False Start: A Football Romance

by Saylor Bliss

  Kip refuses to let me go alone. I think he senses that I need someone there with me, someone to hold my hand and just be there for me. When the doctor walks in, the first thing he does is congratulate me. I burst in tears again. Kiptyn holds me close and explains as best as he can why I'm reacting the way I am. I let him take over, keeping my head buried in his chest, not peeking out until the doctor asks if I’d like to try and see the baby.

  He explains that the ultrasound might not be able to pick up a clear image yet since we aren’t sure how far along I am, but I barely hear him. I'm going to get to see my baby and get the proof that I need, that this is real and not some sick joke.

  I lie on the hard, bench-like table and lower my pants so the doctor can squirt some gel on my belly without getting it on my pants. The gel is cold, and I flinch.

  “What’s wrong? Is it hurting?” Kiptyn asked, and I feel more than see his willingness to protect me from whatever unseen anomaly is hurting me.

  “No, it’s just cold,” I say, reaching for his hand.

  “It's ok, Dad. I promise that nothing about this procedure will hurt her.” Kiptyn tenses, and I worry that the doctor said something wrong, but when I angle my head back and look at him, he’s grinning from ear to ear.

  The moment he touches the probe against my stomach, my breath locks in my throat. I hold it there, captive, until the loud thrum of a heartbeat fills the room. “Well, I think it’s safe to say you're a bit further along that you thought,” the doctor says, and tears leak from the corner of my eyes. I can’t believe it. I’m going to be a mommy.

  “How far along?” Kip asks, taking the words from my mouth.

  “Hmm, it looks to be roughly fifteen weeks, give or take a day.” Fifteen weeks. Three months, and I had no clue. In less than six months, I will be a mom.

  Kiptyn pulls me to him, kissing me on the side of my mouth, pulling me out of my silent reverie. I wrap my arms around his neck and hold onto him. I kiss his shoulder. I want to tell him what he means to me and that I can’t go on without him. I want to hear him tell me I'll never have to, but I don’t, and neither does he.

  “Congratulations, Mommy,” he says with a wink, and this moment is sealed in my heart for the rest of time.

  “Congratulations, Daddy.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Kiptyn

  We are tied at 63. This is the toughest game we’ve played all season, and not because the opposing team is good.

  No, ours is just off. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something's different tonight. I don’t like it. These guys need to pull their heads out of their asses and play some fucking ball before we end up getting crushed. I won’t be enough to win this. It’s a tough pill to swallow, but the truth nonetheless.

  Cole tosses the ball back in. Jordan snatches it up and passes it to Tiny, who stops, dribbling in place while he looks for an opening. I dash to the right, passing my defensive block, and set myself up for the basket. Tiny passes. The ball flies toward me. My fingers wrap around it moments before I'm hit.

  He hits me hard on purpose, and I'm knocked to the floor. The ball rolls off to be picked up by someone else. A whistle blows, but I'm oblivious. Pain radiates from my shoulder. Sharp twists of lightning-fast spasms travel down my arm to my fingertips and back up. I try to wiggle my fingers, and the pain intensifies. Jordan rushes to my side, kneeling down.

  “Can you get up, man? Need a hand?”

  I lift my left hand and he grips it, pulling me, and I cry out. The pain in my right shoulder is traveling around my back. I feel sick to my stomach. Jordan tries again, and this time he gets me to my feet, but the sports doctors are there now, urging me to the locker room. I don’t want to go. I need to stay on the court. I need to carry the team. Without me, they will lose.

  Skila is pushing through the crowd to get to me. I can hear her. “You let me through right this second, or so help me God, I'll castrate you with a rusty spoon.” I laugh when the room parts, making way for her. She rushes to my side, careful not to jostle me. “Are you okay?” she asks, frantic.

  I can't let her see how much it hurts. I don’t want her to worry. I'm doing enough of that for the both of us right now.

  “I'm fine. The doctor needs to check me out, but it’s routine. No worries, babe.”

  She doesn’t believe me—I can tell—but she accepts what I'm telling her without complaint, and I love her in that moment. It shocks me to think that on the tail end of a horrifying injury. My career could be over. I don’t want to think about it, but it's true, and yet my only thought is about how much I love her, my Sky.

  One x-ray and an MRI later, the doctors tell me what I've feared since I hit the floor. I'm out for the rest of the season. No NBA finals for me. I've torn the ligaments in my shoulder and pulled a dozen other muscles. The road to recovery will be a long and painful one. I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to think about anything. I text Chris and ask him to pick me up.

  Tonight, I'm getting drunk.

  ****

  “Loosen up, bro. I swear, you're wound tighter than that stripper’s G-string.” Chris laughs at his own joke. I try, but I'm pretty sure it comes out as a grimace. The alcohol and painkillers have me buzzing, and I haven’t even had that much to drink. A group of leggy, half-naked girls who barely look old enough to drive wander over to our table in the corner.

  Chris invites them to join us, offering his legs as chairs to two of them. I gaze beyond them out into the room. I don’t know what the hell I'm doing here. This is the last place on earth I want to be, and yet here I sit. The waitress comes around and refills my drink. She shakes her head at the group as a whole, and I can't help but return the sentiment.

  I don’t belong here. I belong at home with my Midnight Sky. Getting to my feet, I grab the keys from the tabletop and mumble my goodbyes to Chris, who is too involved with the girls around the table to pay me any attention.

  Outside, I fumble with the keys, trying and failing to unlock the car door. I don’t understand why the stupid thing won’t work. I'm pushing the key alarm into the keyhole on the driver's side door. It just won't fit. I close one eye and stumble, but I can see better like this. I try again. Someone is walking up behind me. I hear the click of heels on the asphalt.

  “Need help there, babe?”

  I turn, looking over my shoulder at one of the strippers from inside. “Can't get it unlocked,” I tell her.

  She laughs, deep and throaty. “Maybe because you're not using the key,” she says, and I almost feel like she’s making fun of me, but I'm too wasted to care.

  “Come on, babe. Let me give you a ride home. You're in no shape to be driving.” I contemplate her words. It makes sense, taking a ride from someone. I'm slightly drunk, and I don’t need to be driving. Chris picked me up from the hospital earlier, and even then, I was buzzing from pain killers, but something about the situation feels wrong.

  I frown, trying hard to pull the thought closer to the surface, but it evaporates. I shrug my left shoulder and nod for her to get in the car. She takes the keys and hits the unlock button on the chain. I start around the back of the car, but the bumper snakes out and trips me. Bastard. I climb in the passenger's seat, sinking into the cool, lush leather seats. She starts the engine, and the car roars to life.

  “Where to, babe?” she asks, running her hand along my bare arm. My skin crawls with her touch, and for a moment, I worry that I may be sick. I snatch my arm away, and she laughs again.

  “Okay. Point made. Just tell me your address, and I'll grab a cab home from there.”

  I rattle out the address and then lean my head against the cold glass window as we wind down the busy streets of LA. I can't wait to be home and wrap my arms around Sky while I make sweet love to her.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Skila

  I hear a car pull into the drive and I know it's Kiptyn. I've been so worried about him. First, he doesn’t come home from the hospital, doesn’t call or
text at all, and then, when I've had enough waiting and decide to call his phone, Chris answers and tells me he must have left it. I hear music playing in the background and women whispering close to his ear.

  My blood boils.

  He's at a club.

  I can tell just from the racket I hear over the line, and the bastard didn’t even bother to call me and let me know. What did the doctor say? Is his injury serious? Why the hell did he decide to go out partying instead of coming home to me? I remind myself that he isn’t exactly mine and I have no right to question where he is, but it’s hard to calm the storm raging inside of me. I will not sit at the house, cook his meals, wash his clothes, warm his bed, and be treated like a house mat.

  I’m standing at the top of the stairs when the door opens and Kiptyn walks in. He leaves the door ajar, and hot on his heels is a busty blonde. She laughs when he stumbles over the rug in the entryway and shuts the door behind her. I can't believe this. He actually thought to bring a woman home with him while I’m here?

  My jaw drops, and I stand there motionless. I can’t believe what my eyes are telling me. It can’t be. I rub the sockets, and when I open them, I see both of them again, clear as day. I turn on my heel and stomp off to the master bedroom.

  That stupid, no good for nothing, rotten piece of . . . ugh. I grab an overnight bag from the closet and start shoving anything and everything of mine I can find into it. I'm leaving. I refuse to stay here and be treated like this. I hear the bedroom door open and then his soft shuffle across the carpeted floor. His arms wrap around me from behind, and I flinch.

  “Get your filthy fucking hands off me,” I grit through my teeth. The tone must surprise him, because he releases me and spins me around to face him. I stare into the face of the man I wanted to share my life with, and all I feel is pain. My heart shatters at the forlorn look on his face.

  “What’s wrong, baby?” he asks me, seeming confused, and I scoff.

  “What’s wrong? Did you think I would be ok with it?” I ask, my voice rising, my chest heaving. I want to scream and curse him, but I remind myself of the baby and force myself to calm down.

  “Okay with what, baby? I just had a few shots, love. Really,” he explains, and I laugh.

  It’s dry, humorless. I couldn’t care less how much he drank. Of course, I would have liked for him to call me and let me know he was going out, but it wasn’t that big of a deal. No, I’m crushed because of the blonde bimbo downstairs. The one he brought home to our house.

  I stop myself there. It's not our house, it’s his. I was just a welcomed visitor for a time. It’s time to wake up and smell the roses. Kiptyn clearly isn’t the man I thought he was, and I was a fool to think we had a future. I’ll still allow him to be a part of the baby’s life. I’m not going to be one of those petty bitches that shut people out of their child's life just because I don’t like them.

  “And what about the blonde bitch who brought you home, Kip? Who the fuck is that?”

  “Sky? Baby . . . seriously? I was drunk as fuck trying to leave the club, and she walked up on me trying to open the car door like a fucking idiot. She offered to drive me here so I didn’t kill myself. That’s all. I swear, baby. Nothing at all has happened or will ever happen with me and another woman. You’re it for me. Period.”

  “Kip, I just can’t deal with this right now. I’m sorry. I don’t know how to process all of this. You say I’m it, and yet you shut me out. You make me leave the hospital and come home, and then you don’t call or show up here for hours, and when you do, it’s with another woman, and I’m supposed to be okay with this? No. I’m not. You need to think about what you really want, Kiptyn, and how you plan on achieving that. Because this,” I say, waving my hand through the air, “isn’t the way to do it.”

  Dropping my bag on the floor at my feet, I flee the room. I can't stand to be around him anymore. Just the sight of him sickens me and makes me feel like I'm about to lose my dinner.

  Halfway down the stairs, I realize the blonde is still here. She's standing on the front porch, staring at the stars. When I open the door, she jumps and swivels around. Her eyes round and bulge at the sight coming for her, but I sidestep and brush past her.

  “Are you okay?” she calls after me, but I don’t bother stopping or answering her. How the hell would I be okay? Is she serious? If I wasn’t pregnant and barefoot at the moment, I'd be tempted to snatch handfuls of her silky platinum strands and drag her down the drive, kicking and screaming all the while. Am I okay? Ha.

  Thankfully, my car is still parked in the circular drive. I climb in just as Kiptyn makes his drunken way out the front door, stumbling and looking as dumbfounded as the blonde at his side. Slamming the car into drive, I peel out, fishtailing just a tad before the car rights itself and I clear his driveway.

  I should have known better. No one as amazing as Kiptyn could ever be happy with just one woman, and if the tabloids are any indication to the man he is, then he isn’t even close to settling down. I thought it was different with us. Stupid, I know, but the way he was with me was totally different from his usual one-night stands with random women at bars and clubs. It was more.

  The hope that had been building in my chest is crushed, stamped out by the four-inch heels and tanned legs of a blonde bimbo. Never again. I refuse to let myself go through this chaos ever again. Not one, but now two Price brothers had used me, and when done, tossed me to the trash like last night's takeout.

  Tears stream down my face, collecting at the base of my throat and settling there, an itchy reminder of the painful truth. Taking a deep breath, I slow my car until I'm driving closer to the speed limit, and then I crank up the radio, praying there’s something good on. Adele’s beautiful voice greets me, and I sob louder. I can't even bear to change the station. It's like she’s singing for the both of us right now. I clench my hands on the steering wheel, my knuckles turning white under the pressure, and sing my heart out to Hello.

  When I pull into the parking garage at Lisa’s, I pull down the mirror and attempt to make myself look more normal. It's no use. My eyes are swollen and puffy from all the tears I've shed in the twenty-minute ride over, and my nose is so stuffed up that I probably sound more like Daffy Duck than a human being. I rub my hands against my face once more and then climb from my Civic.

  I don’t even know if Lisa is home. I can’t call or text her and find out since I stormed out of Kiptyn’s house with just the clothes on my back. People eye me warily when I enter, noting my lack of shoes and the disheveled look of the rest of me. I don’t care. Stare all you want, people. You don’t mean shit to me. No one does, least of all Kiptyn Price.

  Oh God, how I wish that were true.

  Chapter Twenty- Five

  Kiptyn

  I wake with a pounding in my head and a sick, nauseated feeling in my stomach. I’m barely able to peel my eyelids open, and when I do, I immediately slam them back shut.

  Fuck, it's bright out there.

  I attempt to roll from my laid back position and then think better of it. My shoulder is throbbing in tune with the beating of my heart until I sit up, and then the throbbing, pulsating pain increases. How could I forget? Some ass-wipe plowed into me last night at the beginning of the third quarter, and now, thanks to him, I'm out for the rest of the season.

  Hell, I don’t know if I'll ever be able to play again. I'm determined, though, and with the help of the country's finest physical therapist, I'm sure I’ll make a swift recovery. If I don’t . . . shit. I can't even think about that. My life revolves around the game, and without it . . . no.

  I'll recover, period. Next season, I’ll start, just like this one.

  I swallow rapidly as the tart, acidic flavor of alcohol bubbles up into my throat. It doesn't help much. Grabbing a bottle of water from the bedside table, I take a small sip, trying to keep from losing the contents of my stomach all over my fresh, clean comforter and five hundred-count sheets. Skila just bought these, and I’d hate to ruin
them.

  Skila.

  Where is she? Normally, when she gets up before me, she just goes to the small window seat and gazes out into the beautiful sky while she reads, but she isn’t there this morning.

  “Skila,” I call out.

  She doesn't answer, so I call out again as a deep, regretful worry settles deep inside of me. I can feel it. The house seems hollow and empty. It's just an empty shell without her here. She breathes life into this space, into me, making everything better.

  I don’t know when or how, but sometime over the last two and a half months, she has become an integral part of my life. Every day I wake, my first thought is of her and what she’s doing, how she slept the night before, and how many times I can make her scream my name before we both have to climb in the shower and get ready for work.

  During the day, when I’m not texting her or writing her on Messenger, we Snapchat back and forth. If something exciting happens during my day, I can’t wait for my chance to tell her. I miss her every second of every day, and sometimes it's a battle with myself to not walk out of practice and rush to her side, just so I can steal a kiss from her sweet red lips.

  The evenings are my favorite time of the day. I swing by and pick her up from work, and on the way home, we decide on dinner. Some nights, we just pick up something quick, but my favorite is when we come home and, after changing into comfortable sweats and tees, we make our way to the kitchen. While cooking the evening meal together, I tease her relentlessly with soft kisses to the back of the neck and gentle strokes of my fingers along her arm, her jaw, and her lips. I drive her wild with desire, and then after dinner, I take her upstairs and show her how much she means to me.