I thought about it, and out of nowhere, something came to me. I moved my fingers over the keyboard and then showed it to the room. "How's this?"
They passed the phone around, starting with Winnie, and I thanked fuck I had my messages set to show the notification without the message. I didn't need something popping up on there while any of them had their hands on it. Especially because, when you were friends with someone like Thatcher Kelly, you never knew what was going to show up at any given moment.
Winnie's eyes grew moist, just barely-but enough that I noticed-and I knew no matter what any of the other fucks said, I was posting it.
"It's perfect," Quinn thankfully agreed.
"He just needs a hashtag," Sean said as he passed the phone back to Rollins.
"A hashtag?" I asked. Fletcher smiled when he read the words on the screen and lifted his eyes to mine. There was noticeably more warmth within them-as though I'd finally proven myself as human.
"Usually something ironic, funny, and common-ground building," Quinn explained.
"You put this little thing-"
"The pound sign?" I asked.
Sean bit his lip and bugged out his eyes, muttering under his breath, "Hashtag: signs you're old."
I was pretty sure the little asshole was mocking me, but as he typed away in order to give me whatever the fuck the all-important hashtag was about, I realized I couldn't kill him until he was done.
Winnie, as though reading the murder in my eyes, stepped forward and took the phone from Sean to pass it to me herself. I looked down to read what he'd added.
@NYMavsTopGun: Season rush yards: 5468. Pass yards: 4367. Lessons from a six-year-old. #areyousmarterthana1stgrader #no
It looked good to me. "What do I do now?"
"Push tweet," Sean said with a roll of his eyes.
God, this was ridiculous. My thumb hovered for the barest of seconds before making contact with the screen.
"Okay, done."
"Congratulations," Winnie offered enthusiastically, and the guys laughed.
"Why does this feel like the beginning of the end?" I asked with a groan.
"Because it is," Quinn said with a wink.
Another fucking winker.
I shook my head.
Struggling to take my eyes off Winnie and her warmth, and completely done with the other bozos in the room, I forced myself to focus on the phone in my hands and use it for something other than tweeting and chirping and shit.
Me: Meet me in the storage room?
Winnie's phone pinged, and her cheeks got rosier the instant she read the message. The blush overwhelmed the peach of her skin even further when the guys noticed her reaction.
"What's up, Dr. Double U?" Quinn asked with a good-ol'-boy smirk and far more knowing eyes than Winnie or I would have liked.
"‘Who is it, Pooh?' asked Tigger," Sean Phillips teased. He was smart and had a good head on his shoulders-despite being related to Cassie.
In fact, all four of these young men were smart, and they'd pretty quickly become some of my favorite picks. Picks I'd make again, repeatedly, if fate saw fit to give me a Groundhog Day scenario.
Rollins and Fletcher were quieter. Reserved. Watchful.
But what they lacked in exuberance, they more than made up for with intelligence.
Win squatted down and reached for something from her supplies so she wouldn't have to meet any of our eyes.
I kept my phone up, my fingers typing, and my face neutral-what Thatch often referred to as my "natural state."
Me: Tell them to go fuck themselves. It's none of their business.
She read again, and the very corner of one end of her mouth curved up. I could actually feel her fighting the pull to meet my eyes. And it wouldn't be the players she'd be telling to go fuck themselves if and when she gave in.
I typed again.
Me: Tell them it's Coach Bennett. They're all late.
Her face after I said that was my favorite, the horror and realization of a prospective assumed affair between her and the head coach making that excuse a definite no.
I was seconds away from sending another suggestion when she killed my fun but put a whole other kind into motion.
"It's my babysitter," she announced to the room. That seemed to calm the inquisitive young minds around us. "I have to make a call."
As she approached the door, and me, her eyes finally, briefly, caught mine. They said soon I would pay.
I just hoped it was in all the ways I liked best.
Unfortunately for me, when I escaped the guys and followed her to our supersecret location-the storage room-there weren't actually pleasurable things waiting for me.
A lecture. But no pleasure.
Though, really, I had to admit, I really liked when Winnie shoved my shit right back at me. So maybe there was a little pleasure.
"You can't text me like that in front of people," she commanded, backing me into the door with a finger in my face, and I did my best not to smile. Smiling right now would lead to nothing but trouble. Not one goddamn good thing. And I was really trying to be on Santa's Nice List at the end of this exchange so I'd get the orgasm I'd spent so much time writing the letter asking for.
"What am I supposed to do?" I asked as innocently as I could manage. "Spell things out?"
"No!" She swatted at me. I watched her hand move and then looked back to her face and pretended to think about it.
"You're right. Not only would the guys know, but Lex would too. No way spelling will work. She knows more words than I do. So hand signals it is."
A startled laugh sounded surprisingly like a bark as it left her throat. Woof, woof, baby. "Hand signals? What?" She parted her lips and pinched her eyes slightly.
"We're going to need a highly coded but easily articulated set of hand gestures for communication. If technology is off-limits, this is the only other way."
"Are you sure we shouldn't just use carrier pigeons?" she asked sarcastically, and she gave me a little shove so that my back tapped the door.
"Of course," I deadpanned. "They're completely unreliable."
She relaxed her face, and just the hint of a smile curved her lips, but she didn't step back. Thank God.
"Plus," I added dramatically. I put one hand to her hip and pulled her even more tightly against me. "There's also the whole bird flu thing."
"Wes-"
I held up my free hand and showed her the inside of my fist. I held it like I was a fifth grader, determined and ready to master all the facets of a real kiss.
You know you did it too.
"What's that mean?" she asked with frustration, a grown woman stuck playing children's games thanks to an aggravating man, but it didn't last long.
I'd never liked the tell part of show-and-tell in class, and this was no different.
As my lips met hers, I didn't think there'd ever be any doubt what this hand signal meant-to either of us.
"Oh! Go, baby, go!" Georgia shouted across the field, clapping her hands and jumping up and down on her high-heeled boots like a giddy-chic teenage girl, as the rugby match started. Her eyes were on her husband, and she looked like today-and every day-she wanted to swallow him up whole. And by the tender yet fierce intensity of the return smile he gave her, it was safe to say, he only had eyes for his wife.
Georgia and Kline were quite literally beautiful together-she was his world, and she didn't know one existed outside of him.
I want that.
God, I want that so bad.
I wanted to be loved in a deep, all-consuming way. The kind of love that made you feel invincible and special and like the huge expanse of the world had somehow, some way found time for the tiny speck that was you-because the two of you together was that important. So important that it did things for people other than the two of you. Kline and Georgia and Thatch and Cassie had those kinds of relationships. They gave the people around them energy and hope.
And most of the time, when I wasn't having a pity party for one, that was a good thing-the best.
Wes could be that man for you, my heart told me. Sure he's headstrong and stubborn, but he respects you and …
Whoa. Whoa. Whoa.
Where had that even come from?
I glanced around the bleachers to see if anyone else had noticed my moment of temporary insanity, if I'd somehow mistakenly mumbled all the crazy things aloud. Because that's what it had to be, thinking a man like Wes-a man who didn't even acknowledge me as anything more than a fucking friend in mixed company-could possibly be the other half of my whole. Temporary insanity.
I looked to the field just as Wes ran by and shot one of the sexiest fucking smiles to which I had ever paid witness over his shoulder.
God.
It'd been aimed at the other guys on his team, but sweet Jesus, it slayed me all the same.
Shit. Could Wes be that guy? My guy?
He had been spending a lot of time with my daughter, teaching her football, occasionally taking her to practice, and going out of his way to do little things for her that only a child like Lexi would understand and cherish.