Chapter 46 After the buzzer
CALEB
The morning after the final did not feel like morning in the normal sense.
It felt like the world had been left running overnight without supervision.
I woke up on Eli’s couch with my phone already buzzing before I fully opened my eyes. Not one message. A stream of them. Notifications stacked so tightly I had to scroll just to understand what was happening.
Group chat. Team chat. Media requests. Three missed calls from unknown numbers. One from Walter that I had already seen last night but somehow felt different in the morning light.
Eli was already awake.
He was sitting on the floor in front of the couch, holding a cup of coffee like it was a negotiation tool.
“You snore,” he said.
“I do not,” I said.
“You do,” he said. “It is not loud. It is just confident.”
I sat up slowly.
“What time is it?”
“Too early for people who did not just win a championship,” he said.
I checked my phone again.
More messages had appeared.
Eli leaned back against the couch.
“My phone has been vibrating for forty minutes,” he said. “I am ignoring the entire world today.”
“You cannot ignore it,” I said.
“I can for at least six hours,” he said. “After that I will start becoming irrelevant.”
That sounded like him.
I swung my legs off the couch and stood.
The apartment was quiet in the way places are quiet when they have held too much energy the night before and have not decided how to reset yet. Empty cups on the counter. A hoodie on the chair. My gear bag still half open by the door.
Eli watched me.
“You are going to go see her,” he said.
“Yes,” I said.
“You did not even hesitate.”
“There is nothing to hesitate about.”
“That is new for you,” he said.
I did not answer that.
I grabbed my phone again and stepped outside.
Cold air hit immediately.
The arena was still visible down the street. Not loud anymore. Just present. Like it was waiting for something else to happen even though everything had already happened.
My phone buzzed again.
Walter: Breakfast at home. Your mother insists. No press. No detours.
I read it twice.
Then another message came in immediately after.
Mia: I am at home. Do not bring media with you.
I smiled before I even realized I was doing it.
I replied: I am not bringing anything.
Her response came fast.
Mia: That is what I am worried about.
I stood on the sidewalk for a second longer than necessary.
Then I started walking.
The apartment building looked the same as always when I got there. Nothing about it had changed. That was the strange part. The world had shifted completely but the doors still opened the same way.
I knocked.
The door opened before the second knock finished.
Mia stood there.
Hair tied back. Hoodie on. Clipboard not in her hand for once. Just her.
She looked at me like she was checking I was real.
“You are early,” she said.
“You told me not to be late,” I said.
“That is not the same thing.”
“I know.”
She stepped aside.
I walked in.
The smell of pancakes hit immediately.
Her mother was in the kitchen.
Sitting at the table, tea in hand, watching the stove like she had been doing this for longer than she had been sick and longer than she had been well.
She looked up.
“Championship boy,” she said.
“Good morning,” I said.
“You are too calm for someone who ruined my daughter’s sleep schedule for six months,” she said.
Mia spoke from behind me.
“I did not sleep either,” she said.
“That is not the point,” her mother said.
I sat down.
Pancakes were already on the table.
Jamie came out of his room a few minutes later wearing sweatpants and a hoodie, moving like someone who had just realized school did not matter today.
He looked at me.
“You look the same,” he said.
“I am the same,” I said.
“That is disappointing,” he said, sitting down.
Mia sat across from me.
She did not eat immediately.
She just watched the table for a moment.
Then she said, “Media is outside.”
I looked at her.
“Outside where?”
“Building,” she said. “Two reporters. One camera crew.”
Her mother sighed.
“Of course they are,” she said. “They do not have families of their own?”
Mia stood up.
“I told them to leave,” she said.
“Did they?” I asked.
“No,” she said.
That sounded right.
I stood.
“I will handle it,” I said.
Mia looked at me.
“No,” she said.
I paused.
She continued, “If you go out there, they turn it into something else.”
“It already is something else,” I said.
“Not here,” she said.
That stopped me.
Her mother pointed a fork at both of us.
“Eat first,” she said.
Mia sat back down like that was an order she could respect.
I did the same.
We ate in silence for a while.
Jamie broke it first.
“So what happens now?” he asked.
“To him?” he nodded at me.
“To all of us,” I said.
Mia answered before I could.
“Nothing scheduled,” she said.
“That sounds like freedom,” her mother said.
“It sounds like pressure,” Mia replied.
I looked at her.
“It is both,” I said.
She nodded slightly like that was the correct answer.
After breakfast, we stepped out onto the hallway together.
The building outside was quiet but not empty.
Two reporters stood near the entrance.
One lifted a microphone immediately.
“Caleb, just one comment about the championship win,” he said.
Mia stepped forward.
“No statements,” she said.
“We just need,” the reporter started.
“You already have the game,” she said. “You do not get the rest of the morning.”
I did not say anything.
They looked between us.
Then one of them lowered the camera slightly.
“Okay,” he said.
We walked past them.
Outside, the air was colder than I expected.
Mia walked beside me without speaking until we turned the corner.
Then she said, “They will come back.”
“I know,” I said.
She looked ahead.
“Tomorrow,” she asked.
“Same time tomorrow,” I said.
She nodded once.
We kept walking.