Chapter 21
Lucy
“Act cool. Act natural. This isn’t weird at all.
Being at TJ’s house … without him. To check on his chickens.
” I slam the door to my car and dart a furtive look over my shoulder like I’m some sort of undercover operative.
I check my posture. I’m hunched like a turtle ready to bury its head in its shell.
“Pull it together, Lu.” I stand up straighter, even as the wind howls all around me. “And stop talking to yourself,” I add, realizing full well I’m being ridiculous. “I’m a writer. I always talk to myself.” I roll my eyes at the conversation I’m carrying on with me, myself, and I. “Okay enough.”
I suck in a breath and cast another glance toward TJ’s quiet street.
I left Cashmere Cove at two, before the River Foxes game started, but Daisy’s Inn is a solid thirty-minute drive from Green Bay.
Factor in the snowstorm that hit when I was about halfway, and my thirty-minute drive turned into an hour and fifteen-minute harrowing commute.
The River Foxes game is now well underway in Buffalo, and everyone who lives in this neighborhood is glued to their TV or has made the trip east to catch the action in person.
Or so I’m assuming. It’s deadsville around here.
I tuck my chin deep into my coat and hurry to TJ’s back door, clutching my bag to my side. Honestly, I could use a turtle’s shell right about now. Wisconsin winters are brutal.
On his back stoop, I bend and run my mittened finger under the mat. The photo TJ sent me of himself crouched right here flies to the forefront of my mind. Nobody should look that good pointing at the corner of a doormat, and then there’s TJ, effortlessly cool.
I fumble with the lock and manage to shove the door inward.
It’s dark, and thanks to the winter storm, the afternoon sky is a murky gray, so there’s not much daylight coming in through the windows.
I flip on the overhead light in the back entrance and let my eyes adjust. My gaze snags on a notebook next to the ceramic key bowl.
Dear Lu,
Make yourself at home. There’s food and drinks in the fridge. Don’t feel like you have to get right back on the road to Cashmere Cove. What’s mine is yours, so feel free to stay awhile. Thanks for helping out with the ladies. I owe you one. Go River Foxes!
TJ
Okay. How cute is a handwritten note? I grab the notebook and reread his message as I walk into the living room.
The sad-looking table-top Christmas tree in the corner is still undecorated.
I wonder if TJ’s not really the Christmas-y type.
It’s strange, considering the man doesn’t seem to do anything at half-strength, and yet the Christmas tree is decidedly unfinished.
I could ask him about it. It seems like something friends would know about each other.
I’ve been walking this fine line where TJ is concerned.
Trying to figure out what’s appropriate friend behavior.
I’m significantly out of practice. His text messages on Friday felt flirty.
I chalked it up to TJ’s personality. I’m pretty sure the man flirts with anything that has a pulse.
The way he square danced with me should not have turned me on, but it definitely did.
Still, that’s a me-problem. It’s not his fault.
I need to tread carefully, or I’m going to wind up hung up on TJ Wilson.
I set my bag on the couch and notice the remote.
I power on his TV. I promised him I’d watch the game, and I’m a woman of my word.
Friends watch other friends play sports.
It takes me a few attempts to figure out what buttons do what, but eventually I get the River Foxes game playing.
The score at the bottom of the screen reads Green Bay River Foxes, 28, Buffalo Cavalry, 3.
I do a little jig, happy to see the River Foxes taking care of business. I watch as the skinny guy from Buffalo stands back from a long line of other, less skinny guys. The skinny guy runs up to the line and kicks the ball. It sails in a high arc above the field and lands way at the other end.
Everyone from the River Foxes ignores it, so I figure it must be out of bounds. The camera pans to a group of River Foxes players jogging onto the field. I recognize Anton Bates, the player the camera currently has in focus. Behind him is TJ.
I will neither confirm nor deny my body’s instant reaction at the sight of him.
Suffice it to say, my eyes drink him in like a kid chugging down a juice box.
All of him. All at once. I’ll never admit this to him, but I watched his fifteen-minute highlight reel five times in full since he sent it to me.
It’s impressive watching him on the field.
He’s like a man on a mission, and I’m totally here for it.
Right now, he’s wearing his helmet, so I can’t see the lightning bolt in his hair. Pity. He’s grinning and clapping his hands. Hands that were on my waist and spinning me around the square dance floor less than three full days ago.
I let my mind wander again to the way TJ’s touch sent fire coursing through my veins. I shiver at the memory his lips, grazing the side of my cheek when he leaned toward my ear to whisper words for only me to hear.
It’s sad that a square dance at a retirement community chili cook-off is the pinnacle of my real-life romantic endeavors. I’m not complaining. I store it all away as story fodder, and I sigh—in either relief or dismay, I’m not sure—when the screen fades from Anton and TJ to a commercial.
I hoist myself off the couch, remembering what I’m here to do, which is not to pine over TJ Wilson.
That ship has sailed. Actually, there never was a ship.
Ships are too romantic anyway, and a ship sailing away implies all sorts of things like kisses goodbye and longing and letters.
Nope. TJ and me? We’re more like a platonic city bus.
I pull my hood up and head out into the elements, grateful that, if nothing else, tending to the chickens will give me something to focus on.
The chickens are in their run, which TJ has wrapped in some sort of thick plastic.
They’re seemingly unperturbed by the snow swirling around outside.
They are perturbed by me. I slip on the boots TJ instructed me to wear and step inside, and one chicken flaps its wings and seems ready to charge at me before it settles back down.
“Easy!” I use my calmest voice. “I’m here to help you. I’m a friend.”
I make eye contact with a majestic-looking brown-and-red-feathered hen. Her beady black gaze bores into my soul, and I swear if she had eyebrows, she’d be arching them at me right now. It’s like she’s saying, I don’t trust you as far as I can throw you.
“Truly. I come in peace. Just checking on your water. I told TJ I would.”
At the sound of his name, the chickens start clucking, a low, plaintive sound, like they miss their main man. Which is ridiculous. What does he do? Refer to himself in the third person in their presence? How do they know him?
Who knows? I’m in no position to argue.
“I get it,” I say, making nice. “He’s your favorite guy, huh? He takes good care of you.”
The brown-and-red hen continues to stare at me, and I feel like it’s getting personal now.
“Don’t worry.” I hold up my hands. “I’m not going to steal him away from you. Some other women might, but not me. I’m on your team. I’m TJ’s friend.”
More clucking.
“I’m talking to chickens. I’ve officially lost my mind.”
A particularly loud cluck emanates from the brown-and-red-feathered hen, seeming to second the motion that I’m going crazy.
It’s enough to jolt me into action, so I make quick work of knocking the snow build-up from their feeder and checking their water, just like TJ explained how to do before saying goodbye on Thursday night.
Mission accomplished, I head inside.
I shuck the chicken boots on the stoop and scrub my hands for a solid two minutes in the kitchen sink.
I’m not grossed out by chickens, but I also want nothing to do with chicken diseases.
That seems like a fair stance. When I turn off the water, I hear the announcers on the TV talking about Anton Bates.
I walk back into the living room and see him lined up behind a row of hunched-over River Fox players.
The ball is on the ground in the center of the line.
TJ stands behind Anton. I don’t understand why they call it football when there’s not much kicking involved.
Except for what that skinny guy did before.
The majority of the playing doesn’t seem to involve feet.
Football is not a fitting name for whatever is going on here.
“Wilson in the backfield and two receivers wide-set,” the announcer says. “Bates takes the snap and drops back …”
I have no clue what the broadcaster is talking about, but my gaze never leaves TJ.
He sprints out from behind Anton and runs directly into a giant of a man from the Buffalo team who is charging at Anton from the other side of the line.
The dude is twice TJ’s size, and TJ is not small.
I gasp as TJ gets plowed over, but my gaze flips to Anton in time to see him throw the ball.
The camera follows the course of the ball, so I can’t see if TJ got up.
I barely register the cheers and the River Foxes player sprinting down the field until he’s knocked down by a guy from Buffalo.
My heart is in my throat as I wait for the chaos of the play to subside and the camera to pan out.
I don’t take a breath until I spot number twenty-five jogging off the field, looking no worse for wear.
“Take it easy, TJ,” I breathe aloud to the empty room. “You’ve got chickens who are counting on you. And a friend named Lucy who’d like to see you again in one piece.”
I flop down onto the couch and watch as Anton tosses the ball to somebody else.
The name Poe is on the back of this guy’s jersey when he gives the ball back to the referee and huddles up with the rest of the team.
They’ve gotten almost all the way to the far side of the field.
I know from my research that they’re trying to get the ball over the endzone line.
TJ joins the circle, and I bite my lip. I also know from my research that this is either going to be a play to him, or Anton is going to try to dive over the line of big guys himself.
I watch the action unfold, and sure enough, Anton takes a step toward the huge scuffle of oversized men, but then at the last second, he lunges to the side and flips the ball backward to where TJ is trailing him.
TJ snatches the ball out of midair, tucks it under his arm, and runs untouched into the endzone.
“Thank you, Jesus.” I throw up the prayer of gratitude in all sincerity. Football is vicious. My research led me down a rabbit hole of gruesome injuries and … yikes. Even some of the hits TJ took in his highlight reel had me wincing. Anytime a guy can get through a play unscathed, it’s a miracle.
The guy with the jersey that reads Poe joins TJ in the endzone, and together, they do their Cinderella skit.
I roll my eyes at the empty room, but I’m smiling like Christmas came early.
I place my hands on my cheeks because they’re burning up.
The camera gets in TJ’s face as Poe slaps his helmet, and they jog off the field together.
TJ grins and winks. The tiny gesture is magnified on his giant TV screen, and I swear my heart flutters like a feather caught in the wind.
I shake my head. That wink wasn’t for me. It was for the millions of fans watching the game.
The Cinderella Act was for you.
My brain is short-circuiting, coming up with unhelpful thoughts like that.
It’s true.
I have a very convincing brain, I must say.
TJ didn’t have to do the Cinderella celebration.
He found me. I told him I didn’t want to date him.
But he’s still acting out our little inside joke.
Something about that makes me feel warm and gooey inside.
It’s proof that the guy has staying power. Like he actually wants to be my friend.
I sit with that idea. I’m grateful for my girlfriends, definitely, but I don’t have a lot of close guy friends in my life.
My dad died when I was young, and when my stepmom made our family famous, I could no longer trust a guy’s intentions.
Ruby was very discerning with which crowds she let me and my stepsisters hang around, and I’m grateful for that.
We were young and rich, and she didn’t want us to get taken advantage of.
As a result, I’m awkward around men. I know I am.
The only reason I could act semi-normal with TJ at the gala was because I was hiding behind a mask.
But I’ve been normal—or as normal as I get—around him without my mask on. Here at his house and again at the retirement community. Even via text, if we ignore my errant thumbs-up emoji.
Inspired, I pull out my phone and tap out a message. He’s been a friend to me, and I want to be a friend to him, too. Apparently now we’re the type of people who text, because ever since TJ sent me that picture of the doormat, we’ve kept up a constant stream of conversation.
Lucy
You scored! Good job, Prince Charming
I send the message, feeling proud of myself. Look at me go, having a functioning relationship with an adult male. But then I read my text back. And regret immediately kicks in.
Prince Charming, Lu. Really!?
I hadn’t meant to sound flirty. I was only trying to let TJ know I noticed his touchdown celebration.
I lean back into the couch and sit there for a second, debating whether or not to edit the message.
But I don’t want to be edited with TJ. Changing my words now would almost be worse than having sent them in the first place.
Lucy
Your chickens are doing great, btw. I said hi for you, like you asked. FYI, I don’t think they like me. But they’re tucked in and all watered. Heading home soon!
I send off my message, satisfied that it sounds friendly and down to business.
My work here is done. I get up from the couch and grab my bag.
I get out the small gift I brought for TJ.
It makes me smile, and I hope it makes him smile, too.
I lean it on the tiny table behind his key bowl and cast one look back at his home before I head out into the snow.