I'd done my part. Finished the game. Bucked the fuck up and buckled down to win it. Nothing less would satisfy any of my guys. The fact that Jake had been joking at halftime about a "Win one for the Gipper" speech, almost made me lose it a couple of times.
But I'd held it together. Kept my game face on after the game, through the post game interviews where reporters clamored to know how Jake was doing. I'd wanted to know too. It fucking killed me, not knowing, waiting to hear what the doctors had to say.
Was he paralyzed? Would he play again?
"You hear anything," I ask Charlie, as I stare at the floor.
"I don't know much. But they think he'll be okay."
My knees sag. "Okay?"
Charlie knows what I'm asking. "No spinal damage."
I let out a gust of air. "Okay. Okay." Standing straight, I face Charlie. And then I'm hugging him. He pounds my back, and I pound his, both of us breathing too hard. I let him go with a final squeeze then step back and rub my eyes.
"Coach wants to see you," Charlie says when we turn and head back toward the locker room.
///
"Now? Jesus."
I find Coach Calhoun waiting for me. "You hear about Ryder?" he asks without preamble.
"Charlie told me."
He nods, the relief in his eyes clear. "We need to talk about a few things. Got a minute?"
It's not really a question, just Calhoun's way of being polite, which is rare in and of itself.
"I was planning to go see Jake."
"He's under sedation."
"That's good. He needs the rest."
"Nobody but family is getting in to see him tonight."
"I'll get in."
His eyes narrow. "We've put guards to keep everyone out. You're not getting in."
Our stare stretches. It's a delicate thing, saying no to your coach. If you don't have a good reason for it, you're accused of not being a team player. Management does not find that amusing. Press gets wind that you're being uncooperative-and somehow they always find out- and suddenly there's talk of "problems" between the player and the coaching staff.
Politics suck. But there's also respect. I respect the hell out of my coach. Enough that I can wait a few minutes more to go see Jake.
My shoulders lower. "Your office?"
Appeased, he relaxes too. "Won't take too long."
I haven't taken a step when my phone rings. I reach to turn it off, but it's Chess's ringtone. Until now, I haven't let myself think of her; it's hard enough worrying about Jake. But the wall is crumbling. I need to hear her voice, to see her. Hell, I need her.
Calhoun shoots me a glance, as Cindy Lauper's Goonies song plays on. Gritting my teeth, I ignore the call. It feels fundamentally wrong to do it. But twenty minutes isn't going to kill either one of us. Twenty minutes, I promise myself.
We're almost at Coach's office when Chess calls again. Hell.
"You ever heard of turning that thing off, Mannus?"
He's one to talk. Gossip has it Calhoun brings his into the shower with him.
"Give me a second." I pull the phone from my pocket. "I'll tell them I'm in a meeting."
The second I answer, I know something is wrong. It isn't Chess's voice coming at me in a rush. It's James. "Thank fuck you finally answered."
"What's wrong? Why are you using Chess's phone?"
"Chess is hurt. She's in the hospital … "
Had I felt panic with Jake? That was nothing to this. Everything stops. Black spots dance before my eyes. I can't breathe. I can't fucking breathe.
This isn't fear. This is terror.
"Mannus? You there?"
"What hospital?" I manage.
James gives me the name and then takes an audible breath. "She's okay. Just … I think she'd want you here when she wakes up."
Wakes up? A weird sound comes out of me. I catch my breath. "I'm on my way."
My fingers feel numb as I hang up. In fact, my whole fucking face feels numb. "I have to go," I tell my coach, who stares at me as if I've lost it.
"Now? Who was that? One of Ryder's sisters?"
"No. My girl. She's … " Don't lose it. "She's in New York. I've got to go."
"You're going to New York?" His voice rises just a bit. "We have meetings tomorrow."
Already, I'm texting Charlie, telling him to book me the next flight out and fuck the expense. Any flight. Now.
"Mannus," Calhoun snaps. "You listening?"
I meet his gaze head on. "Yes, Coach. Meetings. I'll attend every single one of them. As soon as I get back from New York."
He stares at me, his mouth open.
I should feel bad. Worry, maybe. I don't. I was the number one draft pick of my year. And for the first time, I'm playing that card. "My girl is in the hospital. She is my family. And I'm going to be with her."
It's as if Coach is moving in slow motion but he finally nods. "Give Ms. Copper my best."
I don't answer; I'm already running down the hall, my whole fucking life waiting for me in New York.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chess
* * *
Hospitals are horrible. I woke up on one. I threw up and they scanned my brain for internal swelling or bleeding. That scared the shit out of me. Apparently, I have a concussion. Which means I spent the night being checked on in intervals that felt too short and were really annoying since it meant I couldn't sleep. I really wanted to sleep.
It's morning now. My head weighs a metric ton and dully throbs. But the nausea is gone, and I'm no longer dizzy. I've been allowed to shower and put on my street clothes. Yeah, a hospital shower with antiseptic smelling shampoo that turns hair into straw.
///
Lying on the bed to wait for James, I've been drifting on and off, sheer exhausting pulling at my lids. They're releasing me with instructions that James watch me.
The hollow feeling in my chest grows. I don't want James.
The door opens, another nurse coming to poke at me. But it isn't a nurse. Emotion punches through me, a fist to my aching chest, a sharp squeeze of my tender heart. Finn is here.
He looks about as good as I feel, eyes blood-shot, the skin bruised beneath them, his hair matted on one side and sticking up on the other. I soak in the sight of him like water on parched earth.
His blue gaze darts over me as if he doesn't know what to focus on first, that he can't yet take in the whole of me. Tension rides his body, making it visibly tremble. And then his eyes meet mine. He looks haunted, ripped apart.
I swallow with difficulty. "Hey."
When he speaks, his voice is a ghost of its former self. "Hey." He take a step into the room and closes the door behind him. "I got here as soon as I could. Flights were scarce."
He's here, that's all that matters to me. I should sit up, make myself appear strong and capable and all that. But, unless someone comes to wheel my ass out of here, I'm not moving until I have to.
"I think I was hit by a guy on a bike." Everything's kind of hazy but I remember two wheels and a handlebar.
The grooves around his mouth deepen. "You were."
He moves like an old man, making his way to my side. I watch him come, little tremors quaking in my belly. I want to hug him so badly my arms twitch. He sits in the chair by my bedside, his body too big for its stingy frame. Up close, he looks worse, careworn and exhausted. I empathize.
"Is the guy okay?" My memory is fairly shitty right now. Apparently, concussions can do that to a person.
"Couple of scrapes. Broken wrist." Finn's expression is blank, barely a flicker of movement. He glances down at my hand resting on the bed.
"How ironic. Mine just healed."
The corners of his mouth pinch. "Love that you can joke. Two times, I've had to hear you were in the hospital." Blue eyes pin me to the stop. "That's two times too many."
"It's not like I planned this."
He grunts.
"I'm not even a clumsy person. Both times they ran into me."
"Haven't you ever heard of looking both ways, Chester?" He actually glares.
"It was a one way street. Who thinks to look for rando bikers going the wrong way?"
"You do. From now on. Jesus." He wipes a hand over his mouth. "My heart can't take another call like that, okay?"
"Okay. I'm sorry." I am. Not for getting hit, but for putting that look of abject fear in his eyes.
Finn scowls. "Don't be sorry. How do you feel?"
Whatever they gave me, makes my body sluggish in the best of ways.
"Fuzzy." I blink down at my body. The inside of my elbow has a bandaid on it from where they put an IV in earlier. A saline drip that had provided cool relief and, later, some very exceptional painkillers. One thing to love about a hospital, I guess. "I can't remember what I look like. Give me a damage report."