Chapter 62
Chapter Sixty-Two
NASH
I lean casually against Wyatt’s truck, but I’m so filled with excitement I can hardly stand still.
While we were taking a break, Mrs. Patterson took me on a tour of their framed photos and told me about their life together.
They were high school sweethearts and had rushed to get married before Mr. Patterson was drafted into the war.
They looked so blissful in their wedding photos—and so young.
It stirred up something that was already swirling in my chest. It felt like I’ve seen that look on a man’s face before, I just couldn’t pinpoint where it was.
Maybe my own parents’ wedding photos? They’ve been happily married thirty years, so it’s possible.
When Mrs. Patterson was telling me about their delayed honeymoon, it hit me.
I’ve seen that look more than once in my life.
The look of a man totally lost in a woman.
I have a picture of it on my phone from the day we played flag football with the Hurricanes earlier this year.
I pulled it out right then to look at it, pretending to check my text messages.
When Chrissy sent me this photo and I saw it for the first time, I thought it was just chance that Wyatt was looking at me like that.
That he missed the countdown on Chrissy’s phone telling everyone when to look and smile, but as I scroll through the photos we’ve taken at the NFL Honors, at the PVF championship, at Jaden’s crawfish boil, and at Henry’s wedding—Wyatt is looking at me in every single one of them.
There’s not a photo on my phone where he’s looking at the camera.
This couple’s home is full of water. They’re having to stay with their daughter until it’s fixed.
I’m sure there’s other times where they’ve had to be away from home and that’s never kept them apart.
I feel the realization in the back of my throat.
A house is not permanent. Volleyball might try to take me away from Houston, and if I want to keep playing, I might have to go.
Wyatt and I need mutual ground. Somewhere to meet that we both love.
A place that’s neither Hurricanes nor Butchers nor Moons.
Now I’m here. Leaning up against the best man I’ve ever known’s truck, drinking my favorite flavor of sports drink, having brought it unprompted by me.
I’m covered in muck and sweat. I must stink to high heaven, but I can’t help but smile.
I have a plan. I use my left foot as a pivot to spin around and settle myself against him.
The truck supporting him and him supporting me.
I put my chin on his chest to look up at him.
“Hey there,” he says surprised at my affection.
“Hi.” The universe has been on my side bringing us here, forcing me to see.
I was cleaner then and objectively much cuter.
But I’ve seen what my future could hold with Wyatt in the salt and pepper hair of Mr. Patterson as he carefully packs away their wedding photos with a reverence that’s rare.
They’ve been together literally through hell or high water, and I know in my heart I want that with Wyatt.
He interrupts my thoughts by saying, “Do you want to go for a walk?”
I shrug. “I guess.” What I’d really like is to lay him down in the back of his pickup truck and–
ARF!
I stand perfectly straight, no longer leaning against Wyatt’s hard-packed body. “Did you hear that?”