Chapter Twenty-One
GJ
The season continued to roll along at a breakneck speed, and while I wanted to hold onto it, part of the reason it felt so fast was because of Leah, and I wouldn’t trade that for anything.
My life had become a blur of basketball and seeing her whenever I could.
We still avoided her apartment like the plague—seeing Mags at practice, and games was enough—she was over at least a few nights a week when I was in town for home games.
It wasn’t until the week of our first Point Brook game of the season that time slowed down. If anything, it didn’t just slow down—it slammed so hard on the brakes it gave me whiplash.
“You okay?” Leah mumbled. It was three in the morning, which I knew because I was on my phone. I’d fallen asleep for about an hour earlier in the night, but had woken up to a heart-pounding nightmare I couldn’t remember.
I readjusted my phone, worried the light might’ve woken Leah up. “Yeah, I’m alright. Did I wake you?”
“No.” She curled up against me, sleepy and warm. “NBA highlights more important than sleeping?”
“Can’t miss a clip.”
Leah didn’t even have to look at me for me to know what expression she was making. “GJ.”
“I can’t sleep,” I admitted, folding with absolutely zero pressure. The only downside to having Leah in my life was that I’d become possibly too comfortable with her. Eventually, I’d probably start talking to her about my feelings without her even needing to prompt me.
“Stressed?”
I locked my phone, realizing the same Anthony Edwards reel had been playing on repeat during our entire conversation. “Yeah. It’s the Point Brook game. I’m nervous our luck is going to run out.”
Leah laced her fingers through mine. “I’m sorry.”
The nerves in my stomach lightened. I was so appreciative of so many things about her, but I really loved how she knew how to talk to me.
I didn’t have to explain to her that telling me things would be fine probably wouldn’t be enough; she knew how much this meant to me.
There was a very good chance things wouldn’t be fine, and I liked that she was prepared for that.
It made me trust she’d know how to be there for me if things really went to shit.
When I was having a hard time sleeping like this, it was hard not to go down the rabbit hole of wondering if Leah would still want me if I went undrafted.
When I was feeling logical, I knew she wasn’t doing this for status.
But when I wasn’t feeling logical, I was worried that maybe I wouldn’t be as interesting to her if I didn’t make it.
“You’re spiraling,” Leah said gently, like she could read my thoughts.
I took a deep breath, trying my best to slow it all down. “Maybe I need to talk to Dr. Licht after all.”
It ended up not being difficult to schedule an appointment, unsurprising since Dr. Licht was on the school’s payroll to only work with student athletes.
She was a new addition who had been added when everything with Theo blew up, and we went from regional favorites to basically internationally recognized.
The newness of her role was mirrored in the way the office was decorated—she had a few Lakeside Green items up and her degrees up on the wall, but that was about it.
I was immediately surprised by how young she was, and how she looked like she must’ve been—or currently was—an athlete herself. She was even taller than me and built with the lean muscle that typically developed from years of playing basketball.
“You can take a seat wherever.” Dr. Licht gestured around the office. Her blonde bob moved with her as she walked through the room. I settled on the love seat, and she took a seat in the chair across from me.
“Did you play basketball?” I blurted out. I was nervous, almost like I was on a first date or something. But it was a first date where I was going to spend the entire time sharing my innermost thoughts, which felt like something out of a nightmare.
“I did. I played for a rival school in the division, actually. But not here to sabotage,” she joked lightly.
“I was never going to get drafted—I didn’t play at the level you girls play at.
But I do know what it’s like to be a student athlete, which is what made me pursue this type of specialized therapy. ”
I nodded, bouncing my leg and then readjusting to make myself stop. “That’s cool.”
She turned her lips up in a smile. “Have you seen any kind of mental health professional before?”
I shook my head. “New to this.”
“That’s alright, everyone has to start somewhere.”
“What am I supposed to do? Do I just start talking?”
“You can start wherever, and we’ll go from there. How’s that sound?” she asked.
I took a deep breath and went into it the only way I know how to do anything—headfirst.
I went through the rest of my day after my appointment with Dr. Licht, not sure I felt all that different, but not dreading seeing her again. I considered it as close to a victory as I could get right now.
I was standing in the kitchen, replaying my therapy session and wondering if Dr. Licht thought I was a loser, when the door to my apartment opened.
“God, today was so long,” Leah said as she walked inside. She dropped her bag by the front door and kicked off her shoes. “I have been looking forward to this all day. I had an exam from hell, and then I accidentally spilled my coffee everywhere—”
She stopped when she saw me standing in the kitchen. I leaned against the counter, eating some kind of organic snack Theo had always kept around and gotten me into.
“What?” she asked.
I laughed. “What?”
“You’re giving me a look.”
“A look? What kind of look?”
Leah walked over and kissed me, every inch of her feeling like home. “Hi, by the way,” she said. I pulled her in close to me, my snack bag crinkling against her back.
“Hi,” I responded before kissing her again.
She inhaled and leaned her weight against me. The smell of her hair oil and perfume immediately relaxed me. “This is exactly what I’ve been waiting for all day.” She looked up at me. “I missed you.”
“I missed you, too.”
Her eyes danced around my face like she was looking for something.
“Are you still trying to figure out the look?”
“So you agree that there is a look.”
I laughed. “No, I don’t agree there’s a look, but you seem determined to prove there is one.”
“What is it?” she whispered.
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“You are such a bad liar. Your face gives you away every single time.”
I put my snack bag and pulled her in toward me. “You’re just treating this place like home. That’s all.”
Leah’s eyes widened, her face dropping. “I didn’t realize—”
“No, it’s a good thing. I want you to feel like this is a comfortable place for you. I want you to want to come here,” I said. “It’s nice. It feels…familiar. It feels like you just came home.”
Her face softened. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I brushed her hair behind her ear and then inhaled. There were no secrets between Leah and me, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t still a little embarrassed to have to talk to her about my day. “I went to see the team therapist today.”
“You scheduled an appointment? And went?” Leah did a terrible job of hiding how surprised she was to hear that, but I couldn’t fault her for it. “How was it?”
“She was nice, actually. It was a good session. Obviously, still a lot of ground to cover, but it felt good to just…talk. Everyone was right that I should’ve gone to see her earlier in the season.”
“At least you know for when you go pro,” she responded. I appreciated that Leah didn’t have a single told you so bone in her body—it balanced me out nicely. “And you’ll have her for the tail end of the season. Lots of big games coming up. And hopefully March Madness again.”
I smiled. “Yeah.”
Leah stepped away and went over to my dresser to pull out some clothes, part of what was becoming our regular routine.
It meant more laundry for me, but I let her wear whatever she wanted of my things.
She could ask to wear twenty of my shirts over the course of one day, and I’d say yes; I loved seeing her in them.
“Should we order takeout tonight? I know we talked about saving money, but I kind of like the idea of something good that we don’t have to cook ourselves. This week isn’t ending quickly enough for my liking, and I am so ready for finals to be over,” she said.
I watched as she maneuvered around the room, pulling her shirt over her head and then replacing it with mine, her bare skin glowing and soft.
She pulled her hair out from the neckline and dropped her pants to change into a pair of my sweatpants that were just barely too long for her.
My eyes wandered along the curve of her ass.
“Thoughts?” she asked as she turned around.
“Whatever you want to do.”
She laughed. “You weren’t listening to a single thing I said.”
“In my defense, I was distracted.” I smiled softly at her, my heart practically bursting.
It was the most exciting, most intense emotion I’d ever felt.
There wasn’t a single person in the world whose company I enjoyed more.
All of those things Theo said about Maya made sense to me; all of the love songs were clicking.
It wasn’t anything in particular—it wasn’t therapy or how good Leah looked in my clothes or the urge to lock her down now just in case I actually didn’t get drafted. And it definitely wasn’t to spite Mags, which had me very literally almost fall to the floor with laughter when Leah told me.
It was just Leah. It was how I felt around her and how I felt knowing she was in my life. I had just enough common sense to hold myself back—we weren’t even official yet—but I was feeling just reckless enough and just certain enough to know it was a waste not to acknowledge it.
“I’m falling in love with you.”
Leah stopped and looked over at me. “What?”
“I can feel it. I’m falling in love with you.”
Leah’s face lit up, her lips turning up in a tentative smile like she kept waiting for me to say that I was joking. She slowly started walking toward me. “Say it again.”
I smiled—every single time I said it, I was even more certain I was making the right decision, saying it to her. “I’m falling in love with you,” I repeated.
She squealed and took a running leap into my arms, pulling me toward her. She looked up at me with so much care in her eyes, nothing but absolute certainty between us. “I’m falling in love with you, too,” she said and then smirked at me. “So that was the look you were giving me.”
“Yeah, okay. Maybe. Yes.”
She snorted. “I think there might be one little thing you’re missing, though.”
“I knew I should’ve asked for your parents’ blessing—“
“Stop.” Leah threw her head back with laughter, the sound that would forever and always be my favorite in the world.
I smiled, unable to pretend to be even a little bit cool. I was so excited to say the words; it was the best kind of high. “Can I be your girlfriend, Leah Moretti?”
Leah twisted her lips, pretending to think, and then giggled to herself, already proud of whatever joke was about to come out of her mouth. “Yeah, I think you’ll do.”