Hail Mary

by Nicola Rendell

  My heart is pounding, and I stare at the lock on the door. Until a few nights ago, I don’t think I ever forgot to lock a bathroom door, either on purpose or by accident. But now it’s becoming a habit.

  I clutch my hands to my knees. I don’t exactly know what I am doing. But I know this: It took pretty much all the strength I had not to spend all day with him yesterday, not to text him ten thousand times. But I did it. Because I have this feeling that if he can focus on me, take his eye off the game, he might just break his losing streak in Denver. At Denver. So I managed to play hard-to-get for an entire day. But every girl has her limit. And the Mile High Club is mine.

  I know it’s reckless, I know it’s risky, but I need him. I want him. Right now.

  Nervously, I bounce my feet on the floor of the bathroom and listen. There is some noise out there, an attendant beating the living hell out of a block of ice, it sounds like. But then I hear them. His footsteps.

  I once saw a documentary about the millions of monarch butterflies in Mexico landing on trees and turning green into orange and gold and black. That’s how I feel. My hands are cold, my face is warm, and my entire body is fluttering with a million rare Falconi butterflies.

  Jimmy says something to the flight attendant, that woman Cindi, with the super thick makeup and the too-bright lipstick. She asks, “Need some more peanuts, Jimmy?”

  Oh that woman. I have to say I might have let Brenner hang around a little longer than was necessary just so he’d feel what it’s like too. I think it worked. I could feel him whack the back of my chair with his knee.

  But the truth is simple. It’s him and me. And nobody else matters. It’s me he’s coming to see. In this bathroom. On the Chartered Bears 767.

  I don’t know what my life has become, but I like it.

  And then there he is, opening the door and squeezing in, sideways, because he’s so big. I don’t say anything as I scoot up against the side of the tiny stall to let him in. His eyes meet mine in the metal mirror first, and then he locks the door.

  “Hi,” I whisper.

  He doesn’t answer at first, just takes my face in his hands and flattens me with a heavy, serious, dominating kiss. “Fuck. Hello.”

  “We need to be quick,” I say into his ear.

  “Part of me just wants to kiss you and kiss you and kiss you until the seatbelt sign comes back on.”

  It’s so sweet, so kind, and so very honest, that it kind of knocks the wind out of me. “That would be okay with me.”

  He clicks his tongue. “But that’s not what we’re going to do.”

  My swallow gets stuck in my throat, and all I can do is hang on to him.

  Gently, he bends me forward so I’m watching him in the mirror. I see him glance at the lock to make sure it’s on OCCUPIED.

  He peels down my leggings and my thong. He keeps that hand on my bare hips while he undoes his belt, button, and fly with the other. He pulls his pants down just far enough to let his cock come free. He’s already rock hard. He mouths, “Ready?”

  I nod back at him.

  With that strong, slow power, he pushes into me. A groan comes out of my mouth and immediately he claps his hand to my lips.

  “Quiet, okay?”

  Holy mother of God, it feels so good. My knees start to buckle and he tightens his grip. But I do manage to nod, pressing my lips into his palm.

  “Can you come without a noise?” he says into my ear.

  I nod again into his palm, gripping the edge of the tissue dispenser with my fingers. He slows down just a little. I put a kiss to his fingers. Yes.

  He drives into me slowly at first, gently, but speeding up and getting more urgent as we go.

  I get up slightly on my tiptoes to give him a better angle, and now he’s the one to groan. Just a little.

  I scramble for purchase wherever I can find it, and hang on tight to the soap dispenser, the faucet, anything. I let my head fall to my chest, and let him fill me so completely, so utterly, that I feel it in my bones. I clasp my hand over his at my hip, and feel him dig his thumbs into the muscles of my ass. I glance up and see him looking down at me, head slightly cocked, smiling at the curve of my body.

  Then he loops one massive arm around my waist and pulls me deeper. I grab his other hand and put it back to my mouth. In the mirror, I see him shake his head at my ass and mouth Fuck.

  His fingers find their way to my clit, and my knees buckle all the way. But he’s got me, and he keeps on going. And going.

  I come hard and fast, totally overtaken by the passion that is just his, and I whimper into his palm, being as silent as I ever have in my entire life.

  As soon as I’m able, I glance over my shoulder at him.

  But he is biting back an orgasm already, his eyes tightly shut and his neck curved slightly down. I know that face. I love that face. He’s so close. So very close.

  The Fasten Seatbelt light comes on and a ding fills the bathroom. But he doesn’t notice at all, because he’s gone too.

  37

  Jimmy

  Mary leaves the bathroom first, and then I give it a few minutes and follow her. Half the guys are unconscious, and the other half are watching things on their iPads.

  In her seat, I find her snuggled down with an iPad herself. I have no idea at all what is on the screen: a girl with a shaved head and a nosebleed. Mary looks up at me and smiles. This secret, lovely smile that’s just mine. All mine. Only mine.

  I sit down and take my tablet from my bag. Through the crack between the seats, I see a kid in a trucker’s hat doing something with Dungeons and Dragons. And then I squint, there’s some kind of a monster coming through a Plexiglas wall.

  “What on earth is that?” I press my eye to the crack between the seats. Mary’s face appears. She pulls her earbuds out. “Stranger Things. It’s so good,” she says, beaming. That pure, honest joy. So fucking contagious.

  Normally, I’d spend the entire flight watching highlight reels of Denver’s defensive line. That’s what I should be doing. But this woman, she makes me want to do everything differently than I’ve done before.

  What I really want to do is unbuckle my seatbelt, slip in next to her in row 14, and put my arm around her while we Netflix and chill together. But sometimes, you’ve got to wait for what you want.

  So I have to settle. I open up Gogo wireless, which is on this plane for promotional purposes and calls itself The Official Internet Service of the NFL. We all kind of rolled our eyes at first. Everything in this business is the official whatever of whatever, but Gogo is totally shit.

  I open it up, and then open Netflix. I open up Stranger Things and look at the thumbnail image. For about .5 seconds, I think, Is that Winona Rider? I need to be working. This is nuts. Because I’ve got plays to plan, a defense to sort out, and an offensive line that’s a few yards short of a first down in the IQ department. Good guys, but not the smartest.

  But then, in front of me, I hear Mary give a little terrified squeak. I lean out into the aisle and see her with her arms wrapped around her legs, beaming and watching, as happy as anybody I’ve ever seen. She’s got one hand over her mouth, and her chin on her knee. Completely oblivious to me and the world.

  So I hit play.

  I’m pretty skeptical of most sci-fi shit. They never quite get it right. And yeah, she might like it, and I might like her, but she’s also never even seen Star Wars, so I don’t know if I can trust her judgment on this.

  But dude.

  It’s totally.

  Fucking.

  Awesome.

  By two minutes in, I’m tapping her on the shoulder. She turns around to face me through the gap, and I show her my tablet. “That kid with the teeth?” I tell her. “My hero.”

  “Oh my God!” she says, beaming. “It’s so good, right?”

  I look at her and to her hand gripping the side of her seat. That hand I held, that body I adore. That face that makes me weak. “Damn near fucking perfect.”

  I lose her
for a second when we get to the hotel, which is a cookie-cutter Doubletree in a town called Aurora. It’s situated across from an OfficeMax, a Barnes & Noble, and a Panera. American as apple pie.

  It’s also cheap, and impossibly far from all the interesting shit in Denver that could get us in serious front-page trouble. Bars, clubs. Or the kind of trouble that could find us. Girls. Groupies. Fanatical Broncos fans with silly string.

  Across the painfully ordinary lobby, I see that long, pretty braid and that sexy-ass body. She’s standing next to Valdez, so I take advantage of the fact that, at least until tomorrow, I’m still both the starting quarterback and the team captain. I hustle to the front of the line and take my place on the other side of him.

  The Guatemalan palm reader is strong in him today, and he looks from me to her and then back again. Then he looks straight ahead at this weird modern painting behind the check-in desk, and smiles. A spot opens up, and she says, “Go ahead, Bear.”

  “After you, señorita.” Valdez waves a massive hand out into the air. She laughs a little and shuffles forward with her rolling suitcase behind her. He leans over and says, “I told you, brother…”

  “Shhh,” I hiss, holding up a finger and listening past the noise.

  The manager is making small talk with her about the weather, this and that, and then hands over her keycard and says the magic words, “Room 435, Miss Monahan. Enjoy your stay.”

  I turn to Valdez, smiling. “Say what?”

  “I was saying, a good woman, she can change everything…”

  Mary walks away, glancing over her shoulder at me in a way that lights up my entire fucking body from head to toe, in a way that makes me feel like I could do anything, everything. “Yeah, man. I think you might be exactly fucking right.”

  Then I step forward. I intentionally choose the girl on the right because I’m going to have to flirt a little for what I want. She says, “Hello,” and gives me a very slow blink.

  “Hey…” I lean in. “…Amanda.”

  “Hello!”

  “So you know, football players, we’re pretty superstitious.” I take a pen and turn it over and over in my fingers.

  “Yes! I’ve heard! I had one of your friends ask for a dozen green bananas to be brought to his door at nine o’clock tonight.”

  That would be my tight end, Jorgensen. The man believes in bananas. Who am I to judge?

  “Right. My lucky number happens to be 437.”

  Total lie. I don’t fucking believe in luck. I believe in hard work, athletic tape, and grease paint. But I can be superstitious for a minute. Sure.

  She blinks again and looks at me a little blankly. She can’t be seventeen, if she’s a day.

  “My lucky number is ten!” she says.

  “Ten is good. But 437, it’s never failed me. And if you could book me into that room, you’d make me the luckiest man on the planet.”

  38

  Mary

  As I put my suitcase on the rack in the closet, I hear a knocking. I check the door to the hallway, but there’s nobody there, so I latch it and lock it. I unzip my suitcase and take out my clothes. We are only here for two nights, but I have never liked living out of a suitcase, no matter for how long. I put my pants and shirt into a drawer next to a 2007 phone book and slide it shut.

  But there’s that knocking again.

  And now a note comes in from under the door that links my room to the next one. My heart starts pounding, leaping from my chest with as much delight as I remember from the moments when my high school boyfriend would come to pick me up for a date. That sudden, cool, startling excitement.

  The note says: “It’s me. Open up.”

  I undo the deadbolt and pull it open. And then there he is, leaning up against the doorframe and smiling.

  “How did you do this?” I whisper. “Who did you bribe?”

  He puts one finger to his lips and shakes his head. Then he leans in and whispers into my ear, “Nobody can know. Okay?”

  I nod.

  “Because this is mega against the rules.”

  I nod again.

  “But I couldn’t stay away from you. And no fucking way was I ending up on a different floor.”

  He takes me in his arms and walks me backward, laying me out on the bed. It’s a big king with crisp white sheets, much fancier than I’d have expected for a place like this. It smells like bleach and detergent, but through it all, I can smell him. That deep, warm smell that is his and his alone. He tells me, “I’m sorry it was so rushed on the plane. I fucking hated that.”

  “Me too.”

  “I’m so fucking glad you’re here.”

  He kisses me slowly and carefully, pinning my jaw with his hand. “Do you have plans tonight?” he asks, barely letting any air out of his mouth at all.

  “No,” I tell him, smiling. “Do you?”

  With his tongue, he explores my neck, my collarbone, the place he marked me. “Normally, I go over plays. Sometimes I stay up half the night watching highlight reels. But not tonight.”

  “That’s exactly what I wanted to hear,” I say. “I want to take all your attention.”

  He laughs a little. “Going to make me take my eyes off the prize?”

  Just the opposite, actually. Just a little misdirection to keep him loose, to change it up. To get rid of those old patterns that were making things so unnecessarily hard for him. No way am I letting him work all night.

  “We need to take it easy,” I tell him. “You need to go slow. I don’t want you aggravating this.” I reach down between his legs. His balls are huge and heavy, and I give them a little tug. Immediately, he groans into my shoulder, pressing his lips to my sweater. “Got it?”

  He nods and then lifts his head. “Yeah.”

  “Because I am officially employed by the Bears, Jimmy Falconi. You are my only patient. I take this very seriously.”

  “Want to get in the bath with me?”

  I glance out the window at the Barnes & Noble across the street. The thing is, every time Jimmy gets inside me, he acts like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do. Urgent, furious, aggressive.

  But tonight, we need to do it differently. I want him off his game a little. I want it to be anything but ordinary. Anything but expected.

  “You can’t leave the building, can you?” I ask into his ear.

  “Fucking lockdown. Prisoners of Doubletree.”

  “What about me?”

  He gets up on his elbows and kisses up the line of my jaw. “You can leave, I’m sure. But I don’t want you to.”

  I glance at the bookstore again. “Give me twenty minutes. I’ll come to your room.”

  “What are you up to?” he asks. “And why am I not inside you yet?”

  Good Lord.

  But I don’t answer. Instead, I pull him to me for another kiss. I feel him hard against me, but I like being in charge. Making him wait. Making him groan.

  And groan he does, into my mouth, while gripping my body tightly in his hands.

  Against the instinctive force of every fiber inside me, I manage to push away from him and slip from his grasp. “I’m going to go get something. I’ll be right back.”

  “I’ll be here,” he whispers, and then stretches out that sexy body, crossing one foot over the other over the edge of the bed. He fluffs up the pillow and tucks it behind his head, and then softly—so softly—he says, “Waiting. Ordering room service. Hoarding bubble bath from the maids.”

  I grab my purse and lean down to kiss him. I head out the door and trot down the hallway. Radovic is only a few rooms down from us. This is going to be tricky.

  And such a thrill.

  With my hip, I open up the door into the steps and jog down four floors to the side exit, which opens out onto the huge, mostly empty, parking lot.

  To Barnes & Noble I go. Because we need resources. We need a guide. We need to go slow.

  I know just enough about it to know I need to know a whole lot more, and the internet isn’t
going to cut it. It’s time to go old school. It’s time to go way back.

  It’s time for tantra.

  39

  Jimmy

  I put the DO NOT DISTURB sign on my door but leave it off hers—too obvious, way too obvious. I glance out the window, but don’t see her anywhere. So I make the best of the gap in the action and call room service.

  I order two burgers, which isn’t unusual for me. Nobody in a kitchen would think twice about a professional quarterback eating for two. I can’t order champagne, which blows, but I can order a fruit bowl.

  “Heavy on the strawberries,” I tell the lady on the other end of the line. “The more the better.”

  And then I wait. And wait. But still no Mary. The knock at my door is official-sounding, and I know it’s room service even before the guy on the other side of the door bellows, “Room service!”

  I let him in. He sets everything up on the desk. I tip him five and sign the bill.

  “Good luck tomorrow,” he says, under his breath.

  “What, you’re a fan? In Broncos country?”

  He beams. “Grew up in Naperville.” He glances around and then does a few select moves from the Super Bowl Shuffle. “I’ll be rooting for you guys!” He gives me a two-handed handshake, followed by the old bro-move: The Shoulder Grip. From his pocket, he pulls out a little diary and flips it open to a blank page, handing me a pen. “Would you mind?”

  I scrawl my name across the page, and he smiles, hiding it back in his jacket. “Go Bears!”

  I dig it. It seems like a good sign, being in enemy territory and signing autographs for fans. As Valdez’s mom would say, Bodes well for the future.

  After the room service kid leaves, I look under the warming covers and start to salivate immediately. So I glance out the window again.

  Still nothing.

  Back to the burger, mine anyway. They’re pretty sad-looking because they’re special order for pre-game nutrition—only half a bun and roasted potatoes instead of fries. Everything gets switched around when a team comes to a hotel, I’ve learned. They empty all the mini bars and don’t even give us access to porn. But I don’t really care about that. Never particularly have, and now I most definitely don’t. Because I’ve got my own entertainment right next door.