The Virgin’s Bucket List – Episode 16
Lindsay turned toward the stairs and found Wayne standing there with a duffel bag in his hand. He had returned before her, packed his belongings, and heard enough of Mike’s warning to make the decision for them. The sight of that bag made the consequences of the party feel brutally real.
Mike ordered Wayne to put it down. The season had begun, housing arrangements could not change overnight, and no argument justified abandoning the agreement. His concern sounded practical, but Wayne heard the fear of losing a player rather than the fear of losing someone from the household.
Wayne said he would stay with Felix until he found another solution. He respected Mike as a coach, but he would not live in a home where Lindsay was treated as a threat to his future. Lindsay stared at him, stunned that he would defend her while still doubting her.
Mike accused Lindsay of creating exactly the distraction he had predicted. Wayne immediately corrected him. The decision to leave belonged to Wayne, and Lindsay had not asked him to sacrifice anything. His voice remained respectful, yet the steel beneath it left no room for argument.
Lindsay stepped between them. She refused to let Wayne lose stable housing over a conflict she had helped create. If anyone needed space, she could avoid him inside the house until they worked out what the kiss and the bet meant.
Wayne asked whether she truly believed avoidance could solve this. They had tried staying apart for less than a week, and every encounter had drawn them closer. Mike’s gaze moved between them as he realized their feelings had progressed far beyond casual interest.
He laid down a rule: no dating until the season ended. Wayne would remain in the guest room, Lindsay would stay away from practices, and any violation would end the housing arrangement. Lindsay recognized the decree as another attempt to control grief, fear, and love through football discipline.
Wayne agreed only because leaving might jeopardize his eligibility. He carried the duffel bag back upstairs without looking at Lindsay. Mike told her the rule protected both of them, but she replied that protection without trust was only another kind of prison.
Later, silence settled over the house. Lindsay sat on her bedroom floor with her bucket-list notebook open before her. The wish to find a boyfriend now seemed childish beside the possibility that she had already driven away the one person who mattered.
A folded photograph slipped from the back cover. Lindsay picked it up and found two children standing beside a community playground. The girl was unmistakably her younger self, while the boy beside her wore oversized glasses and held a backpack repaired with silver tape.
On the reverse, her mother had written a date and two names: Lindsay and Wayne, brave hearts. Lindsay’s breath caught. She carried the photograph across the hall and knocked before fear could stop her.
Wayne opened the door but did not invite her inside. Lindsay held out the photograph and asked whether he was the boy. The guardedness in his face dissolved when he saw it.
He explained that his family had lived nearby for one summer. Other children mocked his glasses, his worn clothes, and the stutter that appeared whenever he was frightened. Lindsay had challenged three older boys to leave him alone and had walked him home every afternoon afterward.
She had also given him a list of things they would do when they were older: attend the same school, go to a dance, and watch him score the winning touchdown. Wayne had kept his copy through every move. Becoming a great football player had begun as a promise to the first person who believed he could be brave.
Lindsay pressed her fingers to the image as memory returned in flashes. She remembered scraped knees, lemonade on a porch, and a solemn boy promising that he would find her again. Then came her mother’s illness, months of hospitals, and a childhood divided into everything before and after the loss.
Tears gathered as she apologized for forgetting him. Wayne said he had wanted her to remember on her own because the promise had mattered so much to him. He now understood that forgetting was not rejection; grief had simply buried that summer beneath years of pain.
Lindsay told him the kiss was not part of the bet. She had wanted it before he borrowed Jeremy’s glasses, and she wanted it even after he learned the truth. Wayne reached for her hand, their anger finally giving way to something honest.
Before he could answer, a sharp knock sounded from downstairs. Mike called Wayne’s name and announced that a university scout had arrived unexpectedly. Then he added the warning meant for both of them: if the scout discovered Wayne was distracted by a secret relationship, his scholarship offer could disappear before morning.