38. Chapter 38
Ames
I'm in LA. For nearly three days, I've had meetings where I smile while my heart drowns. I've been as charming and smart as I can manage, when all I want to do is get in bed and forget about the world.
I crawl back to my hotel after another long day, only to climb into bed and cover myself with the duvet. It's starting to get dark outside and I haven't turned on any lights. A good fort-like feeling is precisely what I want.
Maybe it's more like a cave. It seems like the ideal place to hide and push away the embarrassment. The one born from how I keep messing up.
I didn't handle the conversation with Saint as well as I should have.
Part of that was the shock of his words, when I was so sure he didn't feel half of it.
Part of that was worrying that I feel too much to see things clearly.
Part of that was the fumes of the fight with Aidan.
Regardless, I didn't carry my share of the conversation.
Saint deserves better than that. Especially since I care about him so much.
I hug myself under the covers. My stomach rumbles, but I ignore it. Again, Saint gave me all the power. It's on me to choose what happens to us in the future. In the past, I dreamt of this kind of agency. Now that I have it, it's too much responsibility.
My roommate-could-be-boyfriend and I haven't talked much since he left for San José. The ceremony for MVP was on Thursday. He won. Of course he did. He received the award while I was having dinner with my agent.
Pride washed over me for him. Relief flooded my chest, because it got him one step closer to his goal. Still, I hesitated to reach out. It took me a couple of hours to break, but eventually I did.
Ames : Congratulations. So close now
Saint : Thank you. Yeah, it's good news.
Ames : Are you okay?
Saint : I have been better, but I'm trying to focus on the game on Sunday. You?
Ames : Same, but trying to focus on my meetings.
Saint : Good luck to us both.
Ames : I miss you. I promise I'm thinking hard about us. Feeling hard, too.
Saint : I miss you too. Very much. I would have loved to have you on the field with me.
That was it.
He's extra busy, and knows I am too. He said he'd give me distance, and he's keeping to his word.
We're taking some time to process, and I'm doing as I promised.
Yet only after a few days since we said goodbye for a bit, my heart's already on a strike and working at half capacity.
It refuses to carry on as usual, because I miss him.
Oh, how I miss him. But I didn't show him how much I actually feel for him.
Every missing beat digs a little deeper into my chest, because something fundamental is missing when we're not in sync.
I shake my head at myself and push the covers down to my waist. I turn the TV on.
The voices and sounds fill in the space enough for a little while.
If I pick a sports channel and they talk about football, that can only help get me a little bit closer to Saint somehow.
Yeah, it means I will still be submerged in a world I never planned to be in, but it's the only way to have a little bit more of him.
I settle on some sort of pre-game show. I leave it on, while I get on my phone to look up news about Saint on social media. I get lost in new clips and edits his fans have made of him.
There's an edit of different clips of him dancing on the field, made to match the beat of a popular song.
A few others focus on his answers to reporters, and his professional career.
Another one collects several shots of him smiling at the camera, fans, and players.
The description on that one simply read, DIMPLES .
I sigh. My heartbeats echo the efforts of an old steam engine, burning through coal harder than it shows, all to push things into motion. They may seem slow, but there's depth to them. An incredible amount of energy is being put into it.
Missing him means I care about him. It shows me how much I want him in my life.
How I want him to hold me close as we talk through this time in our relationship.
I would cling to him, so we never have to do this apart again.
All I need is a little push and I'll be the one begging, asking him to convince me it's not too soon, that we're going to make it, and we're never going to give up on each other.
I'm not processing anything that shows up on my phone screen anymore. I throw the device on the bed and stare at the TV.
I've been talking to my friends. I haven't shared every single detail, but they didn't need the particulars to support me through this. They were appropriately excited when I told them things had happened between Saint and I, and indignant when they heard Aidan had visited one last time.
Pen : would you have responded the same way to Saint if Aidan hadn't shown up?
I still don't know the answer to that. The most likely turn of events if Aidan hadn't shown up, is that I would still be alone in my hotel while Saint prepared for his game.
I wouldn't know how he feels, but my own feelings might have had me thinking of forever with him.
At least I'd be happier, because we wouldn't have left it the way we did.
We'll wait and talk again.
Ugh. I should at least have kissed him.
Or maybe not? Do I want to hold his hand and walk into the maze with him? Yeah. I just don't know if it's the right thing to do. It may not be the best for us. Going unprepared may wreck everything.
None of that matters, the moment his face fills the TV screen.
They show a clip of him where someone asks him about the award. I press pause on everything else, especially my torn emotions. All I care about is getting this small piece of him.
He wears a bold shirt with a few open buttons. The design is some sort of paint splattering that resembles animal print. In shades of cream, sage, and golden hues, it shows off the deep bronze of his skin. With his earring shining and his hair nicely done, the smile curling his lips looks stunning.
I would be stunned, for sure, if it weren't for the hint of sadness in his eyes.
"You went from a few seasons where you never made it to the playoffs," a reporter asks, "to making it to the big game in just two years. How are you handling it?"
"I'm handling it like a pro, what can I say?" He grins and those sweet dimples show up again .
His chain peeks through the open panels of his shirt. Those times I actually bit the metal links come back to me, or when I pulled him from it and he so willingly followed instructions.
Desire pools so swiftly, I can't deny just how deeply into him I am.
Not that I'm trying, anymore. If nothing else, lust is clear.
The way we fit in sex and intimacy is immaculate.
That part has never been an issue. What I need to define is if what our hearts bring to the picture is the right thing for us.
People laugh around him on the TV. His diamond earring glints at the lights shining on him.
"I've trained for this my whole life." His hand lands on his chest, like he's speaking from the heart.
"I've worked for this. The changes we made when Logan came to the team have set us up for this.
We're the team we need to be. We'll do this again and again.
For us and for the fans. As long as we're together, we can keep the Strike on top. "
I smile. He's hinting at wanting to stay, without revealing much.
The main reporter nods. "And now you got the league's MVP for the season. It usually goes to QBs but you've had such a great season. You broke those records, including most receiving yards. It's like you could read King's mind—"
"Exactly." Saint nods and makes a gesture like asking for more praise. "Keep going."
He gets more laughter at that.
His eyes still hold dejection, but he has them all in a trance. He plays the game. They fall for it. No one sees what I see.
My throat gets a little tight. I happen to know how much he likes to be told he's good. I want to tell him how good he is more than anyone. And I want to hold him and tell him he doesn't have to feel despondent anymore.
The interviewer responds to Saint's smile with one of his own. "How did you overcome those dry years to get here in only two seasons?"
"Like with everything else." Saint taps his chest, deep in thought.
"Anything you want to excel at, you need to work hard to get it.
Find the discipline to get through the days when you can't imagine you can keep going.
Doing the hard things you know will get you closer to what you've committed to. "
His words scratch my mind. I sit up on the bed.
"That's a whole lot of motivation," the reporter comments.
Saint nods. "It's easy when you know why you're doing it."
"Why do you do it?"
"Why else?" He taps his chest. "Love. Isn't that always the answer?"
Tap tap. Tap tap. Tap tap.
"For the love of success?" the interviewer asks. "Of the sport?"
"All of it. Anything you love, it's worth giving your whole effort to. And I love this game. My team. The life I want deserves this kind of commitment. I'll give it my all for as long as I'm here."
Tap tap. Tap tap. Tap tap.
I gasp. The covers end up all the way to the bottom of the mattress. I sit on my knees right there on the bed. To anyone else, the way he drums on his chest could seem like an unconscious move, the kind that shows he's thinking hard.
I know better. I remember.
The rest of the interview goes ignored. I check my text chain with him. It takes several swipes, but I go back far enough to find the right message. The one where he told me that would be his sign to show his love.
I go back to videos I found of him on social media. In a few of them, he does the same gesture. Every time, he's talking about getting through the hard times by putting effort in.
Warmth imbues my face. I tear up.
He's been sending me messages. Not by text. By his sign. The one he told me about when I asked a few weeks ago.
The bed turns into a prison. I pace the room, seeking the space to process, looking for some extra air.
When I was old enough to think about romance, I told myself I would be different from my parents.
I said I would work hard at relationships, because fixing them can be the bravest thing.
The part I got wrong was thinking that meant I needed to bend myself into whatever shapes my partner needed from me.
Even back when I discovered Aidan's cheating and parachuted to Saint's condo, I wondered what true love felt like.
What it looks like. Once upon a time, I thought I'd find it with artists.
Someone creative would be in touch with their feelings, right?
I would get to feel with them. They would have the emotional intelligence to talk about the important things in love, too.
Art and love are the same at their core.
They birth connection. Among people and us and life.
Someone in touch with that would surely crave life-long love, right?
Wrong. I found it in an athlete who opened his heart to me and asked me to do the same. What I sought came in a different package than I expected, that's all.
I thought what I had with Aidan is what people call love. It felt good enough to be comfortable. Peaceful. I could see myself living that life until my last day. What I feel for Saint is… fire , compared to that.
I'm in the hotel bathroom, unaware of how I made it here. I sit on the edge of the tub. Elbows on the stone counter in front of me, I hold my head. Puzzle pieces are all up in the air, but I can see them clearly now. I pick each oddly-shaped cutout and re-arrange them to find a whole new landscape.
I met my new friends thanks to Saint, but they're my friends because I opened up to them.
I'm in LA because the producer believes in me, or he wouldn't have offered a show without a mention of Saint being there as well.
I follow football because it's Saint's world, but he's in my world as well.
If our territories overlap, it's because we're living life together.
We're more than the sum of our parts. We push each other to grow in our own right.
Now things with Saint aren't really broken, they're being…
adjusted. And we're fixing it anyway. He's being clear about what he wants.
He wants to discover who he'll be with me, and asks me to do the same.
He said these few days could be proof of what he does when things get hard. He said he wouldn't give up .
What a show of his commitment to this with me. We're not at our best, and we're making a huge decision about our future. But we're not broken up. We're not each going our own direction. We're working through it.
Saint is showing me what he does when things get hard. He's fixing everything he didn't break, and he wants to do it with me.
I stare at myself in the mirror. My hair is wild, and my makeup mostly in place.
A small black patch smears a corner of my eye, and my foundation doesn't fully hide my blush.
The bright ceiling light puts heavy shadows under my eyes.
Clicking the lights on immediately turns on the fan, and its burr fills the space.
Caught without warning, someone might think I'm forlorn. It couldn't be further from the truth. I straighten up. Lift my chin until all shadows disappear. Square my shoulders.
I finally know the truth. What's happening with Saint is right.
The conversation, the challenge, the process makes it right.
That's why this is different from any relationship I've had before.
He's in this with me. It's not a take it or leave it situation, where I'm the one bending backwards without help or compromise.
He's not here because he likes me enough to stick around.
He sticks around because he cares about me and it makes him want to work through things when we need to.
Mind blown.
In the past, I went above and beyond thinking it would do the trick and make things work. I took responsibility for things that didn't belong to me. But compromise is only fair if it's mutual.
All I have to do is be myself and meet him halfway. Doing hard things for each other, back and forth, to build something good side by side.
Hold my hand so we can walk through the twists and turns of life together , he said.
We will both lead the way.
I will show him. Go into the maze and find him, and hold his hand so tight he knows I will never let him go.
Ames : Hi friends. I need help.
Pen : Whatever you need
Ames : I need to go to San José tomorrow. Can someone sneak me into the stadium somehow?
Evie : this is my time to shine