Chapter 22
November
Nobody had ever asked Dawson, but he thought it made absolutely no fucking sense to have the only Canadian team in the NFL play on Thanksgiving.
American Thanksgiving.
Yet, that was exactly what the Thunder were doing. Flying to Dallas, to play the Cowboys in their annual Thanksgiving game.
“It’s stupid, yeah,” Marty agreed, as Dawson did his final stretches before kickoff, “but it’s pretty cool that we’ll get a long break after this.”
Dawson couldn’t deny that. In the three weeks since Shane had shown up in Toronto and he and Cam solidified their relationship, they’d been working on finding a happy medium between Cam spending time with his dad, Dawson and Cam spending time with Shane, and Dawson and Cam having enough time to indulge in the alone time they both desperately craved.
Playing earlier in the week, on a Thursday, meant that they’d have a nice leisurely ten days before their next game, and two extra days off next week.
“We’re looking forward to it,” Dawson admitted.
He’d already told Cam they were spending one of those days doing absolutely nothing but lazing around in bed—and if absolutely necessary—on the couch.
Maybe figuring out what this thing between them looked like had been a little bit of a challenge, especially with Shane around and the additional time demands of the football season.
But despite all the possible pitfalls and the fact that Cam had never had a relationship before and Dawson’s last one had ended catastrophically, he wouldn’t trade it for an easier road.
Dawson was sure he’d been happier, at some point in his life, but if he had been, he couldn’t think of when that was.
“Good conditions,” Marty pointed out, glancing around.
“Marty, it’s a fucking dome,” Dawson said dryly.
“Yeah. You wanted to push your distance, a good time to try something, maybe. Just throwing that out there.”
In the weeks since missing the fifty-nine-yard field goal against the Bills that would have sent them to overtime, he’d been working hard on upping his personal best distance.
Trying to get more comfortable and more consistent in the upper range of the 50s.
It was hard, but Dawson was also determined that he wouldn’t fail to deliver. Not again.
It was a work in progress, but Dawson felt reasonably certain he could kick anything under sixty yards in a game, but in the last three weeks, he’d barely been tested.
Kicked plenty of extra points. Even some field goals. But nothing over fifty yards.
Dawson was still afraid he might miss—and what missing might mean for this team and for his career—but he wasn’t letting fear dictate his life anymore.
He’d won the guy, and now he was going to own this new professional opportunity too.
“Tell Aidan to be less spectacular,” Dawson said, trying not to sound whiny and only mostly succeeding.
Special teams guys around the league would roll their eyes if they could hear him complaining.
Teams with great offenses who didn’t need their kickers to bail them out or their punters to play a field position battle were the best kind of teams to play for.
But Dawson still craved a chance to try a long field goal again. To have it be the difference between losing and winning. To put that fear to bed, one last time, with the kind of decisive act that made it really fucking hard to rise again.
“Sure,” Marty said wryly. “You wanna tell him or are you gonna let me do it?”
Dawson just chuckled and picked up his helmet to head out onto the field for the kickoff.
Cam intercepted him before he left the sideline. “Kick some ass, baby,” he murmured to him, the touch of his hand lingering on Dawson’s shoulder.
It felt like he’d spent the first two or so months of the season terrified of distractions on game day, and how they might negatively impact him and his performance, but Dawson was discovering that some distractions actually weren’t distractions at all. Cam was the best and brightest of those.
“Love you,” Dawson murmured back. He reached out, squeezing Cam’s waist.
“Love you more.” He swatted him on the ass, grinning. “Now, get out there.”
Dawson jogged out onto the middle of the field for the opening kickoff.
From the beginning of the game, it was obvious that even though the Thunder had five more wins on the season than the Cowboys, they’d shown up today determined to show out for their holiday crowd.
They pushed defensively, causing Jaden to fumble the ball, setting the Cowboys up with a short field and their first touchdown.
Then one of the corners—who was notorious throughout the league for his interceptions and who Aidan had spent the last week sweating over—picked off one of Aidan’s passes, even though it had been a hard-fought ball with Mo.
And just like that, the Thunder were down fourteen to zero, barely into the second quarter.
Dawson watched from his usual spot on the sideline as Aidan prowled back and forth in front of the bench, extorting not just the offensive line to do better, but all the position guys, too. Lane and Trevor. Mo. Jaden.
On the next drive, the Thunder drove farther down the field, Aidan actually using his legs to run for one of the first downs, something he rarely did anymore.
They made it to the fifteen-yard line. Second and three.
“I’m not worried.”
Dawson glanced over to see that Cam had drifted near.
“Do I look worried?” Dawson asked.
“A little, yeah. I thought Aidan’s eyes were going to pop out of his head when that guy wrestled that pass away from Mo.”
Aidan’s expression had been a little funny, and it would have been even funnier if the Cowboys hadn’t scored on the very next play.
Dawson shrugged. “They’re gonna get some points on the board.”
“Short-ish field goal for you,” Cam pointed out. He knew how much Dawson yearned to prove himself. And how that proof wasn’t for anyone else but him.
“They’re gonna get a touchdown,” Dawson said confidently.
Aidan must have agreed, because the next play he handed the ball off to Jaden, who made a beautiful cut and then another, spinning right into the end zone.
“See?” Dawson said, after he and Cam finished high-fiving about it. “Told you.”
“He gave the ball to Jaden because of that fumble, yeah?” Cam asked.
“Something like that,” Dawson said. Jaden had gotten his redemption. Mo had caught two important passes on that drive, getting his.
But now Dawson wanted his own.
And it wasn’t kicking extra points or thirty-five-yard field goals.
Still, nobody was complaining when after that disastrous first quarter, the Thunder went into the locker room at the half tied fourteen all.
During most games the tone on the sideline in the second half had been relaxed. Jovial. In several of the games they’d played this year, they’d been leading by enough points that Wes and some of the other backups had been in by the end of the game.
But not today.
The Thunder traded field goals with the Cowboys, Dawson heading out and not kicking the longer field goal he’d wanted to try, but instead a forty-yarder. Not a gimmie, by any means, but not the fifty-plus he still wanted.
The third quarter ticked to a close, the score still tied. Cam was even getting more work than normal, the Thunder punting on several drives. But he was steady and excellent, both times pinning the Cowboys against the ten-yard line.
Every time Cam came back to the sideline after a great punt, Dawson left his space bubble, giving him a high five and a few words of encouragement. He was tense, but focused, a feeling that seemed to extend to everyone on the sideline.
It was an unspoken assumption that whoever made the worst—or last—mistake would be the team to lose this game, and all fifty-two members of the Thunder were united and determined it wouldn’t be on them.
Midway through the fourth quarter, Aidan led the Thunder offense on a tough, gritty drive.
Jaden routinely making five-yard runs out of plays that shouldn’t have gained him more than a yard or two, at best. Aidan made a handful of great throws, and Mo made at least one spectacular diving catch that was bound to end up on at least a few highlight reels.
It wasn’t the normal kind of offensive fireworks the Toronto Thunder displayed but Coach Robertson was always talking about how teams who wanted to take it all, at the end of the season, had to win all different kinds of games.
This was definitely different from their usual, but maybe that was okay.
Aidan ended up taking the ball himself, running it in the last few yards, to get the touchdown, and that felt representative of the whole game.
It was probably really good that he was going to get a good break after this.
Probably good for all of them, Dawson realized, his own neck stiff and tense with the anxiety, no matter how he tried to loosen it.
Up seven, the game headed into the last five minutes.
It was up to the Thunder defense to preserve the lead, but the Cowboys seemed determined to not let the Thunder come into their stadium and come from behind and win the game.
They might not have had as many wins, but they still had offensive weapons, and they used them.
Dawson watched with disbelief as they converted a third and twenty-four, after a Nate sack and another tackle for loss.
There were forty-five seconds left in the game when the Cowboys tied it up.
Aidan didn’t usually approach him during games.
But Dawson wasn’t surprised to see him coming over, sweat beaded on his forehead, his hair matted with it, helmet in his hand, blue eyes tired but blazing with determination.
“Hey,” Aidan said.
“Forty-five seconds, that’s plenty of time,” Dawson said before Aidan could ask.
He was already steeling himself for what would be his task. But before he could do his part, Aidan had to do his: get the Thunder close enough for Dawson to make the kick.
“How much do you need?” Aidan asked.
Dawson almost told him he knew his max. Aidan knew his stats, same as he knew everyone’s on the team, inside and out.
But that wasn’t what Aidan was asking.
“Get me within sixty, and I can do it,” Dawson said.
Aidan raised an eyebrow.
“It’s a dome,” Dawson added. “And I’ve been working hard.”
Aidan didn’t argue. Didn’t question. Just patted him on the shoulder and said, “You got it, bud.”
And just like Dawson trusted Aidan to deliver when the game was on the line, like he’d done so many times before in his long and storied career, Aidan was trusting that Dawson was going to do the same.
Dawson realized it didn’t matter that he’d missed the last fifty-nine-yard attempt he’d tried. Dawson had looked Aidan in the eye and told him he could do it, so Aidan believed him.
He’d known, of course, that the team trusted him. That Aidan trusted him. Dawson had always had a feeling that the person he was really trying to prove he was back to was actually himself.
But it had never been driven home as much as it was in this moment.
Dawson glanced over to where Cam was standing. He was apart, too. Palms flat against his thigh pads, expression wiped of emotion, as Aidan took the field to get Dawson the yards he needed so he could try the field goal.
Like he’d sensed him looking, Cam glanced over, too. Smiled wide, and it hit Dawson hard and real fast, like Cam had a line straight to Dawson’s heart.
Maybe he did.
It was not easy. The Cowboys were sensing blood in the water. They probably wanted to go to overtime.
But Aidan was not going down without a fight.
He hit Mo on a gorgeous slant pattern. After the catch, Mo, not the biggest guy in the universe, made an extraordinary effort and shucked one defender off and then sent another sprawling with an epic stiff-arm, taking the ball twenty-five yards down the field.
Thirty to go.
Aidan’s next pass went to Trevor, Lane giving him just the block he needed to spring him free. Lane got the next, hovering on the sideline, so that he could make sure the clock stopped right after his catch. Five seconds left.
There it was. That was all they had time for. Marty looked over at Dawson and nodded, approval and certainty in his eyes. Dawson took one last practice kick into the net, and headed out to do what he’d been wanting for weeks.
Cam met him on the middle of the field. He didn’t touch him, but he didn’t need to. The look in his eyes was enough.
Aidan had gotten him just enough yards.
Dawson did the calculation in his head and realized it wasn’t sixty yards, but fifty-nine.
For a split second, that threw him. You tried this before and you didn’t pull it off.
Yeah, he had. He’d been married before, too. Been part of a team. Neither of those had worked out but that didn’t mean you didn’t keep trying. That you gave up hope or gave up on yourself.
Especially not when Dawson believed that he could do it.
Cam lined up.
With one second left on the clock, Joey snapped the ball. Cam caught it and flawlessly positioned it for Dawson’s foot.
He was the only factor of this play left. The most important factor.
Dawson’s foot hit the ball and it felt good. It would have the distance, if he hadn’t sacrificed his aim for the strength needed to boot it fifty-nine yards.
He held his breath as the ball sailed through the air and only let it out as it split the uprights. The referees called it good and a second later he was suffocated by a crowd of excited, happy Thunder players.
Dawson was pretty sure that was Cam’s arm around him, Cam’s face buried in the crook of his neck. His voice telling Dawson, “I love you so fucking much, you absolute beast.”
It wasn’t that hard to believe it, not anymore.
And it was even easier to hope for it.