Page 22

Chapter Twenty-Two

Ivy

I can barely make out the usually lush, green field. It is covered in snow and patches of ice. As if the cold is reaching through my TV, it seems to wrap around me in a tight fist as I watch the players on the field run warm ups. It didn’t matter that the fire has been going since lunch or that I’m wearing a sweatshirt that is two times too big for me. Nothing about the heavy blanket covering me helps warm the chill spreading over my body.

They are being careful. The whole team, all the players. I may be watching through a screen, tuning out the annoying commentators, but only an idiot that has never watched a ball game in their life wouldn’t be able to see the running backs aren’t going full out when they start to warm up their legs down the side lines. Or that the defensive linemen aren’t desperately trying to break through the top layer of ice and snow with their cleats, looking for a way to dig their heels into the ground.

The broadcast cuts to the commentators in their cozy box and I groan.

I don’t care about the fucking commentators.

Katie blows up my phone as the game begins but I don’t need to look at her messages to know what she’s texting me about. She’s at the game—with Grant, in a season box because Scott got them both the same season passes so I would have people to attend the games with—but I can tell just as clearly from my cocoon on the couch that Scott is playing recklessly .

Unlike the others out on the field of ice, he’s running full out and he’s not taking precautions. He’s not watching his teammates, not communicating, he’s not playing their game.

He’s playing his.

Whatever game this is, it’s not a safe one.

He gets taken down by the opposition's defense time and time again. Each time is a direct hit to my nerves the moment contact is made. By the end of the first half of the game, I’ve worn the nail on my thumb down by anxiously chewing on it and I’m curled into such a tight ball in the corner of the couch that there is a really big possibility that I may never be able to get out on my own.

I twirl my phone between my fingers, itching to call him and tell him to pull his head in.

I can’t. But boy do I want to.

There’s no way he would pick up between quarters anyway. I know that his phone is currently tucked in the side of his bag in the depths of his locker and even if there is a chance he is nearby and did hear it, I am absolutely certain that Uncle Jeff would be ripping into him right about now.

Jeff is like Pops—he believes hard in the team game and hates players that think they are bigger than that.

I almost hope that Scott is getting ripped into by Uncle Jeff. Maybe it will make him start playing safer in the snow.

It’s in the middle of the third quarter when it happens.

The Broncos offensive team is on the field and his former deep blue and white uniform is covered in mud and, from what I can tell, a bit of blood.

It happens so quickly I almost miss it.

I’m not paying attention, my eyes on my phone screen typing furiously to Katie.

“They’re down!”

“Woah, where did that come from?! ”

“Ouch! That had to hurt.”

My eyes dart up to the screen in time for the broadcast to switch from the live feed to a replay. I don’t catch the two players’ numbers that are on the ground, but I know it is a Broncos player that got hit.

My legs uncurl from beneath me as I lift myself out of the corner of the couch, phone slipping from between my fingers while the blanket drops to my feet.

In slow motion, they play it back.

Scott hesitates after the snap, just barely, and the left tackle digs in as Scott takes his moment. I see it in the replay, the moment it all goes wrong. The left tackle—Connors I think his name is—takes the brunt of a defender but his back foot jerks, slipping on a patch of ice before sliding through the mud underneath. The defender barrels through him and collides with Scott.

Arm still lifted, ball still in hand, shoulder-hitting-the-hard-ground-first type of collision.

My heart is in my throat. My empty stomach seems to churn over and over. When the live broadcast comes back, I inch closer to the TV. The crackling fire licking at my skin is burning me but I can’t step back.

“Get up,” I beg him. “Get up, Scott. Please, god, please.”

I can’t hear the commentators anymore.

My heartbeat thuds in my chest. Blood rushes in my ears. A distant ringing starts to echo as if an explosion has gone off right in front of my face.

Only it has, hasn’t it?

I am watching the only casualty in live time. Still on the ground. Not moving.

“Scott for fuck’s sake, get up!” I scream at his still body on the TV screen. My body begins to shake and I can feel the tears stinging behind my eyes.

I can’t shut them. I can’t—won’t—look away.

Not until he gets up, not until he moves .

“Please, please,” I beg again, waiting.

Finally he moves and oxygen fills my lungs again. My breathing is shallow and the air feels thin, but it’s something.

The shill ring of my phone cuts through the air and I’m stunned momentarily as I watch medics rush the field. Scott waves them off, slowly getting to his feet.

My hand makes contact with my phone, which is buried in the blanket that had pooled at my feet in my haste to be closer to the TV.

“Ivy? Ivy? Are you okay? Are you there?” Katie yells down the phone as soon as I answer the call. I can hear the crowd in the background but her voice comes through, shaky and concerned. She sounds out of breath.

“Yeah—yes. I’m here. Am I okay? Is he okay?” I question, my voice crackling. My chest hurts. I press the palm of my hand to the ache, trying to soothe it. Something catches in my throat and a small sob escapes. I feel a few tears finally rolling over my cheeks, making my skin feel sticky. “He—I can’t—what if he—”

“He’s okay. He got up. Are you watching? He’s walking off now. No help. He seems okay. He’s okay.”

“The hit—oh my god, Katie I—I can’t breathe.” She curses on the other end of the line as I desperately try to calm myself down. It doesn’t work. I watch Scott disappear from the field. He doesn’t accept any of their help but the entire team's medical staff follows closely behind him.

The benched, second-string QB runs onto the field. I watch as they reset and play begins.

The clock restarts in the corner of the screen and I feel my lungs constrict.

Nothing. No comments. No cutting away.

What’s happened to him? Why aren’t they saying anything about him?

“I’m trying to find someone from the team. I don’t know—Ivy, who should I ask? Who would know what’s happened to him?” I didn’t realize I spoke out loud but Katie’s panicked questions cut through my spiraling thoughts.

“I—” My eyes finally close. Think . “Meghan, I think her name is. The PR girl. She usually sits in the players box with the owners for home games. She’ll—she’ll know.”

“Meghan, player’s box, right.” I can hear Katie trying to push her way through the crowds.

I close my eyes again and focus on the background sounds I can hear through the phone. Zoning in on the muffled voice of my best friend seems to help and the tears begin to slow down. In any other situation, at any other moment of my life, hearing Katie argue with different members of the staff at the stadium would be downright comedic.

Maybe one day, we will marvel and laugh at her ability to tear through what is probably a six-foot something security guard and into the player’s box.

I glance at the TV. The commentators are filling the time between plays and the same time I hear my name coming through the phone I have pressed to my ear, they comment on Scott.

“—Harvey didn’t even see it coming. Did you see how he landed on his right shoulder? That can’t be good for the throwing arm, no sir. Hopefully it’s superficial, otherwise the winning trade that was speculated to take Boston to the Super Bowl may just have ended his season.”

“Ivy? Can you hear me?”

“Yes,” I whisper in reply.

“He’s heading for Boston General. He’s okay but the physio isn’t convinced and wants more scans. Meghan asked if you want her to put your name on the list for security to let you through?” Katie speaks so quickly my brain takes a moment to process her words.

He’s okay.

Not convinced. More scans.

Security.

Lists .

Boston General.

“He’s okay?” I ask, needing more certainty.

“That’s what they’re saying.”

“Okay. I …” My head is spinning but I’m already moving, my body making the decision for me. My keys are in my hand before I answer Katie. “Yes. Please. Ask her to put me on the list. But, Katie, they can’t tell him. I don’t want him to be disappointed if I can’t—it’s just that … it’s snowing.”

“Fuck … do you—I can come get you?” she asks. I love her. I love her with everything I am. Because in the moment, regardless of the crowds, and the game, and the hordes of people she’ll have to drag Grant through just to get him to leave before the game is over, she would move mountains so I didn’t have to drive in the snow.

Not this time.

This time, I will be okay.

“No. I will be fine. I think—will you tell her?”

“Yes. Of course I will.”

“Okay. Thank you.” I hit the garage door button the moment I close the driver’s door behind me.

The snow falls lightly beyond the cover of my garage. The phone connects to my car’s Bluetooth and Katie’s goodbye echoes around me.

“Text me when you get there. You’ll be fine. It’s not heavy and should be stopping soon. I’ll follow your location as well, okay?”

“Okay,” I whisper back, eyes locked on the almost transparent specks of snow through my back windscreen.

“Drive safe. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

I take a deep breath, put the car into reverse and slowly back out.

** *

The main lobby of Boston General is wall to wall filled with reporters. I regret not at least putting a pair of jeans on as a replacement for my workout leggings. I fold the ends of the oversized sweater over my hands, keys clutched in one hand and my phone in the other. I can at least be glad for the cap left on the back seat of my car.

Another item of Scott’s.

I ignore the sharp pain to my chest when I pull it on and down over my eyes. I’m thankful he left it, for more than it being helpful to just hide my face.

The fact that I was likely to be in the background of multiple news outlets’ sports reports this evening looking like this was another thing that I need to file away to laugh about with Katie in the future. When it’s less painful.

I keep my head down and slip down a corridor to the left. Thanks to Nan, I know this hospital like the back of my hand, and thanks to Pops’ stories, I know that they have a suite of private rooms for VIP patients. If Scott is anywhere, he’ll be there.

“Sorry, miss. Can’t let you back there.” A large, stern looking man stops me at the main doors. I imagine this security guard looks similar to the one Katie barreled through back at the stadium.

Despite knowing my eyes are puffy and red, that I’m practically drowning in the sweatshirt I’m wearing, and I’m seconds from sobbing all over the poor man, I do my best to give him a confident smile. “Uh, Ivy Booker. I’m on the list to see Scott Harvey.”

The security guard blinks, staring down at me as understanding crosses his features. He glances at his phone, most likely to the approved list of names and nods.

“Of course.” He puts one large hand on the door to open it for me but stops. “Uh—will you let your Pops know we’re praying for him to pull through? My old man is a huge fan.”

Another sob crawls up my throat but I manage to gulp it down again. The image of Pops this morning when I visited him—in bed, and pale, and barely able to manage a laugh without coughing afterward—floods my vision. I blink a few times before looking back to the guard. “Thank you. That’s very kind of you. I will pass it on.”

Tears are threatening to spill over again and I do my best to keep the weak smile I managed just moments ago on my face. The guard nods, not saying anything else, and pushes the door open. I slip through.

The noise of the reporters and hustle of the main lobby dies significantly. It’s calmer, but not really all that much quieter. Replacing the reporters are team officials, coaches and assistants, members of the PR team roam around with phones to their ears and iPads under their arms.

No one looks up at me.

In fact, as I take a few steps down the busy corridor, it seems no one takes any notice of my quiet entrance. Feeling like it may be best to keep it this way, I edge down the hallway ensuring to stick close to the white walls. I’ve only taken a few steps before a few people shift, moving past me as they keep their phones to their ears, clearing the path for my eyes to find him.

Scott’s sitting up, legs thrown over the side of the hospital bed in a small recovery room. The doors are pushed open so I have an uninterrupted view of him. His fingers are filthy. There’s mud on his neck and caking around his hairline. But at least he’s out of the mud stained uniform and in a clean set of sweats. I freeze, eyes roaming him carefully.

He’s okay.

He’s fine. He’s sitting up. He’s moving.

The words repeat in my head over and over again as I watch the physiotherapist and doctor examine his arm together. They start taking him through the basic shoulder rotation exercises.

I watched him do them time and time again in the living room while I cooked dinner and he stretched out his muscles on a mat while I took the opportunity to unload my entire day with the kindergarteners onto him .

In the gym, on a day he opted to join me for a workout instead of going to the Broncos facility.

In the bathroom, wearing only a towel and standing behind me, watching intently as I cleaned my teeth or brushed my hair or did something completely mundane yet never getting bored and looking away.

He’s okay.

I wrap my arms around my middle, holding myself back as the urge to go to him washes over me with the power of a tsunami.

I want to check him over myself. I want to run my hands through his hair, mud and all. I want to check his shoulder, his arm. I want to kiss him and press myself into him. I want him to wrap his arms around me and tell me himself that he’s okay. I want to lose myself in him and never be found.

Watching him, assessing him from a distance, it’s not enough.

Not enough.

I broke us.

I broke us and because of that, halfway down the corridor and pressed against the wall is as far into his world that I can allow myself to come anymore.

My world tilts when he looks up and I get lost in the green kaleidoscope.

I can hear my heartbeat in my ears, my chest heaves and my lungs fill with air. I’ve been underwater from the moment I made him walk away from me. Again.

Colors have dulled and sounds have muffled and everything I’ve touched has felt rough.

But now as our eyes meet, it all reverts.

“You’re okay,” I mutter, speaking quietly to him knowing he knows without needing to hear me. I take a hesitant step toward him. Scott moves at the same time, gingerly pushing off the bed, shaking off the doctor’s hands gently.

The doors to the corridor open with a bang .

Noise from the reporters in the lobby muddles with the noise from the members of staff. Camera’s flash and questions are thrown from all directions. Uncle Jeff strides down the hall, eyes so fixated on Scott that he doesn’t notice me. Flynn is next, uniform still covered in dirt and sweat. Connors limps behind him, shaking off the defensive team’s physio as all three men make their way towards Scott.

Back flat against the corridor again, our eyes stay connected.

It’s as if he is my lifeline.

Everything feels richer, deeper, brighter again now that he’s looking at me.

I don’t want to blink in case the connection breaks and I am shoved back into the depths of the dark world I’ve been living in lately; a world without the green I so desperately crave.

I’m shoved back anyway.

Scott glances at Jeff and his teammates and the connection is broken. Everything dulls again and the pain in my chest throbs. Again I press a hand into my chest, watching him for only a moment more before I turn away. Slipping through the door, eyes watching the floor as I weave through reporters, and cameramen, and hospital staff alike. It’s the least I can do to keep the tears from clouding my vision.

I fail and hot, sticky tears spill down my cheeks in quick succession.

My sneakers slip over the ice-covered parking lot. The last of the air that had refilled my lungs when I’d been looking into his eyes escapes me as my arms shoot out, attempting to catch my balance. A few more feet and I’m pulling the driver’s side door closed and engulfing myself in the silence of my car.

I attempt to control my breathing as best I can but, as I should have expected, my phone chimes and cuts through the silence.

Scott: Don’t Leave.

My resolve completely crumbles and I let the sobs take over, wracking through my body, taking me over as the waves wash over me one at a time.

Scott: Ivy?

Pain slashes through my body.

My parents. Pops. All of it.

I lost all of them and I thought tonight I was going to lose Scott too. Weaved amongst it all is this fucking game, and the fucking attention, and all the goddamn, fucking press. But as the sobs wreck me and my tears run hot and salty down my cheeks, the locked box I have been keeping buried away bursts open and I feel as if I might pass out.

I was safe in my world before him.

Safe from the heartbreak, and the time lost, and the worry, and the spotlight.

Safe from grief.

It would be so much easier if I wasn’t completely and utterly in love with him. Maybe then I could just go back to the way it was but now? Now, no matter how much it hurts, I want him more than I want to hide away from dealing with my past.

Ivy: I needed to see you were okay with my own eyes.

Scott: Come back inside, baby.

Not yet.

First, even though I can’t be sure I’ll even survive it, I have to deal with my shit.

** *

“Ives, are you sure you’re okay?” Katie sets a cup of tea on the coffee table in front of me. My phone lights up again, buzzing as it rings next to the tea. “And are you sure you don’t want to answer him?”

The him she is referring to is Scott. He hasn’t stopped calling since I left the hospital last night. Katie was waiting for me when I got home. I hadn’t been able to explain anything, my body tired and my nerves shot from driving in the snow, but she’d stayed and was still here when I woke up this morning. I didn’t deserve her.

I shake my head. “I’m fine. I don’t … I can’t talk to him yet.”

“Ivy,” Katie drawls on. I can tell she’s disappointed in me but I need a second to catch my breath before I can figure out how to do what I need to do.

To move forward. To be better.

So instead, I fall on old patterns. “I have to get to work.”

“No, Ivy.” Katie grabs the bag I was about to pick up from the counter. “You aren’t going anywhere until we talk about this.”

“I don’t want to talk yet.” I say. My chest is beginning to ache.

Last night officially drained me of all my emotions. I woke up this morning feeling numb. My eyes are itchy and I blink a few times, trying to bring back some of the moisture. I have been crying all night. I’m officially sick of crying.

“You love him,” she says stating a fact rather than asking a question.

“I—”

“You do. And you’re being so fucking stubborn about this. You love this guy but because you have some weird grudge, you’re not going to be with him?” If I had anything left to give, I would likely flinch at her words. Instead, I just let them wash over me.

“It might never work,” I reply, my voice sounding almost robotic.

“Say’s who?” She steps back, arms out and palms up, like she’s asking me to point something out to her. “Because from what I can see, Ives, he’s trying to make it work with you. And do not try to tell me he isn’t because the man has been calling and texting you non-stop for weeks! ”

Anger rises in my chest. An emotion so hot and powerful, that I’m almost shocked by it. I feel my face flush and my hands shake.

All the decisions I made on the drive home last night—getting help, working through my grief, figuring out how to control my anxiety better—feel as if they are crowding around me and sucking the air from the room.

Too hard.

It all seems too hard in the light of day.

“Says me,” I all but yell back at her. My best friend just stares at me with a sad expression. “I say, Katie. I have spent my whole life having people tell me how great my parents were. What a great couple they made, that they were great parents when I was a baby. I have been told over and over and over about how incredible my dad was on the football field, how he would’ve been inducted into the hall of fame with Pops, how it is such a shame that we lost him so soon.”

“We,” I snarl, desperately trying to keep calm and not allow the angry tears that wait in the wings out. “There shouldn’t be a we. I lost him. I lost them both. They were away because of that stupid game. Maybe if they hadn’t been so god damn invested, him such a fucking prodigy, I would still have them.” My voice cracks and I feel as if I’m going to be sick. “Don’t you think I’m allowed to be a little hesitant of throwing myself back into that world for a man. A man that they feel like they own? Just because he is in the NFL?”

Because what if I lose him too? What if I have to end up grieving him too?

My head pounds. My stomach rolls.

Katie stares at me, her eyes glassy. “Ivy, your mom and dad didn’t die because of football. You … you know that right?”

Memories flash through my mind.

Except, they aren’t memories. They are memories in the form of stories. Stories that my Nan told me of a time when Pops was on the road playing football back in the sixties. Stories they’d told me of my parents. My dad dedicating his time and his energy to playing ball growing up, to the struggles my parents went through when they fell pregnant with me because how could my dad focus on going pro when he had a daughter he wanted to be home for? How would they possibly make that work?

And then, suddenly, the faces in my head morph and it isn’t my parents but Scott and myself.

Scott being gone all the time.

Scott missing birthdays and holidays.

Scott being more famous than my pops or dad ever was.

In every scenario, I am left alone. Every single silly fantasy I have thought up since meeting Scott rises from the ashes and morphs into my personal nightmare.

I squeeze my eyes shut trying to make sense of all the emotions swirling around inside me.

Sadness, confusion, numbness, anger, years old grief.

They’re all there, mixing together like one giant, confusing cocktail.

“I just … I’m angry. I miss them. I wish I had more time with them. I don’t know who else to blame,” I say quietly after a moment. “Scott is … I don’t know. What should I do?”

“I don’t know sweetie. Maybe it’s time to talk to someone about all this.” Katie steps forward and wraps me in her arms, hugging me tightly. “You can find someone to help you work through it, if you’re ready. And, Ives, I love you. I do. But not being with Scott because of his literal job? The only people that you’re punishing are you and him.”

I turn my head, resting on her shoulder. If I had any tears left, there is a good chance I would cry.

“I miss him,” I murmur.

“I know you do.”

“I don’t know how to be all in,” I admit out loud to her. “I’m so scared. Of facing that world, of all the things that come with it. Of losing him to it. ”

“He’ll help you, you just have to let him,” she tells me quietly, her hand running soothingly over my back.

Something in my resolve crumbles. A brick from the endlessly high wall comes crumbling down. She’s right. I know she is. I knew it last night, and I know it now.

I’m still angry. I’m still confused.

Maybe if he never walked into the bar all those months ago, I would spend the rest of my life living in the football free bubble that I made for myself, perfectly content. But he did. And now that I know him, now that I love him, I don’t want to go back.

I just need to figure out how to go forward.

He’s told me he isn’t going to give up, that he’ll fight for me. I think it’s time I step in the ring.

My phone rings again. This time I pick up.

“Ivy? It’s Dr. Bryden.” A chill takes over my body. “I think you should come to the hospital.”