Page 98 of Soft
It was Auden of all people.
I opened the message with a sense of confusion.
Just got off the phone with Meridian. They want Paxton. Full partnership. They said he was already on their list and last night accelerated their timeline. They're not deterred by the press—quite the opposite. They want to announce within the month if we can move. Call me when you're free.
I set the phone down on the table slowly, afraid that any serious movement would make what just happened not real anymore. Holy. Fucking. Shit.
"Everything alright?"
"Meridian," I whispered.
His eyes widened slightly. He knew the name. Most people who followed sports knew them.
Meridian was one of the largest athletic wear companies in the country, and they had spent the last several years building one of the most visible LGBTQIA advocacy platforms in professional sports. Their partnership roster read like a who's who of famous people who had come out publicly and gone on to have longer, stronger careers than the people who had told them not to. They were not in the business of quiet support.
And they wanted Paxton.
"Meridian reached out," I said, because saying it again made it more real. "They want a full partnership. They said last night accelerated their timeline of reaching out."
The silence lasted exactly one second.
Then Paxton’s dad shouted as he pumped his arms in the air. The high of it all tore through me too, and next thing I knew, I couldn’t stop laughing and crying.
He pressed both hands flat to the table, leaning forward, his eyes bright. "That's not a coincidence. That's the world deciding to remind you both who the fuck you are."
The guilt that had been sitting there since last night faded with the joy of the moment. I suspected it would come back in quieter moments and require some actual evaluation then. But right now, with Auden's message on the screen and Paxton's father across the table looking at me with glee in his eyes, it was hard to hold onto.
"He's going to lose his mind.”
"He absolutely is. And I’ll personally be there to watch it happen." He pointed at my phone. "You call your person back and get those wheels moving. This is the beginning of something big."
"I know. Part of me can’t believe it, while the rest of me knew it was only a matter of time."
"I mean bigger than big. You know, when he first told me about you—before he'd even talked to you actually—I thought, well, that boy has found someone to root for. He gets that from his mother. She was the same way. She could look at a person anddecide they were worth it before they'd said a word." He turned the coffee cup slowly in his hands. "She would have liked you."
I didn't trust myself to respond to that immediately. I took a breath and let it out slowly. Then I did it again for good measure.
"I think I would have liked her too," I managed.
He nodded, satisfied with that.
We sat together for a moment in the quiet of a kitchen on a Sunday morning, with cold pastries, half-finished coffee, and amazing news worth celebrating.
"You're going to be a great agent for him," he said, dropping the trash in the bin. "You already are. The vision and the Little side and whatever else you carry around worrying about—none of it makes you less than. You understand me?"
"I'm working on it," I said honestly.
He smiled, and there was nothing in it but warmth. "That'll do for now." He moved toward the door, then paused with his hand on the frame and turned back. "One more thing."
"Yes?"
"You've got a world of people rooting for you two. Not just me. The team, this city, a company that's about to put his face on everything they believe in." He nodded. "That's not nothing, Grizzly. Let it be something."
He left before I could find a response to that, which I suspected was intentional.
I sat in the kitchen for another minute. Then I called Auden.
“Grizzly,” they answered.
