Page 79 of Show Me

“That would’ve been impressive. But this isn’t bad either.” Jesse grabbed my jersey and tugged, urging me upright and looping his arms around my neck. His warm hands cupped my sweaty cheeks, and his magnetic eyes snared my gaze as he lifted onto the balls of his feet.

I felt the kiss he brushed over lips all the way to the marrow of my bones.

“I’m totally going to cry now,” he whispered and tipped his head toward the sky, but I angled his face right back down and then gently swiped my thumbs over his tears.

He buried his face against my chest, and we stood like that for a few minutes with our arms wrapped around each other before he lifted his gaze to mine. “I love you, too. And for the record, I need to confess that I didn’t want to go on that date with John, I just told myself I should because I was scared. And there’s never been a chance in hell that I would now oreverhave gotten back together with Reid, but if either of those things made you even a tiny bit jealous, I’m not going to complain, because I really wanted you to be mine, too. I’d convinced myself I couldn’t have you.”

“I’m yours,” I promised, and saying the words out loud made my heart swell in my chest with therightnessof them.

“Guys like me typically only get guys like you in the movies, you realize,” he said softly.

“Technically we’ve made a lot of movies together,” I reminded him. I kissed him again through his laughter and then glanced over his shoulder as someone whooped. Half the crowd was huddled en masse facing us like a human satellite dish. In the distance, Joel lifted one hand, flashing me a thumbs-up.

Jesse dragged the tip of his nose over my neck, his breath warm on my skin. “Everyone’s looking at us, aren’t they?”

“Yeah, but it’s okay. I promise.”

A squawk of feedback had us both reeling as Coach stepped forward with a megaphone in one hand while he waved his clipboard in the other. “Wrap it up, Harding. We ain’t done here yet.”

Jesse pecked me once more on the lips. “Go. I’ll see you back at the house.”

“Fuck, okay.” I wished we could just turn around and walk home right now, crawl in his bed, and shut out the world.

I left him behind reluctantly and trotted back across the grass.

When I stopped in front of my family, they all fell silent. “Wow. I had no idea it was possible to get everyone to be quiet at once.” Joel chuckled, and my dad reached out and gave me a solid smack on the arm. I fumbled over what to say. “Am I supposed to say something meaningful here? Because I’m kinda out of gas.” I thumbed over my shoulder. “That’s my roommate Jesse. He’s feeling embarrassed right now over some shit that’s not his fault, so when you get back to the house, can you be really fucking nice to him? Because he’s also the guy I’m in love with, and it’d mean a lot to me. I had a different plan for how that intro was gonna go, but it didn’t work out, so…”

My mom swooped her arms around me and squeezed me so tight I struggled to breathe. “Of course, sweetheart.” She cupped my cheeks in her warm hands and smiled up at me. “You make me so proud for so many reasons.”

“Harding!” Coach hollered through the megaphone again, and my mom released me.

“Go, we’ll be at your place setting up for dinner.”

I loped toward the locker rooms with one last glance over my shoulder at my family’s smiling faces, and not even the prospect of being reamed out by Coach and probably having to apologize to Reid again could take away the happiness bubbling inside me.

30

Jesse

Iswear Sam’s dad took up two-thirds of our kitchen just standing in front of the stove heating something on top of it that I couldn’t see. Meanwhile, Sam’s mom, Carla, bustled around pulling foil from the tops of dishes and barking orders at the other kids, instantly making herself at home. She had the same warm vibe Sam had, and I was instantly drawn to her.

“Can I help with anything?” I offered, and she smiled kindly to me, brown eyes twinkling. Her smile reminded me of Sam’s.

I’d gotten home before they arrived and had just enough time to get to my room, have a cross between a breakdown and the kind of hysterical fit of excitement usually reserved for Harry Styles—because, let’s face it, Sam was my own version of Harry Styles—then pulled myself together and went back downstairs as the doorbell rang. All of them had clustered at the front door, each with a dish in their hand, Carla leading the charge. The gratitude I felt when not a damn one of them said anything about what had happened on the football field was so great that I almost burst into tears of joy on the spot.

“Nah. We’ve got a system down pat. Don’t mind us taking over the kitchen.”

“No one’s going to complain.”

“I hear you’re quite the cook. Sam says you taught him how to make chicken cordon bleu.”

I laughed at the memory, even as my cheeks heated for what had come afterward. “Yeah, sort of.”

She looked me over more carefully. “I can tell he’s over the moon for you, you know. All through high school, he was more into sports and his friends than getting around with girls. But he talks about you all the time. Jesse this, Jesse that.” Her smile widened. “Oh, you’re a blusher. Well, you’ll get over that quick enough with us.”

She laughed as I rubbed my cheeks dramatically, and then my smile faltered. “I feel like I should say something about what happened on the field, because I don’t want you to have this awful first impression of me. It’s a really long story, but—” I stopped as she laid a hand on my shoulder.

“Do you care for my son?”