Page 40 of Game Face

Reed takes a handful of fries and shoves them in his mouth, brushing the salt from his hands.

“Ha, character doesn’t do that man justice!” he mumbles through his full mouth. “He’s not so different. Less mobile, but he’s still all there. Mostly. I’m lucky.”

Lucky.There’s that word again. I’ve been hearing it a lot lately. The doctors have said it dozens of times. Peyton’s parents have used it a lot. Hell, Peyton told me her nurse called her lucky for being with me, which I think is bullshit. It’s the other way around. But seriously, for all this luck being talked about, I don’t feel very lucky.

“So . . . Cal is next week, yeah? Road game.”

Reed’s segue into football talk is obvious. I finish my bite, then bunch a napkin in my hand to wipe away the special sauce.

“I’ll be ready. Just like I’ll be ready this weekend.”

His knowing smirk probably matches the one I’m wearing.

“I had to talk to you about it. I promised her I would,” he admits with a shrug.

“She’s hard to resist.”

We spend the next few minutes polishing off our tiny meals and slurping down our kid-sized drinks. Reed collects our trash and tosses it into a bin near the kids’ play area. I loved those slides when I was a child. I don’t think they could hold me now.

“I don’t know about you, but I could really go for a beer right now,” Reed says, plopping back down in his seat as he rubs his eyes and leans his head back.

“I could go for a few beers, and maybe a week’s worth of sleep,” I say.

He shakes with his gravely laugh before he sits up straight again, leaning with his elbow propped on our table, his hand covering his mouth and chin. Yeah, I admitted I’m tired. But who wouldn’t be. He stares into my eyes and blinks a few times before dropping his hand.

“I think I’ll go to the Cal game. I like the drive.” He likes making his opinion known on the sideline.

“You know, for the head coach of one of the country’s best high school football programs, you’re spending a lot of time away from the field this fall.”

He nods, his smirk the look of a man who won’t be detoured by my insistence that I am fine—that everything on the field is fine. Probably because it’s not.

“Coolidge is a well-oiled machine. I’m basically head coach by title, but more of an assistant nowadays. The staff stepped up the last couple of years, and they’ve got this season handled. Besides, I can’t miss my favorite college quarterback.”

“Which one?” I blurt out fast. I laugh it off as the joke it was meant to be, but Reed meets my stare and doesn’t crack. I shake my head and blink away, muttering, “Kidding.”

“No, you weren’t.”

I hold my tongue between my molars, my mouth curved with an irritated smile. An embarrassed smile. An ashamed expression. And the helplessness of this entire season—of Peyton’s situation—levels me all at once. A breathy laugh slips out as a lone tear gets through my guard, and I quickly wipe it away.

“Son, if you want to see her fight, she needs to see you do the same. That’s how it works when you love someone. You dig in when you’re going through the shit. It’s this relentless battle, and the one thing you know you can count on is that other half. You aren’t in it alone.”

“Fuck,” I utter, pinching the bridge of my nose as more tears threaten to fall.

“Yeah, fucked is right. That’s what this whole situation is. And that’s nobody’s fault. It’s not even Bryce’s fault. This wasn’t his plan from the start. It’s where his chips fell. This is what was left on the board to give him the best shot to keep going. And maybe he will. But you’re the one driving the bus, Wyatt. He’s a mere passenger. Don’t quit and give him the keys.”

I chew at my lip and let my eyes stare off at the brightly colored slides behind Reed, at the traffic whizzing by out the window, the ambulance bay across the street that has yet to be empty since we’ve been here. Everyone has their shit they’re going through.

“Your analogies are really on point today, you know that?” I huff out in a laugh.

He cracks a wide smile and stands up, offering me a hand.

“Thank you. Nolan’s not a fan, but I kind of like them. I learned from that character we were talking about earlier. You know, the one who puts on his Wyatt Stone jersey when he puts your game on the TV every Saturday.”

Reed isn’t making that up. I’ve seen Buck’s jersey. His wife has one, too. They’re all behind me, silently willing me on that field. I’m not big into prayer, but I feel theirs. I feel it extra hard lately.

I follow Reed out of the restaurant, and just before we reach the crosswalk to head back to the hospital, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the yellow Hot Wheel, handing it to me.

“Nah, trade’s a trade,” I say, patting my right pocket where the Corvette currently resides. Reed insists I take it, however. So I do.

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