Wrong Quarterback | ✓

bonus chapter | surprise, surprise

FIVE YEARS LATER

Panting, Avery falls back against the wall—welcoming the chill of the AC. Her chest rises and falls with her heavy breaths; it seems every time she decides to go on a run around here she forgets just how steep some of this godforsaken city's hills really are.

    She likes San Francisco, she does, a lot. With its cute cable cars, the heavenly to-die-for chai lattes from the coffee shop three blocks away and especially the city's two The Reformation stores housing every sundress a girl could ever dream of—but she could do without the hills.

    Drawing in a deep breath, she pushes her hands through her hair. Barely reaching her collarbone, the blonde strands curl slightly at their edges where they brush against her skin. Still, even though it's been at least a month since she wandered into a hair-salon on a whim, she's surprised to find her once long locks gone. But she likes it, and the fact that only a couple of strokes with her hairbrush is enough to style it in the morning is an appreciated bonus.

    Her body protests at the small movement, an ache blossoming at the left side of her ribcage; maybe going out on a 6.5 mile run after spending the past five hours on a poorly air-conditioned airplane had been pushing herself a little bit too hard, but she had been too restless upon arriving to simply just sit here.

    Besides, the past year she's learnt there is no better way to throw her brain off the three hour time difference than to get her body moving. It tends to help with all the back and forth. Once she has washed the sweat—and the lingering, probably imagined, stench of airplane—off, she'll be glad she braved the city's terrain in this suffocating mid-spring heat.

    The early afternoon sun slips through the windows, casting their apartment in a honey-yellow glow. Its rays sprawl over the cream colored cushions of the couch, pooling in shadows upon the fuzzy rug, reflecting in the frames of the few photographs stood on the bureau lining the wall between the kitchen and the living room.

    Technically, it's Ethan's apartment—but it's come to feel like home to her too.

    She has her own. A two-roomer, just a few blocks off Main Street in the heart of Acebridge, with a comfortable enough commute to Raleigh and her job as an editorial assistant. Of course, she could've avoided the commute all together but after having spent four years living in both Chapel Hill and Durham with Ethan and Jake, she'd longed for her coastal town. And so, she doesn't mind the drive much. Especially not since Callie's just around the corner, sort of, from her. It's a win-win, really.

    Well, apart from the fact that Ethan is a five hour plane ride—and three hour time difference—away, that is. The first few months living so far apart had been harder than she'd imagined, going from breathing down each other's necks to only being able to see each other every few weeks, but they make it work. And now, as they've spent nearly a year in this new life of theirs, it's easier.

    There are still difficult days; sometimes she finds herself curled up on Callie's kitchen floor, cursing practice schedules and time-differences and her too-good-to-pass-up editorial job, but the good days outweigh the bad ones. They make it work.

♡♡♡

An hour later she's stood in the kitchen, fingers tapping against the black marble of the counter. Glancing at the digital clock on the stove, she purses her lips in thought, trying to think back to Ethan's schedule for this month. Shouldn't he have gotten home already?

    Weird. He usually calls her when he's on his way back to his apartment.

    She uncorks a bottle of red wine, throwing another glance at the time—mid-afternoon is okay for wine, right?—as she pours herself a glass. She takes another one out for Ethan, leaving it stood empty on the counter as she sinks into a seat at the kitchen table.