Thirty-Three

THE LOCKER ROOM had gone mad. At half-time, the Raptors were up twenty-one to three in Kansas City. No one had ever done anything like it. Not in a playoff game, not in a championship game. Not with the Super Bowl on the line.

And none of it will matter a bit if we call in the second half , Scott thought to himself. The Chiefs were masters at the come-from-behind victory. You could never count this team out.

As if he could read Scott’s thoughts, Coach called for silence, gesturing the last of his staff away from the small huddles of players.

The offensive coordinator, Jeff Rigby, showed Scott a final play on the small tablet lying across his knees.

Scott nodded, then poked Finn, tipping his head at the screen.

Finn checked, nodded, and offered a fist-bump.

“... but we can’t get slack. Defense, keep the double coverage going, but don’t forget it’s a red herring for their run game. Offense. Let’s keep those points coming. We all know that team out there has a long history of closing big gaps. We’re not adding to their list.”

The men in the locker room leapt to their feet. “Work harder. Work harder! Work harder! ”

The chant echoed from the walls, and Scott welcomed the familiar rush of adrenaline, feeding off the energy around him, and feeding it, in turn, as he jammed his helmet onto his head and led the rush back onto the field.

Reaching the sideline, Jeff took Scott aside. “I think we should keep the ball on the ground, unless we have to pass. Less chance of a turnover if we keep it out of the air.”

Scott nodded. Football, especially in the playoffs, could be as much about the mental game as the physical one. Not only keeping your emotions in check, but playing smart, as well.

“You got this?”

“I got this.”

And he did, for the most part. He pushed Abby from his head, pushed Dylan’s hearing away, too, forcing his mind to a laser focus.

Thirty more minutes to play. Thirty minutes, and then he could deal with all the rest of it.

Maybe he and Finn could go out, afterwards, win or lose, and he’d tell him what happened with Abby this week.

Maybe in telling someone, it might make it real.

The Chiefs pushed hard, but the defense held them to another field goal. Then, Scott had his hands on the ball again, a line of men before him, Finn behind and to one side.

He breathed, let the sound of the crowd wash over him, closed his eyes for a moment.

Letting them snap open, he read the line and absolutely knew they’d already recognized the play.

So much for the run game. He stood, called the audible, watched his men shuffle.

He crouched, gave the count. The ball touched his fingers, the rough, pebbled surface exactly like a million times before.

The world went silent.

He stepped back once, twice. Checked right. Finn. Double covered. Glanced left. The rookie, Highcastle, open. Planting his feet, he spun the ball off his fingers. It sailed, floated, in slow motion, and Highcastle, head turned to track it, let it slide into his outstretched arms.

Sound returned, a rushing wall battering his senses, buffeting him as he followed the ball’s progress down the field. One tackle avoided, a quickstep and spin, and then a clear, straight run.

“Yeah!”

He chased Highcastle into the end zone, knocked the forehead of his helmet against his, grabbed his arms, too pumped to use words, nothing but an animalistic scream of victory.

They still had twenty-five minutes to play, but the Raptors had controlled their own fate and would continue to do so.

Scott’s hands shook, but not for the usual reasons.

Well, not just for the usual reasons. The usual reasons were the kind of pre-game jitters he’d spent a decade mastering, or accepting and getting the job done, anyway.

Post-game jitters, on the other hand, were for the adrenaline crash after a high-stakes game or. .. I’m going to the Super Bowl!

Elated, breathless, beyond words, he shook out his hands, took deep breaths, grounded himself in an overwhelmingly surreal moment.

The long walk back up the tunnel had been muffled, his mind so far out of his exhausted body he’d been hovering. Sound receded, only one thing kept looping through his brain: Super Bowl, Super Bowl, Super Bowl...

I can’t wait to tell Abby...

And then it all came crashing back in, like the moment after the snap, when the other team has anticipated the play, and his vision filled with nothing but the massive bulk of a lineman coming straight for him.

Stand up. Protect the ball. Take the hit.

He didn’t know how many more hits he could take.

Through the haze, as if his best friend could sense his thoughts, his attention snapped to Finn. “I’m sorry?”

“Have you seen Abby, yet?”

“Abby?” The air went out of the room. “What do you mean?”

He should have told Finn about the breakup sooner, but they’d been so busy with practice...

“Oh, man, Kelly is so psyched to be here. Didn’t even care at least a dozen Chiefs fans flipped her off before she made it out of the parking lot.”

“Here?” Scott’s voice cut out, sound strangled in denial. “Kelly’s here?”

“I couldn’t believe it, either, when she told me... Wait,” Finn’s brain caught up to his words. “You didn’t know? Crap. She’s gonna kill me for ruining the surprise.”

“Abby’s here?”

“Dude,” Finn shook his head, then peeled out of his jersey. “I mean it, she might actually kill me. If you value our friendship at all, don’t tell her I told you.”

Dazed, Scott nodded.

Abby was here, at Arrowhead? Why?

“I swear, Kelly, it’s okay. I’ll wait for you out here.”

Kelly whirled, cocked her head at Abby, and crossed her arms. “What happened?”

“N... Nothing.”

She raised one eyebrow and waited. Abby twisted her fingers in the hem of her jersey.

The jersey with Scott’s name and number emblazoned across the back.

The one he’d given her when he’d visited the hospital last Spring.

Only a few weeks ago, she’d wondered if it might someday sport the same glittery scrawl of letters Kelly’s had: Mrs .

Now, it never would.

“You’ve been quiet as a church mouse since I met you at the airport yesterday.

I know Gen... Well, I know what’s going on, but now you, what?

Don’t want to go see Scott? He won, girl.

He’s going to the Super Bowl. You think he won’t be thrilled you flew out?

I told Finn we’d be here because I knew how much it would mean to him to have me in the stands while he played. So, what’s going on?”

“I’m so sorry, Kelly, I should have told you. I wanted you to enjoy the game. I wanted to enjoy Scott playing one last time, and pretend...” She took a deep breath. “Scott and I broke up last week. That’s why I didn’t tell him. That’s why I don’t think I should go in there.”

Kelly’s face fell. “Girl...”

The ready room doors swept open, cutting Kelly off, and the first few players trickled out.

She turned, searching their faces for her husband. “Highcastle, nice catch, man. Well played. Donte, solid defense. I loved that stop in the third...”

A consummate football wife, Abby thought as Kelly greeted each player coming out of the locker room by name, offering some small word of praise or encouragement.

She’d only had eyes for Scott, even if he wasn’t hers anymore.

Hadn’t even noticed the receivers, except where they’d made Scott’s throws matter, hadn’t noticed the defense, except for getting their job done and getting the ball back into Scott’s hands.

I’m so selfish .

Swallowing the bitter pill, her chest tightened as she counted what it had cost her.

Then, Finn came out, and, with a screech, Kelly launched herself into her husband’s arms.

Abby was forgotten. As she would be by next season. Nothing but another girl who had dated a player for a while, then disappeared.

A lump formed in her throat, choking her breath.

Behind Finn, now kissing Kelly passionately enough to draw some wolf whistles from the players skirting around them, those whose wives or girlfriends hadn’t been able to come, Abby recognized a familiar shock of tousled hair, the freshly-showered look that made her knees go weak and her breath catch.

She froze, pressed her back to the cool concrete wall behind her, wished it would swallow her whole, so she didn’t have to face this moment.

He was braver than her. Crossing the hall, he punched Finn’s shoulder as he passed. “Let her breathe, man.”

Stopping far too close for comfort, but still too far away, out of reach of the fingertips that longed to reach for him, to brush against the buttons at the collar of the blue polo he wore, the one that brought out his eyes, Abby shoved her hands into the tight pockets of her jeans.

Not yours, anymore, she reminded herself.

“Why are you here?”

He sounded angry, hurt, and Abby cringed. She’d somehow managed to mess this up, too.

“Kelly and I planned to come. I didn’t want to bail on her.”

“Planned? When?”

She bit her lip. She didn’t want to make this worse, didn’t know how to do that, except to say nothing. But a few players had slowed in the hall, edging around Finn and Kelly, then, scenting drama about to unfold, stopping outright. “I bought the tickets Monday morning.”

He flinched, and his thoughts flickered across his face. Monday morning. And by Monday night, it was over. “I... see.”

The silence stretched again, tense, anxious, but without any entertainment factor, the men in the hall began easing their way onward, toward the team busses that would take them back to the airport.

“You, um, played good. Well. You played well. Your throw right at the beginning of the third? Beautiful.”

He nodded. “Thanks.”

For a moment, his eyes lit up, and Abby reveled in the rightness of it. His love of the game. His joy in sharing it with her.

Then, they shuttered again.

Accepting the inevitable, though it tore her apart to do so, Abby forced a smile to her lips. “Congrats. Super Bowl. That’s... amazing.”

He nodded, then turned as another wave of men went by. “I should go.”

“Yeah. No, I know.”

Another moment passed as they locked eyes, and the weight of the things between them suffocated her, sucking the very air from her lungs. Then, his gaze slid from hers, and, following it, he moved away, down the hall, after his teammates.

“Scott?” Her voice threatened to break.

He paused, glancing over his shoulder.

“Good luck. Wednesday. I hope...” Her throat closed and she couldn’t force another word through.

“Me too.”

Then, he’d disappeared. A moment later, Kelly stepped up beside her, Finn following his quarterback out of Abby’s life.

“Okay, girl. Now we drink. And you tell me what the hell happened. And we figure out how to fix it.”

For a moment, Abby actually considered it. It wouldn’t take much alcohol to dull the keen edge of her pain. But no, she couldn’t do that.

“You drink, I’ll drive.”

“You talk.”

Mute, Abby nodded.