Page 62 of Sportsball is for Lovers

Sadie hands me a bowl and a set of chopsticks along with a fork.

“How do you feel about shrimp in lobster sauce?” she asks seriously.

I laugh. “I don’t keep kosher.”

“Cool. Me, neither.” She’s nonchalant about it. “It’s always kind of awkward bringing it up. Like, my family didn’t do it growing up, but whenever I’m with someone else that’s Jewish, I always wonder if they’re judging me if I’m Jewish enough.”

“I’m not judging you or anyone else.” I help myself to some sweet and sour pork, taking care to pick out some pineapple chunks. My favorite. “I know what you mean, though. I’m not religious. I don’t know the last time I went to temple, actually. But I’m still Jewish and I still identify with the culture. It’s such a big part of me.”

Sadie blinks a few times. “Yes. That’s it exactly.”

“It’s an ethnicity as well as a religion. People who aren’t part of it don’t get it.”

“They don’t,” she says quietly. “I’m working hard to cultivate friendships with other Jewish people as an adult, not just the kids I knew from camp growing up. Same as I try to cultivate friendships with other neurodivergent people and other romance writers. I want to surround myself with people like me.”

My stomach tumbles. “That sounds really nice. You can carve out a community for yourself.”

Her cheeks go pink. “So, um, how are you settling in? You like the job?”

“I’m enjoying it so far.” I didn’t get the Logistics Director temp job—that went to Vanessa—but someone else moved into her role, and I was brought on to cover theirs. “It’s similar to what I did before, yet still different enough to be a challenge.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t get it.”

“Get what?” I twirl some of the lo mein noodles around my chopsticks and succeed only in dropping them all over my shirt.

Smiling, Sadie passes me a napkin. “I mean, seeing you in real life… it’s hard to connect the nice guy with the Dom,” she says.

“I’m not that nice,” I tell her honestly.

She scoffs.

“I care more about bringing my partner pleasure than mine. It typically means putting my needs aside for theirs.” I shrug. “I don’t need to be in control. I just like it.”

She chews on her lip. “Your profile… it says you don’t want a relationship.”

“When I was traveling three-quarters of the year, I didn’t have the energy for a long-distance relationship,” I clarify. “I’m no longer traveling for work. I don’t know that I’ll get back in the broadcast studio anytime soon. More than that,” I stress, “I didn’t want to disappoint someone by being emotionally unavailable on top of being physically unavailable. That was too much.”

“You consider yourself emotionally unavailable?”

I shrug again. “Casual sex was always easier.”

“Oh.” She looks down.

“But—”

Sadie’s eyes dart to mine, then back to the floor.

“I’m in Boston for the long term,” I tell her. “I’ve decided I want to stay here. Unless I magically get my dream job somewhere else, I’m staying in town.”

“What’s your dream job?”

I chew my lip. “Promise you won’t laugh?”

She inhales sharply. “Promise.”

“I want to do studio analytics for the NHL,” I admit. “I don’t have a degree in statistics, my background is in journalism, but half those dudes don’t have the qualifications, either.”

“And that would be… where?”

“Jersey.”

“Oh.” She looks away.

“But this is a long-shot pipe dream,” I am quick to add. “And I—well, I don’t know that I’d ever get the opportunity to do it. If I had to pie-in-the-sky dream, though… that would be it. And it wouldn’t involve a lot of travel. It would be in-studio.”