* * *
Harlan: How can you tell?
* * *
Katie: You never answer.
* * *
Harlan: Ha, you’re astute.
* * *
Katie: You just say thank you. Nothing more.
* * *
Harlan: I don’t know what else to say.
* * *
Katie: You’re really torn, aren’t you?
* * *
Harlan: I am. Completely.
It feels good to tell her, to unburden myself of some of these thoughts, so I keep going.
Harlan: I don’t want to give up the game, but I also don’t know what makes sense for life beyond football.
* * *
Katie: You could open a foosball and ice cream shop.
I laugh as I type.
Harlan: I’ll mention that to my agent. I’m heading to see her now. She asked if I was going to open a pie shop like my mom. What do you see me doing?
* * *
Katie: Whatever makes you happy :)
* * *
Harlan: Good answer.
When I reach my agent’s office, I don’t know that I’m any closer to deciding, but I feel better after talking to Katie.
Harlan: I’ll see you tomorrow for our session. I promise I won’t steal any more kisses.
She sends me a sad face.
“Beat you,” Jason calls out from one hundred feet in front of me the next morning.
“I let you beat me,” I shout as we make our way down the winding hills at the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge, headed toward Crissy Field by the bay.
He slows to a walk, and I catch up with him, having finished our four-mile sunrise run.
“So, you let me beat you? That’s how you’re spinning this?” he fires back.
“Kiddo, I give it all on the field, so I don’t need to beat your young ass on a weekday jog.”
His brow knits. “Dammit. You have a good point there.”
“I usually do.”
We pass early morning exercisers spread out on the fields—boot campers doing burpees, serene groups of older men and woman swaying through tai chi moves, and then a pack of fit twenty-somethings just . . . shaking their hips.
What the hell are they doing?
I peer more closely as the attendees bend and pick up hula hoops from the grass. “Ah, a hula hoop class,” I say, then tilt my head when one of the gals in the class drops a quick kiss onto her neighbor’s cheek.
“Looks like a workout date too,” Jason adds as we walk past them.
“Speaking of, how was yours from the other week? Anything come of it?”
He shrugs. “We went out a couple times, but I dunno. There wasn’t a spark. Not the kind I want. Know what I mean?”
I picture Katie and our yoga sessions. The fire that flames between us. I chuckle knowingly. “I do know what you mean. Very much so.”
Jason turns to face me. “Spoken from experience?”
I don’t need to blab. I’ve got to protect my woman. But Jason’s a cool guy, and he doesn’t know Katie. He plays for the other team, so he’s not her yoga student. “Yeah, the woman I was supposed to go out with a couple weeks ago. Didn’t quite happen, but it’s still awesome.” Even without naming her, that feels good to admit.
“Wait. You were supposed to go out with her, but it didn’t happen, so how can you say you’re sparking and it’s great? I’m a little confused.”
I’m not sure I can untangle it for him or anyone yet. “Let’s just say it’s complicated. She’s someone I, well, I work out with.”
He cracks up, grabbing his belly. When he collects himself, he says, “I told you workout dates were great.”
“I suppose you did. I suppose that’s what we’re doing,” I say, and talking to a friend about what’s happening feels fantastic.
Holy hell, I want to tell him more. I want to tell everyone about Katie.
Not yet, of course. Not today.
But soon.
I want to go out with her, to paint the town red, to take her dancing at the 80s club. I want to shop for crazy costume parties at Daisy’s Duds, and, hell, to take her to the playground with my kid.
I stop in my tracks, struck dumb by a realization.
I’m thirty-six, and I’m pretty sure I’ve never fallen this hard for a woman before.
“Wow,” I mutter, awed by the awareness of what’s happening to me.
“You okay, man?”
I shake my head like a dog shaking off water, trying to collect myself. “I’m great, actually. I just realized something kind of mind-boggling.”
A sly smile spreads across his face. “And are you going to tell her you’re falling ass over biceps, triceps, and delts for her?”
I jerk my gaze to the relationship expert by my side. “How are you so wise at twenty-five?”
“It comes with my good looks,” he says with a wink. “Also, maybe don’t wait too long.”
That’s excellent advice.
Later that day at her studio, as Katie and I work on variations of the warrior pose, I ask her, “How are you feeling about . . .?” I point from her to me.
She shoots me a sassy smile. “Am I still hot for you, do you mean?”
“No, I consider that a given.”
“So cocky.”
“And you should take it as a fact that I’m still hot for you. I meant are you still feeling okay about our plans?”
As I stretch my arms ceilingward, she answers, “Yes. I’ve been checking out other teachers, visiting their classes, working on some suggestions for replacements.”
She tells me more about what she’s been up to as we move through other poses then drop to the floor, stretching side by side on our backs.
I flash back to Jason’s words from this morning. Don’t wait too long.
I don’t want to wait any longer, but I don’t want to pressure her either. Hell, I feel the pressure from my team, and it’s no fun, so I don’t want to do that to Katie. But I can let her know where I’m at in other ways. “I wish time would speed up,” I say, turning my gaze to her as I stretch.
“Me too,” she whispers, sounding sexy and hopeful at the same time.
“What do you want to do first?” It’s wild, secretly planning this romance we’ll have when our careers are no longer in the way. “Every time we’ve planned a date, it’s fallen through.”
She wiggles her brow. “Then we won’t plan a typical date. No foosball and dinner. No bowling and ice cream.”
“We have no luck when we plan like that,” I agree.
She takes a beat, reaching her arms high over her head on the mat. “I think you should just come over the night you win the Super Bowl.”