Love Like Champions

The Eagles Won

The next minute might have been the longest in the history of sports. The Patriots got the kickoff. They messed up on a few plays, but managed to move the ball to midfield. With each yard they gained, she felt Adam tremble a bit more, doubt and dread creeping into him with every play. She held him a little closer, as if to protect him from it. She wanted him to believe as strongly as she did.

Finally, it all came down to one play. With 9 seconds left and no timeouts, it was down to a final Hail Mary to the end zone.

“This is it,” Darla told him. “This is the last play of the game.”

“Please, be right,” Adam said. “I want you to be right…so much.”

“I know.”

“No…I don’t think you do.”

Darla cast her lover a strange glance, but didn’t have time to scrutinize it. The play was about to go off. As soon as the Patriots snapped the ball, time seemed to move in slow-motion.

For a moment, it looked like Brady would get sacked. She sensed Adam wanting to shoot up and cheer. That didn’t happen, though. He managed to escape, as he always did, and got the throw off. At that moment, Darla almost felt her heart crack again.

“Not this time,” she said in defiance.

She and Adam watched, like a couple of deer looking at an oncoming train. The ball hung up in the air for an eternity. The game clock now read zero. It all came down to this.

Finally, in an instant, it actually happened. The ball hit the ground. The pass was incomplete. The game was over and the Philadelphia Eagles were Super Bowl champions.

“YES! THEY DID IT! THEY REALLY FUCKING DID IT!” Adam exclaimed.

“THEY WON! OH MY GOD! THE EAGLES WON!” Darla exclaimed.

In a moment of pure, unadulterated elation, Darla and Adam cheered with the rest of Philadelphia. They jumped up from the couch and hugged, as though they’d just won the lottery. Earlier that year, winning the lottery seemed more likely than seeing the Eagles win their first ever Super Bowl. After only knowing disappointment for so long, Eagles fans like her and Adam could finally say that they won.

They kept wildly hugging each other and cheering, watching as the confetti fell on their favorite team. They didn’t care that they knocked over some empty beer bottles and crumbled up bags of chips. Their team had won. For once, she and Adam knew what it felt like for their favorite team to be a Super Bowl champion.

At one point after all the cheering, they settled down enough to face each other. Adam hadn’t let go of her since before the fumble. She hadn’t let go of him either, still clinging to his favorite jersey. Now, in this moment of pure elation, they looked at each other with a sense of both shock and triumph.

“You were right, babe. You were right,” Adam said.

“Yeah, I guess I was,” Darla said with a smug grin.

“You really have no idea how much I wanted the Eagles to win this…to finally see them win a championship.”

“You don’t need to tell me. I know you’re a bigger Eagles fan than I’ll ever be, Adam. You deserve to run down Broad Street and cheer with other fans like you.”

“See, that’s just it,” he said in a more serious tone. “I wasn’t planning on doing that. My buddies at the office all had elaborate plans for how they would celebrate if they won, but I wanted no part of it. I knew if this actually happened…if the Eagles actually won…this is where I’d want to be.”