Anthony: “Man, proud doesn’t even begin to cover it. As an athlete, I’m in awe of what she does. Her making history was a guarantee once I saw how she pushed herself. The only question was what year she was going to do it.”
Interviewer: “That confident?”
Anthony: “Have you seen her play?”
Interviewer: “I have and I definitely agree. So she should be ranked number one in your mind?”
Anthony: “In the sport, of course. In my heart, that goes without question.”
So yeah, he was stuck with me forever.
“I’d hope you feel that way. Got you running around with my name on you, you can’t be denying my ass after I’ve professed to the world how I feel multiple times.”
He tugged at the t-shirt I wore that had his name and number on the back of it. A fan had designed them for us and they were the perfect weight to lounge around the house in. The fireplace was wood-burning and directly off the large kitchen. I loved how the rooms flowed one into another. With the number of friends and family here, we could have everyone in one space and it not feel like anyone was cut off. The primary bedroom was downstairs and there was another upstairs with four other bathrooms. There was a double-sized bonus room on one side of the house that doubled as a workout room and den. The den was being used as the trophy room and Anthony had plans to have lights installed over every one of my trophies so they lit up when someone entered.
I tossed the throw pillow off of the sofa I’d gotten as our joint homecoming gift. Billy had turned three of the photos that we’d done for Sports News into paintings that we’d hung on the wall. It was crazy that the random man I picked out to be in a photoshoot with almost nine months ago was now the love of my life.
“That’s the only reason you want to keep me around? So that folks who ain’t in this with us don’t clown you?”
“Nah, I want to keep you around because the thought of being without you makes my heart want to stop beating. Makes the air in my lungs seize up. Everything about you makes mewant to be better than I was the day before.” He touched his heart as if the idea of being without me caused him pain.
“Bam.” Besides the way he beat the pussy up, I called him Bam because he was always saying stuff like this and it struck me to my soul.
“I’m serious, AP. The idea of you, the thought of you it’s enough for me to want to keep going. Stay motivated to reach even higher than I did before. You’re the part of me that was missing and the piece of me I’d been waiting for.”
I rubbed the side of his face and then let my fingers run through his braids. His eyes closed as they always did when my nails scraped his scalp. “I never knew love that until I knew you. I was afraid of what I would lose by taking a risk on somebody.”
His eyes opened slightly but I could tell my touch was relaxing him. “So why did you?”
“You showed me it wasn’t a risk. That falling in love with you, that loving you was almost guaranteed to work. It felt right. It feels right. Even when you do the little things that make me want to kick you out of the bed, I still wouldn’t want to be away from you long.”
“How you gone put me out our shit, Phro? We ain’t even been here two days.”
I rolled my eyes at him because he acted like I hadn’t ever been to his brother’s place. “Antwan and Rye have a house with a whole other house in back. You act like you’d be on the street or something.”
“Anywhere I gotta lay my head that is absent of your love and presence is akin to hell to me.” He kissed the back of my hand and I swore I was going to melt like butter on a hot stove.
“You trying to get me pregnant talking like that.”
“Nah. You at the top of your game and I would never want you to limit anything about you and ever feel you settled. You made history this year and that is the crowning achievementfor some. But I know you still hungry for more. When it’s time to hang up the racket you’ll be wearing my ring and my name before I put a baby in your belly.” His fingers were grazing my hip bones like he could already imagine the baby he was going to put there in a few years.
“You feel that way because of your parents?”
“Yeah. There ain’t ever gone be a time that you gotta wonder where I stand. You gone always know how crazy I am about you. How much I wanted you and that I’ll never stop pursuing you. Some folks get married and think that’s it, but to me it’s just the beginning of being able to love you as a completely new version of me and a new one of you.”
“New version?” I wondered how much he thought I was going to change.
“Yeah. Right now I’m loving the woman who made history. Then I’ll be loving you through each phase of fiancée, wife, mother of my kids, my teammate as they battle against us, and the lil gray haired ol’ lady I’m sittin’ wit’ on that front porch recounting how I taught her how to drive.”
He had me smiling especially when he pronounced porch likepawch. His accent was so damn sexy to me and it was so cute to hear Nia talk like her daddy. To imagine I was gonna have the same one day running around this house brought tears to my eyes.
“That life sounds perfect. Even if I know it won’t be smooth and stuff will come up, we've got each other to work through whatever comes.’
“You damn right. Dance with me, Aphrodite.”
“Dance?”
“Yeah. My ass was born 90s and I loved seeing all the movies that had great love stories that came out during that time. You’ve met my mama so you know she wasn’t slow dancing with my daddy and shit. But I wanted to do that. Have that momentthat was pure romance and feeling. So come dance with me Aphrodite, goddess that I love, so that you can make another of my dreams a reality.”