Chapter 20 #2
“I’m fine.” I study him more closely. “You?”
He exhales slowly, like he’s only just realizing he’s been holding his breath. “Better now.” And then he reaches for my hand.
His fingers simply lace with mine as if this is what we’ve always done in daylight.
The flashbulbs explode as questions fly.
“How long have you been married?”
“Why hide it?”
“Is this affecting the team?”
We don’t answer. We don’t even acknowledge them. We walk.
The car door shuts, and the noise disappears as abruptly as it arrived. The silence inside feels dense and almost sacred after the chaos.
Ollie leans his head back against the seat and lets out a long breath. “Jesus.”
“You handled it,” I tell him.
“I walked to a car.”
“You didn’t flinch.”
He gives me a sideways look. “You’re grading my handholding now?”
“I’m grading your composure.”
Vinny’s rented SUV pulls out behind us as I start driving. I told him I wanted to take the wheel myself today. I needed the illusion of control. Needed to feel like I was steering something.
For a few blocks, we just move through the city in quiet.
“So,” Ollie says eventually, voice lighter, “first public outing as married men.”
“Not exactly the launch we imagined.”
“Understatement of the year.”
We stop at a light. I glance at him and see that he’s watching the city differently today, as if recalibrating where he stands in it.
“How was training?” I ask.
“Good. Strange. A few guys pulled me aside. Mostly support. Some awkward jokes. A couple of rookies were more interested in whether you’re actually as tall as you look onstage.”
I snort. “They want tickets.”
“They absolutely want tickets.”
“And?”
“And I told them I’d see what I could do.”
“Traitor.”
His smile widens, but it fades quickly. “Coach was solid. GM too. They said nothing changes.”
“It better not.”
We drive in silence for a moment, the weight of that settling between us.
“I’ll head back to San Francisco after tomorrow’s game,” I say. “Stay there a week. Then I’ll come back here.”
“You don’t have to keep flying,” he replies.
“I want to.”
“It’s a lot of back and forth.”
“Eight years of nothing was worse.”
That shuts him up.
He looks at me, something complicated moving behind his eyes. “I don’t want you rearranging your life entirely around me.”
“I’m not rearranging it. I’m integrating it.”
He studies that answer carefully, like he’s testing it for cracks.
“And I’m not moving in,” I add. “Not yet.”
His shoulders loosen slightly. “Good.”
“Good?”
“We need time,” he says. “To figure out who we are now. I don’t want to default to what we were just because it’s comfortable.”
That’s one of the differences.
Eight years ago, Ollie would have leaned into intensity and hoped it held. Now he thinks in architecture. In foundations.
“I don’t want comfortable,” I tell him. “I want stable.”
He nods.
I pull into a small parking lot a few minutes later.
He looks around. “Where are we?”
“Food.”
He blinks. “You drove all the way out here for food?”
“You said simple.”
Recognition dawns slowly. The diner sign glows red against the snow. His mouth curves. “You remember.”
Of course I remember. We celebrated his birthday here, quietly, and one of my awards for song writing. And that’s the point: Our four years together were filled with so many good, perfect moments. And love. Always so much love.
Inside, the warmth hits us first, followed by the smell of coffee and frying oil. No one stares. No one whispers.
We slide into a booth, and it feels almost surreal how easy that is.
He exhales. “This is perfect.”
We order burgers and milkshakes like we’re twenty-two again. The waitress, Doreen, still wears the same unimpressed expression that she did the last time we were here all those years ago. She doesn’t look twice at us.
For a while, we talk about small things.
Ollie tells me about a rookie who tried to body him in drills and nearly bounced off. I tell him about a producer in LA who insisted on adding a saxophone to a track that absolutely did not require one.
He laughs more easily than he used to. The edges around him feel less brittle. Therapy, maybe. Time. Or maybe the relief of no longer splitting himself in two.
“I like this version of you,” I tell him.
He studies me. “Yeah?”
“You’re calmer.”
“I’m exhausted,” he says dryly.
“Not that. You’re… steadier.”
He considers it. “Therapy,” he says finally. “And I’m not pretending anymore.”
I nod. “That helps.”
“And you?” he asks. “You’re different too.”
“How?”
“You don’t flare as fast.”
That one hits.
“Rehab,” I say quietly. “And not wanting to wake up hating myself.”
He reaches across the table without thinking, brushing his fingers against mine.
The contact is small and intentional.
We leave as the dinner crowd starts filtering in. Outside, the cold has deepened, sky fading toward navy.
Back in the car, the city feels quieter.
Ollie watches me drive for a while.
“What?” I ask eventually.
“You look happy.”
I think about that longer than I expect to.
“I am,” I admit. It feels dangerous to say it out loud, but it’s true.
“Me too,” he says.
We pull up outside his place. Before he gets out, he leans across the console and kisses me. It’s not heated or urgent. Tenderness and certainty is in every touch.
When he pulls back, he smiles, steps out into the cold, and I watch him walk toward the driver’s door. His smile stretches when he opens it for me, and he holds out his hand.
I snort and shake my head but take it willingly. We head toward the building, cameras still hovering at the perimeter, while I’m wearing a shit-eating grin.