TGS Chapter 92 Welcome to LA (Patreon)

The private jet touched down on the runway at Van Nuys Airport at 11:15 in the morning, with the California sun doing exactly what Wyatt thought it would do—standing there with a consistency that left no room for interpretation.​Wyatt looked out the window as the plane decelerated along the tarmac. The airport hangars slid past on both sides, with the line of palm trees bordering the perimeter behind them, and the Los Angeles sky displaying that specific shade of blue that West Coast coastal cities wear in May—a blue Blaire would have described as monotonously perfect. Though at that moment, Blaire was not on that plane; she was thousands of miles away in their Clemson apartment, eating whatever her stomach happened to be demanding that day.​The plane came to a stop.​The door opened.​Wyatt grabbed his bag from the overhead compartment and was the first to reach the airstairs. As he stepped down and placed his feet onto the Van Nuys tarmac for the first time in his life, the May California temperature greeted him with the exact same dry warmth it offers anyone arriving from anywhere else in the country where May hasn't quite figured out how to be warm yet.​A man in his mid-thirties was waiting at the foot of the stairs, wearing a Rams polo shirt, holding a tablet, and wearing the smile of someone who has been waiting for a specific person—and who, upon seeing that person appear at the top of the stairs, confirms that everything prepared for this moment can now be executed.​"Wyatt Sterling," the man said, extending his hand. "Marcus Calderon, team operations coordinator. Welcome to Los Angeles."​"Marcus," Wyatt said, shaking his hand.​"We have a full day ahead," Calderon said, glancing at the tablet with the speed of someone who has the itinerary memorized, but checks it anyway because that is simply the kind of person he is. "But first, the car is waiting, and if it's fine with you, I'll give you the rundown on the way."​"Sounds good," Wyatt said.​The black Escalade was parked twenty yards from the plane, engine idling, with the driver standing by the rear passenger door in the exact posture of drivers who have waited at many airports for many important people, having calibrated precisely how much visible attention to project while waiting.​Los Angeles had a different quality than what Wyatt had seen in images and television clips processed over a lifetime without ever having set foot there—the quality real places have when you finally arrive and discover that the image in your head was correct in certain details, yet entirely inaccurate in the overall texture of the experience itself.​The palm trees were exactly like the pictures.​The traffic on the freeway was considerably more intense than any image could ever convey.​Calderon sat in the front passenger seat, tablet in hand, turned slightly to look back at Wyatt while explaining the day's itinerary with the efficiency of someone who had made this exact drive, with this exact conversation, in other iterations with other players in other years—and who had perfected precisely how much time he needed to say what needed to be said without exceeding what the other person needed to hear.​"First stop is the facility in Thousand Oaks," Calderon said. "Full medical exam, about two and a half hours, followed by custom equipment fittings and a meeting with Coach Fisher. After the facility, we take you to the hotel where you'll stay while finding a permanent residence."​"How long is the hotel stay?" Wyatt asked.​"Depends on what you find and when you find it," Calderon said. "Some players stay two weeks, others stay two months. The team has an agreement with the hotel to extend or shorten as needed."​Wyatt nodded, looking out the window as Los Angeles rolled past—a sprawling mixture of architecture, vegetation, billboards, and people that big cities possess and small towns lack, simply because big cities contain too many versions of themselves for any single one to be definitive.​"There's something I wanted to ask you," Calderon said, taking the tone of someone who had waited for the right moment to say something and decided this was it.​"Go ahead," Wyatt said.​"The city," Calderon said, gesturing toward the windshield to encompass everything outside. "How are you finding it?"​Wyatt looked outside for a moment.​"Big," Wyatt said.​Calderon nodded.​"Everyone says the same thing the first time," Calderon said. "Then three months later, they say they couldn't live anywhere else."​"Or they say there's too much sun," Wyatt said, thinking of Blaire.​Calderon looked at him.​"That happens too," Calderon admitted.​The Rams' temporary facility in Thousand Oaks was a cluster of modular buildings on the grounds of California Lutheran University, with two practice fields visible from the entrance. It carried the functional logistics of an organization that had set up what it needed in the available space—lacking the lavish resources of permanent facilities that more established teams possessed, but operating with the sharp efficiency of a team that knows exactly what it needs and how to get it under current conditions.​Calderon led him through the main entrance, where two staff members were waiting in matching logo polo shirts, displaying the same level of preparation Calderon had shown at the airport. Wyatt processed it as a sign that the Rams organization was the kind that prepared important days far enough in advance that when they arrived, everything ran without anyone needing to improvise.​The medical exam came first.​Wyatt had already undergone the combine medical exams in Indianapolis back in February, and the Rams' exam followed the same general structure—though with additional depth, as this was the baseline health assessment at the exact moment of joining the team, serving as the benchmark for every medical decision the franchise would make moving forward.​He undressed in his designated locker, changed into the medical gown prepared for him, and went through the MRI first—maintaining the specific stillness required, a skill Wyatt had practiced enough times in recent months to produce effortlessly. Afterward came the physical performance tests, with the team doctor logging results into a tablet with the focus of a man who knew precisely what numbers he was looking for.​When the medical exam concluded, they brought him a Rams workout set featuring the team name across the chest and the number ten on the back. Wyatt put it on in front of the locker room mirror with the natural ease of someone who had worn training gear for most of his adult life—even if he had never worn this specific gear, with this specific logo, and this specific number. Though the number ten had been his since his freshman year in Katy, which was why he had requested it with the Rams. Snead had confirmed it was available, and there was no reason it shouldn't be his.​The fitting area was a small room stocked with specialized equipment, where an equipment staff member waited with the attitude of someone who had measured many feet in many situations. He held no particular opinion on the feet he measured, but possessed very specific opinions on the precision with which he measured them.​"Feet first," the staff member said.​Wyatt sat in the designated chair.​The staff member took measurements of both feet using a tool that produced figures down to fractions of an inch, logging them into the corresponding form before measuring width and arch. Wyatt listened to the numbers being rattled off without saying anything, as there was nothing relevant to contribute to that specific process.​"Equipment manager will see you in twenty minutes," the staff member said upon finishing.​The equipment manager was punctual.​He arrived in the locker room carrying three boxes that Wyatt recognized by size, shape, and the distinct weight of boxes containing custom professional-grade football gear. He opened them with the ordered routine of someone who had done this enough times that it required no conscious deliberation.​Shoulder pads first—customized according to NFL team specifications based on each player's measurements. In Wyatt's case, it prompted the same comment he had heard from every training staff he'd ever worked with: Wyatt's build made fittings far more straightforward than with most quarterbacks, possessing the shoulder-to-torso proportions manufacturers used as a reference point when calibrating standard gear.​The helmet came next, with the number ten painted on the side.​Then the custom cleats—ordered by the team using the exact measurements logged twenty minutes earlier by the fitting staff. It reflected an operational speed unique to NFL organizations that Wyatt was still processing; Clemson had top-tier resources, but not quite these resources, operating at this specific speed.​The meeting with Fisher took place in his office, located in one of the modular buildings. It carried the same practical functionality as the rest of the facility, decorated with wall photos typical of coaches long-established in the business—game shots, players, and moments that had mattered across a career Fisher had built over decades before arriving in Thousand Oaks.​Fisher pointed to the chair across from his desk with the same gesture he would use with any player called into that office. Wyatt was the first overall pick in the draft, but inside this room at this moment, he was a rookie who listened—not someone granted special treatment over anyone else who walked through that door.​Wyatt listened.​"In the playbook we're giving you this week, there are concepts you'll recognize from Clemson, and concepts you won't," Fisher said. "What I need from you is to focus on the ones you don't recognize. The ones you know, you already do well—time is better spent on what's new."​"Understood," Wyatt said.​Fisher looked at him for a moment with the quiet evaluation experienced coaches apply when gauging whether the person across from them is someone who actually listens, or someone who nods while waiting for the other person to finish talking.​He apparently concluded Wyatt was the former, as he continued without changing his tone.​"One more thing," Fisher said.​He opened a desk drawer and pulled out a fabric bag that Wyatt recognized by size and shape before Fisher even placed it on the desk and slid it across.​Wyatt opened it.​It was a Rams jersey.​Blue and gold, featuring the number ten on the front, STERLING across the back, and the team logo on the chest. It possessed the rich texture of professional game-grade fabric—a distinct step up from college jerseys, being two variations of the same concept where one was undeniably more definitive than the other.​"Welcome to the Rams, Wyatt," Fisher said.​Hours later.​The hotel was located in Woodland Hills. The room featured a double bed, a desk by the window, and a view of Los Angeles that—from that specific vantage point—included the freeway and the hills rising behind it.​Wyatt set his bag on the bed, pulled out his phone, and went straight to the video call app. Too much had happened during the day for any of it to wait until morning.​Blaire answered on the second ring.​She appeared on the screen with her hair tied up, wearing an oversized shirt Wyatt recognized as his own—though he didn't recall leaving it at the apartment. In her hand, she held something that took Wyatt a second to identify, producing a look on his face of someone processing unexpected information.​It was a pickle.​Dipped in peanut butter.​"What are you eating?" Wyatt asked.​"A pickle," Blaire said, with the matter-of-fact tone of someone who felt what she was eating required no further explanation.​"With peanut butter?"​"With peanut butter," Blaire confirmed, taking a bite just as casually.​"That's not normal."​"The baby has weird tastes," Blaire said. "Yesterday was pickles and peanut butter, today is too. Don't ask me why; I don't have an answer that will satisfy you. How bright is it out there?"​"Pretty bright," Wyatt said.​"I knew it," Blaire said. "Tell me everything."​Wyatt leaned back against the bed, resting the phone on his chest with his eyes on the ceiling, and recounted everything that had happened throughout the day in exact chronological order.​He told her about the airport, Calderon with the tablet, the Escalade, Los Angeles from the freeway, the Thousand Oaks facility, the medical exam, the MRI, the training gear, and the foot measurements—which Blaire interrupted to ask if there was a specific reason the NFL measured feet in such detail. Wyatt said yes, Blaire called it an absurd detail, Wyatt explained that the equipment staff held very specific opinions on feet, and Blaire remarked that it was the weirdest thing she had heard in a long time.​Then he told her about the jersey.​Blaire set the pickle down on her plate for a second when Wyatt reached that part of the story.​"They gave it to you already?" Blaire asked.​"Fisher gave it to me," Wyatt said.​"Number ten?"​"Number ten," Wyatt confirmed. "STERLING on the back."​Blaire looked at him through the screen for a moment with that expression Wyatt had learned to read over their two and a half years together—the look she wore when something mattered enough to her that her usual casual indifference wasn't the appropriate response.​"Good," Blaire said eventually.​Wyatt nodded.​They kept talking for a while longer, the conversation drifting toward things unrelated to the Rams—the kind of quiet talk shared between people in different cities who need each other to know that the day contained more than just the major events already reported. Eventually, Blaire said she had to sleep, as the baby, the peanut butter, and the pickles had made the day longer than usual. Wyatt agreed, telling her he'd call tomorrow. Blaire reminded him to call before he left for the facility, because once he got there, he was always busy. Wyatt promised he would, and they said goodnight.​Wyatt placed the phone on the nightstand and stared up at the hotel ceiling. The Rams jersey rested inside the bag beside the bed, Los Angeles hummed outside the window, and everything that came next was still waiting ahead.