by Tijan
And Angie. She started crying because the soda wouldn’t stop running over the sidewalk.
“Oh dear.” Georgia laughed, realizing what her daughter had been crying about. She scooped her up, and her husband helped to clean Angie’s fingers.
And Jared, he was just staring at me. “It’s good to see you.”
Damn.
Oh, yeah. My throat was so clogging up again. “You, too.”
Jared ducked his head.
“I have to pee!” Angie announced to everyone. A few people going past heard and snickered. One teenager wrinkled her nose. “Ew.”
“Hey, that’s my sister.”
Yeah. That didn’t come from Apollo. The girl stopped, taking Jared in, and I could see the crush already starting. And I could see why Angie was smitten. Jared was all angry and smoldering and he was cute.
He was going to be a heartbreaker.
The girl said, “Sorry.”
When she kept going, Angie snorted. “That was a fake apology. She didn’t mean it.” She raised her voice, “You don’t mean it!”
“Oh, dear God.” From Georgia.
Apollo was laughing. “I have to pee, too. Can we, you know, move it along here?”
On that note, I stepped forward and knocked on the door. A security guy opened it. He verified who we were, then showed us inside. A quick trip to the bathrooms, then we were taken to our seats.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Watching Stone run out for their game, I’d forgotten what it was like to see the game in person.
It was pandemonium. It’d been like that back home and it was ten times louder now, but damn. In his uniform, those shoulder pads, his hips. Wow. There were emotions going on inside of me, but I was really only remembering how he felt above me and inside of me last night.
Lots of emotions firing inside of me.
My lips were dry. I knew my eyes were hungry, because damn. Stone was hot. His picture flashed on the jumbotron and his eyes were smoldering, that square jaw firm, a slight scowl on his face, but with his short hair, yes, just fucking hot.
Jared didn’t talk much to me after our initial meet-up. He laughed with Apollo. They were either on their phones or pointing to the field. Right before kick-off, he and Apollo went with Bud to the concessions. Georgia moved down and took Jared’s seat beside me.
I had a feeling she was going to stay the whole time.
Angie came running next to her, launching herself into her mom’s lap.
“Oomph.” Georgia laughed, untangling some of Angie’s curls. “I was hoping to talk a bit. What are you doing after the game?”
I frowned at her. “What do you mean?”
“Stone offered to meet us on the field if we wanted pictures. We have to head to the hotel and get to bed right away since we fly out so early. So instead of going somewhere after the game, we were just going to go on the field to see him, but I wanted to talk about Jared and his future.”
My stomach took a nosedive. “About?”
“The adoption. I wanted to make sure you were still okay with us doing that.” She seemed to be hesitating before blurting out, “I know Jared’s been wishy-washy, and I think that’s normal with what you’re both going through.”
I didn’t respond. I didn’t know where she was going with this.
She added, tucking more of Angie’s curls behind her ears, “Gail and I talked maybe a year ago. I know they didn’t specify in their will where they wanted Jared to go, but she and I talked. She said she’d be happy if we brought Jared into our family.”
She was biting her lip, and understanding dawned then.
She felt guilty.
I laid a hand on her arm, and felt her own slightly trembling. “I’m okay with this. Jared, he and I barely know each other. His mom called me a bunch of times. My dad raised him the last few years. The two of us need to get to know each other, but as long as he’s happy with you guys, then I’m happy. You guys have a family already. You’re established. You have careers. And I know you’re amazing parents. It’s obvious.”
More tears slid down her face. Her mouth was shaking and she pressed her lips together. “You mean that?”
“I do.” And I did.
She stopped, looking and watching Stone for a moment. “You and he, are you guys…?”
Oh, boy. I didn’t want to lie, but I didn’t want to tell her what we were doing.
She added, “No talks about marriage or…?”
Oh! It was all lining up, how she kept talking to me, making sure I was okay with them adopting Jared, and now coming here, asking about marriage.
I sat up straighter and spoke clearly, “I don’t know what I’m doing. My focus is getting through one day at a time right now. If you’re worried that I might marry Stone and decide I want Jared,” she sucked in a breath. I kept on, “I can reassure you that that won’t happen. Jared needs a functioning and stable family. I am not that at all right now.”
“Oh, honey.” Her hand came to my arm.
“You don’t have to worry that I’m going to change my mind and fight you for Jared. I wouldn’t do that unless I truly believed he’d be better off with me than with you guys, and I don’t think that’s the case. I’d be hurting him if I made him be with me.”
She held still.
The crowd was deafening around us. Hip-hop music was blaring over the speakers. Cheerleaders were dancing. Mascots were walking around, waving to the crowd. The players were finishing their warm-ups, but all that melted away.
Georgia saw me. I saw her.
She was grieving losing Gail, and she was a mother yearning to love another son. And me, she saw me, too. I don’t know what she saw, but she did, and a look melted over her face. “Oh, baby.” She reached for me, pulling me in. Angie squeaked, but she was in the middle of the hug, and after stiffening, she laughed. Twisting around, her little arms wrapped around me, too. She could only get one of my arms, but she buried her head into me.
I laughed. Georgia chuckled. Angie was laughing, then said, “Your hair is tickling my face.”
Georgia released me, sitting back, and I could see how relieved she was. She rubbed a hand up and down my arm. “We’re here for you, also. I want to make sure you know that. I am fully ready and prepared to step in and be another mom if you’d let me. And that’s only if you want that.”
I let out a ragged breath, one that I hadn’t known I’d been holding. The mom offer was nice to hear, but I was fighting dealing with my own feelings of how good of an older sister I was being. And since Jared wasn’t there, I asked, “How’s he doing? For real?”
“He’s—”
“He’s here!”
Georgia and I both froze, but it wasn’t Jared saying that.
Angie shoved up on her mom’s lap, pointing and waving. She added, yelling, “Jared! Apollo!”
They were higher up, coming down the stairs. Their hands were full of soda and popcorn. I spied a few hot dogs. Pizza. No, two pizzas.
As soon as they got to our chairs, Angie pointed at us. “They were talking about you.”
Jared froze, a slice of pizza halfway to his mouth. “Huh?”
Georgia stood up. “Oh, it’s fine. Your sister was asking how you’re doing. That’s all.” She reached over, taking some of the food and drinks from him before moving back to their seats. “Come on, Ang. Let’s sit over here again.”
Apollo came in.
Jared waited, looking up the stairs.
Apollo’s dad came next, stepping just past me, and then his son. “Thanks for moving, bud.”
“No problem, Dad.” Apollo popped the rest of his slice in his mouth.
Jared stepped around me since I was on the end, sinking down next to me.
The players were lining up, readying for the anthem to be sung, and Jared waited for all of that. Once the song was done, the fans were going nuts as the captains were running out on the field, Jared looked at me. “You want to know how I am, you ask me.”
&
nbsp; “It wasn’t like that. Georgia was worried that I might try to take you away from them.”
“Why would you?” he bit out, shoving half of a hot dog in his mouth. Two bites and it was gone. “I’m seventeen. Not even a full year and I’m an adult. Who’d want to fight for me?”
He started to turn away as the teams were lining up. The Belves were kicking off against the Kings. Stone was out there, he was primed to catch that ball, but I stopped Jared from totally turning away.
“What are you talking about? I thought you wanted to be with the Montroses?”
He was glaring at the field, his jaw tightening. “Yeah. I mean, yeah.” His tone was so biting. I heard the anger there and I knew what Georgia would’ve said to me. “You’re all I have now. I mean, we had to come down here for a game to even see you.”
My heart broke. It shattered. There were a million pieces on the ground by our feet.
I didn’t say a word. I grabbed him, pulling him to me, and I wrapped my arms around him. There was a hot dog squished between us. I was hoping there also wasn’t a drink. I knew there was a bag of chips somewhere, probably his pockets. I heard the squish.
I just hugged him harder.
“I made a decision two days ago that as soon as I could medically travel, I was coming to you.”
He stiffened, asking in my other ear, “Really?”
I just hugged him tighter. This boy. He was mine. He was Gail’s. Gail had been mine. She’d been my dad’s. We were family.
“Really,” I choked out. “Only reason I didn’t was because Stone said you guys were coming here. Today’s the first day I could’ve come with the concussion.”
“Oh.” His head bent down, almost shyly. “And I do want to stay with them. I’m sorry I said that.”
Okay.
Yeah.
He was confused. So was I. He wanted me, but he wanted them. He was still a kid. Everything is overwhelming when you are seventeen. But I could do this. He could do this.
I framed his face, my forehead falling to rest on his. “You and me.” I made sure his eyes were looking in mine, even as I had to pull him down since he was so much freaking taller. “We’ll figure it out, but I got you. You got me.”
He hesitated, then nodded with me. “Okay. Yeah.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Another hug. This one I had taken Georgia’s role and I just wanted to hug him for the rest of his life. I wanted to shield him from everything, take care of him, protect him, love him, guide him, challenge him, but most of all, I just wanted him to be okay. That was job number one.
He pulled back, flicking his hand up at his eyes, his head turned away. He flicked his hand a couple more times before the crowd sat and we went with them. He nodded toward the field. “You and Reeves. He good to you?”
I was having another ‘oh, boy’ moment, but it was more like an ‘oh, shit.’ And a laugh pulled from me, hitching up a note. I patted his knee. “He and I… Yeah. We’re… Yeah.” I noticed the best distraction ever. “Look! They already scored!”
Apollo shot over Jared. “Your boy got the ball and ran it all the way in. One fucking play and touchdown!” He tipped his head back. “YEAH, REEEEEEVES!”
A collective cheer went up around us, but Jared was grinning and laughing with Apollo a second later, and for a moment, just that one moment, all seemed right in the world.
I vowed to have more of those moments with him.
Chapter Thirty
We had three minutes to score.
Kings were down seventeen to twenty-one. Belves scored three touchdowns with the extra point scored for each, and Kings only had two with a field goal. They had possession, but were only at the fifty-yard line. It’d been mostly a running game. We needed something extra.
“We won’t get down there if they don’t throw the fucking ball!” Jared had been saying the same gripe for the last period. His hands were permanently attached to the top of his head. He kept looking from the game to the scoreboard and back again.
As for me, my heart was permanently stuck in my throat.
Stone kept getting tackled. Over and over again.
A few weeks ago, I would’ve cheered. Now I wanted to tackle those guys who kept taking him down.
It was our possession.
The ball was snapped back. Colby looked like he was going to hand it off. Their halfback was going past him, and it was a fake! A fake. Cortez, their halfback, tucked it in, but he didn’t. He didn’t at all. Wait. Where was Stone?
He was breaking through, running down the middle.
NO ONE WAS ON HIM!
He was running, head down.
I jerked my gaze back to Colby. He was looking.
The defensive line was going after Cortez.
It all happened in a split second.
They realized he didn’t have the ball. They were looking… Colby’s hand went back. He launched the ball.
It was a beautiful spiral and everyone was on their feet. I mean, we were already on our feet, but if we could all jump to our feet again, we were doing it.
The ball was soaring, going, going, going, then going down. And…
Finding his target!
Stone looked back, NO ONE WAS ON HIM. He jumped up, caught the ball, a perfect cradle to his chest, and he was back down and sprinting.
Wait.
A Belves player was zeroing in on him. Their safety saw the play and was coming in fast and hard.
I was screaming. Everyone was screaming.
Twenty.
Fifteen.
Ten.
The safety was right there, angling right at Stone.
He had his arms open. He was readying to tackle Stone, but Stone stopped, pivoted, rotated his hips, and he dove in just behind the safety.
TOUCHDOWN!
I was going nuts.
Everyone was going nuts.
Kings won. There was no time. God. Was there time?
Yes. They had time. Just over two minutes. Anything could happen.
They were lining up. The kick went in. Kings were up now twenty-four to twenty-one.
Jared was groaning, bending over. His hands still attached to his head. I did glance once to make sure he wasn’t pulling his hair out without realizing it, but no. His hair was still there. He was saying now, “If they get close enough for a field goal, we’re fucked.”
We wouldn’t be fucked. We’d just go into overtime.
I patted his back. “We’ll be okay. It’ll all work out.” Truth be told, I was as close to vomiting as he was.
They had to hold them, and spotting Jake running out, I was back to screaming.
They lined up. There was the snap, and they pushed it forward, only getting an inch. They repeated this each time, getting a first down, but they were running out of time. They needed to do something. Kings defense was holding them for the most part.
“They’re going to throw. They have to throw.” Jared now had his ballcap in his mouth. He was chewing on the back strap. “They can’t throw.” His hand suddenly grabbed my arm and he held tight. “Bolston’s been shut down most of the game.”
He stopped talking.
The Belves’ quarterback dropped back.
Bolston shotput forward, running right up the side. He looked alone… I was scanning the field. He was alone. No. He wasn’t. Sprinting to catch up was Bilson.
I tracked back to the quarterback, the ball was already in the air.
Bad déjà vu was filling my mouth full of bile.
No, no, no. Miss. Or interception. Either of the two.
Then it was going down. Just like Stone had done, Bolston turned, read the ball, and reached for it. It connected…bam! Jake slammed into him. The ball bounced off his hand, then fell to the turf.
The clock was winding down, and as it was nearing the end, Jared heaved a huge sigh of relief. They did a snap, but it was done. The clock ran out. The game was over.
The Kings had won.
Yeah, but, “Don’t curse.”
He only grinned at me.
“WE GET TO GO DOWN TO THE FIELD!” Apollo launched himself onto Jared’s back.
Laughing, Jared caught him and they were bouncing up and down. Apollo’s fist was in the air.
A staff person came over, showing us to the field.
I felt the attention from people around us. They were assessing who I was, and recognition flared in one person’s eyes. He nudged his friend, but I was moving to the aisle. The back of my neck was already hot, and it was only getting hotter.
We were going down there to see Stone.
Cameras were down there. Journalists were down there.
He wanted to give Jared some attention, but there’d be some on me, too. Jared. I saw how excited he was as he moved past me with Apollo. Angie was half asleep, her dad was holding her. Georgia’s eyes were dilated from the excitement, too, and she gave me an impulsive hug before following the rest.
My heart fell out of my chest for my brother, and I was just following behind it, trying to catch it back up, but it was now Jared’s. Totally.
We were taken to the field. It was how I knew it’d be. Chaos.
Interviews were happening in almost every corner.
A large crowd had formed, and Stone was in the middle. A woman’s microphone in his face, the ESPN logo attached. He was nodding, talking, then he looked up, and seeing us, he began grinning.
“Hey!”
That wasn’t from Stone. I was turning.
“HOLY FUCK!” Jared couldn’t breathe.
It was Colby coming over with his helmet on his side. He nodded to me, smiling, and gestured to Jared beside me. “This the brother?”
Yeah.
I couldn’t talk.
I was starstruck again. Just like the kitchen, but on steroids.
“Hmmm-mmm.” That squeaked out of me.
Laughing, Colby held his hand out. “Met your sister yesterday. You’re Jared?”