Beauty and the Running Back

by Colleen Masters

  “No,” Jessa breathes, clutching at my jersey as Buck takes off into the locker room, “You have to finish the game. Dad said there are recruiters out there—”

  “I don’t give a damn about the recruiters,” I tell her, as Blaire hurries over to help me support Jessa’s.

  “This can’t be happening,” Jessa moans, and Buck runs back over to us, keys in hand. “You weren’t supposed to get dragged into this, Dean…”

  “You’re not dragging me into anything,” I tell her, planting a firm kiss on her forehead, “Nothing could stop me from being with you right now.”

  She opens her mouth to speak, but another agonized groan rings out from her lips. Blaire and I all but carry her toward the exit as Buck trails behind us.

  “Just put the keys in my pocket,” I tell Buck, “You’ve got to get back out there.”

  “Fuck that,” he replies, “I’m driving. You’ve got more important things to worry about.”

  “It’s gonna be OK,” Blaire says to Jessa, brushing the blonde hair away from her forehead, “We’ve got you, now.”

  We’re not exactly a conventional birthing team or whatever. But at least we all have one thing in common—we all want to keep this mom and baby safe. And in the end, that’s all that matters. If I knew even one thing about childbirth, I’m sure I’d be scared shitless right now. Maybe it’s a good thing I coasted through all my science and health classes here at Rayburn after all. I have no idea what’s coming next, but whatever happens, I’m not leaving this woman’s side.

  Not for anything.

  Chapter Twelve

  Jessa

  My entire world dissolves into a series of numbers as we book it to the hospital. I count the minutes between contractions. The number of breaths that make up each of those painful swells. But more than any number, the one that hangs heaviest above me is 29.

  I’m only 29 weeks pregnant.

  The little person inside of me has only had 29 weeks to grow.

  It’s too soon.

  It’s just too soon…

  I’m bleary-eyed with pain and panic as we pull up to the emergency room. This isn’t how I planned to give birth at all. I’m supposed to be up in Boston, with my own OBGYN and Allison coaching me through my birth. I’m supposed to be prepared. Or at least more prepared than this. But what’s that they say about God laughing when you make plans…?

  “Jessa,” I hear Dean’s voice say above me.

  I blink up at him from the backseat of the car as he opens the door. His face is calm but firm as he helps me up. Hot tears spring into my eyes as he loops an arm around my waist and leads me toward the emergency room door. After everything I’ve put him through, he’s still here at my side. He doesn’t even know that this kid is his, and still, he’s the one who’s right here to help me through this. All at once, any doubts about what kind of man he is evaporate. I know, in this moment, that I’ll never meet a better man than Dean Carter. Never.

  “Dean,” I whisper, and Blaire and Buck run ahead into the hospital to get me some help, “Dean, I’m scared…”

  “I know Jess,” he says, his brown eyes full of compassion, “But we’re all here to help you through this. I’m gonna make sure you’re OK.”

  And you know something? I absolutely believe him.

  The second Dean and I step into the hospital, we’re swallowed up in a rush of activity. A nurse helps me into a wheelchair as Blaire and Buck are ushered into the waiting room. I sign some papers and offer up some information about my health insurance, but my mind gets snagged on one detail in particular along the way.

  I still haven’t picked an adoptive family.

  Another contraction swells up, blinding me and silencing my swirling thoughts. It feels like I’m about to come apart at the seams as I’m wheeled up to the labor and delivery floor. As I come back own from the painful peak, I hear the words “possible emergency c-section”, “premature”, “life of the mother”.

  “How old are you, honey?” one of the nurses asks as we roll up to the elevator bank.

  “Nineteen,” I murmur deliriously.

  “And you’ve never had a baby before?” she goes on.

  I shake my head, tears running down my cheeks. I feel sure in this moment that I won’t make it through this experience in one piece. I have no idea what I’m doing.

  “You’re going to have to wait down here,” the nurse says to Dean, as she wheels me into the elevator.

  “Like hell,” he says, blocking the elevator door with his arm, “She needs me.”

  “Are you the father?” the nurse demands impatiently, “Because if not—”

  “He’s is,” I gasp, “He’s the father.”

  “Well in that case,” the nurse says, jerking her head at Dean to invite him into the elevator with us.

  Dean stands behind me in his Red Birds uniform, my silent sentry. It isn’t until we’re alone in my hospital room that we even touch again. Dean helps me into my gown, holding my hand as I lie back on the bed as a dozen machines whir and beep all around me. Nurses rush in and out of the room, getting everything ready in the event that I need to be rushed into surgery. I pray to whoever might be listening for a safe delivery. I don’t care what that looks like, just as long as my little boy is OK.

  My little boy.

  Our little boy.

  “Good thinking, telling them I’m the dad,” Dean whispers as I settle back against the bed. “I’m not sure they would have let me stay with you otherwise.”

  I swing my eyes his way, surprised by his words. Of course. With the scene my own dad made back at the stadium, I never even got to tell him…

  “Dean,” I say softly, holding his hand on the blue hospital blanket, “I… I wasn’t lying.”

  “What?” he breathes, his fingers lacing through mine.

  “The lie was what I told you up in Boston,” I whisper, “When you came up to see me. I don’t even know why I… I mean, I know why I tried to keep this from you and just handle it on my own. I didn’t want you to feel like you being forced into anything—”

  “Hey, slow down…” he murmurs, laying a hand on my tear-streaked cheek.

  “You have this great life ahead of you,” I tell him, “That was one of the first things you told me, when we met by the garden. Remember? You told me that someday the whole word was gonna know your name. I want that for you. I want you to have exactly the life you want. I don’t want to ruin—”

  “Jessa,” Dean cuts me off, his voice hoarse with emotion, “Don’t you get it? None of that stuff—the fame, the success—could come close to meaning as much to me as you do.

  “God, I love you,” I tell him, amazed all over again by his beautiful heart.

  “I love you too,” he goes on, taking a deep breath, “So then… are you telling me that I am the father? That this baby… This baby is ours?”

  “Yes,” I smile, squeezing his hand, “He’s ours.”

  Dean’s entire face lights up at my words. “You said he…”

  “I sure did.”

  Before we can share another word, the pain in my abdomen comes walloping back. Three nurses swoop in to take care of me as my labor kicks into high gear. The world becomes a blur of pain, pressure, and breath. It feels like my body has been plucked out of time, like nothing has ever existed before this moment, and nothing will exist after. The only thing rooting me to this planet is Dean’s hand holding mine, Dean’s voice telling me that it will be OK. That I’m strong. That I’m doing great.

  A bell-like, unmistakable cry cuts through the chaos of the delivery room after god only knows how long. I fall back against the hospital bed, covered in sweat and more exhausted than I’ve ever been in my life. But when I bring my weary eyes to the foot of the bed and see the doctor cradling a tiny, wailing figure, every other thought and feeling floats away. As my son is placed on my chest, his little cheek resting against my flushed skin, it’s like the gravitational pull of the entire universe shifts.

&nb
sp; I look up at Dean, sitting beside me on the edge of the hospital bed. He stares raptly at the little boy he helped create, a look of unimaginable awe on his handsome face.

  “Hey little dude,” Dean murmurs, laying his fingertip against our son’s tiny palm.

  “I’m so glad you’re here,” I whisper.

  And I realize the second those words leave my mouth that I mean them for Dean and our baby alike.

  Dean

  In the coming weeks, Jessa and I all but live in the hospital together as our baby gains his strength in the NICU. At first that phrase, “our baby”, felt so strange to say out loud. I haven’t exactly had a lot of time to get used to it, after all. But from the second I got to hold that little boy in my arms, I knew that he was mine. I felt it more clearly than anything in my life. And make no mistake, I couldn’t be happier to call him mine.

  For the few weeks or so right after the baby is born, Jessa and I are too busy dealing with the day-to-day realities of his new life to talk much about the big picture. He’s doing great for having been born at 29 weeks, but it’s touch and go for a while. His lungs and brain especially still need time to fully develop. But as Jessa’s body heals and our son’s gains strength, the big questions insist on being answered.

  One afternoon, Jessa and I are sitting in the NICU together, staring into our son’s incubator. The school year is officially over, which means we have all the time in the world to focus on our son. We haven’t come up with a name for him, yet. So his name is listed on his charts as “Little Dude”. Not the most traditional name, I admit, but it has a certain ring to it.

  “I think he looks more like you,” Jessa observes, cocking her head to the side as she drinks in the sight of him.

  “I don’t know,” I reply, taking her hand, “That looks like a Cahill nose to me.”

  Jessa has been incredibly through all of this. Not only did she make it through the birth like a champ, she’s already bouncing back to her clear-eyed self. This isn’t a situation that just any young woman could tackle with such grace. But then again, Jessa Cahill isn’t just any young woman, is she?

  “I really thought I had this whole thing figured out,” she says, shaking her head. “God. I had no idea what I was doing.”

  “Well. What was the plan?” I ask her. “I mean, before…”

  Jessa lets out a deep sigh, turning to face me.

  “I was going to line up a family that wanted to adopt him,” she tells me, “And then, once he was born, I was going to tell you what the plan was. I thought you’d be relieved or something, that I’d taken care of it on my own. That you didn’t have to worry about it… It feels so stupid to say out loud, now.”

  “You were scared,” I tell her, running my thumb across her knuckles, “You were just trying to do the right thing by both of us.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t trust you from the start,” she says, almost mournfully.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t prove to you from the start that you could,” I reply. “But I hope you know now that you can trust me with anything, Jess.”

  “Oh, I do,” she smiles, “And then some.”

  We turn our eyes to back to the incubator, where our baby lies on his back with a half dozen machines keeping track of his vitals. Helping him eat, and breathe. It’s so hard to see him like this, but he’s getting stronger every day. He’s a fighter, no doubt about it. I know he’s going to make it through this. 29 weeks is early, to be sure, but the doctors are confident that he’ll be just fine.

  “So much for plans, huh?” Jessa says quietly, resting her fingertips against the glass.

  “You can say that again,” I sigh.

  “We have to figure out where to go from here,” Jessa goes on, “We have to decide what’s best for him.”

  “Well,” I say, taking a deep breath, “What are our options?”

  “We can follow through with an adoption,” she says, “I’d had inquires from a bunch of families already. I’m sure we could find someone to take him home once he’s ready.”

  “Oh…” I say, trying to keep my voice neutral. But if I’m honest, the idea of handing our little dude over to someone else makes my stomach turn over on itself.

  “But then,” Jessa continues, her eyes fixed on the baby, “There’s another option.”

  I wait with held breath for her to go on.

  “I know I’m only just starting school,” she says, “And I know that you’re gonna need to work like hell senior year if you want to get recruited. I know it’s just about the worst timing, and that we may very well not have the support of any of our parents, but…”

  “But what?” I ask.

  She brings her shining sea-green eyes to mine.

  “We could keep him,” she all but whispers, “We could raise him together.”

  “We could…” I echo, placing my hand on the incubator beside hers.

  “And I’m not even saying that we’d have to be a couple again, if that’s not what you want,” she hurries on, “We don’t need to run out and get married tomorrow. We already have a lifelong commitment in this kid, you know? If you just want to co-parent, we could find a way to make that work.”

  “Is that really what you want?” I ask, locking eyes with her.

  “Honestly?” she asks.

  “Honestly.”

  “No,” she says, “It’s not. I don’t just want to co-parent with you, Dean. I want to be with you again. I want us all to be a family.”

  “Well good,” I smile, my heart bursting at its seams with love for her, “Because that’s what I want, too.”

  “Really?” she whispers, eyes wide.

  “I haven’t felt like part of a family since my mom passed away,” I tell her, “I think some part of me has been waiting for a chance to start of family of my own ever since. Sure, I didn’t think it would happen so soon, but now that it’s here in front of me… I can’t think of anything I want more.”

  “I feel the same way,” she smiles, tears welling up in her eyes, “Exactly.”

  Jessa

  The exhaustion, the worry, the physical pain lift away for the briefest moment as Dean places his hand over mine on the incubator glass. We turn our eyes to the little guy resting there, gaining strength every day. After months of uncertainty, this moment of clarity is like finding water in the desert. There’s still so much we don’t know about the future. We don’t know how we’re going to pull this off, or what complications could arise in our son’s health during the coming weeks. We don’t know who’s going to stand beside us as we take this journey together and who’s going to turn away. Really, there’s only one thing we do know for sure, which is that we’re in this together.

  But right now, that feels like the only real thing in the world.

  “Hey,” I murmur, lacing my fingers over Dean’s. “What was your mom’s name?”

  “Rowan,” he tells me, “Rowan Carter.”

  “Rowan Carter,” I repeat, letting the name roll off my tongue as I bring my eyes back to our son, “It has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?”

  EPILOGUE

  One year later…

  * * *

  Dean

  “How are you not freaking the fuck out right now?!” Buck cries, pacing back and forth across the living room of our once-shared apartment.

  “I’m happy to outsource the freaking out to you,” I laugh, taking a sip of my IPA as I keep one eye on the TV.

  Buck flops onto the couch beside me, his eyes riveted to the muted broadcast of this year’s NFL draft pre-show commentary. Things are just about to get underway as the biggest teams in the country recruit their newest players. My cell phone is sitting on the coffee table, ready to receive a call that could change the course of my career—and my family’s life.

  “I swear, I’d go into my room and have a private little shit fit right now. If it were still my room and not a nursery, that is,” Buck says, watching the TV through his fingers.

  “Aw, you miss havi
ng me as a roommate?” I laugh, ruffling his unkempt black hair.

  “Not at the moment, jerk,” he grumbles, tousling his locks back into place.

  Buck was a saint about giving up his room in our apartment last year. Once Rowan was cleared to come home with us after a couple of long months in the NICU, having him and Jessa move into my place was the best thing for our little family. We baby-proofed the entire apartment, converted Buck’s room into a nursery, and upgraded my twin bed to a queen. And just like that, we had a place to call our own as we figured out how to balance parenting, school, and my obligations to the football team. Don’t get me wrong, there’s been a lot to figure out. But at least we’ve had a safe space to come home to at the end of the night.

  “You’re a hell of a lot calmer than I was on draft day,” my big brother Tom remarks from the arm chair beside the couch. “I was shaking like a leaf, remember?”

  “Guess I’ve just got a cooler head than you,” I grin.

  “Well no shit,” he laughs, “I only had myself to worry about going into the draft. I can’t imagine starting my career with a family to take care of.”

  I smile to myself, happy to have Tom here for the big day. My brother and I could easily pass for twins, with our identical shade of sandy blonde hair, brown eyes, and distinct jaw lines—though his face a bit more square than mine. Hell, we even play the same position. There’s been quite the media frenzy about where “Carter 2.0” is going to be drafted this year. The press loves the brotherly connection between us, and the fact that I’m a young father has all the sports blogs buzzing. I’ve got to say, the family man image goes a long way in endearing me to the press. And considering that it feels natural as hell, I don’t mind that perk one bit.

  “I wouldn’t have been able to take such good care of Jessa and Rowan this past year if it wasn’t for you,” I tell Tom, raising my beer to him, “We owe you so much, bro.”

  “You don’t owe me anything,” he says, waving away my praise. “The team pays me stupid amounts of money to do the thing I love, and I’ve gotten to share that money with my little brother and his family. I call that a win-win situation. Besides, you won’t need my help for much longer, will you?”