I stared at the message for a long time. The comeback. Like that's what this week had been about—me getting my head right so I could return to football. Ruben didn't know about Dusty, about the cabin, about any of it.
To him, I'd just spent a week at an expensive resort getting fucked.
“Would you like to respond?” the car's automated voice asked.
I could tell him the truth, that I wasn't sure I wanted a comeback anymore. That the week had shown me what life could look like if I stopped chasing what everyone expected and started figuring out what I actually wanted.
But that was too big for a text message. Too complicated to explain while sitting in a rental car with my chest still aching from watching Dusty walk away.
“Yeah,” I said to the car. “Let's talk when I get home.”
Home. Should have been comforting, heading back. Instead, I had decisions looming: Surgery. Recovery. Pittsburgh or Alabama or ESPN. The future stretching ahead like an empty field with no clear path forward.
But all I could think about was a man teaching yoga to strangers while his dreams crumbled around him, too proud to accept help and too angry to ask for it.
My phone buzzed again. Ruben:Good. Come by the office tomorrow. Got updates from Pittsburgh and some other opportunities that came up. This could work out better than we thought.
Better than we thought. Right.
The mesquite and cedar blurred past my windows, all of it beautiful in its harsh, unforgiving way. Like Dusty—strong and stubborn and refusing to bend.
One week. That's not enough to build a life on.
Maybe he was right. Maybe I was kidding myself thinking seven days could matter enough to change everything. Maybe this was just what it looked like when you tried to build something real with someone whose life didn't line up with yours.
Or maybe I'd just fucked it up by treating his crisis like a transaction instead of understanding what it actually meant to him.
My shoulder throbbed, a reminder that I had my own shit to deal with. Surgery Tuesday. Twenty percent chance of permanent nerve damage if I went with Istanbul, eighty percent chance of partial recovery with the standard procedure. Russian roulette with my future either way.
A week ago, that thought would have sent me spiraling into panic. Now it just felt like one more thing on a list of problems I had to solve.
Take care of yourself, Cord.
His last words to me, spoken without looking back. Distant and final, like he'd already moved on to whatever came next.
I wondered if he'd remember to take care of himself. If he'd let himself feel the weight of losing everything, or if he'd justpush through like he pushed through everything else, strong and stubborn and alone.
I tried to sleep on the flight home. But my mind stayed in Texas, in a yoga studio with floor-to-ceiling windows, watching a man with paint-stained fingers teach people how to breathe through their pain.
I wondered if he'd remember to breathe through his own.
Chapter Fifteen
Dusty
I folded the last yoga mat and stacked it with the others, moving through the familiar rhythm of closing down my studio for the day. Late October sun slanted through the windows, warming the bamboo floors. The space was quiet now, empty of the men who'd just finished my afternoon class.
Quiet except for my thoughts.
I had an hour before Lars Yonling arrived for his private session. The reminder on my phone had been taunting me all day.
I walked to the supply closet and straightened the rolled towels there, trying not to look at the portfolio sitting open on the bench near the windows. Sketches of Cord visible on top. I'd been looking through them this morning before class, unable to stop myself. Forgot to put them away when students started arriving. Should've hidden the evidence of how much those seven days had meant.
But I was tired of hiding things.
The studio felt different now. Smaller, maybe. Or I'd outgrown it without noticing when it happened. How many private sessions had I conducted here over seven years? How many times had I dimmed these lights, set out these mats, prepared my body and mind for intimate work with me who booked time with me specifically?
The last time had been too close. Cord walking in for what was supposed to be a simple session. The way everything had shifted the moment our eyes met.
