Page 58 of Wedge

My chest is about to burst with pride and another word that I’m carrying. It’s getting heavy. I don’t say it. Not on a practice green with half the field watching.

24

ADRIAN

Ben’s house smells different from any home I’ve been in: cedar and coffee and something faintly medicinal. It’s early December and full dark by five, the porch light making a yellow circle in the cold, our breath smoking as we stomp off our boots on the mat. Inside, it’s warm enough to fog the windows. Bigger, somehow, like the walls know what we’re here to celebrate.

“There you are.” Ben pulls me into a hug the moment I’m through the door, harder and longer than his usual quick squeeze. “Final Stage. Do you have any idea how many guys never get this far?”

“A lot?”

“Almost all of them.” He claps my shoulder, then reaches past me to pull Stephen in as well, still the double-pat, but warmer, fonder. “Both of you. Get in here, Geoff’s been cooking since noon.”

Geoff meets us in the kitchen doorway, apron on, a smear of something orange already drying on his shoulder, and Jasmine perched on his hip gnawing enthusiastically on what appears to be a dinner roll.

“Congratulations,” Geoff says, leaning in for a one-armed hug around the toddler currently using his collar as a napkin. “Ben hasn’t shut up about it all week.”

“I have shut up,” Ben protests. “Several times.”

“You made me look up Sawmarsh National on my phone during breakfast.”

“That was informational.”

“Uh, huh.”

Dinner’s good, real good, some braised short rib thing Geoff clearly spent all afternoon on, and Jasmine’s in a booster seat at the end of the table treating her mashed potatoes less like food and more like modeling clay, both fists buried before anyone can stop her.

“Jazz, baby, use the spoon,” Geoff says, without much hope in his voice, already reaching for a napkin. “Show Daddy how good you are with a spoon.”

“No spoon.” She holds up a fistful of potato like a trophy, grinning around it, and smears the rest across her own cheek as she mashes it into her mouth for good measure.

“She’s got your negotiating skills,” Stephen tells Ben.

“She’s got no negotiating skills. She’s three and feral.” Ben reaches over to wipe a streak of potato off her forehead with his thumb, and she shrieks with laughter and immediately reloads.

For a while it’s just easy, the four of us, talking Final Stage logistics like it’s just another tournament instead of the biggest one of my life, while Jasmine methodically redecorates the tray of her booster seat and, at one point, Geoff’s sleeve. Sawmarsh National, most likely, or one of the other rotating sites. Four rounds again, no cut days, just the top five places walking away with actual IPGA Tour cards.

“Top five,” I say, mostly to hear how it sounds out loud. “Out of what? A hundred and fifty guys? Jesus.”

“Top five places. If there’s a ten-way tie for fifth, all ten players get cards. But you’re not the same golfer who showed up in Grand Junction.” Ben leans back, studying me the way he does when he’s about to say something he’s been sitting on. “Which brings me to something I want to talk through with both of you.”

Stephen’s hand finds my knee under the table, steady.

“Final Stage means real visibility,” Ben says. “Cameras. Media requests. If you play well, people will start paying attention. Sponsors start calling.” He looks between us, not unkindly, just direct in the way he’s always been. “I need to know if you two are planning to be public about this. Because that changes some conversations I have on your behalf.”

I feel my face heat, and beside me Stephen goes still, the way he does when he’s deciding how much to say. Across the table, Geoff quietly intercepts Jasmine’s hand before she can add mashed potato to Ben’s sleeve too, timing it without even looking away from us.

“We haven’t really talked about it,” I admit. “Like, in those terms.”

“You should. You need to decide.” Ben’s not pushing, just laying it out. “Some sponsors won’t care at all. Some might. I’m not telling you to hide anything, Adrian. That’s not what this is. I’m telling you I’d rather walk into those conversations knowing where you stand than get blindsided by a question I can’t answer.”

“And if we’re public,” Stephen says carefully, “What does it cost him? Straight answer.”

“Some doors probably close that might’ve opened otherwise. Some open instead. I genuinely don’t know the ratio, and anyone who tells you they do is guessing.” Ben shrugs, but there’s weight behind the casualness of it. “What I do know is you deserve to make that call with your eyes open, not stumble into it because some reporter asks who’s on your bag and you haven’t thought about the answer yet or worse, some guy with a telephoto lens blasts it out via social media before you are ready.”

The table goes quiet, just the five of us, Jasmine included, who’s gone still with sudden interest in the tone shift, watching us with potato-covered fingers frozen halfway to her mouth like even she can sense something important is happening. I look at Stephen, and he looks back steadily, no hesitation in it at all.

“Your call,” Stephen says softly. “It’s your career. Whatever you decide, I’m on the bag either way.”