Page 43 of Break

She had nannies and maids, chefs and landscapers growing up. She doesn’t understand why I would ‘waste my time’ with them when I have her at home. Sitting around, waiting for me. But… What else is new? Alex is never happy when shit isn’t constantly going her way.

Even when I started making millions when I was drafted, Marie and I did everything on our own, aside from deep cleaning this monstrosity of a house.

Outside of that? Nothing really changed. She didn’t start wearing nice clothes and getting her hair done until after she got her own job as a physician's assistant. She never used my money.

Marie watched the girls, I hired babysitters when she had school that overlapped with games, but outside of that? Marie did all of the cooking, she went to – and still goes to – all of the parent teacher conferences at their school. I dealt with the bills and vacations.

We were perfectly oiled machines, always in sync, and now everything just feels, tilted. Out of sorts. Wrong.

I liked Alex, but love? No. I don’t feel that for her.

Engagement, wedding, and the fucking talk about babies is driving me insane… I’m ready to pull my hair out. Shit, I can barely get my fucking head on straight with everything else going on.

Maybe if Marie and the girls said they would move back in with me it would help make my decision easier, faster. But they won’t. So, bye bye house.

Alex never wants to leave the house, either. She only wants to go shopping, either on her phone or trying to get me to take her to some new store. She doesn’t lift a finger around the house and begs me to hire a live-in housekeeper and chef because picking up her own clothes is apparently a travesty. And she doesn’t cook.

She only knows how to pour wine into a glass. I don’t think she’s ever really stepped foot into a kitchen aside from grabbing a drink. Or ordering someone to fetch her one.

I don’t understand that life, and I’ll never succumb to one.

Hence the downsizing. I want something small, simple. Comforting.

Plus, money isn’t forever. I can be injured in a game, never able to play again. Sure I have investments, stocks, and bonds.I can live off of this money for several lifetimes, but it doesn’t mean I have to live like it.

Look at Marie… She’s going to be close to a multimillionaire when she turns thirty if she gets the trust fund without her parents fucking with it. She works as a PA, she makes a decent amount of money, but I know the bills stress her out… and she lives a lot more modestly than I do.

If I didn’t buy her that Range Rover a few years ago, she would still be driving an old, beat up Honda Civic. She buys all of her clothes and décor from Target and Walmart.

I need to stop comparing the two women, it’s just so hard not to.

If Marie wasn’t my best friend, she would be my dream woman.

She’s kind, thoughtful, witty, and insanely smart. She puts me in my place, knows me like the back of her own hand. Loves the girls as much as I do, and always,always,puts them first.

I’m failing at that more every day it seems, but I’m trying now. That counts for something, right?

Maybe me buying a small three-bedroom house will be the last straw for Alex and she’ll leave on her own accord. Fixing my mistake. She hates it when I go out with the guys. Hates it when I say I’m going to go spend time with my sisters, and hates it when I bring up Marie.

I don’t do it to be rude or to talk about another woman but to talk about my damn best friend who is fucking raising my sisters. Something not anyone else would ever do.

Alex doesn’t know about Marie’s pregnancy, and I don’t think it’s her business, as much as it’s most likely not mine. But I made it my business. She deserves the help.

I’m going to be a better uncle for those babies than the brother and best friend I’ve been lately. Marie deserves it, and so do those two innocent kids.

I shove all thoughts of Alex away as we bar hop, take shot after shot, and party like we’re twenty-one again.

Which we are certainly not.

We dance, holler, and sing. We sip whiskey at the last dark bar and finally hire a driver or five to take us over to Nolan’s house.

All I know is that Morgan shoved me into the back of a black car and he sat beside me, glaring down at his phone. How he is even able to see anything on that bright screen is giving me a headache just to think about. Maybe he didn’t drink enough. My fucking head is spinning.

Luckily Nolan has enough room for all of us to crash tonight. And look at that… no one brought a woman back.

Logan didn’t even so much as look at another woman. Such a good fucking guy. Fuck, I love him. I love all of them.

We all strip down to our boxers and sit in the massive jacuzzi in Nolan’s back yard when we all arrive. There’s like three feet of snow on the ground and I had too much to drink to even feel the cold. I lift my nose into the air and breathe in the fresh, frigid air. I will never miss California. The smog, the foul, garbage lined dirt roads in our trailer park.

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