Page 84 of The Fake Play

Wait. That’s not right. She turned me down. What’s going on?

My back hurts, aching from the cold. And my jaw… fuck, my jaw throbs along with a headache from hell.

“Smith! Wake the fuck up!” Coach shouts from somewhere far away.

I try to laugh because Coach doesn’t curse much at all. I didn’t even know he knew that word. But the pain in my jaw makes laughing damn near impossible.

I force my eyes open and get an extreme close-up of Coach’s face right over mine. A sharp, metallic taste fills my mouth as I struggle to focus. I cough on it, and he helps me sit up.

“Spit it out!”

Too late. I’d already swallowed the blood.

The hum of voices fills my ears, distant, muffled, like I’m underwater. I blink, trying to clear my vision, but the lights overhead feel like spotlights—too bright, too harsh. I squint, trying to make out the shapes around me.

Dr. Catarino, she’s part of our medical team. She has a silly nickname but it’s gone from my brain, like someone cut it out. People are talking, their voices low and urgent, but I can’t make out the words. I try to sit up but a sharp pain shoots through my head and I slump back, the world tilting around me.

“I’m fine,” I manage to say, the words slurred and barely audible. One of the medics presses gently on my shoulder, keeping me down.

“You’re not fine,” he says firmly. “You need to stay still.”

The sound of my own breathing seems loud in my ears. I’ve been sucker punched before, but this was different. Lucas had caught me completely off guard. The pain is sharp, throbbing, and radiating through my skull in a way that makes everything feel slow and disjointed.

I want to vomit, and I know what that means. Concussion.

They lift me onto a stretcher, the movement sending a fresh wave of pain through my head, increasing the nausea. I clenchmy teeth, holding back a groan as they hoist me off the ice and through the corridor. The usual familiar surroundings blur by in a haze of colors and sounds.

Just then, out of the corner of my eye, I see her. She’s the only person clear in my vision.

Keke. No wedding dress this time which means she’s probably real.

She stands just past the boards, her eyes wide with fear as she watches them carry me out. For a moment, everything else fades away—the pain, the noise, the confusion—and all I can see is her. I reach out my hand toward her, a desperate, instinctual need to touch her and let her know I’m alright. But before I can reach her, they turn the stretcher, pulling me away, and the last thing I see before everything goes dark again is the fear in her eyes, a look that stays with me, even as consciousness slips away.

The next time I wake up, I’m in a dimly lit room, the sterile smell of antiseptic heavy in the air. I blink, trying to focus and to make sense of where I am. What happened?

Lucas.

I am in an exam room. The ache in my jaw has cranked up, the throbbing in my skull begging for attention, a dull nausea pulsing with every heartbeat. I shift, but that makes all of it worse, forcing me back down.

The door creaks open and I glance over, expecting to see a doctor, or one of the medical staff. But instead, it’s Keke.

She stands there, her arms crossed over her chest, her face a mixture of relief and frustration as she looks at me. For a moment, she doesn’t say anything as if she’s trying to convince herself that I really am okay.

But then, the wedding dress materializes onto her body, and I know this isn’t real.

Had she really been at the game when I was carted off? Or was that nothing more than a concussion dream, too? When I’dreached for her, she looked real. She looked terrified. But maybe I was deluding myself that she cared that I was hurt.

I had potentially ruined her career and threatened my own, all because I couldn’t stay away from her, and now, she probably hates me.

No wonder she isn’t here.

Chapter 36

Keke

The chilly hospital air prickles my skin as I sit next to Luke’s bed, watching his chest rise and fall. I’ve hated hospitals ever since Michael’s accident. But then again, who likes spending time in a hospital?

I’ve lost track of how long I’ve been here, the hours slipping by. The doctors examined him, but because of HIPAA, and the fact that I’m not his spouse or family, they can’t tell me anything. The nurse comes in and adjusts his IV bag, the quiet beeping of monitors the only sound.

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