Page 8 of Wedge

“It worked!” he gushes.

I can breathe again. What the hell was that? Taken down by a guy’s smile?

He hands me his club, and I place it in the bag and shake myself mentally. I walk behind him down to the green, pulling his putter as we move. I also pull my eyes away from his cute ass as we walk. He sinks the putt in one for a birdie.

Coming up to the thirteenth hole, Split Rock, I pause. The temperature drops ten degrees at the mouth of it, cool air breathing out from between the stones. The memories crowd in, making this stretch seem even tighter than it is. The towering boulders on each side squeeze the fairway to six feet wide, gray and lichen-spotted, taller than a house. Someone trying to bomb through it will inevitably bounce it off the rocks on either side, ricocheting like a pinball machine.

“Lay it up to get it short of the rocks, don’t try to get through it,” I say.

He’s nodding. “Tried that once. Never found that ball.”

I hand him the three-iron and he swings perfectly, ball landing right where I said. I pat his shoulder in quiet praise, and he shudders.

“Oh. Sorry. Should keep my mitts to myself,” I say, feeling like a heel.

“No!” he replies quickly, looking straight at me. “I… liked it.” He blinks, those pretty hazel eyes a little confused, a frown creasing his forehead. “You had consent. Have consent. Don’t stop.”

I don’t move for a moment. Feels like there’s more he wants to say. More here.

“I like it,” he almost whispers.

Well, okay, then. I raise my hand where he can see it coming, and I hold his shoulder lightly, shaking him a little with a small lift of my lips. Pat his shoulder gently. The frown leaves his forehead, and a grateful flicker turns up his pretty mouth. I hold out my hand, and he looks at it for a moment.

“Club, Adrian,” I say with a tiny twitch of my mouth.

“Oh. Right,” he chuckles, shaking his head, and passes it over.

We walk up the narrow fairway together, our footsteps loud between the rocks. I can just see the group ahead of us still working on their putts, so we pause, three feet of grass between us. This close, I can see the green flecks in his hazel eyes.

I clear my throat. “So, who taught you?”

He gives me a small grin. “Foster dad. Good guy. Didn’t have anyone to play with, so he bought me some secondhand clubs and took me with him. Miss him.”

“He gone?”

Adrian nods but doesn’t elaborate.

“That’s rough.” I look out at the green. White golf caps are still moving. “I wasn’t close to mine. Kind of an asshole. Just wanted the check. I did my own thing, didn’t get in trouble, just waited until I was eighteen and left.”

He looks at me in surprise. “You were in the system?”

“Yep. Junkie mom. No dad. The usual.” I pause, then add on. “No abuse, at least. Count myself lucky, I guess.”

His face closes down, and I figure I’ve gone a step too far, have gotten all I will get. For the moment.

“Green’s clear. Let’s hit this ball.”

We fall into a rhythm through the next few holes. Club, breath, swing, and a pat on the shoulder that he stops flinching from. The afternoon stretches long and gold. His shoulders loosen back up by the time we get to seventeen, a long par five curving around a small grove of pines, the air sharp with resin.

“You’ve got the leg to get this one over the pines, get a birdie on it. Or you can take the safe route, down the fairway to the curve, another shot to the front of the green, wedge it up, two-putt for par. What do you want to do?”

His eyes narrow at me. “I want to go for it.”

“Man after my heart,” I quip, and hand him the driver. He blinks at me for a moment, then slowly takes the club.

Jesus, this man is killing me with his open face and blazing smiles. This tournament is going to be more of a challenge than I thought.

Walking off of eighteen, I pull my cap off and fluff my hair, trying to get some air on my sweaty head. The sun is high now, no shadows on the fairway. Adrian does the same with his cap, running his fingers through his sweaty mohawk, and I know my mouth is struggling not to laugh. His badass mohawk is now flattened on either side of his head and looks comical, like a sad rooster.