Erin

Derek eagerly digs into his second helping of Aunt Carrie’s chicken pot pie.

“This is the best meal I’ve had in a very long time,” he says, smiling at her.

She waves a hand like it’s nothing, but I see her blushing.

After staying five nights at the hotel, I brought him home with me. We’ve started letting photographers take a few photos of us—at dinner one evening at the hotel’s restaurant, and when we come and go visiting Matias. Derek told me it’s easier to give them a little something, because they’ll leave if we do.

The number of vans following us has definitely lessened. Derek agreed to give ESPN an exclusive interview next week, and he said it’ll decrease even more once that comes out.

“So, will you be playing football again?” Uncle Cal asks.

It’s the one thing we haven’t discussed yet. Derek and I got here early this afternoon, and my uncle took him on a tour of the farm, which took several hours. We talked a lot about our time in the bunker, but no one has brought up any questions about the future.

I’m almost afraid to hear Derek’s answer to the football one.

“I should be able to start next season,” he says. “I don’t think I’ll be physically ready by the end of this season.”

“Do you think you’ll be able to dive right back in?” my aunt asks. “Is it like riding a bike?”

“Pretty much.” Derek nods. “I’ve been a quarterback since I was a teenager. Everything but the physical part is second nature to me.”

“You have to be cool under pressure to be a quarterback,” my cousin Matt says, clearly awed that Derek Heaton is sitting at the farmhouse’s kitchen table. “If you had to get stuck in the bunker with anyone, Erin, might as well be him, right?”

Derek takes my hand beneath the table, and I smile.

“Actually,” he says, “Erin was the coolest of us all. She’s the most level-headed person I’ve ever known, but she’s also compassionate.”

“You are too,” I say, feeling myself blushing at his compliments.

“Not like you.” He looks right into my eyes. “There’s no one else like you.”

I bask in his words for a second before nudging him. “Eat before your dinner gets cold.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Derek winks at me and returns to his chicken pot pie.

My uncle and cousins start talking football with Derek, and I’m immediately out of my element. I help Aunt Carrie clear dishes and get the apple cobbler she made for dessert.

“I like him,” she whispers in a conspiratorial tone as she takes out dishes for dessert.

“Me too.”

“He’s so handsome, Erin. And he’s crazy about you.”

I warm from head to toe.

“I don’t know what the future will hold for us, but for now, I’m trying to just enjoy it.”

My aunt furrows her brow. “What do you mean? Why wouldn’t you have a future with him?”

I shrug. “He’s based in New York with his team. His lodge was just an off-season place. And I don’t think I can fly to spend time with him.”

Aunt Carrie gives me a knowing look. “Ah. And you don’t want him to know about the extent of your claustrophobia.”

“Oh, he knows. He saw it in the bunker, and I’ve told him the rest. He knows about my mom and everything.”

Her lips part incredulously. “Well then, what are you worried about? He wouldn’t be here right now if he weren’t serious about you.”

“Yeah, but…real life is different than life was down there. I want to be an optimist and hope for the best, but…”

“That’s always been hard for you,” Aunt Carrie says softly. “And I can understand why.”

“Derek is famous. I’m not sure I’m meant for a high-profile life.”

“So…he accepts you exactly as you are, and you’re not sure you can do the same for him?”

“It’s not like that.”

Aunt Carrie scoops ground coffee into a filter. “What’s it like, then?”

I try to come up with an answer, but I’ve got nothing.

“Give him a fair chance, Erin. He deserves that. And you deserve it too.”

I look down at the floor, admitting the hard truth. “I’m terrified he’ll leave me.”

“You’ve got so much to give this world. But you can’t do it unless you open yourself up.”

The swinging doors into the kitchen are pushed open, and Derek steps into the room and looks at me.

“Anything I can do to help?”

“Can you carry this out?” Aunt Carrie passes him the apple cobbler.

“Oh wow.” His eyes widen. “That smells amazing.”

Aunt Carrie hands me the ice cream and a stack of dishes.

“I’ll be out soon with coffee,” she says.

When we’ve finished dessert, Derek and I put on coats and hats to walk to my place, which is on the property but away from the main house. I’ve always loved the farm at night, when everything is shrouded in darkness and it’s quiet.

“Your family’s great,” he says as we pass the dormant Morrison Farms garden plots.

“Thanks. I can tell they liked you.”

When he looks over at me, I can see the outline of his skeptical expression in the moonlight.

“What’s wrong, Erin?”

I sigh softly and look out at the nearly invisible horizon. “Just…it feels too picture-perfect, I guess. The hugs and apple cobbler and my family looking at me like they’re thrilled I’ve finally brought someone home because it means maybe I’m going to have a normal life, after all.”

“You’re not abnormal. All of us have shit going on that no one knows about.”

I wrap my arms around myself. “What shit do you have going on?”

He blows out a breath. “Besides spending the past decade working myself into the ground to make my mom sorry she abandoned me? Let’s see…there’s also a constant dialogue in my head about whether I can ever get back to the top of the game again and whether I even want to.”

“Whether you want to?” Now it’s my brows lowered in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“When we were down in the bunker, I didn’t regret anything about football. I’ve done it all…maybe at the cost of everything else.”

“This is the way to my place,” I say, turning toward a winding gravel path. “Do you think maybe that’s your inner critic talking, making you not want it because you’re not sure you can get back to where you were physically?”

A small smile pulls at the corners of his lips. “I can definitely get back there, no doubt in my mind. I think your inner critic doesn’t want to think I really want more, because what if I change my mind?”

It’s all I can do to hold back an eye roll. “You’re not supposed to know me this well.”

“Too late.”

The leaves on the ground still fill the air with a sweet smell, none of them dried and crunchy just yet. But soon they’ll dry, and then snow will fall and Uncle Cal will get his sleigh out of one of the sheds.

Horse-drawn sleigh rides at Christmas time here are magical. In the past couple years, I’ve started dreaming about having children of my own to take on sleigh rides and bake cookies in the big farmhouse kitchen with Aunt Carrie.

“What’s going on in that head of yours?” Derek asks, taking my hand.

“Just thinking about what I need to do at the camp tomorrow.”

“Liar.” He shakes his head and laughs.

I nudge him with my shoulder. “Okay then, what are you thinking about?”

“How fast I can get your clothes off once we get to your place.”

“You’re such a man.”

“Guilty.”

The barn housing my loft apartment comes into view as we round a corner.

“Remember, it’s nothing fancy,” I remind him.

“Perfect. I hate fancy.”

“Uh-huh. Says the guy who’s rebuilding his ten-bedroom luxury lodge.”

“Six bedrooms.”

“And how many of them have private baths again?”

“Only four.” He winks at me.

I open the door and lead the way up the staircase to the door that takes us into the loft. It’s all open, with reclaimed wood flooring and lots of windows displaying the night sky.

“I love it,” Derek says, stepping in and looking around.

“Thanks.”

I literally live in a barn, but I’m proud of my home. It has tall, white-painted cabinets, stainless appliances, and dark granite countertops. My queen-size bed sits in a corner of the huge, open room, still unmade from this morning.

“This place really feels like you,” Derek says as he walks over to the bed.

“What, messy? Scattered? Weird?”

He shakes his head, his expression serious. “Beautiful. Authentic. It makes me feel so good, I could stay forever.”

My stomach flips as I slowly join him next to my moonlit bed. I remind myself of the most important lessons I learned in therapy. Optimism is a choice. Trust is the greatest gift we can give another person. It’s also the greatest gift to receive. And of all the places in the world Derek could be right now, all the people he could be with—he chooses here. He chooses me.

“My clothes are still on, Heaton,” I say in a level tone. “It’s like you’re not even trying.”

With a smirk, he takes me into his arms and kisses me long and deep. It’s the kind of kiss that takes ahold of all thought and sensation. As Derek’s mouth moves down to my neck, and then my shoulders, I let myself feel not just his physical touch, but the reverence too.

As he slides my clothes off and we fall to the bed together, I work up the courage to say the thing that terrifies me most. More than any basement or confined space.

“I love you, Derek,” I whisper.

“I love you too.” He pauses for just a second to cup my cheeks in his hands. “And I’ll do whatever it takes to be with you.”

We take our time, the brightness of the moon outlining every expression of bliss as we both find release again and again. And when Derek finally pushes himself inside me, we’re both more passionate than usual. It’s harder, faster—charged with the sensual high of having exposed our feelings for each other.

When we finally fall asleep, I feel more relaxed than I have since before the bunker. I never thought when I was down there, I could ever be grateful for the experience. Not knowing if we were going to make it out was harrowing.

But I found out a lot about myself underground. Who I truly am and what I’m truly capable of. I wish I could hug the terrified young girl I once was and tell her to hang on, that it’ll all be okay.

In fact, it’ll be way better than okay.