Page 286 of Across His Line

And somehow that feels worse.

Because this time I won’t get to pretend I don’t care.

I look at the text for another second.

Then I put my phone face down.

On Wednesday night, I pack small. Three days of clothes. My laptop because I’m not going to stop working just because there’s an arena. My notebook. The watch, which I never take off anyway, ticking on my wrist. And a dress. It’s dark green with thin straps and a skirt that moves when I walk. I found it at Goodwill two weeks ago on the rack in the back with the tags still on it from a store at the mall that went out of business. Eleven dollars. I could get eighty for it, easy. I looked. I didn’t list it because I tried it on, and it fit perfectly.

Rafe walks over and sees it. “What’s that?”

“Clothes.”

“I know, but––”

“It’s a surprise,” I say, trying to hide it. “If you deserve it.”

“If I deserve it?” he asks, reaching for me.

I let him pull me in and kiss the back of my head.

I’m packing to watch his life open up. I want to see it. I want to be standing there when somebody says his name, and I’ll be wearing the dress that matches his eyes when they do.

40

Polyester-Blend Lining, You’ll Live

Rafe

The suit is hanging on the back of the bathroom door. I’ve been looking at it since five-thirty. I’m sitting on the edge of the hotel bed in my boxers with my elbows on my knees, and the curtains are open a crack, so the light is coming in gray over the arena across the street. And I’m looking at a suit.

It’s navy. My mom picked the color. The tailor picked everything else. It cost more than I could stomach telling Tessa. It fits like somebody built it on me.

And it’s hitting me right in the chest that I’ve wanted today since I was six.

That’s the thing I keep thinking. Since the garage. Since the tarp. Since I was too small to lift the net back up when it fell over. I’ve imagined this day ten thousand times, and in every single one of them, I felt something. Something huge. Something like the building coming up out of its seats. I’m sitting here now, and I feel normal. Not numb. Not nothing. Just—normal. Like it’s a Friday. Like it’s a game day. Like I’m going to get dressed and go do a thing, and then it’ll be done. I keep waiting for it to get bigger in me, the way it’s bigger in my phone, which has been buzzing on the nightstand since five with every person I’ve ever met.

Barnes: TODAY’S THE DAY!

Barnes: You nervous?

Barnes: Don’t be nervous, baby.

Barnes: Ok be a little nervous.

Kennebeck: He’s asleep.

Barnes: At 5:40? on DRAFT DAY?

Kennebeck: Some of us are normal.

I’m not asleep. I don’t tell them that.

Tess is.

She’s behind me in the bed on her stomach with her face mashed into the hotel pillow. Her hair is everywhere. The watch is on her wrist. She hasn’t taken it off since Christmas, not once, not even in the shower, which I keep telling her is going to ruin it, and she keeps telling me she already looked up and it won’t.

She’s here. I can’t believe she agreed to it when I know she’s busy with her businesses. The entire plane ride she kept telling me she’s never been on a plane before, and she joked that I’ve given her many firsts.