For all his reputation for being a rule breaker on the pitch, Rico was, in fact, never stupid about which rules he broke. His father hadn’t had a chance to teach him much, but the one thing he had taught Rico was that you couldn’t win if you got thrown out for committing fouls. Staying in the game was a requirement for winning.
“Does that mean there’s no chance of you and Myra getting back together, then?” Zee asked, running his hand through his blond-highlighted hair, his very obvious worry tell.
“That would be hard given that she just got engaged to her new boyfriend. Apparently, he wasn’t emotionally unavailable.” To her credit, Myra had tried not to break up with Rico before the spate of surgeries started almost a year ago. But he hadn’t wanted her nursing him through sickness if she was done with him in health.
Zee gave him the kind of look only a happily-in-love person could give a single friend, especially one they believed had no idea what being in love felt like.
“So, on to the next relationship, then?” Zee said, meeting Rico’s gaze over his almost-empty glass. “Frederico Webster Silva and his string of lovely women, each one of whom has gone on to make someone else a lovely wife.”
“You sound like you’re trying to say something, mate. Blokes like you who have it all always have something to say about things you know nothing about.” Rico held up his club soda and clinked glasses with his friend.
“Hey, all I know is that you’re my best mate and you have no interest in playing the field. You’re an excellent boyfriend—my old woman’s words, not mine. I don’t understand what it is you’re waiting for.”
“I’m waiting for someone like Tanya who keeps the ball and chain tight without letting it chafe.”
Zee let out the deepest sigh any human should be allowed to sigh. Seriously, if all those rabid female fans saw him moon over Tanya, there would be a serious threat to the poor woman’s life.
“I do love my ball and chain.” Zee punched his phone screen and a sleepy “Baby? You all right?” came across the phone.
“Never all right without you, love. My mates are knobs. I want to be home, baby. Home with you, not here with these hairy, stinky bastards.” Then he dropped his voice. “All I want is to be buried deep inside you right now.”
Rico turned away and started scrolling through his phone, blocking out the lovestruck whispering.
“You can stop pretending to check your phone now, I’m done being a sop,” Zee said when he was done, and Rico had to smile.
“It’s okay. But only because Tanya deserves a sop like you,” he said less lightly than he’d intended.
Zee didn’t notice, lost as he was in his groom raptures. The general belief was that only brides went into a wedding haze, but men were worse. Where brides tended to get lost in the wedding details, Rico had noticed that men tended to get hit on the head by the idea of getting to hold on to the woman who made them come apart.
“I’m telling you, man. I want this for everyone. This single-minded need for a woman. No other shit in life comes close to this. You know what I mean?”
I know exactly what you mean.
It was a thought Rico hadn’t had in years. He didn’t allow himself to have it, ever.
Zee was wrong in thinking that no other shit came close. Rico had spent the last decade proving that a lot of shit came close.
It’s just that none of it came close enough.
Rico shifted in his seat. The immobility from his propped leg made him restless in a way he couldn’t explain. Restless in a way he hadn’t been in a very long time.
He reached for Zee’s drink. Not drinking had to be messing with his brain.
Zee, being Zee, moved the glass out of his reach. Not that Rico would have actually broken doctor’s orders and taken a sip, but it was good to have someone to nudge you back into place when you slipped.
“Bloody hell, I’m being an arse,” Zee said. “Here you are with Myra marrying someone else, and I won’t stop going on about things. Talk to her. She was really into you. It’s not like there was closure. You’re still friends. Maybe it’s not too late.”
Rico had to laugh at that. “This isn’t one of your Bollywood films. I’m not going to ride into her wedding on a horse and whisk her away. As a matter of fact, there was closure. That’s why we’re still friends.”
“You’re really not broken up about her marrying someone else, are you?” Zee looked abjectly disappointed, but Rico wasn’t sure if it was at not getting to witness the drama of a filmy reconciliation or at Rico’s inability to feel deeply enough.
“Myra’s exactly where she wants to be. And I want her to be happy.”
This was true. But Zee’s other assumption wasn’t. Rico would never admit it to Zee, or to anyone else, but Rico did, in fact, know exactly what Zee meant about single-minded need. Or he had once. Maybe pain receptors weren’t the only things that worked like jealous mirrors. Maybe pain wasn’t the only thing your brain refocused on when it was reminded of it.
Zee and Tanya had always dug up memories of something. Someone, rather. Someone who deserved neither the comparison nor the single-minded devotion Rico had felt.
Unfortunately, he’d been too young to choose how he reacted to her, and by the time she had proven herself unworthy of those feelings, it had been too late. Now here he was, relationship after relationship, unable to be that Rico again. The one who had no idea how to be emotionally unavailable.
She had taken that away from him. The reckless freedom of being emotionally available.
After all these years of doing all he could to wipe away his memories of her, the realization hit him like a body blow.
All he had succeeded in doing was building scabs, and blocking himself off emotionally. He was running around in a hamster wheel of his own making.
Closure.
The word ricocheted in his head, setting off a raging longing for relief.
He touched his knee, where throbbing pain wrapped tight on the outside even as it pushed from the inside, the brace holding everything in place until he was healed and ready to go on as normal. Maybe it was time to cut open another wound and sew that torn muscle together too. Regain the use of other parts he had lost.
Zee chugged what was left of his drink. His gaze bounced from the empty glass to Rico.
“There’s plenty more where that came from. Go on. I’m fine,” Rico said.
His friend studied him for another second, then opened and closed his mouth a few times. There was nothing he could say that Rico wanted to hear right now. Zee was smart enough to know this. He thumped Rico’s shoulder and headed to the bar.
The guys rushed at Zee and lifted him up above their heads, carrying him to the dance floor, where EDM boomed against the walls and broke into strobes of fluorescent light. They could have done this anywhere in the world. The wedding was in London, where Zee and Tee were from. But they had chosen to come to Vegas for the bachelor party.
Nevada was right next to California.
That could be a coincidence, but what was it they said about coincidences? That there weren’t any.
Rico leaned his head back and closed his eyes. The psychedelic lights continued to flash behind his lids. The pain on Myra’s face as she told him she was done with him danced there with the lights.