Fucking people in love.
I rolled my eyes and looked back to the field as the captains walked to the center to do the coin toss. We needed this to go in our favor. Without our best defensive end, our offense was going to have to come out blazing and set the tempo for a race up the scoreboard.
“You have any booze in this place?” Cassie asked, and I turned back to look at her. Thatch’s face had turned hard.
“Yeah,” I answered her while I looked at him and tried to figure out what that was about. “There’s some beer in the fridge, but if you want something else, they’ll bring it.”
“Beer’s good,” she announced with a shrug, climbing from Thatch’s lap. But he grabbed on to her hips and didn’t let her go.
“Uh, I’m trying to walk here, Thatcher,” she challenged with a smile. His face was still remarkably devoid of one.
My confusion blossomed. What happened to the happy-go-lucky guy of fifteen seconds ago?
He glanced at Kline briefly, who just smiled and shrugged, and then turned back to Cassie. With one rough yank, he pulled her down to straddle his lap and whispered something in her ear that made her eyes light up.
She moved quick, like a jack-in-the-box, jumping back off of his lap and pulling him to standing. His eyes skated briefly across mine, something in them I didn’t quite understand, before going back to her as she pulled him around the seats and back toward the en suite bathroom.
Jesus Christ, again?
“Is anybody going to actually watch this game with me?” I asked Kline testily. Frankly, I sounded kind of like a whiny kid, but Winnie fucking Winslow had me all out of whack.
Kline didn’t call me on it, though. He was pretty much the only real adult among us. Rising from his seat, he walked over and stood next to me at the window and both sets of our eyes went to the field.
“What’s the plan?”
I shook my head, grimacing as the coin toss went in Pittsburgh’s favor, and answered honestly. “Play as hard as we can for all four fucking quarters, I guess.”
Kline’s smirk hooked my attention from the corner of my eye. “What?” I asked.
His head shook slightly, and he smiled. “I’m just hoping Coach Bennett’s plan is a little more detailed.”
Two minutes left in the fourth quarter, and we were up by seven. A fucking touchdown was practically nothing, the kind of lead that could change on a dime, but it was a lot goddamn better than being behind.
I hadn’t left my spot in front of the windows, my feet having practically grown roots there, and that was the way I liked it. Involved, engaged, and in tune with every second of play.
My friends didn’t have the same kind of avid concentration, but I’d done my best not to notice them as they flitted and squealed all over the room. Cassie had the most attentiveness of anyone, but only when her brother was on the field, and the way she screamed in my ear every time he did something noteworthy made me wish she didn’t.
The fabric of my pants pockets bunched in my hands as I worked to not scrub my hands down my face. I knew there was a camera on me at any given time, and while it wasn’t actually the case at all, I’d made an outward name for myself as having nerves of steel. Commentators often made remarks about my ability to maintain so much composure.
Hell, maybe it was a bad thing. Maybe it was something everyone mocked rather than revered, but it was what I knew. What made me comfortable.
And, as my eyes scanned the sideline to see if I could catch a glimpse of the new team physician, I knew I needed as much fucking normalcy as possible.
Fourth down and three yards to go, our defense lined up without their star defensive end, with the game on the line. My lungs ached with the huge inhale of air I took, and my jaw wasn’t feeling unused either. But if we stopped them from converting this fucking fourth down, the game was over. Rodeshiemer took the snap, shuffling his feet while his eyes scanned the field for an open receiver. He was one of the best fucking passers, with one of the highest completion rates in the entire league, and my balls nearly shriveled up just thinking about having him on the other side of the line in a situation like this. “Get him, get him, get him,” I chanted in my head. Fucking end this.
His offensive line held strong, but all of his receivers were covered. I saw him glance to our weak side again, the gaping hole left by Mitchell only partially filled by his replacement, Harvesty, but Ontario Williams, our defensive tackle, finally broke his hold against Dan DeLuva and took his mammoth body barreling toward their quarterback.
Fuck yes. End this.
Pittsburgh was a formidable opponent for a reason and made for a nightmare of a first game of the season, but even they weren’t invincible. Williams brought Rodeshiemer down with a thud, and my hands finally shot into the air.