“It’s the pads. Everybody looks thin in the pads.”
“Hm.” She never once believed me about the pads.
The conversation went another four or five minutes. Mom doesn’t end a call so much as let you off it, slowly, the way you ease a hook out of a fish you’ve decided to let go.
After the call ended, I turned back toward Rook. “Sorry, she’s on Christmas already. It’s October, and she’s—“ I waved a hand. “You know how she is. You don’t, actually, because you’ve never met her. That’s a whole—” I stopped.
Rook had plated the food while I was on the phone.
“You were saying something,” I said. Careful. “Before. You had to tell me something.”
And I watched him not be able to.
His jaw set the way it did when something mattered, and he kept his eyes on me. The words were right there, but the phone call had let the air out of the moment, and he couldn’t get it back.
“It can wait,” he said.
“Rook.”
“Eat. It’s getting cold. It wasn’t a tonight thing anyway. I shouldn’t have led with it. Eat.”
And here’s the part I’m not proud of. The old me—the me five years deep in this, the one who decided way back that you don’t ask the sun to come closer—took the exit he held open. Pushing meant he might actually say what he was holding, and I was tired, and the paprika smell was good. Mom’s voice was still warm in my ear. It was so much easier to pick up the fork and let it wait.
***
The TV was on; some random cop show. I had my head on Rook’s thigh and his fingers were in my hair, lightly tugging and twisting. I always complained, but I would die without it.
On the screen, a ripped detective leaned against a doorframe and brooded.
“Him,” I said. “He’s doing a lot with just his jaw.”
“He’s fine.”
“Fine. The man is a cathedral, and you say fine?” I tipped my head back to look at him. “You have no taste. That’s obvious because you picked me.”
“Counterargument,” Rook said, not looking up from his book.
The detective’s partner came in, and I made a case for the partner, who had the better forearms.
“No,” Rook said before I’d said anything. I laughed and let it go. I didn’t care about the forearms. My favorite man in the world was tracing the back of my ear with his thumb.
I closed my eyes and hummed for a moment. Then my phone buzzed on the coffee table.
I almost didn’t reach for it, but I’m never able to let the phone just lie there. I grabbed it and looked at the screen without lifting my head off Rook’s leg.
It was a text.
Kovac:Hi Lucas — Daniel Kovac, The Athletic. Working on a piece about veteran leadership in the locker room, and I’d love a few minutes on Rook specifically. You’re one of the best teammates to ask, near as I can tell. Mark passed along that you two go back a ways. Any chance you’ve got a quick window this week? No rush.
I smiled a little after I read it the first time. Somebody wanted to write about Rook, and they came to me. Of course, they came to me. I’ve watched him longer and from closer than anyone. That meant I could talk about him for a year. I could tell this guy things Rook would never say about himself—the gap control and how he makes Pratt’s nights boring on purpose.
I lifted my head off his leg and started to type a response.
“Who is it?” Rook asked.
“It’s a reporter,” I said. “His name’s Kovac. He wants to talk to me. About you.”
Rook didn’t move. On the screen, one of the hot cops grabbed a perp and wrenched his arm behind his back.
