CHAPTER 6
NATHAN
I should not have sent the second text.
The first text was bad enough.
You’re favouring your left side.
A full sentence with the emotional intelligence of a clipboard.
The second one is worse because I knew better before I sent it.
You okay after the clinic?
Five words. Harmless from anyone else.
From me, they come with a siren, a flashing light, and a helpful label: man who has learned nothing.
I stare at the message from the edge of my hotel bed like shame might develop editing skills and rewrite it for me.
No answer.
Good.
Not good.
Respect the silence.
I lock my phone.
Unlock it.
Still no answer.
Excellent. Mature. Elite-level emotional cardio.
The hotel room is too quiet after the clinic. No kids shouting. No whistles. No Coach Miller crying near a banner. No Emily standing in golden light with grass on her hand, saying, I didn’t, like she kept some memory of us in a place I had no right to reach.
My Kings jacket hangs over the chair by the window. Turf rubber is caught in the tread of my shoes. Somewhere outside, traffic hums against wet pavement. The air smells like hotel coffee I made and forgot to drink.
My phone stays silent.
I deserve that.
Knowing does not stop me from wanting to send a third message, which is a spectacular argument for taking the phone away from myself.
A knock hits the door once.
Then the door opens.
Colton walks in without waiting because apparently winning a Global Cup together legally cancels privacy.
“Oh good,” he says, taking one look at me. “Emotional texting. Healthy.”
I drop the phone facedown. “I could’ve been doing anything.”
“You’re sitting on a hotel bed staring at your phone with the face of a man waiting for sentencing.”
“I have a normal face.”
“You have a defender face. Everything looks like a crisis forming in a channel.”
He flops into the chair by the window, then winces and adjusts his leg.
“Morgan told you not to sit like that,” I say.
“Morgan tells me many things. Some medical. Some threats in compression socks.” He points at my phone. “Read me the message.”
“No.”
“Then it was bad.”
“It wasn’t bad.”
“That means it was bad or boring. With you and Emily, I’m betting bad.”
I sigh and pick up the phone. “I asked if she was okay after the clinic.”
Colton goes still for one second.
Never reassuring.
“After the clinic where she very clearly did not ask you to check on her?”
“I didn’t say I noticed anything.”
“No, you asked the kind of question that tells her you noticed everything.”
I hate when Colton is right. It feels bad for the natural order.
“She was favouring her left side,” I say.
His teasing fades. “Still?”
I nod.
Colton glances toward the dark window, then back at me. He understands enough not to make a joke there. Somehow that makes it worse.
“Did she ask for help?” he says.
I look away.
“Ah,” he says. “The silence of a man who knows the answer and hates the question.”
“I’m not trying to help.”
“You sent, ‘You okay after the clinic?’”
“That’s concern.”
“That is concern wearing a fake moustache and calling itself casual.”
“I saw her pivot during the recovery demo. She caught it hard. She hid it well, but she caught it.”
“Okay.”
“She’s in Ocean Cup week.”
“I know.”
“She’s captain.”
“I know.”
“She’s got cameras around her, and a young defender watching everything she does, and if this gets worse...”
I stop.
Because I hear myself.
And because Colton is looking at me like Morgan does when a player says, “It only hurts when I sprint,” as if that is useful information.
“What?” I snap.
Colton leans forward, elbows on knees. “Seeing it doesn’t mean you own it.”
I hated that line when Morgan said it yesterday.
I hate it more now that Colton has adopted it like a rescue animal.
“I’m worried.”
“I believe you.” No joke. Unfair. “But worry isn’t a permission slip.”
The room goes still around that.
Outside, a siren passes faintly below the window. My phone stays dark in my hand.
“I’m not some random guy watching from the stands,” I say.
Colton’s expression softens in a way I do not appreciate.
“No,” he says. “You’re the guy who left and came back noticing the thing she’s trying to control.”
The words land hard.
He doesn’t even look pleased with himself for saying them.
That’s how I know they’re true.
Before I can answer, the door opens wider.
Morgan steps in with her tablet under one arm and a small recovery case in the other. Her eyes go straight to Colton’s leg.
“I told you not to sit like that.”
Colton points at me. “He’s emotionally worse.”
Morgan’s gaze shifts to me.
Sibling radar. Undefeated. Deeply inconvenient.
“What did you do?” she asks.
“Why does everyone assume I did something?”
“Because your face is making an unnecessary claim again.”
Colton nods. “Strong face evidence.”
I toss him a look. “You’re not helping.”
“I brought the court stenography.”
Morgan sets the recovery case on the desk and crosses her arms. “Nathan.”
I stare at the floor for half a second, then give up.
“I texted Emily.”
Morgan closes her eyes.
“It was four or five words,” I say.
“That’s often enough.”
“I asked if she was okay after the clinic.”
Morgan opens her eyes. “Did she invite you into the problem?”
“No.”
“Then that answer matters more than your concern.”
I stand because sitting still suddenly feels impossible. “If someone is hurt and I can see it, doing nothing feels wrong.”
Morgan watches me carefully.
“I spent half my life seeing the hit coming too late,” I continue. “With Mom. With you. With everything. If I can see the danger before it gets worse, what am I supposed to do? Stand there and pretend I don’t?”
“No,” Morgan says. “You’re supposed to remember the person in danger is still a person. Not a situation you get to solve because fear is loud.”
The words land.
I look at the window.
My reflection looks older than I feel.
Colton clears his throat. “For the record, fear is very loud. Mine sounds like Morgan saying, ‘We need to talk about your mobility.’”
Morgan points at him without turning. “We do.”
He sinks back into the chair. “Regret.”
Another knock lands on the door, and Darius appears there with the expression of a man who has either arrived for a team meeting or found one already in progress.
He glances from Morgan to Colton to me.
“I’m either early,” he says, “or exactly on time.”
“Intervention,” Colton says.
“Unscheduled,” Morgan adds.
Darius steps inside and closes the door. “For Nathan?”
“Always,” Colton says.
“I’m right here.”
“That’s part of the issue,” Morgan says.
Darius leans against the wall near the door, arms folded. He has that captain stillness that makes people confess things just to make the silence stop.
“What happened?” he asks.
I exhale. “I noticed Emily favouring her left side. I texted yesterday. I followed her yesterday. I texted again today.”
Darius winces slightly.
Not dramatic.
Enough.
“Great,” I say. “Captain judgment face.”
“It’s not judgment.”
“You have a face.”
“I have many faces.”
“That one is judgment.”
Darius’s mouth twitches. “Fine. It’s concern with eyebrows.”
Colton points at him. “Good line.”
Morgan makes a note on her tablet. “No one encourage him.”
Darius looks back at me. “A defender who leaves the line at the wrong time creates the gap.”
I hate him immediately.
Mostly because the metaphor works.
“You can see the danger and still make it worse if you step without communication,” he says.
“I’m not on her back line.”
“No,” he says. “You’re outside it. That means you need more permission, not less.”
The room goes quiet.
Even Colton keeps his mouth shut.
Emily’s voice comes back to me from the equipment corridor.
You do not get to walk back into my life through the medical entrance.
I rub both hands over my face. “I know.”
Morgan’s voice softens. “Do you?”
I look at her then.
My little sister. The kid I used to walk to school when the neighbourhood felt too big and she felt too small.
The teenager who got good at pretending not to need anything because I got too good at trying to provide everything.
The woman who now stands in front of professional athletes with a tablet and a spine made of steel.
I wonder how many times my protection made her feel watched instead of safe.
The thought sits badly.
“I’m trying,” I say.
Darius nods once. “Then ask. Don’t override.”
Ask.
Don’t override.
Simple.
Brutal.
Probably impossible when fear is loud.
Colton reaches into his hoodie pocket and pulls out a packet of trail mix. “This feels like a good time for protein and emotional carbohydrates.”
Morgan stares at him. “Where did that come from?”
“My pocket.”
“Why?”
“Preparedness.”
Darius takes a handful like this is normal.
Maybe it is, for us.
Morgan checks Colton’s recovery schedule, threatens him with a modified mobility session if he keeps sitting like a dramatic teenager, and then leaves with Darius.
Colton pauses in the doorway.
“For what it’s worth,” he says, quieter than usual, “you can care and still be wrong.”
“I know.”
“Annoying, isn’t it?”
“Very.”
He gives me a small smile and closes the door behind him.
The room feels larger after everyone leaves.
Not better.
Just larger.
My phone is still on the comforter where I dropped it.
No new message.
Good.
Respect the silence.
Bad.
I sit at the desk instead of on the bed. That feels more official, as if emotional disasters improve with posture.
I open a blank note.
Not Emily’s text thread.
A note.
Safer.
Less intrusive.
The cursor blinks.
I start with I’m sorry.
Delete it.
Too small.
I try, I should have told you the truth back then.
Better.
Still not enough.
Truth makes me look worse than the story I have been using.
The old story had noble bones. Family crisis. Younger sister. Sick mother. Too much responsibility too young. Letting Emily go so she could chase the future she deserved.
All true facts.
Arranged in a coward’s shape.
The actual truth is uglier.
I was scared she would choose me.
And then I would have to either accept something good while my family needed me, or hurt her while looking her in the eye.
So I made the choice for both of us from a distance.
Then called the distance kindness.
I type one sentence.
I told myself leaving quietly was better for you because saying the truth would have made you part of the choice, and I was afraid of what you might choose.
My chest tightens as soon as the words appear.
That is closer.
Still not enough.
But closer.
I do not send it.
I write more.
Badly.
Fragments, mostly. Things I should have said years ago and things I am only beginning to understand now. The screen fills with lines I do not trust myself to polish.
Good.
Polish is how I hide.
By the time I finally stop, the room is dark except for the desk lamp, and my coffee is cold enough to be a legal concern.
My phone buzzes.
I almost grab it too fast.
It is not Emily.
It is tomorrow’s updated schedule from the tournament coordinator.
Breakfast. Media check-in. Shared facility transfer. Filmed feature.
My eyes snag on one line.
DEFENDERS READ THE GAME
Participants: Emily Smith, Nathan Bellows
Format: Tactical breakdown, side-by-side analysis, short-form feature
Location: Shared Facility Film Room
Time: 10:00 a.m.
Of course.
Of course the universe would hand me a do-over in the language of defence.
I laugh once under my breath.
It sounds like panic and exhaustion had a child.
The next morning, the hotel breakfast room smells like toast, eggs, burnt coffee, and the specific emotional fatigue of athletes being asked to appear cheerful before nine.
Colton is at our table with an enormous plate of fruit and pastries, building what appears to be a structural model of poor choices.
Morgan stands beside him with her tablet.
“No.”
“You don’t even know what I’m doing.”
“I know exactly what you’re doing.”
“It’s called breakfast.”
“It’s called pretending blueberries create medical clearance.”
Darius sits across from them, quietly eating oatmeal like a man who has discovered peace and refuses to share the map.
Sienna arrives with coffee and slides into the chair beside him. “Tournament media moved my first interview back twenty minutes. Why does Colton have a pastry tower?”
“Architecture,” Colton says.
“Rehab denial,” Morgan says.
“Both can be art.”
I sit beside Darius and reach for coffee.
“Rough night?” he asks.
“I wrote things I didn’t send.”
“Better than sending things you shouldn’t.”
“Barely.”
He nods like that is fair.
Across the room, the tournament coordinator claps her hands lightly and begins reviewing the day’s media flow with both teams. Most of it blurs together. Recovery windows. Feature spots. Panel clips. Sponsor obligations. Youth content.
Then she reaches the film-room segment.
“Emily Smith and Nathan Bellows, you’ll be together at ten for Defenders Read the Game. Tactical focus, very clean. We’ll review footage from both tournaments, especially back-line decision-making under pressure.”
Colton looks at me over the pastry tower.
I do not look back.
Morgan’s gaze lands on my face with surgical precision.
I drink coffee that is too hot and pretend it is fine.
Then the breakfast room shifts.
Not because someone announces anything.
Because Emily walks in.
She enters with Ava and Coach Ramirez, Canada gear sharp, hair pulled back, face composed. She looks perfect.
Too perfect.
That is the first warning.
She steps around a chair near the entrance.
Tiny delay before the left side loads.
The kind of movement no one else at this table should catch.
I catch it.
Emily’s eyes find mine across the room.
She knows I caught it.
The old instinct rises so fast my hand tightens around the coffee cup. Heat bites into my palm.
Good.
Pain is useful if it keeps me still.
Do not move.
Do not look at her side.
Do not become a situation before breakfast.
Morgan’s voice appears quietly beside me. “Nathan.”
“I’m not moving.”
“Good.”
Emily passes our table with Ava beside her. Close enough to speak without stopping.
“Good morning, Bellows.”
Her voice is smooth. Cool. Completely in control.
“Captain Smith,” I answer.
Her eyes flick once to my coffee cup, probably because I am holding it like it owes me money.
Then she keeps walking.
I do not follow.
It feels like pulling a muscle I did not know I had.
She reaches the doorway toward the corridor, then pauses.
Looks back.
Her expression is unreadable, but there is the smallest curve at one corner of her mouth.
“Film room in ten,” she says. “Try not to diagnose anything before then.”
Ava’s eyes widen beside her.
Colton chokes on a grape.
Morgan closes her eyes like she is praying for strength, patience, or a transfer to a different hotel.
I swallow one laugh and all my worry.
“Yes, Captain,” I say.
Emily turns and walks out.
This time, I let her.
***