Nate sat in the air-conditioned courtesy bus, tapping at his phone trying to get a signal. After a long flight to Florida and the heatwave, he was starting to think the honor of being on this all-star team wasn't exactly the honor it was supposed to be. He was ready to get to the hotel; he just wanted to get some food and some sleep. He had picked a seat as far away from the others as possible and was not in a mood to socialize.
"Okay, players...and staff, we are officially off-schedule by thirty minutes. I've contacted the hotel and informed them of our unforeseen delay. We're just waiting on another player whose plane was delayed. Once we get him in here, you'll go straight to the hotel. Thank you," a officious older guy with a clipboard announced before slipping outside.
The guy came quickly back on-board and whispered something to the driver. He turned back to the passengers, counting heads and looking at his clipboard, before trotting down the steps and disappearing outside. He returned a few minutes later. Nate didn't even take his earbuds out this time. He pulled his ball cap low and hunched down in his seat, closing his eyes.
He heard some garbled speech, some noise near him. He opened his eyes and raised up to see some guy standing beside his seat. He was saying something, Nate pulled out one of his earbuds.
"Do you mind if I sit here?"
"Uhm, not at all. Help yourself," Nate lied. But he was sort of surprised by the dude. He was a stunner -- straight longish black hair, dark eyes, big white smile. He looked like some exotic olive-skinned male model, ready for his close-up, Nate thought.
Nate motioned towards the seat and started to reinsert his earbud.
"I'm Stedman Rasmussen, everyone calls me 'Sted'," the guy said, holding out his hand to Nate.
"I'm Nathaniel Rodgers. Everyone just calls me 'Nate'."
They shook hands, and there were a few awkward seconds of quiet.
"I'm from California...UCDavis...it's near Sacramento...the capital." Sted told his seatmate, pulling his long hair back into a ponytail and securing it with an elastic band.
"South Carolina here. Little quiet town, small university."
"Cool," replied Sted, nodding his head
"Yeah, I reckon," Nate nodded his head in response and started to hunker down in his seat.
"'I reckon'," Sted repeated Nate's accent with a little grin.
"What?" Nate asked.
"Is it always this hot in the South?" Sted wondered.
Nate threw his earbuds in his bag.
"No, I just think it's Florida," Nate grumbled. Turning to look at his seatmate, he smiled.
Sted laughed. Nate got a good look at Sted. He looked more like a soccer player than an American footballer; heck, he really did look more like a model than an athlete. Nate himself had the stereotypical football physique -- square head, stocky thick muscle build --but this guy was not that at all.
"I bet you're a quarterback," Nate ventured.
"Yeah," Sted laughed. "Have you been looking at my bio or something?"
"No, you've just got that look," Nate replied.
"I bet you're a bulldozer," Sted teased, pushing a bit of stray hair behind his ear
"What do you mean?"
"You've just got that look. I bet you can really plow through a line," Sted joked. "Oh, I bet you could plow through a herd of cows with that big build. I'd hate to get in a fight against you."
"Well, I have that reputation," Nate said, laughing. He hunched over and put up his fists, pretending to knockout some invisible adversaries before falling back in the seat.
"Oh, you like Bonaventure Blue?" Sted pointed at Nate's t-shirt.
"What?" Nate looked down at his shirt, pulling at it. "Oh, yeah, definitely, I downloaded their new album before my flight. The song Half-Moon Bend is fire. Love them!"
"Dude, this might be the beginning of something beautiful," Sted laughed as the bus pulled away and they headed to the hotel.
The two discussed the new album and then got onto the subject of the old lead singer leaving and how the new guy brought a grittier edge to the group's sound. They discovered they shared a lot in common beyond just a favorite band by the time the bus finally grinded to a stop at the hotel.
The clipboard guy appeared again as the bus sat idling.
"Okay, okay, guys, listen up! There's a problem here at the hotel. They texted me to say that there's a problem with the cooling system. Okay, there's nowhere else to get another set of rooms, so we'll just have to make do with what we've got." The bus door opened and someone handed a box to the clipboard guy. "Everything's been processed and here are your room keys and assignments. As I call your name, come up and get your keys and disembark from the bus." He shifted through some papers. He started calling pairs of names alphabetically. "Rasmussen and Rodgers," he finally called out.
"Glad we're sharing a room," Nate said, and Sted nodded in agreement as they grabbed their stuff and got off the bus.
The hotel wasn't really much cooler than it was outside. Hot air from their room hit them when they opened the door. They debated whether to open the patio doors to let the air circulate. They figured being so high up and it was getting dark, opening them would be less stuffy and probably a whole lot cooler. But there were two problems. The first problem was the outside lights, and a big full moon, pretty much lit the entire room up. The other problem was the fact there was just one big queen-sized bed and not two singles.
Nate took off his cap, fanning himself a few times with it before setting it on the table in the corner of the room.
"How in the heck are the both of us going to fit on that?" Nate asked. He ran his hand through his dark blond hair. "Sleeping that close I guess it means we're married," he joked. "It's too hot for all that."
