It was her idea to set him up with her roommate. She thought it would make it easier, her wanting for him, to have that boundary line between them. They were teammates, and she didn’t want to destroy their chances of winning the championship if things didn’t work out between them. She didn’t realize how much it would hurt seeing him with Tori in front of her face.

She thought of the way they looked on the field. The crowd cheering from the stand, the players jumping and colliding in a wild dance of glee. She’d searched for his face in the crowd, the beaming smile on her face. They’d did it. They’d won. But the smile quickly vanished the second she saw Tori leap in his arms, their lips meeting for a midair kiss so romantic it made her heart drop to her stomach so fast she thought she would vomit.

Her eyes are still burning from the thought as she hops out of the truck and releases the straps of her shinguards, tossing them into the passenger seat. She pulls her socks high above her knees, her teeth chattering from the cold. Her jersey is still wet with sweat and sticking to her back. Briefly, she wishes she’d remembered to bring a jacket.

But then she starts to run.

Her lungs burn with every icy breath. The snowflakes whip into her skin and leave tiny pinprick puddles where they dissolve. But she keeps running until the images no longer overwhelm her mind and all she feels is the sweet relief of nothing.

She returns to her truck delightfully numb. 

Until she she’s him standing there, leaning up against her truck with his hands in his pockets. His lips lift slightly at the sight of her and she stops in her tracks, frozen in place as he pushes himself off the truck and walks steadily toward her. 

Snowflakes gather on her eyelashes, blurring her vision and she welcomes it, but they melt too quickly, the condensation sliding down the same tracks left behind by her tears.

“Hey,” he says when he’s close enough for her to hear.

“We did it,” she says, trying–and failing–to conjure up the enthusiasm for their win she’d felt before she saw him wrapped together with her roommate.

“We did,” he says, his smile lifting a little more.

He seems nervous. He steps a little closer to her. She should back away, put some distance between them, far enough so that she can’t feel the aching, pulsing nearness of him, but she doesn’t.

“Why’d you leave?” he asks.

She fights back the tears that spring to her eyes, determined not to cry in front of him. 

“I…” she starts, but finds that the words that usually come so easily to her have failed her.

She licks her lips, dry and cracking in the cold, and turns her head toward the sea, still laughing at her with its calm and unrelenting pushing and pulling. It makes her angry, suddenly, and she surrenders to the rage warming her from within.

She turns to him, her fury blazing in her eyes. “How could you not see it?” she asks. “Are you really that clueless?”

He holds her gaze, his face unreadable as always. “What do you mean?”

“I looked for you after the game. The second we won, I looked for you. But then I saw you with Tori, and I just…I couldn’t…How can you not see how much I’m in love with you?”

At this, his eyes widen slightly. He takes another step toward her. The tops of their shoes touch, and she feels the warmth of his body radiating into her. His hands wrap around her in slow motion, pulling her into his embrace. She lets herself be enveloped by him, breathes in his warmth and the smell of the field, their win, his sweat mixed with the salt-tinged snowflakes melted on his skin.

“I looked for you too,” he says, his breath warm against her ear, “after the game. It was you I wanted to celebrate with. Only you.” He cups her face in his hands, cradling the back of her head with his fingers threaded through her hair. “I broke up with Tori.” he says. “I broke up with her and came here to find you. So I could make you see how much I’m in love with you too.”

The snow falls down all around them as their lips meet–finally–for the first time, the magical pieces of her life falling perfectly into place at last.