Page 54 of Good Guy Gabe

She attempts half a smile, her eyes damp but hopeful, filled with love. She loves me. I love her. That’s the most important thing. I need to figure out how to stop this for my own sanity, but that’s the most important thing. “It’s worth it, though.”

I get her foot situated in my hand so that when I lean forward, I don’t hurt her. Her soft blonde hair is loose, falling in gentle waves, the ponytail bump prominent. Fatigue from the pregnancy has made her forget to put her hair up first thingin the morning, and I love it that right now, I can dig my fingers into the warm, silky strands and kiss her as gently as possible, lingering there, savoring the moment, knowing that I will protect her.

Chapter 24

Joss

“GEEZLOUISE, what’s she doing in a Jugs jersey way over here?”

It’s not the first time I’ve heard that since walking into the U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis this afternoon, and I doubt it will be the last. I can’t even be mad about it, any more than I could be mad when I ordered a drink at concessions and got ribbed for calling it a soda instead of a popandfor wearing red instead of purple. The Minnesota accent is too fun to get mad at their mildest of insults, and I’m mostly upset at how well Gabe has apparently squashed his own accent.

I haven’t seen him since yesterday morning when he dropped me off at the airport, and he’s been in a state over the fact that I had to go solo on the first two days of the trip. He’s on the clock, after all. Team protocol.

But I’m loving this. I’ve spent the last six years on my own. There are some days I don’t have another human being in reaching distance for the entire day. I love Gabe, I’d rather him smother me than not be in my life at all, but Minneapolis is a new adventure for me. I’m having a blast.

I visited four local fabric shops in the area yesterday and this morning. I called them in advance, casually dropped my name in the conversation, and three of the four ladies asked me to do a meet and greet. I graciously accepted — graciously to them, but it was really the purpose of the call.

I don’t know, maybe it’s petty and self-indulgent, but I bask in those meet and greets. I absorb the adoration from the quilters who come by like I’d absorb sunlight. And that fourth shop? The moment I walked in, the lady at the cutting table looked up, got halfway through her rote greeting, and wrecked her cut. “Oh my word, you’re Joss Page.”

So yeah, I get an impromptu meet and greet there, too. It’s the guiltiest of pleasures, filling me with all those happy good feelings from back in my pageant days, when I was routinely getting Miss Congeniality if I wasn’t winning the tiara itself.

I’ve just sat down in the sea of purple when the lady two seats down comments on the jersey. I’m ready to ignore it, but then a heavy hand lands on my shoulder and a friendly voice behind me says, “Yeah, no, it’s Shaunessy’s jersey. You come down from Duluth for the game?”

The man behind me looks as friendly as he sounds, wearing a silly Viking helmet with fake — hopefully — fishing lures dangling from it and a Vikings tee, but also the biggest grin and a bushy white Santa beard. I want to say yes, I’m from Duluth, to hide the fact that I’m on a first-name basis with half the team, but there’s no way I’d be able to pass with my voice. My mother put me in diction classes for years so I wouldn’t sound like a Southern hillbilly, but I can only pull off neutral.

“I’m Gabe’s girlfriend,” I admit, feeling better about that than lying, even if it’s going to make me a spectacle.

The guy on my other side slaps my back too hard. “Well then, you’re family!” he yells, obviously drunk but happy.

I make fast friends with my neighbors after that, trading friendly jabs but grudgingly complimenting each other’s teams. They’re as stressed as I am when Merrick has to be helped off the field at the beginning of the first quarter, but they have him iceddown, taped up, and back on the sideline halfway through the second quarter.

By then, the Vikings have pulled ahead of the Jugs and are leading by nine at the half. They’re taking the field again and we’re speculating about whether Merrick is going to be put back in when I hear, “Joss? Oh my god, Joss, it is you!” from down the way.

I lean forward to look past the rest of the spectators to see Rachel in her Gabriel’s Angels halo on the stairs. “What on earth are you doing here?” I yell back with an incredulous laugh.

“I’m at a conference in Minneapolis this weekend!” She pushes her way to me, but everyone’s happy to get out of her way. No one ever claimed the seat next to me, so there’s room for her. “Came in a day early to see the boys.”

I nearly ask her why call center workers would need to have a conference, but then it hits me I don’t know all that much about her and there are all sorts of conferences for hobbies, including hobbies Ireallydon’t need to know my students are into. Instead I go with, “How did you find me in fifty thousand people?”

She points at the gigantic screen showing everyone getting set up for the kick-off. We’re the receivers, and Merrick still isn’t on the field. Crud.

“You were on the jumbotron, and the section number was visible. Thought I’d come investigate. This isn’t crazy, is it?”

I laugh. “It’s a crazy coincidence, but I’m glad you’re here.” As she sits, I notice she’s got a container of the cookies she always makes for Gabe in her bag, but this time, there’s a letter taped to the top of it, folded so I can’t see what it says. “Did you want me to give those to Gabe?”

She looks down at her bag and closes it quickly. “Oops! No, those aren’t for Gabe. I’m . . . meeting coworkers after the game. It’s for them.” She sounds flustered, so I’m betting they’re not coworkers at all.

She’s here for some weird sex convention, I just know it.

Merrick does eventually make it back onto the field, but we still end up losing in a nail-biter. My neighbors and I exchange encouraginggood gamesas we file out of the stadium, and I have Rachel to commiserate with until Gabe texts me where to meet him and the rental car.

“You wanna get a room for the night?” I ask him the moment he intercepts me at the closest section of the path that keeps him out of Viking fan traffic. He looks tired, bummed out from the loss. I know he’s wearing a boring black hoodie and navy sweatpants to avoid attention, but the lack of pink Party Animal cat makes him look that much sadder. He brightens up when I’m close enough for him to snag me and reel me in, but he’s slumped and he holds me for too long.

“Nah, I’d rather get home.”

“Are you sure? It’s going to be one a.m. by the time we get there.”

“Yeah. Ma’s gonna have a breakfast casserole for us. She’ll be bummed if we’re not there for it.”

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