My heart beat so hard I felt a little lightheaded, but I couldn’t wimp out now. This meant everything… everything to me. Placing the trophy back on its stand, I pulled the scrap of paper out of my pocket and looked out over the crowd.
“This is… wow. I should warn you now, I perform much better on the field.” Emotion welled up inside me and I inhaled a shuddering breath, but the gentle laughs from the crowd settled my nerves. “I want to thank my team first. At the beginning of the season we lost our captain, Lincoln Manella, and Coach Faulkner asked me to step up as captain.”
“Hell yeah, he did,” Asher yelled, and everyone chuckled again.
“The team didn’t only accept my leadership, they respected it. My O line: Gio, Klein, Macca, Treyvon, Austin, Louis, Paulie. Those guys have been unbelievable this season and I couldn’t have done it without them. All my teammates have supported me and made this possible. I want to thank my coaches for guiding me right and keeping me grounded. For imparting their knowledge and pushing me to work harder.” I gave an appreciative nod in the direction of Coach Faulkner and his team.
“I want to thank the team at Heisman for everything this weekend. For allowing me and my family to be here. It’s an honor to stand on the same stage with some of my childhood idols.” I glanced at the line of previous winners standing tall, all here to celebrate this moment. “I want to thank my dad, for pushing me to go harder, faster… for showing me what it takes to be the best. To my stepmom and sister, for being here today despite our history. My friends, my brothers in all the ways that matter, for always having my back. I’m so grateful. To the other finalists here tonight, it has been an incredible experience sharing our journeys and being in the company of such talent.”
Taking another deep breath, I steeled my spine. “Earlier in the season, someone suggested that I could be in the running for the Heisman Trophy, but I dismissed it. No way a kid out of a small town in Pennsylvania, playing for an Ivy League team, was going to end up here tonight. But here I am.” Another round of applause washed over me and I soaked it up. “So to anyone sitting at home, thinking it will never be them, that they will never make it… play harder, work harder… love harder, and the rest will follow.”
My hand slid into my dress slacks pocket, my body vibrating with restless energy. I felt like I’d been standing up there for an hour, not ten minutes. But there was still one person left to thank.
Rubbing a hand over my jaw, I forced down the wave of emotion threatening to bring me to my knees. “Before I say goodnight, there’s someone else I need to thank tonight.” My eyes found her down in the audience. “Two years ago, I believed the only way to get to the top was with rigid determination and narrowed focus. I won’t sugarcoat it; I was a bit of an arrogant ass. But then Felicity barreled into my life and showed me it didn’t have to be like that. Love doesn’t make us weak, it makes us strong. Football will always be the dream, always. But what’s a dream without a pretty girl by your side and a future laid out before you?”
I left the stand and walked along the far aisle to Felicity. Her eyes widened, filled with fresh tears. “J- Jason, what the hell are you doing?” She pressed a hand to her mouth as I dropped to one knee and presented her with the ring box I’d been carrying all evening.
“Felicity Charlotte Giles, you once permanently inked my stamp on your skin, but what I didn’t tell you that day was, you’re permanently tattooed on me too. You own me, babe. And I wasn’t kidding when I said we’re endgame.”
Mya and Hailee let out little shrieks of approval as I flipped the lid.
“So, what do you say, Giles? Want to really make this a night to remember and say yes to marrying me?” The words coiled through me, filling me with so much emotion I had to blink the tears right out of my eyes.
“You’re crazy.” She slid off her chair, kneeling with me.
“Crazy about you.” I grinned. “I know this season has been hard. I know the next two seasons will probably be equally as hard. But I thought that maybe if you’re wearing my number as well as my ring, it would help you remember that I’m all in, babe. I’m so fucking in.”
“Yes,” she cried. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”
I’d won a ring once. A championship ring in my senior year of high school. It had meant everything to me at the time; but this, right here, sliding the princess cut diamond band onto Felicity’s finger showed me it was nothing compared to this moment.
Because no matter where my football career took me; no matter if I entered the draft and landed a spot with an NFL team, it would be nothing without this girl by my side.
Football was the dream.
But Felicity?
She was my endgame.
Part II
Junior Year
Asher
“I can’t believe it’s junior year already,” Mya let out a small sigh as the six of us sat around the electric fire out on the terrace on the roof of our building. Summer was slowly retreating, giving way to the crisp mornings and cool evenings.
It had been a crazy year. Jason and Felicity had gotten engaged after he won the Heisman Trophy, seven months ago. Their relationship had only gotten stronger after he put that ridiculously big diamond on her finger. I couldn’t speak for Cameron, but I felt the pressure. We were still young—we still had two years of college left—but I wanted that.
I wanted to bind Mya to me in all the ways that mattered.
She’d rip me a new one though if I even tried to get down on one knee. She wanted us to enjoy life, to make the most of college and classes and football. If anything, I was the Flick in our relationship; wondering when this smart, gorgeous, humble girl was going to slip through my fingers. But I wasn’t about to confess that to her or my friends, so I pulled her closer and kissed her hair, reminding myself of how fucking lucky I was.
“You ready for another season?” I asked Jase.
“You know it.”
It had been a summer of football camps, some time visiting my folks and Mya’s aunt back in Rixon, and a week at the Hamptons.
“You think the Wolverines can go all the way this season?” I asked Cam.
He gave me a half-shrug. “Who knows?”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“Ash,” Hailee warned, and I frowned.
What the hell was happening right now?
“Xander got upset when we left,” Cam blew out a long breath, running a hand down his face. “He said some things.”
“Shit, man, I didn’t realize.” Xander was almost seven and he adored his older brother to the point where he struggled with Cam being away so much.
“It’s just hard, ya know? I want to be there for him, but I’m not always going to be around.”
“It’s not your fault.” Hailee rubbed his arm.
“Sorry for being a dick.” I apologized.
“Nah, it’s not you, it’s me,” he murmured.
Being an only child, I didn’t get what it felt like to carry the responsibility of a sibling, especially a little kid who had already been through so much.