48. Indy
FORTY-EIGHT
INDY
Over the following weeks, I settle into Callum’s routine.
He seems competent enough on TV. Not that I’m the best person to judge that since I don’t give a fuck about football. In real life, the guy’s ridiculously disorganized. It hasn’t even been that long since Dia quit, but it kind of feels like Callum’s been on his own since kindergarten.
I don’t hate it. Instead, I dive into un-messing somebody else’s life with gusto.
I manage his schedule and I answer his emails.
I organize travel plans and make sure he has a closetful of clean jerseys and shorts and shirts.
I coordinate appointments with trainers and physical therapists, keep track of his meetings, and remind him of the obligations he keeps forgetting about left and right.
I pick up dry cleaning, deal with deliveries, and stop him from impulse buying expensive nonsense online at least twice a week.
Turns out keeping a professional athlete functioning actually is reminiscent of babysitting.
I don’t love the job, but I like it. Honestly, maybe not the job part itself, even. I just like being useful. I like having somewhere to be in the morning. I like the steady rhythm of solving small problems throughout the day. I like having a distraction. I like it a lot.
“You’re late,” I tell Callum when he walks into the apartment.
He stops and blinks at me. “I’m here. How am I late if I’m here?”
“You missed your meeting. Bridge is not happy.”
His shoulders slump. “But it was the PR guy. You know I get hives when it’s the PR guy, Indy. It’s like, dude, just let me speak my mind. I don’t need to be coached to sound boring.”
“You poor, poor thing. Wasting everybody’s time. Hey, remember that interview from last week where you talked about the Ravens and said—”
“I know what I said.”
“‘Fuck those stupid cunts. I’m allowed to say it, my nan’s British.’ And that’s a direct quote, by the way.”
Callum points at me. “My socials are blowing up with people who agree with me.”
“That’s called being in a bubble. Enjoy another round of PR training. I’ve been here a handful of weeks, and I’ve already scheduled two of those for you. Is this something that should have a regular slot?”
He winces before he schools his expression. “No. I’m being good.”
“At not showing up?”
“I was doing something important instead?” He squints for a moment. “Charity. I was doing charity.”
I hold my phone out toward him. “You posted a shirtless gym selfie thirty minutes ago.” I hold my hand up. “Don’t make a lame joke about how that is charity.”
“When you say it like that, it comes off way worse than it would have if I’d said it.”
“Why? Is it somehow less stupid when you say it?”
He lifts the hem of his shirt and pats his abs. “I’ve got all of this going for me, so I can get away with a lot.”
I give said abs a cursory look. They’re great abs.
I don’t know why I feel absolutely nothing when I see them.
Okay, I do feel things. A lot of complicated things.
Those abs are for Nick, so a lot of the time I feel faintly nauseous when I see them because I immediately start imagining Nick’s hands on them, and then—no.
I’m definitely not going there. There’s also a rush of jealousy, anger, regret, and a handful of other things, which makes for a huge mess when mixed all together.
“I rescheduled your meeting, and the PR guy is waiting for you in the living room. Go on, show him your abs and see how much you can get away with there,” I say.
His mouth drops open. “But I was going to relax and watch the game.”
I make a sympathetic face and pat his shoulder. “I know, big guy. If it helps, the thought of you suffering through another round of media training is going to make my evening.” I grab my keys and give him a small wave with my fingers. “Bye.”
“You’re fucking brutal, dude,” he calls after me.
“That’s a compliment in my book.”
I open the door and run straight into Nick, who’s carrying two full bags of groceries.
He quirks his brow. “What’s a compliment in your book?”
It’s been a few days since I last saw him, and I was sure I would be gone way before he showed up. Stupid Callum and his stupid lateness.
“He’s finding joy in my misery,” Callum says sourly.
“Don’t we all?” Nick asks.
Callum narrows his eyes. “Why are you ganging up on me like this? In my own house.”
“What did you do?” Nick asks while he puts the two bags down and toes off his sneakers.
“He was late,” I say.
Nick snorts and sends me a knowing look that hits me right in the chest. “I’m sure that went over well.”
“He got Marcus to make a house call,” Callum says. “He’s sitting in the living room as we speak!”
“Yes, and since Marcus isn’t deaf he can hear everything you say,” a voice calls from the other room.
“Oh, he’s here now?” Nick says. “That’s like a present just for me. Thanks.” He looks at me and smirks like we’re both in on the joke.
My traitorous lungs immediately forget how to function properly.
“Is it?” I manage.
“You haven’t lived until you’ve watched one of Callum’s PR training sessions. They do mock interviews, and he’ll be confidently wrong with every reply, while you get to watch Marcus’s soul slowly leave his body.”
“That’s slander,” Callum says. “I’m delightful. It’s why people scramble to interview me.”
“No.” Marcus’s voice again, closer this time. “They interview you because you keep saying stupid shit and giving them soundbites. It’s like you can’t help yourself.”
He appears in the doorway, holding a tablet and an iced coffee.
In the few weeks I’ve been here, I’ve learned there are two categories of people in Callum’s orbit.
There are the football players. Massive men in expensive hoodies who communicate almost exclusively through slaps, insults, yelling at the massive TV in Callum’s living room, and somewhat problematic dares.
And then there are the PR people, agents, and managers.
Marcus belongs in the second category. He’s sharply dressed even on a random Tuesday evening, every light brown hair in place, his expression firm and serious, with a faint trace of amusement mixed with the exasperation on his face when he looks at Callum.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s get this over with.”
Save me, Callum mouths at me before he sighs and follows Marcus.
And then it’s just me and Nick.
“Want any help with those?” I nod at the bags on the floor.
I’m not sure why I offer. It’s not like I’m dying to stay here any longer than strictly necessary.
I don’t want to accidentally be a witness to any type of PDA.
Or domesticity. I think that would somehow be even worse.
I mean, Nick clearly feels at home here.
He has a fingerprint that opens the front door and everything.
But right now, him being with somebody else still feels theoretical in a way. I’d like to keep it that way.
“It’s fine, Blue,” he says. “I can handle some groceries.”
“Yeah, no, I know. Just that Callum’s kind of… my job, I guess? So I figured that falls under my… jurisdiction.”
I feel my face go warm while Nick’s lips twitch.
“Feeding him is kind of my business,” he says. He does it neutrally enough. Even gently.
It’s a necessary reminder. Food is Nick’s love language. Of course feeding Callum is his business. Something I should stay away from.
“Right,” I say. “Well, I’m off, in that case.”
I pat down my pockets for my phone, but I can’t find it, so I look around for it for a bit before I realize I’ve had it in my hand the whole time.
“Idiot,” I mutter to myself.
Nick chuckles.
I glance at him and make a face.
He’s still grinning when I turn around.
I try to breathe calmly, but it’s starting to feel like I’ve just run a mile at full speed. This room is hot and my face is hot, and I really am an idiot.
“Have you eaten?” he asks, and when I turn around he seems about as surprised that he asked the question as I am.
“I haven’t gone home yet, have I?” As if on cue, my stomach rumbles.
“I’m making chicken piccata.”
I’d have to be an idiot not to see the invite, and it’s not that I don’t realize he’s asking me to stay.
It’s more that I’m having a hard time figuring out why.
I assumed a truce meant being civil when we run into each other but otherwise keeping out of each other’s way. This offer almost feels friendly.
And ooh boy, does that scare the crap out of me.
Him wanting to be friends? No. No, I don’t want that.
I can’t do that. This would basically be him saying he’s over me.
At least when he hates me there are feelings there.
Being friends? We could never be friends.
If love is friendship on fire, you can’t just put out the flames and call it good.
It won’t be anything but a charred, burned mess.
“Blue?” he prompts.
“I have to get up really early.” I blurt out the first excuse I think of.
He nods.
I nod.
Civil.
We’re being civil.
“Yeah,” I say when he doesn’t say anything to that. “I’m just…”
I wave my thumb toward the door behind me and start to turn around.
“Rowing?” he asks.
Now my heart is hammering in my ears so loudly I can barely hear him.
“What?”
“Are you going rowing?” he asks. “Early morning, right? Like we—you used to.”
The transition from we to you is so smooth I’m not even sure it was really there. Maybe I was just imagining it. Doesn’t stop the memories from flooding in. Him and me, shells and kayaks. The bay.
All those early mornings we spent out there while the rest of the world was still asleep. The sunrises and sunsets. Just us and the water and the feeling that there were endless possibilities ahead of us.
I square my shoulders and lift my chin up while I breathe in, erasing the aftereffects of that march down the memory lane.
“I haven’t been in a while.”
He raises his brows and tilts his head to the side and looks right into me, and who gave him the right?
I shrug.
“Don’t really have the time for things like that anymore. Look, I really have to go. I’ll see you around.”
I would like to say I leave, but this is a full-blown escape. Nothing more, nothing less.