The QB's Nerdy Addiction novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: Closing Time

Hallie's POV

Bowl week was the first week of my life when nothing was on fire.

I woke up on Monday in Gage's bed above the garage, with his arm over my waist, a thriller on the nightstand, and a bookmark in it.

It was a different thriller.

The first one he had finished on Sunday night, alone, at the kitchen table, while I did my problem sets across from him and pretended not to watch.

He read the last page with one finger on the line.

When he got to the end he laid the book down and sat very still.

"Who did it?" I asked.

"The brother."

"I said the brother in chapter three."

"I know. You were right. You get to be insufferable about it."

"I'm going to be insufferable about it for the rest of your life."

He laughed so hard he put his head on the table.

Then he said, into the wood, "That's the first book I've ever finished."

I put my pencil down.

I came around the table and sat in his lap, and we stayed there a long time.

By Wednesday the left tackle had decided that bowl week required a grilled cheese ceremony.

He made twelve.

He wore the apron.

"I'd like to propose a toast," he said, holding up a sandwich. "To the nerd."

"To the nerd," said Gage.

"To the quarterback," I said.

"To the plate," said the left tackle, nodding at a new one on the shelf, which Gage had bought and wrapped in a bow.

We ate on the brown couch in the kitchen.

The apartment smelled of butter and floor wax and the radiator.

For the first time since October, no one's phone rang.

On Saturday the Valor Bowl would be played in front of forty thousand people, and the scouts would be in the stands.

On Friday afternoon, the day before the game, we went to the library.

It was my idea.

I wanted to see the third-floor stacks in the daylight.

The building was nearly empty, the way it is on the last weekend before finals.

I led him up the stairs by the hand and past the carrels and into the back row.

Pale winter sun came through the one tall window at the end of the aisle.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The QB's Nerdy Addiction from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.