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“Ay, everyone, the episodes just dropped!” Brent said, and I turned to see him standing at my TV with the remote in his hands, gesturing at the screen.
“They finally uploaded them?” I asked. “Oh, shit. It’s on, then. Time to watch.”
“Time to watch!” Marcus bellowed, commanding the attention of all the people in my house. “I don’t know about you all, but I’m ready to see myself acting like a damn fool on TV.” That was one good thing about having professional football players at a party—they could get anyone’s attention, anytime.
As everyone crowded around, packing in on the couch, chairs, and sitting all around the floor, I had a nervous flutter for the first time in a long while. I did dumb shit in front of millions of people online every day, but seeing the opening credits of my own, actual TV show was something different.
I watched as footage of me on the field started to play, and everyone clapped and cheered. The first episode followed me on a typical day, doing some training and working out in the morning, sauna and cold plunging, and then keeping up on my social media. They focused on the fact that I was one of the few openly gay pro football players in the country, and showed scenes from a day a few months ago when I had volunteered at an LGBTQ fundraiser.
If it was strange seeing myself on a real show, it was even weirder looking around at all my friends watching it, too. I glanced around the room, a surreal feeling hitting me.
People usually watched me from bleachers high above, or from their phone in the comfort of their own homes. But for the first time, right now, I was feeling something close to stage fright.
Callie was standing next to me as I watched the show from behind the couch. She’d put her arm around me, squeezing me during a part of the show where they’d interviewed me regarding my coming out experience.
I clenched my jaw. Why did all of this feel so weird? I’d always even called myself a bit of an attention whore.
But I felt like I was about to explode, right now. Like there was some pressure on me I had never been aware of before.
“Thanks, Cal,” I told her quietly before slipping away from her. “Give me a sec, okay?”
She lifted an eyebrow. “You okay?”
I nodded once. “Need to, uh, grab something,” I said, fumbling to make some excuse before I stole off toward the kitchen.
I ducked around to the back of the kitchen and down the short hall that led to the entryway foyer.
My heart was beating way too fast. I leaned on the marble table near the edge of the entryway, closing my eyes and trying to breathe evenly. What the fuck was wrong with me? As I opened my eyes, I glanced toward the long windows that looked out onto the driveway, and I felt like I’d had the wind knocked out of me.
Out in the dark, I saw Nathan in the driveway, struggling to carry a long, narrow white box in his arms while balancing a bottle of wine and some other liquor bottle on top of it. One of the bottles teetered and almost slid off, but he stopped, balancing the box.
I let out a breath that I hadn’t even known I was holding. It was as if seeing Nathan had flipped some switch in me, releasing some pressure valve that had been keeping me sealed in. There he was, ashimselfas ever, being adorable, adorkable, and somehow managing to look ridiculously hot in the process.
I pushed open the front door, heading out into the refreshing night air.
“You need a hand?” I asked. “You definitely look like you need a hand.”
Nathan’s eyes met mine and he let out a breath of air, too. “So badly,” he admitted, a sheepish, polite smile appearing on his face. He was wearing a leather jacket I’d never seen him in before, and it made him look almost absurdly hot. “The valet guy was so nice to take my car, but I needed to bring all this inside and I knew I was already late—”
“It’s okay,” I said, shaking my head. I grabbed the bottle of wine in one hand and the bottle of tequila in the other, helping him out. “I’m just glad you came.”
Our shoes crunched over a portion of gravel before we walked onto the stone pathway leading up to my front door.
“Are you?” Nathan asked right before I pushed open the door.
I turned back to look at him. “What do you mean?”
His eyes searched my face. “Are you really glad I came? Because until about two seconds ago I wasstilldoubting whether or not I should have shown my face here.”
I paused and hung back, dropping my hand from the door. The faint sound of crickets filled the air, a brief respite from the activity inside my house.
“I want you to be able to come here anytime,” I told him softly. “I owe you an apology for the other night. We were having a good time, and I went cold on you.”
Nathan watched me like he was a startled animal. “I couldn’t figure out what I did to piss you off.”
His voice was so quiet, so full of true confusion, that it almost broke my heart.
“You didn’t piss me off at all,” I promised him. “It was a fun hookup, and I messed with that vibe. I’m the one who’s sorry. I want to be your friend no matter what, okay? Even if you guys completely screw up my guest house renovation and the damn thing collapses, I’d still be your friend.”
