32. Forced to Party
32
Forced to Party
I can't guarantee that anybody in the world will be alive Sunday, so I can't guarantee who will be on our roster on Sunday
-Kyle Shanahan
Dylan
“Do I have to?”
Coach glared at me from under bushy eyebrows. “Yes. It’s mandatory.”
I would have rather run laps for hours. I would rather flip tires, run drills, sprints, anything... anything but this.
“Besides, it’s a fundraiser for a good cause,” Coach continued, ignoring my best attempt at puppy-dog eyes. “Delano is out sick with the flu. We have to send someone. Your star is back on the rise and the team owners requested you specifically.”
I shifted from one foot to the other and wished I could run out of Coach’s office.
“I can’t,” I told him.
He raised an eyebrow and asked “Why?” in that tone that made me double check my uniform was on straight.
“I just... It’s Friday and...” I didn’t have a babysitter tonight. Natalie was working and I’d promised her I would never ask her to watch Ellie on workdays. Alex had a date with McKenna and had made me promise I wouldn’t interrupt with anything short of a nuclear disaster.
I didn’t have anyone else I could ask at this point.
But I couldn’t tell Coach about my daughter. Not yet.
“This isn’t a request. This is for your career,” Coach reminded me, his voice low and dangerous. “You need all the good publicity you can get right now. You’re not clear from being traded. This is the best way for you to get in good with the Clarences and stay with this team.”
“And the Clarences requested me specifically?” I asked, more to buy time than as a real question.
Coach nodded. “I’m telling you that this is the only way to survive this season,” he said. He sighed. “And I want you to stay here, Dylan. I really do.”
If that wasn’t enough to make me feel guilty for the rest of my life, I wasn’t sure what was. Maybe I could kick a puppy. I didn’t want to let Coach down.
“Then I’ll be there,” I said, deciding I could find a solution. There were always solutions, right?
“In a tux,” Coach added. “I expect you to be on your best behavior. Remember we have a game Sunday and I need you to be ready.”
I left Coach’s office with my shoulders deflated and without a plan.
I would just have to ask Natalie. I’d pay her extra. So much extra. I would make it up to her somehow, but I needed her to watch Ellie tonight. I didn’t have time to find someone else. I couldn’t trust anyone else.
I slumped into the empty locker room. Everyone was already gone for the day since I’d had to stay late to talk to Coach. I was glad. The last thing I wanted was for Marcus to ask me to come have burgers or Franklin to need advice. I thought about asking one of them to watch Ellie and shuddered. That wouldn’t work. They couldn’t know about her yet.
I sat down on the cement bench dreading the text message I needed to send. I wasn’t even going to try calling first. I was too much of a coward.
My phone had three missed calls and a new very important email. I swallowed hard. I wasn’t ready to read that email that said if my daughter was truly mine. I loved her. I knew that, but if she wasn’t my blood, that meant someone else would want her.
My hands trembled. I didn’t want to open that email, so I did the other horrible thing I needed to do.
“I need you to watch Ellie tonight. It’s important. I’ll pay you extra.”
Shame washed over me as I hit send. She was going to be so furious and I couldn’t blame her. I’d promised I wouldn’t do this, but I didn’t see much of an option.
I glanced around the empty locker room.
With a deep breath, telling myself that it didn’t matter, that I had to do this, that it would all be okay, I opened the email and read the results.
There is no genetic match between the samples. The individuals are not related.
The words swam across the screen. I swear she had my eyes, but... they were someone else’s eyes. That nose wasn’t mine. Her amazing little grip had absolutely nothing to do with me.
Ellie wasn’t my daughter.
The phone clattered to the floor as it fell from my hands.
She wasn’t mine.
Heartache so deep I wanted to howl and scream raged through me, but at the same time, I couldn’t move. I was frozen to the bench, my eyes not seeing the room around me. The world spun around me so hard that I thought I might throw up.
“Hey man, you okay?” Alex’s soft voice echoed through the empty room. I looked at him, not really registering anything.
Ellie wasn’t mine.
“You read the email.” Alex sat down next to me on the bench. “I’m really sorry. You’ve been a really good dad to her.”
I didn’t have words. I didn’t know how to talk anymore. A bone deep hurt, an ache I didn’t even know I could feel reverberated through my being.
And Alex just sat with me. He didn’t say anything else. He just sat with me, keeping me company as I worked through the horrible emotions rolling through me. There was no judgment. Just friendship. He knew how much this hurt, so he just gave me the silent support I needed. Without words, I knew that he was there for me. That he understood.
“She’s not mine? Are you sure? The test isn’t wrong?” My voice cracked with the wild hope that the testing company had screwed up and sent me the wrong results.
“I talked with your lawyer,” Alex replied. “There is no doubt on the test.”
The little flame of hope blinked out of existence. I sank into darkness.
“What do you want to do?”
Alex asked it with such softness in his voice, yet each word stabbed like a knife. What did I want to do? She wasn’t mine. Another man could be looking for her. Another father might not know she was out there, but would he love her the second he saw her? Would he be a better father than I could ever be? He was her real father.
She wasn’t mine. She wasn’t supposed to be my responsibility.
Yet all I could think of was her little fingers. The fact she loved anything by the Beatles and Taylor Swift but would scream the minute we put on any 90s music. The way she milk drunk smiled at me.
“Do you know anything about her real parents?” Those words hurt coming out. Her real parents. Not Natalie and me.
“There isn’t anything in the system for her mom,” Alex replied. He sighed. “But there is a DNA hit on the father.”
Hope, fear, disgust, and anger all rose up inside me at the same time. I thought I might throw up.
“He’s not a great guy,” Alex continued. “Your lawyer says he won’t be a problem with whatever you choose to do.”
“What do you mean?”
Alex handed me his phone. A news article filled the screen. The man that shared DNA with my Ellie was wanted for several felonies and was last seen in Mexico running from the authorities. Anger sizzled down my veins. How could he do this to his daughter? How could he abandon her like that?
Because he didn’t know. I knew that was the answer. The anger evaporated as quickly as it had come.
I looked at the picture of the man. He had similar coloring as me, but only in a generic sense.
“He’s not going to contest any custody arrangements,” Alex said, taking back his phone.
“He looks familiar,” I said, leaning against the wall and staring up at the ceiling. “Do I know him?”
“He used to live in the building. He lived in the apartment directly below yours,” Alex replied. “I spoke with the front desk. He was a real ladies’ man. Apparently, he would tell all the women he brought home that he played for the Twisters.” Alex scoffed. “He was an accountant. I doubt that man even knew what a touchdown was.”
I thought about what the front desk lady had said.
The damn Twister player. We were not the same. Again, anger buzzed through my veins, but there wasn’t enough steam in it to do anything.
The ceiling didn’t hold any answers, so I looked down at my hands. I remembered the feel of my daughter.
“So, she’s not mine. Her dad is scum. Her mom is a ghost.” My fists clenched. “And I need a babysitter for tonight.”
Alex winced. “Non-refundable tickets.”
“Is your cousin available?”
Alex shook his head. “I mean, I can ask, but it’s one of the boy’s concert’s tonight. He plays violin. I’m already in trouble for missing it to go on this date that I am about to be late for. My whole family is going, so they’re all out.”
“I asked Natalie.” My heart continued to sink. Today sucked. “She hasn’t responded yet.”
“She’ll be fine with it,” Alex assured me, his voice full of false bravado. We both knew she wouldn’t be. “Pay her extra. Maybe bring flowers or something.”
“Penelope will just eat the flowers,” I replied, feeling that plan going down the drain as well.
“So it’s a win-win, everyone is happy,” Alex tried to laugh, but it came out strangled.
“I don’t know what to do, Alex.” Despair filled my lungs.
“About a babysitter? I told you, flowers and extra money.”
“No, I mean...” I sighed, running my hands through my hair and wishing I could punch something. “I’m not Ellie’s dad.”
Alex didn’t say anything.
“Do I keep her? Do I do the single dad thing?” I asked him, not really expecting an answer. “She’s not mine. I mean, I can adopt her, but what if she ends up hating me for it? I keep reading about all these terrible adoption stories online.”
“You shouldn’t believe everything you read...” Alex began.
“What about your cousins? They want her. Would they be better?” I didn’t wait for him to answer. “What about Natalie? This will break her heart. She loves the kid. She’s practically Ellie’s mom, but I’ve known her for all of a couple weeks. She’s not really Ellie’s mom and I can’t ask her to make that life choice on two weeks. She has her own dreams. It always supposed to be a short term solution.”
“You are going way above my pay grade,” Alex said after a moment of silence.
“I pay you. I can afford you,” I replied.
Alex sighed. “I don’t know, man. I wish I had answers for you. Hell, I don’t even know what I would do if our situations were reversed. It’s a shit sandwich. There is no good way to eat it. Every option is hard and sucks.” He sighed again. “ Mi abuela would say, ‘pick the option that sucks less,’ but I don’t know what that is.”
We sat in silence for a moment.
“But I’ll support you no matter what you choose,” Alex promised. “I’m here for you, and not just because you pay me. Whatever you choose, I’ve got your back.”
“They might trade me.” The words hurt coming out.
“Well, can you try and get someplace warm?” Alex asked. “I don’t want to deal with snow if I can help it, but I think I could get into hockey if absolutely necessary.”
“You’d come with me?” An ache behind my chest grew to the point an alien should have exploded out of it.
“Someone’s got to keep an eye on you,” Alex replied with a shrug. “ Abuela would be pissed if I didn’t make sure you ate once in a while. She likes you.”
“No, she doesn’t,” I said, thinking of the grumpy old woman that always glared at me when I visited.
“She bets on you every week,” Alex replied softly. “She’s up over ten grand because of it.”
“No way.” I shook my head and scoffed. “I lost every game but the last one. She can’t be up.”
“She started betting on you in college,” Alex explained. “Overall, you’re a winner. Abuela’s never wrong.”
I stared at him in surprise. I couldn’t believe that his grandmother, a stern woman who didn’t speak three words of English, had believed in a scrawny boy who was friends with her grandson enough to bet on him. And keep betting on him.
“You’ve got this,” Alex said. “You’ll figure out the best option. You always do. Not every play works every time, but you have the best record I know. You can do this.”
A little of the darkness surrounding my heart lightened.
“Thank you.”
“Now go take a shower. You reek.” He made a gagging face. “I’ll go find you some flowers and a tux. You should ask her to babysit wearing the tux. Girls love a guy in a suit.”
I didn’t feel much better, but at least now I had a plan.