Playing for Keeps: a Friends-to-More Sports Romance

Hunter McKinley pulled air into his lungs, slow and deep, like a man savoring a long-lost scent. The tang of the soccer field—even this one with its brand-new artificial turf—flooded him with memories, grounding him in the place where so much had begun.

Legacy Falls.

Home.

He’d missed this—more than he’d let himself admit. Not that he regretted the scholarship to Illinois that had taken him away. It was part of his journey, part of God’s plan. But being back stirred something deeper, a longing not just for the town, but for the healing that had started here. Even if it meant facing his high school friend, Carson, on opposing teams today.

Hunter waved to his parents in the near bleachers, their purple Northwestern shirts and matching ball caps making them easy to spot. Five years since the shooting. Five years since he’d nearly lost his life—and them. But God had worked a miracle, not just in his body but in their relationship. He marvelled at the grace that had woven them back together, stronger than before.

As he stretched—calves, glutes, back, shoulders—his gaze drifted, searching the spectator stands almost unconsciously, until—

There.

His breath caught.

Jo Donahue.

The girl—no, the woman—who had saved his life.

A flood of memory washed over him, transporting him back to that night, to the pain and the fear. And Jo. Her face hovering over his, eyes a deeper blue than Carson’s but just as familiar. Her quiet, steady voice piercing the chaos: Stay with me.

She’d been his anchor then. And now she was here, looking every bit as unforgettable. His chest ached with words left unsaid, questions never asked or answered. Back then, he’d been a scared kid with no understanding of the gift he’d been given—not just life, but a second chance.

He hadn’t understood faith, not really. He hadn’t known how God could take brokenness and weave redemption through it. But he did now. And Jo was part of that story, part of God’s grace in ways he was only beginning to grasp.

It’d been five years since they’d spoken. Five years of silence that felt heavier now, seeing her again.
But he wasn’t leaving Legacy Falls until he told her everything he hadn’t had the courage to say back then.

He tore his gaze away, heart thudding hard. First, he had a game to play—and a promise to keep.