Chapter 48

I was cringing even before opening my eyes the following morning. Oh Jesus, this was what a hangover felt like. Now I remembered them. Obviously able to tell that I was awake, I felt Sidney’s arms tighten around me and pull me into him. I let out a half groan half growl at the nausea that simple move caused. Along with that came the headache and terrible cottonmouth.

“Are you okay?” he asked, shifting himself up on the bed to look down at me. I made another inaudible sound as I pulled my knees up to my chest. I heard him laugh at me.

“It’s not funny,” I grumbled.

“How much did you drink yesterday anyway?” he questioned.

“I don’t know, but I thought I was regulating myself pretty well. I failed to factor in the fact that I haven’t had more than one drink at a time in over 7 months,” I responded.

“Why don’t you get up and I’ll get you some water and breakfast,” he suggested. I covered my mouth with my hand.

“Do not mention food right now,” I muttered through my hand. He chuckled and I felt him get up off the bed.

“I’ll be downstairs whenever you decide to get up.”

I finally opened my eyes to watch him walk out of the bedroom. Then I pulled the comforter over my head and closed them again. I didn’t fall back to sleep, but I was not at all ready to move yet. Slowly the nausea faded enough that I felt like I could get up and get something for my headache.

I cursed as I wobbled on my feet when I stood up and swore that I was never drinking again. I laughed at myself when I realized how often I’d made that promise over the years. I took something for my head and chugged down a glass of water with it before changing into yoga pants and a sweatshirt. I threw my hair into a messy bun and made my way downstairs. I needed hangover food and I needed it badly.

“I could go for some really greasy homefries right now!” I called out as I entered the kitchen.

I expected to see Sidney sitting in there reading the paper like he did every other morning he didn’t have practice or a game. He was nowhere in sight and I called out to him again. I didn’t get an answer and I wondered if he’d gone somewhere so I opened the door to the garage. His car was still there so he was around here somewhere. Just as I was about to close the door I could hear voices carry into the garage from outside.

I closed the door and made my way down the hallway to the front door. I opened it to see who Sidney was talking to. I’d put on a smile to greet whoever it was, but it faded when I saw who was standing there. What the hell would make Tamara wear a skin tight, low cut dress this early in the day? After a moment Tamara stopped talking and looked up at me. Sidney turned around and smiled when he saw me.

“You finally decided to join the living?” he asked. I narrowed my eyes at him.

“Hey, not fair to make fun of the birthday girl,” I shot back. “Hi, Tamara.”

“Hi,” she responded coolly. I fought the urge to roll my eyes at her.

“So what’s going on?” I asked.

“Tamara was just asking me if she could interview me for a school project,” Sidney replied. Well that explained the dress, I thought sarcastically.

“Oh yeah? What for?” I half thought the request was a lie, so I wanted details. If she couldn’t provide them, I would know.

“It’s kind of an open ended project. We could pick any topic we wanted as long as it was health related. I thought about doing the impact of injuries in athletes,” she explained. What, Pitt didn’t have enough athletes for her to interview?

“I see. Are you going to do it?” I asked turning to Sidney. I could see he felt a little stuck in the middle.

“Yeah, I guess. I mean, it’s for school, right?” I gritted my teeth in annoyance. I wasn’t at all convinced of that.

“You could come to my dorm room whenever you had some free time,” Tamara suggested. My eyes widened in surprise. That fucking bitch.

“A dorm? I’m not really sure it’s a good idea for me to be someplace that public and confined,” Sidney declined. Good boy. “We could just do it here at the house after one of my practices.”

Tamara agreed and I smiled at Sidney. That meant I’d be around to make sure she didn’t try anything. After that was over I walked inside followed by Sidney. I spun around on him once the door was shut and he threw his head back and sighed, knowing exactly what was coming.

“Really, Sidney? Really?” He threw his hands in the air.

“It’s for a class, Tanner. What do you want me to do?” he asked.

“Did she have to dress like that to ask you? God, it’s like she wants to pretend I don’t even exist!” I exclaimed. He walked over to me and pulled me into him.

“Come on, it’s day two of your birthday. Just forget about her and enjoy the rest of the day, okay?” I nodded and pulled away.

“I want homefries.” He laughed at me and grabbed his car keys.

We made our way to a small breakfast and lunch only place where we sat at a corner table and ate. When we were done we headed straight to the zoo. We spent the afternoon walking around talking and watching the animals. Especially the polar bears. When we left Sidney looked over at me and smiled.

“I need you to do something for me,” he said. I looked back at him suspiciously.

“What?” I asked.

“Open the glove compartment and take out the blindfold. Then blindfold yourself,” he ordered. My jaw dropped.

“Are you kidding me right now? No way!”

“Just do it,” he demanded. “Trust me.”

I gave in and took it out and blindfolded myself. Then Sidney started the car and began to drive. Despite trying to gauge where we were headed I was completely lost. After what felt like forever Sidney stopped the car and told me not to move. I heard him get out and then heard my door open. He took my hand and helped me out of the car. I followed him blindly until we came to a halt.

“Take it off,” he told me.

I untied the blindfold and my first reaction was to glance around to figure out where we were. Instead of that happening however, my eyes fixed on the thing in front of me. My eyes went wide in surprise and my jaw dropped as I took it in.

“Why are you showing me this?” I asked slowly.

“Happy birthday!” Sidney replied. I turned to him, still in shock.

“This is mine?”

I couldn’t believe it. There was just no way. He nodded and I let out a loud, high pitched squeal. He, along with the man standing next to him, started to laugh as I rushed over to it. I ran my hand along the smooth, shiny, black surface as I walked around it. I stopped in the front and grinned. Sitting in front of me was my dream car. A 1955 Porsche 550 Spyder, just like James Dean’s, only in a different color.

“Like it?” Sidney asked after a few minutes of me just staring in awe at the thing of beauty in front of me.

“Are you kidding?!” I shrieked. I ran over into his arms and planted kiss after kiss on him.

A little while later the keys were handed over to me and I got in and started it up. I wasn’t much of a car person, but everyone had that one dream car and I was now sitting in mine. Listening to the engine start was the most amazing sound I’d ever heard. I followed Sidney all the way home, a giant grin on my face the whole time.

Once we got there, he switched cars into mine and we went for a nice long drive. It was getting a little cold, but I didn’t care. I couldn’t feel the temperature as the wind blew into our faces as we drove. Eventually I pulled back into the driveway so we could get ready for dinner. I thanked Sidney another million times in the process, still in complete shock over my birthday present.

We headed out for dinner and talked and laughed over a bottle of wine and the best Chilean Sea Bass I’d ever had. As we sat there enjoying a full day of each other all thoughts of Tamara were long gone, replaced by thoughts of how amazing Sidney was. After dinner was over we stopped at a park where we walked hand in hand looking up at the stars.

We sat on a bench in a content silence, my head resting on his shoulder. I looked up at one random star in particular and reflected back on the past year. I couldn’t believe it had only been that long since I’d met Sidney behind the arena in Philadelphia. With everything that had happened, it felt like so much longer. A tear fell from my eye and Sidney must have felt it.

“Are you okay?” he asked turning to look at me. I picked my head up off his shoulder and nodded.

“I was just thinking about the day we met.”

“Why would that make you cry?”

“Who would have thought that I would fall in love with the random hockey player my 6 year old cousin pulled off of a bus?” I asked. He smiled and placed a kiss on my forehead.

“Let’s get home,” he suggested.

I nodded and he helped me up from the bench. He held my hand in his as we walked back to his car. Sidney was the one. I knew it as much as I knew anything else. Andrew needed to be put up for sainthood.