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Prologue
Rhys
My head throbbed.
My body was wracked with pain.
My heart was broken.
Every night since Mel left, I had been living the same miserable existence. My very ownGroundhog Dayscript. A loop of soccer practice, games, pushing myself to pain, and then falling into my bed at night, hoping sleep made me forget.
This wasn’t supposed to be how the story ended.
I was miserable, intolerable.
“Back, back, back,” my teammate, Cruz, yelled from his position in the goal. The entire team shifted at his command as the other team pushed down the field. When they took a shot on the goal, Cruz caught the ball, and punted it toward me.
The crowd was excited and started chanting my name. Despite the aches and pains in my body, I wanted to drive the ball all the way to the goal, but I was double teamed and would never make it. Choosing to pass it to Tripp instead, I let him drive up while I set up for another pass.
When Tripp kicked the ball back toward me, I didn’t give my opponents time to crowd me again. I took a long shot on the goal, aiming toward the left corner of the net. It flew past the reach of their keeper and in, making the home crowd scream even louder.Let’s Get Loud,by Jennifer Lopez, played in the stadium while my teammates tried to congratulate me on the score.
I accepted their pats on my back and words of praise, but I stayed quiet, walking back to my position as the ball was brought to the center of the field. But my eyes scanned the crowd, just like they did every night for the last few weeks, always looking for the same thing.
Bright green eyes.
Always looking, but never finding them.
“Que te folle un pez.” A guy from the other team ran past me as we reset the field. I had no idea what he said to me, but it didn’t sound like ‘good job.’ I guess he had no way of knowing how short my fuse was, so he didn’t count on me turning toward him and approaching.
“Excuse me?” I realized the player was Hugo Garcia, a big name from Spain who was a renowned competitor, and spoke very little English. That meant whatever I said back to him, he may not interpret correctly. So to make sure he understood how I felt, I chose the universal language of throwing my fist.
Knocking him in the side of the face with a sucker punch, he fell, and I pounced on top of him trying to get another jab in. My teammates started pulling me away as his teammates did the same for him. The referees were blowing their whistles and the crowd was going wild.
I could hear my coach yelling from the sidelines for me to hit the showers, while Cruz had run all the way from the goal and was telling me to cool down. When I was sure I wouldn’t get any more hits on Hugo, I turned toward the bench and marched off the field, assuming the referee had already flashed the red card, indicating my night was over.
As I walked, I glanced up one last time in the crowd, looking for green eyes.
“Do I need to bench you?” My coach asked when I passed him. But I kept walking, shrugging and letting him do whatever the hell he wanted to do. He couldn’t afford to bench me, because despite how I reacted to Hugo, I was the leading scorer in the league.
When I got to my locker, I sat down and flexed my hand, looking at the blood that covered my knuckles. It had been a while since I’d thrown a barehanded punch, and it felt fucking good. Those days of boxing with gloves on to relieve stress may have to be a thing of the past. I wanted to feel more pain, see more bruises.
My phone started ringing, and I knew before looking that it was my brother. The game was being broadcasted on TV and he watched me play, when he could, from his place in Atlanta.
“What?” I answered.
“Do I need to fly down there and beat your ass?” He yelled. Levi was my favorite boxing partner, but living so far away from one another meant we didn’t get much sparring in.
“Don’t bring any gloves,” I snapped back at him.
“Get your head together, little brother. Focus on what’s important.”
Levi, always the coach, always spewing advice. He was the dad I never had when I was younger, and the best friend I needed when I was down. I knew he was already calling for a flight to Miami and would be at my place by the time I showered and talked to my coach.
“It's hard to remember what’s important.”
“Focus on the good. Remember your goals.”
I scoffed and shook my head, even though he couldn’t see me. The blood on my knuckles started to drip, and I flexed them a little more to feel the pain. In the past few weeks, I had learned one thing I knew was certain, and one thing I don’t think Levi yet realized.
