Chapter 18 #2
“I’m sorry, Aunt Ethel,” I whispered.
She shook her head. “No, my darling boy, do not apologize for being happy. I’m not sad that you got married. Only that I wasn’t able to see it.”
I felt the first tendril of regret in my gut.
I’d hurt Aunt Ethel’s feelings. Rowan pressed his thigh tighter against mine, looked at me for a moment, and then spoke: “This summer, we can do something public. A reception or a party or something. Maybe a vow renewal,” he suggested.
Aunt Ethel’s eyes lit up, and Rowan continued.
“We can find a date that works for everyone.”
The rest of the evening was spent poring over calendars and thinking of ideas for our reception.
“Coach Cal, can we talk to you?” Rowan asked once everyone filed out of the auditorium after the walk through for that week’s game.
Coach Cal looked between us and shrugged. “Office?”
“Yes, please,” I answered.
Rowan and I followed Coach Cal to his office.
I’d been in it more times than I could count, usually just to chat about the game or problems I noticed in the locker room.
Sometimes, just to hang out and chat about movies or TV shows or concerts.
Coach Cal had an open-door policy, and I’d never hesitated to take advantage of it.
His office reflected that. There were two couches and an armchair arranged to take up one half of the room, all positioned around a flat screen television.
He had a large wooden desk that dominated the other half of the room with a big swivel chair behind it and two comfortable chairs on the other side.
A third comfortable chair was pushed against the wall in case someone needed to pull it up.
The top of his desk was crowded with paperwork and a closed laptop.
Team pictures, family pictures, and pictures of Coach Cal’s own career decorated the walls along with Coach Cal’s framed jersey from the year his team won the Championship, back when he was still a player.
Coach Cal went straight to the armchair and plopped down into it. Rowan and I followed his lead and settled onto one of the couches. Unlike when we told Aunt Ethel our news, we left a few inches of space between us. “Alright, gentlemen, what’s going on?”
“We got married in Vegas on Saturday,” I told him. Better to just rip off the band aid, right?
Coach Cal’s eyes grew wide. He looked between the two of us, and then his eyes slowly moved down to our hands. They landed on the gold rings on our fingers. Finally, he dragged his eyes back over to me. “You got married?”
“We got married,” I confirmed with a decisive nod. “We were dating before we got married.”
“You were dating?”
“For a few months,” Rowan informed him. His voice was a lot more serious than mine.
Maybe I should have let him break the news.
Maybe Coach Cal wouldn’t have looked like he couldn’t believe the words I was saying.
“We went out to drink with Jonesy and Liam. They left. One thing led to another, and we got married.”
“And are you staying married?” Coach Cal asked. His eyes were still darting between us like he was waiting for one of us to yell April Fool’s even though it was late December.
“We are,” Rowan answered. “We will be having an unofficial ceremony and reception this summer. You’ll be invited, of course, once we have everything planned. But we are married, we are staying married, and we need to know the next steps for the team.”
Coach Cal nodded, and he switched straight to business mode. He grabbed the laptop from his desk and drafted an email to inform the front office about our marriage and relationship. It was official.
We told Jonesy and Liam the night we told Coach Cal. The next day, before practice began, we announced the wedding to the rest of the team.
After practice, our social media team presented us with two new jerseys and pulled us into the hallway to film a short clip for the team’s socials.
I was handed a jersey with my number and the name Rangecroft, and Rowan was handed a matching one with my last name and his number.
The social media team filmed us walking toward one camera on the outside field.
After they got the footage they wanted for that, they took close-ups of the back of our jerseys, and then they took a few shots of our joined hands and the yellow gold bands around our fingers.
They promised to email us the final copy later that night for our approval before it was posted.
When we got home, we folded the jerseys and put them on my dresser along with the two game balls Rowan had earned this season.
“I’m going to rearrange my trophy room,” I told him as I looked at the balls.
“I want you to have half of it so you can put all your stuff up too. Then we can frame the shirts and hang them side by side with all my accomplishments on one side and yours on the other.” I thought for a moment.
“And you’ll need to have Raina send your stuff from Fayetteville too, won’t you?
Once you do that, we can figure out what we’re keeping from both households and donate the rest? ”
Rowan pulled me in for a quick kiss. “We will figure it out, but not until the season’s over.”
“Rangecroft, Tobitt,” Coach Cal called out after he blew the whistle to call for the end of practice. “Come see me!”
A few of our teammates made the same kind of noises schoolboys made when one of their classmates were called to the principal’s office, the kind that implied that we were in trouble.
I flipped them off playfully and jogged over to where Coach Cal was waiting for us.
Rowan walked behind me at a leisurely pace.
“What’s up, Coach?” I asked once my husband finally joined us.
“Front office called down during practice. Y/N from SEN’s here.
They want to interview the two of you about your marriage and what it means for the team.
I told them I’d ask, but I would not require either of you to do the interview.
” Coach Cal had his serious voice on, and the respect I’d always had for him grew tenfold.
I felt safe and protected, because I knew our coach wouldn’t make us do some interview about our personal life if it wasn’t something we wanted. “What do you think?”
I looked over at Rowan and shrugged. I didn’t mind doing an interview, but I loved doing press. Rowan raised an eyebrow at me, and I nodded. “I’m game if you are,” I told him easily.
“Is there anything we should avoid saying in regard to the team?” Rowan asked Coach Cal.
Coach shook his head. “Your marriage has no bearing on the team. Not either of your roles on the team, not plays the team is going to call, none of it.” We both nodded, and Coach Cal told us where to go to meet Y/N after we changed out of our practice clothes.