Page 127 of The Pucking Date
“I bring her lunch. I check in. I make sure she’s okay.”
“You do,” Nate agrees. “You’re just not really…in the room when you do it.”
I stare down at my palms. “What else am I supposed to do?”
Nate leans in, elbows on the counter. “You tell me, man. Because from where I’m sitting? She’s wrecked. You’re wrecked. And nobody’s saying a damn thing.”
I let out a slow breath through my nose. “She didn’t tell me.”
“I know.”
“Sheletme keep showing up like nothing changed. Like I was some dumbass she could just pat on the head and lie to with a smile.”
“She panicked.”
“Shelied.”
That comes out harder than I mean it to. But Nate doesn’t flinch.
“I loved her,” I add, low. “Jesus, I still do. But she made a decision, and now I have to live with it.”
He studies me for a second. “You think she did it to hurt you?”
“No,” I say. “I think she did it because she didn’t trust me.”
That hangs between us. Heavy. “I’m not saying you have to forgive her,” Nate says softly. “But you should figure out if you’re going to hate her for not being perfect, or if you’re just scared of what happens if she hands you the pieces and asks you to stay.”
Standing up, he pats me on the shoulder and heads to the guest room. “I’m gonna do as the boys do,” he says, nodding at the twins passed out in the cushions. “Nap time for this big guy.”
After he leaves, the house falls silent. That afternoon lull where even chaos takes a breath. I rinse out the last mug, dry my hands, and step into the hallway, needing a minute.
Passing the old coat rack by the stairs, I spot Dad’s Hurricanes cap. The salt stained one with the faded brim. Still hanging in its usual spot. Mam never threw it out, even when he couldn’t remember his own name, let alone his glory days.
I walk to the mantel. Half the surface is still cluttered with sympathy cards, votive candles, a framed photo from Aoife and me.
One corner of the frame is chipped. I lift it anyway. It’s the photo from my first junior league press day—seventeen years old, baby-faced, grinning like mad and wearing my new team’s jacket. Patrick O’Reilly stands beside me, onehand on my shoulder, the other in a pocket, all polished confidence and teeth. He looked so proud.
The scandal hadn’t broken yet. That came later. Quietly, then loudly. Whispers in the hallway. Journalists in the driveway. Sponsors who stopped calling. Coaches who suddenly stopped using my name in interviews.
I flip the frame over. The cheap cardboard backing peels a little at the corner. Inside, tucked behind the photo, I find it—a folded scrap of paper I forgot was there.
My first draft ranking. His handwriting on the bottom, slanted and bold:
Seventeenth. First to me.
I stare at the words.
That was before the nonprofit. Before the money vanished and the lawsuits followed. Before he stopped looking me in the eye. Before the tumor rewrote what little was left of him.
We never talked about it. Not the shame. Not the fallout. Not the damage it did to both our names.
He never said he was sorry. But then, just before he died, Aoife said he did. That he remembered. That he was proud of me. That I’d already broken the cycle.
The photo trembles in my grip. I breathe through it. Slow. Tight.
I don’t know if I believe it. But I want to.
I set the photo back down, a little more centered this time. Then I turn off the light.
