Page 182 of Colliding with Ten

When we separated, his eyes were red, and he was laughing and crying at the same time, pointing at me like he was trying to say something else but couldn’t find the words. I grabbed the back of his head and pulled his forehead against mine.

“Man, you have the best hands in the league.”

“You made it easy.”

“I’m giving you credit, and now you’re dodging.”

Jace grinned at me.

The field swarmed with coaches, trainers, staff, and security trying and failing to hold the perimeter. Confetti cannons still fired, gold and white paper drifting down through the stadium lights. My teammates found me one by one, hands slapping my shoulder pads. I hugged every one of them.

Then a microphone appeared, and Zariah Brooks stood behind it. She stayed composed amid the chaos as she navigated the crush of bodies. As an athlete, she knew what this meant.

“Lennox, Jace,” she said, holding the mic between us. “The final play. Eleven seconds, forty yards, the championship on the line. What does this moment mean to you?”

Jace spoke first. He was still breathing hard, confetti stuck in his hair. He looked into the camera, and whatever composure he’d been assembling fell apart.

“Everything,” he said. His voice broke on the word, and he pressed his fist against his mouth before continuing. “I’ve been dreaming about this since I was eight years old. Every rep I did, it was for this.”

Zariah’s expression softened. She held the mic toward me.

Everything. That was Jace’s word, and a year ago, I would have said the same. I’d spent my career building toward this, wanting the ring to prove the torn knee hadn’t ended me. I’d pictured this scene a thousand times, feeling vindicated. In every version, this was the summit where everything made sense.

But Jace was wrong. Not about himself, because for Jace, it may have felt like everything, and he’d earned the right to call it that. Standing on the field, I realized something I hadn’t expected. This wasn’t everything. This was extraordinary, and I would remember it for the rest of my life. But it wasn’t everything.

“It means I finished what I started,” I said. “A lot of people told me this wasn’t possible after the injury. I heard every one of them, and used it. But honestly?” I paused, looking past the camera into the chaos behind Zariah. “The best part of this isn’t the win. It’s that I get to share it with the people who believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself.”

Zariah gave me a huge smile, nodding the whole time. “That’s a championship answer.”

She turned back to Jace for a follow-up question. He’d had time to gather himself. He ran a hand over the waves of his hair. It was a useless gesture, given that he was sweating and confetti was still stuck to him, but his voice dropped half an octave.

“Yeah, I’m, uh—yeah, I’m happy to answer whatever you need,” he said, now speaking like a man at a job interview rather than a man who’d just won a championship game.

I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from smiling. After he met Zariah, I’d watched him practice what he was going to say in the mirror before the next media day. He was the most confident receiver in the league, but could not function within ten feet of this woman.

Zariah asked him something about the route, and Jace answered it while maintaining an amount of eye contact that was either romantic or clinically concerning. When she thanked him and turned to find her next interview, Jace watched her go.

“Smooth,” I said.

“Shut up.”

“You ran a perfect post route against double coverage in the biggest game of your life, with eleven seconds left, and that’s the most nervous I’ve ever seen you.”

“I said shut up.”

But he was smiling. When Zariah glanced back over her shoulder, Jace saw it. His entire face changed. It was the same look he got when a ball was in the air, and he knew it was coming to him. There was hunger as it came, and his eyes held the certainty that he could get it.

“Go.”

He looked at me. “The trophy ceremony⁠—”

“Is in fifteen minutes. Go.”

He grinned, clapped me on the shoulder, and jogged after her, dodging a cameraman and a security guard on the way. He caught up and said something that made her laugh. Jace had been through a lot, and I was pulling for him.

The crowd moved around, facing the stage where they were placing the trophy. The commissioner and the league officials gathered there, but my attention wasn't on the stage; it was on the field, where I looked for the one face that would make it all real.

Ayla was walking toward me from the far sideline. She was wearing my jersey, the number ten shining with crystals in a custom design that hung off one shoulder. Her hair was loose, curls wild from the humidity, and she was radiant.