Page 6

Amy

"Ma boy!" Fiona shrieks. It cuts through the stadium, a siren of grief that floats above the diminishing noise as forty thousand people gasp, then go dead silent.

Her shriek is a bloodcurdling sound that makes me understand, in one horrifying moment, why parents always say they hope their kids outlive them.

And then I’m flying.

Down the concrete stadium stairs, feet barely touching. I’m moving like a linebacker guarding a quarterback—except I am the quarterback, and Hamish is the ball, and I’m about to bulldoze anything in my way.

Someone yells at me. I don’t hear them. Someone tries to grab my arm. I shake them off so hard, their sunglasses fly.

Hamish isn’t getting up.

He always gets up.

After every hit. Every fall. Every collision. Every tackle.

He pops right back up, grinning like it’s foreplay.

But this time?

He’s not moving.

My heart breaks open and spills out all over the turf. I can't think. I can't breathe. All I am is movement . Legs pumping. Lungs in suspended animation. Skin an afterthought on the wind.

Eyes locked on him.

"Move!" I shriek at a line of security guards, who seem to view the word as a challenge to...

Not.

I slam into one of them, who might be part granite, and half the wind's knocked out of me.

The half I need to get to Hamish.

My throat is shredded as I find my words, staring at Hamish on the ground past the player benches.

“Get out of my way!” I scream.

The wall of security does not.

"That's my boyfriend!" I try again.

Two of the guys snort. "Sure, honey, they all say that," says a bald dude with a twisted nose.

I try waving down Coach Jensen, Luis - anyone on the team - but they're all head down, focused on Hamish. The team is trained to surround injured players, and that means I'm shut out.

And then.

And then.

"THAT'S MA SON!" Fiona screams from a few flights of stairs above me, waving her hands like she's shooing crows. "YOU LET HER SEE HIM!"

"DON'T YOU DARE HURT MY AMY!" my own mother screeches from above. Her choice of high heels, as delightfully color-paired with her eyeshadow as they are, proves deadly on the stadium stairs as she makes her way slowly down.

"SEE? I shout to the guards. "Hamish is my boyfriend. Almost fiancé. He's proposing today. I'm Amy Jacoby. Go check with Coach and he'll tell you."

Now I'm getting somewhere. The guard speaks into his earpiece and I feel like I'm about to puke on his shoes.

Luis looks up, catches my eye, and jogs over, saying something to the guard, who gives him a skeptical look but moves aside. I shove him a bit as I walk past the benches, then run to get to Hamish.

"ME TOO!" Fiona screams. "I MEANT YE TA LET HER AN' ME ON THE PITCH!"

The men around him—hulking, panting, professional athletes—freeze as I shove past them like I’m a one-woman 4-3-3 attack formation, screaming onto the pitch with my heart on the ground, writhing in pain.

And a mouth that sounds like their locker room.

Hamish is curled slightly, writhing. Face pale, sweat shining on his forehead. One leg is bent wrong.

So wrong I can’t look.

"Don’t you dare," I whisper. "Don’t you dare not be okay."

Coach Jensen steps in beside me. “You beat the medics,” he says, voice filled with ire.

Luis crouches nearby, wide-eyed. “He’s talking. Kind of.”

“Hamish?” I drop to my knees beside him, cupping his face. The denim around my knees is tight, pulling up to the waist. The wind quiets like the crowd until it's just background noise, all murmur and hush. My heart beats in my ears and my skin hums a sick tune. “Hamish, can you hear me?”

He blinks up at me, pupils huge.

Then he smiles.

“Pet,” he slurs. “D’ye think the crowd saw ma nipples again?”

Oh, no.

I brush his hair off his forehead. “Hamish.”

“I canna feel ma knee but I can smell pretzels. Purple pretzels wi' mustard and caramel. Does that mean I’m dead?”

“No,” I choke out. “You’re just injured and delusional.”

“Oh. Good. I hate pretzels. 'Specially the glitter ones.”

An EMT pushes past with a big, bulky kit. “Miss, I need you to step back. Get off the pitch. Only authorized personnel should be–”

Coach Jensen starts to say something but I snap at the EMT first. “I'm not going anywhere.” My voice is foreign, low, threatening.

Feral.

The guy blinks and lets me stay.

Hamish tries to sit up.

“Absolutely not,” I bark, pushing him down by the shoulder as the EMT assesses Hamish's eyes.

“But I gotta win the game. The team needs me.” He looks around wildly. “Where’s the sheep? I was gonna propose to the sheep.”

“Baby, no,” I whisper. “There are no sheep.”

“Oh. That’s good. ’Cause I love you , no' the sheep.”

My hand covers my mouth. I’m laughing and sobbing at the same time, which is exactly as attractive as it sounds.

Another EMT leans over and starts unlacing his cleats.

“Careful,” I say quickly. “There’s?—”

His sock has a bulge in it, and the EMT peels it back carefully. Out rolls a tiny velvet bag.

The entire circle of players gasps like we’re in a soap opera, all eyes on me suddenly, as if they’re worried the “surprise” has been spoiled..

“Oh,” Hamish mutters, blinking at the bag. “There’s the sheep.”

“That’s the ring, Hamish.”

“Oh. Right. Aye.” He smiles dreamily. “Did I ask ye yet? ’Cause if not, I will. Soon. I promise. Jus’ lemme find ma other leg first. It wandered off. Don' let Pookie shoot it out o' her glitter cannon.”

The EMT gently lifts his knee and Hamish yelps like someone set it on fire, moaning like a professional Scottish mourner.

My heart breaks all over again. Hamish is flesh and bone, human like the rest of us, but when he's hurt on the pitch, he shakes it off. Pushes through. Pushes past .

I've never seen him like this, so helpless, so tormented.

So out of it and yet so sober.

“ Shh ,” I whisper, holding his hand tight. “You’re going to be okay. You have to be okay.”

He leans his head back, closing his eyes. “Is this the part where they make me eat puddin’?”

“What?”

“I want chocolate. No—banana. Banana’s sexy. Ye ever think about that, pet? Banana puddin’ in bed? Imagine the possibilities.”

Coach Jensen leans in. “I think he hit his head.”

“No kidding,” I fret, brushing sweat off Hamish’s temple.

The cameramen are circling like vultures now, long-lensed and leering, hungry for emotion.

One tries to zoom in on the ring.

I turn and hiss, “Do you want a Pulitzer or a black eye?”

He backs up. Slowly.

Hamish turns his head toward me, dazed but smiling, eyes glassy but focused just enough.

“Amy,” he says, his voice low but clear. “Ye'll be ma pool noodle spouse?”

“What?”

“I was gonna get on one knee,” he says with a crooked grin, “but... seems I’ve got nae knee left to bend.”

A small, startled sound escapes my throat. A laugh. A sob. A full-body tremble.

"You're going to be fine." I hate platitudes, but it’s funny how they really do just come out of your mouth when you're scared.

"Ma leg is a pool noodle, Amy. Ye prepared to spend the rest o' yer life marrit to a pool noodle? I'll let ye pick the color. A nice neon pink, I prefer, maself."

“Are you kidding me right now?”

He wiggles his eyebrows—or maybe just blinks unevenly. A neurologist can assess the difference. “Been carryin’ that ring ‘round in ma sock for weeks. That’s commitment. Fookin’ hurts when ye hit the pitch just wrong.”

I look at the EMT in horror. "He didn't get hurt because of the ring, did he?"

"Nah. He got hurt because Blavek over there decided to give his knee a hard kiss with the bottom of a cleat."

The crowd around us is buzzing a bit louder now, confused and concerned.

Then I hear them.

Our families.

The Jacoby and McCormick clans have apparently stormed the sidelines in a unified front of plaid, pearls, and panic.

“LET ME THROUGH! I’M HIS MUM!” Fiona screeches, punching an unfortunate assistant coach in the arm with her purse. “Purse” is an understatement. The woman carries a duffel bag that weighs as much as an anvil.

“I’M HIS MUM, TOO!” Mom yells, before frowning at herself. “I mean— she’s the groom’s mother, but I'm the bride's! WE HAVE RIGHTS!”

Fiona, in a rare moment of cooperation, lets out a primal growl and links elbows with Mom like they’re about to do a two-woman WWE tag-team takedown.

Security is not ready.

And I’m not ready either, not for any of this.

But here I am on my knees beside him anyway, stroking his face, dirt smudging my jeans, my hands shaking against his jaw. Hamish's beautiful auburn hair is a pile against the ground, face coated in sweat, eyes surprisingly alert.

Those eyes are full of love and pain and some kind of ridiculous peace that I can’t wrap my head around.

“Say yes, pet,” he whispers. “Or at least tell me I didna roll around on the grass fer nothin’ and lose ma knee ta banana puddin' just so ye could say no.”

I laugh.

"You haven't asked me, Hamish."

"I did!"

"You asked me if I'd be happy marrying a pool noodle."

"I'm being poetic, Amy. I'm the pool noodle, ye see? A bit floppy an' good for naught but floatin’ around in water." A classic Hamish grin, impish and sweet, as if he's brought me in on a cosmic joke–as if the world is nothing but a joke–makes me tear up.

I squeeze his hand. He becomes sharper instantly, and reaches with his other hand for my face.

"Aye, pet. I understand. Ye want me to do it proper.

Of course. Ye deserve it all, Amy. I want to be a good enough man to give ye all of it.

The world. Ma heart. Ma body." He winces.

"Minus a knee. It's a bit broken. Mebbe ye want a discount on it?

Ma todger's fine, though. Mebbe give it a touch to see? " he adds with a wink.

He's fine .

"I want you to shut up and get to a hospital."

"Nae. No' before this." He pulls my face closer. "Been planning this for too long. Today's the day, and now's the now, knee be damned. I'm serious, pet. Please, Amy Jacoby. Please. Be ma wife? Let me make ye the happiest woman I can?"

I nod, then I say it.

“Yes.”

And we kiss.

The crowd doesn’t just cheer.

It erupts .

Like someone hit the jackpot on a slot machine rigged to fireworks and tear ducts. We must be on camera. I knew I should have decked that guy.

There’s a wave of screaming from Section 19 that I’m ninety percent sure involves a glitter cannon, and someone—possibly Pookie—shouting, “WE GOTTA DO A FLASH MOB!”

The Jumbotron lights up like the fourth of July over the Esplanade. In big, flashing letters, it reads, "SHE SAID YES!"

"Ladies, he’s off the market!" some sports announcer whose name I can't recall declares, to a rousing chorus of female boos.

"Yes, he is," I whisper, kissing him softly, the roar of the stadium making my ears ring. Hamish's mouth is soft and hard at the same time, eager and a bit desperate as we kiss. I feel a tension in his skin I've never, ever found in him before. It's new and makes my stomach tighten.

This is Hamish in pain. This is Hamish confused and struggling.

This is Hamish down .

The EMTs start to move him, hoisting the stretcher as cheers wash over us.

Hamish smiles up at me, eyes fluttering.

“Did I do it right?”

“You did it perfectly,” I assure him.

And then?—

He passes out.

Right there on the stretcher.

Dead weight, head lolling, smile still faint on his lips.

The love of my life just proposed to me on the pitch, in front of tens of thousands of people, with a ring that fell out of his sock and a knee formed in the shape of a question mark.

And now he’s unconscious.

Coach Jensen plucks the velvet bag off the ground and hands it to me with a shrug. I stuff it in my pocket. Time for details later.

"PUT IT ON, HEN!" Fiona shouts. "YER ON CAMERA!"

But I don't care. I want him to put it on my finger. I want my love staring deep into my soul as the precious metal makes its journey along my finger, across my lifeline.

A lifeline I intend to be as long as possible, right alongside his.

I walk beside the stretcher, still holding his hand.

Because even now—bleeding, broken, unconscious—he is mine .

And I am his.

Not because of a ring.

Because of love.

Big, messy, inconvenient, unstoppable, ridiculous, sacred love.

The kind that crashes onto a football pitch and rewrites your whole life.

One banana pudding at a time.