Page 67 of A Follow-Through in Faking
My heart drops all the way into my stomach.
I jump off Santi’s lap, rushing toward the door without a second thought. Panic has infiltrated every part of me, and I won’t be able to get rid of it until I hear that Sage is going to be fine.
She has to be fine.
“I need you to tell me exactly what happened,” I say to Carlos when I open the door, picking up my bag before I follow him down the hall. I look over my shoulder to ensure Santi is coming too, which he is. There’s concern on his face, the same I feel deep in my chest, and it’s almost a relief to know I don’t have to be alone while I worry about my friend.
And I blame that as the reason for me taking his hand.
Carlos sent me the video of the moment when Sage hurt something in her back, but I’ve been too nervous to watch it. He told me she was serving when it happened, and I know Sage also suffers from back problems like me, but seeing it will make it all the more real.
I’ll think about her getting surgery right now.
That’s how horrible it must have been.
She’s getting emergency surgery.
Tears fall down my cheeks before I can stop them, and I drag my legs against my chest on the uncomfortable hospital chair. Charlie went to get us some food, so I can’t even lean on them for support. And Santi? He went to do our post-match conference so we don’t get in trouble, but I wish he was here. I want to sit in his lap and let him wrap me up in his arms while he promises me everything will be okay.
My mother wasn’t sick for a long time. She didn’t have a disease that dragged over days and months and years, so I didn’t have to sit in waiting rooms as a kid. But being here still brings up things I’ve been suppressing for years. Because I did sit in ahospital room with Ori for a long time the night she died. I held baby Sam in my arms, and Ori hugged Hernanda to her chest while we waited to hear any news.
Mamá had a heart condition that cost her her life. She always knew it could, but there was nothing she could do to change that. She had several surgeries to fix whatever was wrong with her heart, but they were temporary fixes. The only thing that could have saved her would have been a new heart, but she didn’t get one before… well, before she passed.
Sitting here, I realize it bothers me that I don’t remember what heart condition she had. It bothers me that my trauma has taken that information from me, but at the same time, I’m not sure I want to know.
It wouldn’t change anything, after all.
More tears fall as I press a hand to my chest, right where the tattoo for Mamá is. She’d be so sad if she saw that I’m still crying over her so many years after her passing. It hasn’t gotten easier for me like everyone promised it would be. Any memory of her saddens me deeply. Even if some of them bring me joy, it’s hard to think or talk about her.
“Cata,cariño,” Santi says, and I realize I’ve covered my eyes with my hands, so I lower them to look at him.
He’s standing at the end of the hallway, soaking wet from the rain outside, and I have so many questions.
Why does he look like he ran all the way from the post-match conference to this hospital? Why can’t I stop relief from filling every part of me at the mere sight of him? Why did he take so damn long to get to me?
But I don’t ask any of them at first. No. I stand up and run all the way to him, straight into his arms. It doesn’t matter that my clothes are immediately soaking wet. I need him, his touch, and even if the feeling doesn’t last because one of us finds a way to ruin it, right now it’s in my chest. And I can’t get rid of it, nomatter how much I try. Not that I’m trying very hard. Despite my best efforts and everything that’s happened between us, I care so much about this man.
I always have.
I’m starting to realize I always will.
“Mariquita, I’m getting your clothes all wet,” he says, but he doesn’t release me either. If anything, he holds on tighter.
“I don’t care,” I reply, my fingers slipping into his hair. “Did you run all the way here?”
He chuckles as he holds me tighter, burying his face in my neck.
“Pretty much, yeah. Traffic was so bad, running was faster,” he replies, and I shake my head as I fight back tears because of how relieved I am that he’s here. Because my feelings for him are more than reciprocated, they’re multiplied tenfold for him. Because he’d run in the rain for me, the man who never wanted to be in a relationship.
“This is getting so messy, Santiago. What does any of this mean? We keep kissing when no one is watching. We keep touching when it’s not necessary. You keep saying things you don’t have to. This doesn’t feel so fake anymore, and that makes everything complicated,” I say, finally leaning back to see drops of water dripping from his hair and onto his cheeks.
He should look exhausted. We had a match earlier and he just ran I don’t know how many kilometers to the hospital. But he doesn’t. He looks devastating. His heart is in his eyes, he’s been wearing it there for weeks, if not months, and I can’t decide if that terrifies me or settles the turmoil inside of me.
“It doesn’t feel fake because it isn’t fake,cariño. What I feel for you has been real since we met. I keep touching you because I think I’d die if I didn’t. I keep saying things that I don’t have to say but that are true in every way. I keep kissing you because I’m catching up on the time I didn’t do so.”
As if to prove his point, he leans down to lightly brush his lips over mine.
“Let’s give this a shot. We won’t tell anyone in our surroundings that we’re not faking anymore. We will let them think we’re pretending, but in private, we can try this out for real.”
