Old Fashioned - Becker Brothers

“Time to get focused, Coach,” Elijah Braxton said from behind me, clapping me on the shoulder with a knowing look, like he could see I was a mess.

We’d been allowed to bring more people onto the field than we needed, and he’d been one of the fans we’d invited to be on the sideline with us. He was helping in whatever ways he could, getting water for the guys and helping run warm-ups, but for the most part, he stayed out of the way, watching.

And when he looked at me, looked at Sydney, and then gave me a knowing, sympathetic smile — my heart burned like a dying star.

I glanced at Sydney then, and our eyes met for one brief second before I jogged out onto the field for the coin toss.

In that one moment, we seemed to say a thousand things.

But I couldn’t understand a single one of them.

I heard Eli’s words like bell tolls in my ears when the coin was tossed and our players lined the field for kickoff. And with all the effort I had left, I shoved everything out of my head that wasn’t football. It was a skill I’d practiced and perfected when I was younger, when Dad had died and I was trying to figure out how to take care of Mom and be there for my brothers and somehow still get my career as a coach off the ground, too.

It was a numb state of mind, one that felt like I was floating underwater, or like being tethered to the Earth but suspended in outer space.

Somehow, I slipped back into that zone for the next hour and a half, and I didn’t emerge from it again until we were jogging into the locker room at halftime.

We were down by a touchdown.

I had to figure out a way to get my boys back on track, to get them fired up, to get this win.

So, I put on my game face and walked into a silent locker room with all eyes on me, waiting.

It was when I locked gazes with a pair of almond brown ones that I found the strength to speak.SydneyIf I looked at the facts alone, I was still alive.

I was still breathing, inhaling oxygen and exhaling carbon dioxide, and it had been like that all week long. I was still waking up each morning — though I wasn’t sure it counted as waking up if I hadn’t ever fallen asleep — and I was still getting Paige ready for school, and going to work, and coming home, and making dinner, and hanging out with her until bedtime, and then climbing into bed myself just to do it all over again.

I was showing up.

I was holding it together.

I was alive.

Those were the facts.

But if I broke it down to the molecular level, it was all a lie.

No one saw the tears I drowned in every time I took a shower, but that didn’t mean they didn’t happen. No one saw the hollowness I felt in my chest, or the ache that ripped through me as my heart broke every time I laid eyes on Jordan — but they were there, regardless.

My past had trained me to put on a warrior face, to stand tall and strong no matter what, and I was doing just that.

But inside, I was crumbling.

The week I’d spent without Jordan since that wedding had been nothing but a numb blur of daily tasks and motions that convinced me I was going to be okay. I told myself that the more time that passed, the less it would hurt, and one day, it wouldn’t hurt at all.

That felt like a lie, too.

To his credit, Jordan hadn’t reached out to me. He hadn’t texted me or called me or asked for anything from me at all. It was the right thing to do — a clean break.

But it was the last thing I wanted.

Every time he walked into his office, I wanted to walk in right behind him, shut the door, and leap into his arms. Every time I stood next to him on the field, I wanted to lace my fingers with his, tell him I was sorry, that I loved him, that I wanted to be with him. Every time our eyes caught, I looked away as fast as I could, but every cell inside me begged to keep his gaze.

I wanted him. I wanted us.

But I knew deep down that I couldn’t give him what he needed.

It was more than just the fight we’d had in the garden Saturday night. It was true that I couldn’t testify against my ex-husband, that I couldn’t be what Jordan wanted me to be when it came to finding justice for his father. There was too much at stake — my daughter, my safety, our future.