey—pulled Miles aside and told him if he didn’t get himself into therapy and take care of his mental health, he’d never pass him another puck again. ”
“And it worked?”
Anna nods. “Yeah. It did. Miles was barely twenty years old, trying to live on his own, sending seventy percent of what he earned back to Canada for you and your mom. I think he understood that if he threw away his career, he was also throwing away his ability to take care of you.”
“So he went to therapy?”
“For years,” Anna says. “The team set him up with someone, and it truly changed his life. It’s why he was committed to making sure you were seeing a therapist once you moved to the States. Because he knows it works.”
I lean back into the couch cushions, one hand rubbing up and down Fiona’s back. “When I was little, he told me he had special powers,” I say. “That the hits didn’t hurt him—like he was some kind of superhero.”
“That sounds like something he would say,” she says. “He’s only ever wanted to protect you.”
I breathe out a long sigh. “I know. That’s what makes it easier for me to forgive him for how boneheaded he’s being right now.”
She gives me a commiserating look. “Did he try to make you talk to the Canadian teacher he found?”
“He all but called him for me.” In my arms, Fiona wiggles, arching her back as she stretches and lets out the cutest tiny baby grunt. “Should I lay her down?” I ask Anna.
“You can try, but she’ll probably wake up if you do.” She stands. “You keep her. I’ll take the girls up and put them to bed.”
“Are you sure? I was going to do it to give you a break.”
“You are giving me a break. And giving Poppy and Olive some much needed Mommy time. What do you say, girls?” Anna says to her two oldest daughters. “You want to do bedtime with me tonight?”
They immediately jump up and cheer, clearly thrilled with the idea.
While the three of them are upstairs, I pull out my phone and take a selfie, the top of Fiona’s head just visible at the bottom of the photo.
I send it to Carter, a pulse of nerves pushing through me as I do.
If not for the kiss this morning, I might not have had the courage to send it. A text, yes—but not a selfie.
That kiss. I’ve replayed it in my mind at least a thousand times, and it makes my skin prickle with awareness every single time. Carter didn’t just kiss me—he kissed me like I belong to him. Like there was no possible way he could pull out of the driveway without kissing me.
My phone vibrates beside me, and I grab it, my heart already pounding in anticipation.
Carter has hearted the photo, then a message pops up.
Carter
You’re beautiful.
I close my eyes, resisting the urge to kick my feet like a middle schooler getting her first text from a boy she likes.
I heart Carter’s message, then switch over to Instagram, trusting the Jaguars’ social media crew has posted pictures of the team boarding the airplane.
Sure enough, a post went up this morning.
It doesn’t include photos of every player, but it’s my lucky day because there’s a great shot of Carter, sunglasses on, looking serious and sexy and perfectly delicious.
I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about the fact that less than an hour before this photo was taken, he was pinning me against the wall in our kitchen, kissing me senseless.