He deserved all of it. He had motivated me to follow my own heart, even if my dream was about one-hundredth the size of his. But if every person weighed their dream against someone else’s, nobody would ever dream at all.

Anyway, other than a text from Boogie about him possibly coming to visit when my sister was here, I hadn’t thought much about it—okay, Zac—since.

So the last thing I freaking expected was for him to text me.

And that was exactly when another message came through.

512-555-0199: Zac, peewee

Did he think I’d forgotten who Snack Pack was? The thing was, I hadn’t had his number in my phone in probably five years, if not longer. I’d dropped my cell in the toilet and had to start all over again with my contacts. I sure as hell hadn’t been about to ask my cousin for his number. There hadn’t been a need for it.

I made sure no one was paying attention to me and texted him back. I might not get a response but… it wouldn’t be the first time, and at least I’d know I had tried. It was my choice, and I knew the worst that would happen: I wouldn’t hear from him again.

Been there, done that, and I had the bumper sticker.

Plus, I still felt like an asshole, and I hated knowing I’d acted that way. I’d thought I was better than that. And I just wanted to know that I had always tried. Unlike him.

Me: Hi Zac

There we go. That wasn’t needy or inconvenient or too familiar.

My phone vibrated a minute later, and if my heart skipped a tiny beat, well, it was dumb, and I didn’t need to be paying attention to it anyway.

512-555-0199: Hi darlin

512-555-0199: You free after work?

I didn’t know what it said about me that I noticed he used “darlin’” enough so that it was saved on his phone instead of “darling.”

Most importantly though, how did he know I was at work? And now that I thought about it, had he had my number or had he asked Boogie for it?

You know what? I didn’t need either of those questions answered.

Because regardless, it had taken ten years for him to remember I existed.

But at least this time, I was prepared for what could happen next. It wouldn’t be a shock to my system again. I knew where I stood, and that would be the difference between now and before.

Mostly though, I didn’t want to be a jerk.

Me: Yes. [smiley face emoji] Need something?

That was good, right? I thought so. Hoped so. Maybe a little cold and blah, but oh well.

He replied five minutes later, but it took me twenty more minutes after that to read it because someone came in and signed up for a month-to-month membership.

512-555-0199: I just wanna see you if you have time for me.

Okay. So he wanted to catch up? All right. I hadn’t been very nice to him, but he was still trying, which was so like him—or at least how he used to be. And that made me feel a little worse.

But….

He was asking for it, not me. The fact was: I didn’t cry myself to sleep at night because he’d stopped caring about me. And if he wanted to come back into my life, even if it was just for a couple of hours?

That was all right too.

Expectations.

And he loved my cousin. And maybe I’d see him again during Boogie’s wedding. Might as well get used to the idea.

I peeked again to make sure the coast was clear and replied.

Me: I get off at 4. Let me know when you’re free. [smiley face emoji] No pressure.

No pressure. A smiley face. Passive-aggressive much?

It took three minutes to get a response.

512-555-0199: Come over when you get off work.

What?

Me: Today?

512-555-0199: Yeah

Yeah.

For one brief second, I thought about all the things I needed to do at home. Laundry for sure. Meal prep for a couple of days. Respond to some emails. And brainstorm some more ideas for upcoming recipes. Watch another episode or two of the Turkish show I was hooked on….

But an image of Mamá Lupe settled into my brain right then—specifically an image of Zac standing beside her on his twenty-first birthday with his arm over her shoulders, slouched over so much that his cheek rested on her head. She had loved the hell out of him.

And I knew what she would want me to do.

I also knew what would keep me up at night and what wouldn’t.

Shit balls.

Four hours later, I was pulling up to a house that looked even bigger without three hundred cars parked in the driveway and in front of the street. There were cars in the driveway but only two, a newish Mercedes and a red Jeep.

Parking on the street after pulling a U-turn, I headed up the pathway and shot off a text to Zac letting him know I was there. I wasn’t nervous. My stomach didn’t hurt in any way either. I’d had hours to come to terms with the fact that I was going to hang out with him—as in physically drive to his house and spend some time with him one-on-one. Because he’d asked me to.

And I was planning on apologizing for how I’d acted.

Okay, maybe I was a little nervous, but just a little.

And really, my nerves came from me not wanting to talk about certain things. But that was it.

At the door, I rang the doorbell and waited, glancing down to see if he’d replied; he hadn’t. But not even thirty seconds later, someone approached the glass and iron door. Someone that couldn’t be Zac from how much shorter and beefier he seemed to be built.

I remembered during his days in Dallas, he had lived with some big-name player for a couple years. Toward the end of that living situation was when he’d been released from that team, the Three Hundreds. Boogie had told me he’d struggled during that time a lot; that had been when he had been working in London long-term. It had been before Zac had been picked up to play in Oklahoma.

The door swung open, and the guy who had called Zac’s phone, the one with the bleached, platinum blond dreadlocks, stood there, dark eyebrows already up and aimed at me.

I lifted my hand and offered him a smile, a real one. “Hi again.” I held my hand out. “I’m Bianca.”

The muscular guy looked down at my hand. He looked at it for so long I was more than halfway expecting him to just keep on looking at it, but he finally took it, giving it the slowest shake as he said, in the deepest voice I’d probably ever heard other than on those insurance commercials, “CJ.”

CJ, right. “Is Zac here?”

“He’s upstairs.”

My phone pinged at that exact moment, and I looked down to see it was a message.

512-555-0199: Gimme 5. Sorry.

I showed him the screen—regretting for a second that I hadn’t saved his phone number and more than likely wasn’t going to—when I glanced back up at him and found him still looking at me funny. “He said he’ll be done in five minutes. Can I wait for him inside? Mosquitoes really like me.”

CJ nodded, his expression still careful and almost wary, but he stepped aside.

I went in, taking in how clean the place was, and waited for who I was pretty sure was a football player too to head back into the main part of the house before I followed after him, taking everything in now that I wasn’t looking through a mass of people for Zac to give him bad news.

Sure enough, the house was just as bare as I remembered.

There was only the most basic of furniture. Nothing on the walls. It was all so… vanilla. And so unlike Zac and his hoarder ways from what I could remember. His car had been a mess. Then again, this was probably just a rental he was sharing during the off-season, so why would it have personal touches in it?