Page 4 of Hometown Touchdown
I take it all in like I’ve never seen it before. Same white furniture. Same pale blue walls. My crooked homecoming queen crown still perched on the dresser next to a stack of playbills from musicals I took way too seriously. God. It’s like a museum exhibit: Brynn Marlow—High School Golden Girl, Frozen in Time. I walk over and plop the crown onto the messy knot at the top of my head. A coronation of chaos. Knox had been my homecoming king. We slow danced under the bleachers after the game, him whispering that we were going to be together forever. Plot twist: forever didn’t last.
I rip the crown off and chuck it onto the bed, where it lands with a sad little thunk. Unpacking feels pointless. I’m supposed to tour apartments tomorrow, but I needed a distraction. Something other than wallowing in the fact that I didn’t return to Cedar Falls, Virginia for a fresh start or nostalgia. I came back because my life in Seattle crumbled faster than a store-brand granola bar. I didn’t just leave the city—I fled it.
“Sweetheart?” My mom’s voice floats in from the hallway. I jolt like I’ve been caught mid-heist. She stands in the doorway, calmly surveying the wreckage with that trademark mom expression, part amusement, part concern. She’s seen worse. She raised me during my eyeliner-as-eyeshadow phase after all.
“I was just...reminiscing,” I lie, yanking a hoodie off the floor like it’s contraband.
She doesn’t comment. Just smiles softly. “Dinner’ll be ready in a few. How are things going in here?”
I nod, the kind of nod that’s basically a shrug in a trench coat. When Henry—my almost-husband—called off the wedding three weeks before the big day, I held it together long enough to cancel the florist and return the monogrammed napkins. Then I crashed. Full-on breakdown, ugly crying into my phone in a grocery store parking lot, leaving a sobbing voicemail for my mom. She didn’t ask questions. She just said, “Honey, come home.” So I did. Now I’m twenty-seven, sitting in a room that still smells faintly of warm vanilla sugar body spray and teenage delusion.
“Things are...going,” I say, tugging the hem of my sweatshirt. “I think I’m on track to break a world record for how fast a grown woman can regress into her teenage self.” She walks in and wraps me in a hug. I let her. I’m too tired to pretend I don’t need it. It’s the kind of hug that says, I know you’re hurting, and I’ll hold you up until you can stand on your own again.
“You can stay as long as you need,” she murmurs, smoothing my hair like she always does when I need calm energy.
“Thanks, Mom.” I pull back and manage a half-smile. “I’ll be down in a minute. Just want to wash up.”
“Don’t be long,” she says, stepping over a pair of leggings like a gymnast. “Mashed potatoes don’t wait.” God bless her and her emotional support carbs.
Downstairs smells like meatloaf and rosemary. Like comfort and routine and the illusion that life is still manageable. I wander into the kitchen and glance at the clock. 4:07 p.m.
“Okay, why are we eating dinner so early?” I ask, swiping a roll off the counter like a raccoon at a picnic. “Is this what retirement looks like? Dinner and Jeopardy before five?”
Dad chuckles from his seat at the table. “It’s Friday. Game night.”
“Youstillgo to the football games?” I raise a brow as Mom hands me a plate.
“It’s a small town. Not much else to do. Besides, we thought it’d be good for you to get out.”
“Nope. No way. I am not emotionally stable enough to socialize with people who knew me when I had braces and a Lisa Frank planner,” I say, attacking my roll like it’s to blame for my personal history. “You can’t just throw me to the wolves.”
“You’ll thank me later,” she singsongs, practically glowing from the success of her ambush.
“She’s right,” Dad chimes in. “You can’t hide in your room forever.”
I glare at them both. “Traitors.” They just smile like they’re proud of their mutiny. Mom sips her iced tea, Dad stuffs a fork-full of green beans in his mouth. An unshakeable alliance.
“Fine,” I grumble. “I’ll go. But I’m not wearing makeup. Or a bra.”
“Deal,” Mom says. “But please wear a bra. Decency, sweetheart.”
Chapter two
Knox
Thecrowdroarslikewe just ran it in from fifty yards out, but all I see is another incomplete pass spiraling through the air like a dying bird. Another wasted third down. Another missed block. Another crack in the damn foundation that refuses to hold no matter how hard I try to patch it.
“Plant your feet, Dylan!” I bark, sharper than I mean to. The poor kid flinches, and immediately, the guilt creeps in. But I’m tired. Last season we won one game. This season isn’t starting off any better. We’re two games in with zero wins to show for it,and my patience is held together by little more than caffeine and spite.
The air has that particular Cedar Falls bite—the late September chill subtly setting in. The smell of wet leaves hangs in the air, mingling with a faint drift of kettle corn from the concession stand and the metallic tang of sweat and turf. Nothing on this field has changed. The bleachers are still rickety. The scoreboard still skips the number eight. Same band half a beat behind but giving it their all.
Same town. Same script. Coach Knox Dalton. Gruff. Unapproachable. Focused. Alone.
I scan the stands out of habit. Half out of routine, half hoping to find a spark of something that might shake the dust off this tired night. It’s all the usual suspects: cheer moms in fleece jackets, dads shouting like their fantasy football leagues depend on it, and teens sneaking sips of something out of suspicious thermoses. I almost turn away.
But then—top row, just past the glare of the stadium lights—there’s a figure that makes my breath catch.
I blink. Squint. No way.
