It was a hard fought game, but playing in the rain has always been my favorite. It makes football just a little bit tougher, running routes a little bit harder, the strain of your muscles just a little bit more painful.
Victory and exhaustion mix in my veins, and the team bus is a group of rowdy twenty-somethings sneaking shots behind the coaches back while getting ready to go wild once we roll back into campus. Saturday night and the parties and bars will be in full swing, just waiting for their kings to complete the chaos.
And while part of me wants to be bowed to, I also just want to go to bed. I scored three touchdowns tonight, practically carried the team on my back. My bones hurt, my feet are sore, and my head feels so heavy that I may just shut my eyes and fall asleep right here. I take another swig of whiskey from the flask being passed around, not that it will help my exhaustion.
No, I could go for a mighty fine blow job right now and then pass out.
Unlocking my cell phone, I pull up Demi’s number and text her. We’ve been fucking for a few months now, and I know she’s readily available any time I call.
I can see the hope in her eyes each time we finish, but I never broach the subject. I’m too busy for a girlfriend, and while she’s a great lay, I’m not interested in more. My eyes are on the future, and a female will just tie me down.
It’s almost too easy when she texts back within seconds saying she’s free. Sometimes that’s a turn off for me, a fact that I know is shitty but it’s true all the same. Demi needs me way more than I need her … but she’s so damn hot in the sack that I can’t give it up.
“Are you going to see your fuck buddy?” Travis, my quarterback, takes the empty seat next to me.
“Shit, that girl wants to be a wife. You haven’t cut that off, yet?” Darrell, our massive outside lineman, rolls his eyes at me.
I give them both the finger. “Fuck you, guys. I’m not wifing anybody, and yeah, I’m going to get some pussy. Can’t help it you’re jealous that I’m getting consistent blow jobs from a fine-ass chick.”
Darrell chuckles. “I can’t argue that … I am a little jealous. The tits on your girl …”
He makes a sound like he’s trying to imagine what Demi looks like naked. Not so secretly, I like that they envy me … and that I’m the only guy she’ll take it off for. Outside of what she does with me, she’s the ultimate good girl … another fact that makes it hard to break things off. It gets me harder than a steel pipe knowing that Demi is a lady in the streets and a freak in the sheets.
I flex my hands, cracking my knuckles. “Soak it up, fellas, and just know that when I snap my fingers, she comes crawling.”
It was true. Twenty minutes later, I was sitting in my room in the house some of my teammates and I rented just off campus, when Demi came walking in. I’d texted, and she’d driven over at two in the morning. I didn’t even have to make the effort to show up somewhere else to get my dick sucked.
“Hey, you.” Demi was always shy when we first greeted each other, like she knew she should be ashamed for giving it up so easily but also not caring.
For one fleeting second, I felt bad for making her get out of bed in the chillier temperatures of fall in North Carolina. She is constantly driving over here in the middle of the night, alone, to my shitty room in my shitty house. I don’t even have proper sheets, the king size threads too big on the queen frame. Most of the time, I make some excuse about why she can’t stay over. And yet, here she is. I’m the lowest kind of scum, but at least I’m not lying to her about what I am. She clearly sees that I don’t want to do anything remotely close to falling in love with her, and yet she continues to sleep with me.
I walked to her, my prick already half-cocked, my balls drawing up tight while the tingling sensation of arousal shot up my spine. “Hey, gorgeous.”
Once my hands were wrapped around her waist, pulling down the leggings she donned, she warmed up a bit. “Great game, Pax. It looked so nasty out there, you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine, but I could use a nurse if you want to tend to my wounds.” I wink at her, my dirty mind in full force.
I push those leggings down past her hips, loving the rough feel of the calluses on my palms against her velvet skin. Using my lips on the spot just below her ear, I feel her preen like a cat in heat, pushing her hips against mine.
“You guys are only two games away from the championship, how exciting is that?” Demi pushes back, looking me in the eyes.
She’s doing that thing again, the attempt to make a connection and talk. How come all girls want to talk? As if us guys are going to suddenly become one of their girlfriends and have a dish session. Demi tries to do this every so often. I think it’s because she thinks that I’ll suddenly become interested in something more with her than just sex.
Shutting her down, I cover her mouth with mine, plunging my tongue in deep, demonstrating the things I can do between her thighs. Sighing into my mouth, she gives way so easily, swayed by the skills I’m using as I nibble on her bottom lip.
Jutting my hips against her, Demi takes my not so subtle cue and reaches down into my sweatpants. Her small hand finds me, wrapping tight around the base and pumping just the way I like it. She makes sure to flick my head with her thumb on every upstroke, a little trick I taught her that makes my balls squeeze impossibly tighter and has me seeing sparks on the edge of my vision.
“That’s it, baby. Get on the bed, ass up,” I growl in her ear, needing to shove my cock between her velvety folds right now.
She does as she’s told, knowing it will make her feel incredible. That round ass smiles up at me as I roll a condom on. If I asked, I could probably convince Demi to let me raw dog it … but for now, I still wasn’t that much of an asshole. I was extremely close, though.
I don’t even take the time to finger her, or lick between those beautiful lips, because I’m horny and need to celebrate my victory tonight. Lining myself up to her, I groan when I sink in, her pussy gripping me tight.
This is how I like Demi best, beneath me, pliable, moaning. With every thrust, she pushes back on me. I wrap my fist in her hair and stroke how hard and how fast I want, never letting up. This is my situation to control, and it feels damn good to just be in this moment with no talking, just feeling.
I plow into her, not checking to see if she came, though by the sounds I’m pretty sure I’ve satisfied her. When my orgasm comes rocketing up from my balls, I still myself, feeling every blood vessel empty into the condom.
By the time I roll over, away from Demi, a glance at the clock reveals it’s around three thirty in the morning. I want to fall asleep, stretch out by myself in my own bed. But, it’s late, and I’m not that big of a dick that I’m going to send her out into the asscrack of dawn for a walk of shame.
“You can stay if you want.” My tone conveys that I don’t really want her to.
Those big brown eyes hold hope. “Are you sure?”
I turn on my side, looking back at her over my shoulder. “Yeah, it’s late. It’s cool.”
I make sure not to touch her the entire rest of the night. And when I wake up around ten a.m., she’s gone.
Seven
Demi
The noise is deafening.
Towels of maroon and gold are waved in circles around almost every fans head, the bump of some hit pop song mixing with the cheers and chants of the home team.
My mouth waters, the scent of sausage and peppers, popcorn, beer and peanuts drifting on the wind. Everywhere you look, some kind of excitement is taking place. Whether it’s the wide-eyed look of a child experiencing her first game, the mascot doing cartwheels down the sidelines, the coaches smacking their players on the shoulder pads, getting them pumped up.
Living in Charlotte for most of my adult life, the one thing I haven’t done at all is attend a Cheetahs game. I think, after obsessing over Paxton’s college career, football was one of the things I had to swear off when he left without so much as a goodbye the day he
entered the draft. Anytime we had a wish that required attendance at a game, I sent Farrah. She never asked questions, but I knew that she understood that there was some kind of history there. So, while I knew a bunch of the players, and was friendly with many from hospital visits or signing days or charity dinners, I’d never shown up at a game.
“Demi Rosen, on the field! I never thought I’d see the day. And in heels no less.” Greg Backus, the Cheetah’s running back, stood in front of me in full uniform and pads.
Greg had tried to ask me out at least a dozen times. Not that he wasn’t handsome, heck, I’m sure women in the Charlotte area would cut off their right hand to go out with him, but I stuck to my rule and always turned him down.
I peered down at my favorite Sam Edelman pumps. “A business woman always has to look the part. Plus, these heels are amazing.”
His eyes heat. “Well, they look it. Are you going to let me take you out yet?”
“Hi, Demi. Nice to see you, again.” At that exact moment, Paxton walks up.
It’s bad enough I have to see the jerk who stomped on my heart, but does he have to be so freaking gorgeous? Paxton looks like Thor, before the Thor movies even existed. With an earring. If you’ve never been with a guy with an earring, you’re missing the boat. It’s a surprisingly huge turn on.
“Paxton.” I nod my head.
“Hey, don’t give the new guy all the attention. Remember who was here first.” Greg winks at me before running down the sideline to get his ankle taped.
Paxton narrows his eyes at Greg’s retreating back, and I want to slap him. He has absolutely no claim over me, not anymore.
But clearly, he remembers what we were to each other. He’d made that known when he came into my office and tried to have a jovial conversation. I’m not interested in any of that, and I hope I got that message across. I’m gritting my teeth and bearing this until today is over and I never have to be in the same room as Paxton Shaw again.
“Miss Demi, look at my jersey!” Ryan runs over to me, his bald scalp covered by a Cheetahs hat, a jersey signed by all the players hanging down to his knees.
“That is too cool, you’re one lucky kid to get one of those. And to have so many players look up to you. I heard you scored a touchdown on Connor Ike before!”
Ryan and his family had gotten to spend most of this week’s practice days, and the warm-ups hours before today’s game, with the team. They’d included him in drills, throwing passes, film watching, and running through today’s play calls. I’d laid this all out with Harry, the public relations rep we usually dealt with.
“I did, and kicked the extra point! And now they gave me a headset. Pax is really awesome.” He’s missing one of his front teeth, and my God is he adorable.
We’re down on the sidelines, where we’ll stay for the entirety of the game. The staff gave him an official earpiece, so he can hear all of the plays as they’re being called.
And yes, Paxton had been really sweet with him. I’m not sure why I’m surprised, he’s clearly practiced at media training being in the league for so long. But I silently thanked him for being so good to Ryan. He hadn’t left his side since day one of meeting the little boy, and I knew that in the long run, Ryan would remember and cherish this wish for the rest of his life.
Bitterness and upset have a ball of emotion clogging my throat. The rest of his life. That may not be long. Fuck this fucking disease, and the fact that it took children so young.
“Buddy, watch for my first touchdown, I’m coming to give that ball right to you.” Pax ruffles Ryan’s hat.
“And now, your North Carolina Cheetahs!” The voice booming on the sound system drowns out my thoughts.
The crowd goes insane as the rest of the team runs out of the tunnel, and the players on the sideline wave to the crowd or jump up and down, getting pumped up.
Even when times were best between Paxton and me, a six month stretch during my junior year where we made a semi-go of being exclusive, he hadn’t invited me to attend a game as his girlfriend. One of my biggest dreams was to sit in the family section, next to the other girls wearing their boyfriend’s number, known by all the families as Pax’s girl.
But he never gave me that, and looking back now, my heart aches with sadness for the girl too insecure to dump his loser ass and get rid of the guy who treated me like shit. Because that was what he did, everyone saw it. My friends, Chelsea especially, would berate me for staying in any Saturday night the football team had a game, my eyes glued to the television watching Paxton score touchdowns.
So when, on the fourth drive of the game, Pax soars through the air into the end zone, my heart leaps. I don’t want it to, but old habits die hard.
He runs down the sideline to where Ryan is and thrusts the point-scoring ball into his hands before lifting him up on his shoulders. The video board in the stadium shows the two of them cheering, and the crowd goes wild for this little boy who, in this moment, can forget all about the illness plaguing him.
As soon as it’s socially acceptable to leave the game, I bolt. Another minute inside that stadium and all of the carefully constructed walls I’d used to steel myself against my past would come crumbling down.
Eight
Demi
“Tell me I did not just watch what I thought I did.”
Chelsea’s voice comes in over the Bluetooth in my car. “Hi, to you too, Chels.”
“Don’t bullshit me, Demi Rachel. You can’t stand next to the Axis of Evil and just think your best friend is not going to call you to see if you were scorched standing that close to Hades.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re being dramatic. I’m a professional, this was part of my job. I’m fine.”
The doubt rings in her tone. “I don’t buy it. It took you years to get over that asshole. I know, I was there. I had to talk you down multiple times.”
Memories of crying silently into my pillow plague me, but I push them to the back of my brain. “I’m fine, Chels, really. I’m a thirty-year-old woman with her own business, I’m mature enough to be able to see a former flame and live to tell about it.”
I wind my car through downtown, passing the skyscrapers and heading toward my condo in Davidson, a suburb just outside the city.
Silence follows for a few seconds before she speaks again. “Okay, I believe you. But I need details. How the hell did this happen?”
I sigh and tell her about Ryan, and his wish, and how hands-on Paxton has been. It was actually kind of sweet watching them together.
I scold myself for thinking fondly of him at the same time that Chelsea does. “So, he’s helping out a sick kid … still doesn’t make him a good person. In fact, I can still feel the rage boiling in my gut when I think about the prick.”
I have to laugh, because damn if she isn’t the best friend ever. We talk for the rest of my twenty-five-minute car ride, about her patients at the dentist office she works at as a hygienist. About my parents and hers, about the mouse she’s been trying to catch in her apartment. When we hang up, promising to text each other during Dancing with the Stars, I’m left with the sense of loneliness I usually have when I say goodbye to Chelsea.
She decided to move home after college, electing not to stay in Charlotte, the city we’d attended college in. Unlike me, she wanted to be close to home and her family in Connecticut. And not that I didn’t love my parents or where I grew up, but I felt the need to branch out. And if I’d gone back to Queens, I would have fallen into the same old rhythm.
As the bustle of the city melts away behind me, I can feel the tenseness in my shoulders unwind. I bought a condo in the cute neighborhood of Davidson about two years ago, wanting to plant some roots and get out of the city.
It was the best decision I ever made. It is my paradise, the two-floor white brick abode with an attached garage. I painted it in neutral tones, doing all of the fix ups myself for months and on the weekends. In the summer, I sit on my back patio and drink iced tea with my Kindle. In the w
inter, I light my wood-burning fireplace and snuggle up with a glass of wine.
And then of course, there is Maya.
My golden retriever runs to greet me as soon as I push open the door, not even allowing me to get the keys out of the lock before she’s twirling at my feet, wanting to go out.
“Hi, sweet pea!” I bend down, dropping my bag on the floor and kicking my heels off at the same time I nuzzle into her fur.
Maya is the only one I need to live with. She doesn’t nag me for getting my nails done twice a month, or keep the television turned to ESPN twenty-four seven, or need constant reassurance about the size of her ego.
No, she is perfectly happy to sit next to me on the couch, being petted and occasionally fed some human food. Maya occupied the other side of my queen size and delighted in walks in the park on weekend mornings. She was my child, my confidant, and the one I looked forward to coming home to.
“Who is the best girl in the world?” I cooed at her as I put her leash on to take her out.
Twilight is setting in, the world both going dark and lighting up simultaneously. I may be a hustler during the day, but nighttime has always been my favorite. A sense of mystery, the shadows allowing us to feel something that the daytime prohibits. The moon and its tapestry of stars; artwork put there for our perusal. The sense of relaxation that comes with the winding down of a day.
But the one thing I despise about the hours after seven p.m. is the loneliness. The stark feeling of being by myself sets in fast when the sun goes down.
Nine
Paxton
Being a professional athlete is both a blessing and curse.
On the blessing side, I get to go to a job I love passionately every single day. I also get paid a hell of a lot of money to do it. I’m damn good, and being a football player fulfills my fiercely competitive nature.
When Stars Burn Out Page 3