had already taken the field to pump up the crowd. The marching band, a few sections away, was making a racket, more noise than music.
His phone buzzed. Wes. What section are you in?
Student section. It was the only one left that had any tickets. The entire rest of the stadium was sold out. Over one hundred thousand people, all there to watch Wes and his team play.
I’ll find you.
Cute words, and Justin grinned, bouncing on his toes. No, Wes wouldn’t, not in this crowd, but he’d look, and that’s what mattered. I’ll be watching you, love. You and your cute butt.
He got a heart-eyed emoji back, and then Wes texted, Got to get lined up. Text you after. ILY
Je t’aime, cowboy. Kick ass!
A few minutes later, the smoke machines started at the Texas tunnel entrance. The music changed to a pounding, anticipatory beat, and then the announcer’s voice boomed throughout the stadium. Everyone leaped to their feet, screaming, roaring. The bucket drums went wild.
“Welcome to the field your Texas players, led by team captain Wes Van de Hoek!”
Justin jumped up and down, screaming and grabbing the hands of the frat boys next to him, stomping his feet and roaring with the crowd as the football players burst out of the tunnel through the lineup of cheerleaders. They barreled into the middle of the field, Wes at the very front. The crowd was wild, beyond anything Justin had ever experienced. Everyone was screaming Wes’s name, chanting Van de Hoek! Van de Hoek!
Wes ran backward. He faced the student section, and as he jogged, he tapped his gloved fist to his chest twice and then pointed to the crowd.
Deafening applause. People leaped to their feet screaming Wes’s name, waving signs and posters and cardboard cutouts of eights and sevens. The crowd was so wild that they blocked Justin’s view of the field and of Wes.
They thought Wes was giving his love to them, the student body. Their number-one player, the nice guy who never minded when people came up to him and wished him well, who never had an unkind word for anyone. Of course his love was for them.
No, it was for Justin. Wes had done that, in front of everyone, for him. He nearly sagged into his seat, weak at the knees. Wes was about to play his first game of the season, and he’d sent his love straight to the stands, to Justin.
He texted Wes, even though Wes’s phone was in his locker. I love you so much. And so do the fans. He took a quick video of the wild craziness, attached it to the text, and sent it.
He even texted his dad, sending him a selfie of him smiling in the crowd and wearing Wes’s jersey, right before kickoff. His dad sent back a line of exclamation points, and then Maybe I can drive down and we can go to a game together! :)
Yeah, Dad. That’d be cool. Up in Dallas, his dad was watching the game, too. About to watch his favorite player—and Justin’s boyfriend—dominate.
Wes and Colton won the coin toss and got possession to start. From the very first drive, it was obvious that they, and the team, played a totally different game than the rest of the conference. The university had switched from the Big Twelve to the Southeastern Conference so they’d have more competition and they could play stronger, better, more challenging teams. But from the first snap, it looked like Wes and Colton and the rest of the offense were picking apart a pee wee league, not Florida, last year’s top-ranked program in the FBS.
Wes alternated between blocking and slant routes, and the offense marched down the field as if the defense weren’t even there, like the game was just another practice and they were executing perfect timing drills. In under two minutes, Colton threw a fade to Wes in the end zone. Wes leaped to pluck it out of the air in between two defenders and came down with an easy triple step for a picture-perfect touchdown. A SportsCenter moment.
The team’s defense was equally hot, and they shut down the Florida offense after only two first downs, forcing a punt. Wes and the offense took the field again, and they were even better than in the opening drive.
Every time Wes came out of the huddle, he turned to the student section. The stadium cameras caught him smiling behind his face mask, and that was the image that ended up replayed over