Page 51 of On His Team

Most of the team follows him.

I have my headphones around my neck but nothing playing through them. There’s a reading for Novak open on my phone that I’ve been staring at without actually reading for the last ten minutes, so I finally give up and lock the screen.

That’s when I look back. Gianna is four rows behind me on the other side of the aisle, asleep against the window.

She’s wearing the same Camden hoodie she had on yesterday. The hood is pulled halfway over her head, and her arms are folded tight across her stomach like she got cold and never woke up enough to fix it. Her equipment credential is still hanging from the lanyard around her neck.

Donovan is beside her with his laptop open.

I passed the loading dock after midnight Friday and again last night. Both times, she was still there.

Now she’s completely out.

We start descending twenty minutes later. The seatbelt light comes on, and Gianna doesn’t move when the flight attendant makes the announcement.

I pull my phone out. Her number is only in it because she texted me Thursday night about her project. I open the conversation.

Me: Wake up.

I look back.

Still asleep.

Me: Gianna.

She doesn’t move.

I send another.

Me: We’re landing.

Her eyes open slowly, and she lifts her phone in front of her face with one eye open. I look forward and stare at my phone. A few seconds later, mine buzzes.

Gianna: Are we crashing?

I look back again.

She’s squinting at me from four rows away.

I shake my head.

Me: Landing.

She looks down.

Gianna: Worse.

I laugh under my breath.

The guy across the aisle looks at me, and I turn back around.

By the time we get to Camden, unload, and separate everything that belongs at the rink from everything that belongs to us, it’s after two. I get home, shower long enough for the hot water to start running cold, put on sweats, and sleep for almost three hours.

When I come downstairs again, Hawthorne looks like everybody came home from war and dropped whatever they were carrying wherever their body gave up. There are bags in the living room. Somebody’s suit jacket is hanging over the stair railing. A pair of shoes is in the middle of the hallway. The dryer is running, and there’s a pile of clean clothes in front of it that nobody has claimed.

Blue is on the couch with an ice pack over one knee. Stanley is lying on the floor with a pillow under his head, scrolling on his phone. Percy disappeared in his room after we got home and hasn’t come back out.

I’m hungry enough that none of them matter.