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30.
Hope
I jerked my car door shut and sat in the freezing, quiet cab for a second with my eyes closed, willing the day's frustrations away. I held my breath, waiting to feel the relief that usually came with putting distance between Thacker and myself.
But it was no good. My rotten mood wasn’t dissipating. If anything, it was getting worse by the second.
I was going to have to get whiskey involved.
I pulled up my text thread with Jeanine.
Wanna get drinks at Copper’s? Sorry for the short notice.
Jeanine was my best friend in town, now that Lola had once again blown off on a gust of wind, headed for greater adventures than Casper, Wyoming could offer her. But I rarely invited her out because, now that she had Micah and another on the way, her days were wonderfully full. Plus, I knew it was a pain in the ass to find a babysitter at the last second. The guys were at an away game this weekend, so she couldn’t leave Lars in charge. I was pretty sure I remembered her saying that her mom was going to come stay with her and the kids while he was out of town. But given the fact that she couldn’t actually drink because she was pregnant, I felt selfish asking her to go to the bar with me for an after-work gripe session. Gone were the days of being young, unattached women, for whom ten o’clock at night was a perfectly reasonable time to head out for the evening.
So I was surprised at the quickness with which those three bouncing dots popped up.
Yes, please!
I grinned triumphantly when her message came through.
Gonna run home and change, meet you there in an hour?
Yeah, I need to wash the spit-up out of my hair. See you soon!
I laughed reading her last text, content as ever in my decision to put off having children until amuchlater date. If ever. I loved Micah, and I knew all the stuff my mom said was probably true, that holding my own baby would awaken my latent maternal instinct. But even now that things were starting to get serious with Jamie, I hadn’t once considered removing my IUD.
It would have been easy to imagine a little boy with big gray-blue eyes and shaggy strawberry-blond curls. But for some reason, my mind just didn’t go there. I loved the time we had together. Wewerebringing new people into the relationship. Just in a very different way.
I realized with a start that I was turning into my driveway. That familiar disconcerting feeling crept up my neck. Work was long and hard, and I was usually a zombie by the time I got off. I’d lost count of how often I drove home in a daze and remembered nothing.
I ran through the shower and then I stood in front of my closet, my arms crossed over my stomach, surveying my limited options.
I’d never been the type to go dancing or go out at all. I’d never been to a proper nightclub, not even when I was going to culinary school in Denver. I usually preferred a good book, a sweet cup of tea or coffee, and an uninterrupted night ahead of me to lose myself for a few hours before I had to be “on” again for work the next day.
There was little time left over for getting wild and letting my hair down when I had dreams to chase, I thought as I flipped through two weeks’ worth of chef uniforms in various states of disrepair. Singe marks on the sleeves, stained aprons. Not giving a fuck what you looked like was an occupational hazard of being a chef. But I knew I would only ever be truly happy if I could figure out how to find a work-life balance, and how to make the effort to have a social life instead of just coasting, year after year, waiting on “one day” when everything would be easier. Deep down, I knew that day would never come. Life just got more difficult, more complicated. Even when you thought your story was all wrapped up in a tidy little bow, life was waiting in the wings to shock the hell out of you. I never expected to fall in love with my brother’s best friend. I sure as hell never expected to enthusiastically agree to participate in his hotwife cuckold fantasy. But the truth is, even if I wasn’t into it, I would at least try anything Jamie asked me to. He’d come out of nowhere and saved me from myself, while encouraging me to be exactly who I was at all times, no matter what.
Jamie gave me space to be an introvert. He invited me to events with the team but never pressured me to go. I was surprised to find that I usuallywantedto go, if only so I could be with him every second that we were both free. We worked a lot, and on top of his player duties, team-building events were mandatory for him now that he was the captain. It was a strain and cut into our alone time together, but I could already see the good that his commitment had done for the team when I watched them play. They were far more cohesive and adaptable than last year’s team had been. We had some heavy hitters the previous season who had gone on to play for the pro team in Denver, but the team chemistry was all fucked up back then.
Largely thanks to Lola getting half the team jealous of each other and ready to go to blows over her. I cringed when I pictured the friendly-fire on-ice brawl she had inspired.
She, like Jamie, had been able to coax me out of my self-protective bubble in a way that showed me maybe I was missing out if I spenteverynight curled up in bed with my Kindle. I knew Jamie through Reid, but I also knew that it was largely thanks to her that we’d been forced to spend time together alone, mostly thanks to her that I had the confidence to lean across the table and kiss him that night at my house while Reid and Lola were playing out their old high school drama upstairs. I just couldn’t take the way he was looking at me, like he was burning from the inside with words he couldn’t say. So I put my mouth on his, to take some of the pressure off. The rest was history, happily ever after.
Back then, I was sure that Jamie was the one for me. The only one. I would never have guessed that I would soon be entertaining the possibility of following in Lola’s footsteps, allowing myself to be fullyexposedto a group of athletes working toward a shared goal—to make me come.
I got goosebumps just thinking about it.
I decided to wear the outfit I looked best in, and pulled down a sparkly gold mini dress with a high neckline. I shimmied into it, and then ran for the car. I was going to be late to meet Jeanine.
31.
Hope
She was waiting at a high top when I came stumbling in, nearly losing the heel off of one of my pumps on the uneven threshold.
She waved with a big grin, and I hurried over to hug her neck.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” I mumbled.
