One minute, thirteen seconds on the clock.
“I can’t take this,” I whisper into my fingers, my eyes locked on the field.
“It never gets any easier,” Carol warns me. “But we’ve pulled out of worse. Just wait. They’ve got another down and plenty of time.”
They’re lining up. Colt is far to Trey’s right. I watch him anxiously, waiting for him to perform a miracle. Praying for him not to get hurt.
Trey snaps the ball. Colt bursts into action, running down the right side of the field. A lineman tracks him, ready to cover him, but Trey isn’t going for him. He’s been watching Tyus and he’s open. Trey makes the throw, a high, precise spiral that’s aimed right at Tyus’ waiting arms. He’s on the fifty with no one around and I’ve seen his speed before, once he gets going no one can catch him.
I’m on my toes, my hands on my mouth as Tyus waits for it. As he lines himself up with the pass. As a lineman barrels toward him.
They both go up at the same time. Tyus reaches for the ball. It bounces off his left hand, tumbling to his chest. He goes to wrap his arms around it just as his feet come back to the ground but the Falcon is there with his hand in the way and he strips the ball from Tyus’s grasp. He takes it in his own.
“NO!!!” the stadium erupts around me.
Tyus wraps up the Falcon before he can run away, but the damage is done. We’ve lost possession. It’s the Falcon’s ball on the fifty yard line.
Forty-seven seconds on the clock.
“No,” I whisper.
But it doesn’t matter. The offensive line leaves the field. Colt rips his helmet off and heads immediately for Tyus. He’s in a rage and Colt can see it. He grabs the back of his friend’s head and talks to him quick and low. Tyus tries to pull away but Colt won’t let him. He keeps talking. Keeps holding onto him. Finally he releases him and Tyus nods once, his eyes on the ground. The rest of the team passes him, each one clapping him on the back or knocking his shoulder. Telling him it’s alright. They don’t blame him. Trey is the last one to him and he doesn’t say a word. He just stands next to him, shoulder to shoulder, their faces equally grim.
Colt has removed himself from the pack, his back to the field. I can’t see his face.
Things move quickly after that. The defense holds strong, but the Falcons aren’t looking to score. Not really. They want to run out the clock and seal the victory.
A minute later they do just that.
Final score: Falcons twenty-six, Kodiaks twenty.
The Super Bowl just fell out of reach.
I fall into my seat, my face in my hands, my hair tumbling in a veil around me. I can’t believe they lost. I can’t believe how sad I am over this game, something I couldn’t have cared less about three months ago, but now I’m heartbroken for them, for all of them. I’m destroyed for Colt.
There’s a shuffling around me. Loud cheers, condolences being shouted. I look up in surprise to find everyone around me on their feet facing the wall. The wall where Colt is climbing up and over in his cleats and his gear, only his helmet shucked off somewhere between me and the field. I watch in amazement as his large arms are able to pull him up and over the bars on the railing in front of me and hoist his heavy body into the stands. His face is a tight mask of determination, stone chiseled into the agony of defeat.
I go to stand to meet him but he falls to his knees in front of me. He leans forward to wrap his arms around my waist and bury his face in my chest like a child looking for comfort. This massive man covered in sweat and gear, this warrior who fought from the hold of men a hundred pounds heavier than him for the last four hours, is kneeling at my feet, breathing hard and broken against my breast.
I wrap my arms gently around his head, the only part of him I can reach that’s not covered in pads, and I stroke his wet hair gently.
I lean my face down to the top of his head, whispering, “I’m sorry.”
He doesn’t reply. He doesn’t have to. I understand how he feels, I know what it is to lose, and the only thing he wants from me is the one thing I can give him.
Me. My presence. My love.
My promise to always be there for him, win or lose.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
COLT
February 15th
Enclave Estates
Pacific Palisades, CA
“Here we are again,” I mutter.
Lilly laughs, taking my hand as we walk toward the front of the house. She looks sexy in a yellow summer dress, her hair curled and swept to one side exposing her neck and the diamond earrings I gave her last night for Valentine’s Day. “At least you’re allowed to give them your present now. You’ve had a baby chair in your trunk for almost four months. My ovaries were starting to feel pressured.”
“I wish you would have told me. I would have tossed it out on the side of the road.”
“Not ready for kids, huh?” she chuckles.
I raise a dubious eyebrow at her. “Are you?”
“Not at all.”