Page 26 of Sportsball is for Lovers

nine

. . .

Sadie

When I wake up,it takes a moment to remember where I am. Yoni’s snuffling snores in the bed across from mine, though, quickly tell me.

Even though it’s ass o’clock in the morning, I start the process of getting ready with a face mask and restyling my obnoxiously flat waves that I wish were curls before sitting at my computer and working on today’s project. I finished a book last month and I’m already knee-deep in the next. It never ends. Not that I’d want it to.

I have three weeks to get my next book to Lu for initial feedback and I’m not nearly where I should be with the draft. Just because I can crank out 50,000 words in a week doesn’t mean I should. Or even that I want to.

Self-preservation is not a life skill I possess. Luckily, Yoni keeps me on task.

Sometimes.

Mostly.

He tries, at least. Sometimes my force of will is more effective than his, though.

My character is a happy-go-lucky golden retriever hockey player giving the grumpy equipment manager a blowjob in the locker room. As I try to focus on blond-haired, green-eyed Dane and his hunky enemy-slash-love-interest, though, a different image unravels in my mind’s eye.

Instead of the locker room, I see a swanky hotel room. Instead of the equipment manager, I see a husky, hunky guy with dark hair and eyes and a glucose monitor on his arm.

And instead of the hockey player on his knees, it’s me.

What is the coincidence that Yoni’s brother Jared is the same guy J who fucked me to oblivion—not once, but on two separate occasions?

My assistant talks about his brother all the time. Despite living halfway across the country from one another, he and Jared are close. Much more than I am with any of my sisters—or even all three of them, combined.

Jared kept his distance last night. It makes sense. He was there to see his brother. Not me. Definitely not me.

I don’t think it was an unpleasant surprise for him, though. It certainly wasn’t for me.

Yoni’s alarm goes off, shattering my concentration. I’ve accomplished negative seventeen words today.

Not the best. Certainly not my worst performance of late.

Closing my computer, I continue getting ready for the day ahead. By the time we get downstairs for breakfast an hour later, I’m in an entirely different mindset, and after my coffee and bagel, I’m good to go.

Yoni flutters around me, setting up the table and making sure things are just right. This is what he excels at. I don’t have the eye for aesthetically-pleasing tablescapes.

Just ask my seventh grade etiquette teacher, Mr. Benjamin. In the multi-purpose room of the local YMCA, he taught our entire class—both boys and girls—how to dance a few basic steps, set a table, arrange a bouquet, navigate formal dining situations, and more. Mostly, what he taught me is the old-fashioned kind of heteronormative etiquette bullshit that I rail against. At the same time, I can admit I need to know the rules in order to break them and declare them toxic as fuck.

Which I do. With great pleasure.

Except for setting the table. I have very strong opinions on which side of the plate the fork goes, mainly because my grandmother always insists on putting it in the wrong place. Then again… pretty much everything Myrna does drives me crazy.

Family. Can’t live with them, can’t live without remembering all the trauma they inflicted.

As if on cue, Yoni’s brother appears. To my surprise, he’s holding a tray with three coffees.

“Good morning,” he says with a roughness to his voice that reminds me of his early morning just-fucked voice. My face heats at the memory of our lazy morning in bed in Boston almost six weeks ago.

Did he get laid last night?

I have no claim on him. So why does the idea of him hooking up with another person bother me?

“Morning,” Yoni says. “Thanks for grabbing extra coffee. I haven’t had a chance to get away.”