Fowl Play (Tuft Swallow)

9. Brian

CHAPTER 9

Saturday Scrimmage Soured by Sore Sackers?

It’s a hard day in Tuft Swallow for this year’s cornhole team, as it looks as though four of the twenty teammates are out for the count for the first match of the year. Word on the tweet is, new team captain Kodi Gander has got herself a case of the try-hards, according to our sources who wished to remain anonymous in case she decides to take it out on them again at next week’s practice.

Of course, we all remember that devastating States Championship game where our dear Kodi lost her shot at the title, her Division I scholarship, and the use of her leg in one fell swoop. Here’s hoping that a taste of victory against our bitter rivals, Spitz Hollow, will be just the thing to drum up a little team spirit.

See you all at the Eagle View Football Stadium!

Happy Game Day,

The Nosy Pecker

As I wait for my breakfast sandwich at the bakery around the corner from my new place, I allow myself to peruse the local gossip rag. Yesterday was slightly more successful than my first day exploring the town. I managed to acquaint myself with the owner of the boxing gym and the yoga studio, even making plans to meet up for coffee to discuss free consults for their members.

I’d been nervous that everyone in town would be wary around me after Thursday’s scathing article. But overall, the sentiment among Tuft Swallow’s working class is surprisingly non-judgmental. If anything, both Nick and Caleb–the retired MMA fighter and yoga instructor, respectfully–seem more excited about having another doctor in town to send their injured clients to than worried about my sexuality.

Despite that, there’s still an emptiness in my stomach that even my favorite breakfast foods can’t seem to fix. Zeke’s absence weighs heavy in the new place, and it’s been pushing me outside to socialize more than I ever thought I’d be comfortable with. Especially in a town that seems so embroiled in stirring up the latest scandal. Today’s paper didn’t have a single word about me or my floundering love life, though. So maybe things are looking up.

Shame about Kodi, though. While she’d told me she played softball in high school, I had no idea she’d lost a scholarship due to her injury. That had to have been devastating. The woman has guts to keep competing after something like that.

At the various tables scattered about the bakery, Tuft Swallowers of all ages are reading their own Peckers and yammering about the upcoming match. I notice even the elderly Tit Peepers are sporting colorful jerseys under their bright turquoise windbreakers. It seems like this kind of thing is a big deal in this town. And here I thought the welcome sign boasting their “Cornhole Champions since 1969” status was just some homophobic graffiti.

As I pick at my ham, egg, and cheese croissant and sip on my black coffee, I consider my plans for the day. As bad as my first impression of this place was, it would be a good idea to meet a few more of my neighbors on my own terms. Attempt to fill the Zeke-shaped void, make a friend or two. Maybe I should check out this cornhole game that everybody’s so excited about.

When I arrive at the high school stadium at two o’clock for the game, it’s packed. They’ve taken over the football field, with bleachers set up on either side of a rubber track and townspeople of all ages filling up the stands. Along the 30-, 40-, and 50-yard lines are pairs of plywood bean-bag toss sets like people would have at backyard cookouts, only these are much more ornate. They’re high-gloss works of art emblazoned with what I assume are the team colors and logos of the opposing towns: Spitz Hollow and, of course, Tuft Swallow.

I feel like I’ve heard of Spitz Hollow from somewhere outside of the talk of the day’s match, but I can’t remember where. But when you look at a map, all the towns around here have bird names: Robin Springs, Eagle’s Peak, Tuft Swallow…I’m sure I’m just getting them confused with each other.

Out on the field, I see a few familiar faces dressed in what I now recognize as the signature turquoise and orange of The Mighty Swallows . It’s the same shade of turquoise as the Tit Peeper’s windbreakers, and matches the game boards on the home-team side of the field. Both Nick and Caleb recognize me and give me a wave. I return a little two-finger salute, and then my eyes land on Kodi.

Like the others, she’s toting a turquoise short-sleeved jersey with bright orange-and-white letters across the front, as well as a white silhouette of a swallow in flight above her breast. Her orange shorts are… quite a bit shorter than I would have expected for a family-friendly sporting event, honestly. All the women on the team are sporting bottoms that could pass for Hooters uniforms.

However, none of them pull them off quite like Kodi does.

That confident, determined personality that I glimpsed only briefly in our exchanges earlier in the week is out in top form. She’s blasting on a whistle that she wears around her neck, looking more like a bonafide college sports coach than just a mere beer league captain. Her hair is pulled back into a glossy ponytail that shows off the highlights in her dirty blonde locks. Her bright eyes glisten with an almost manic energy that seems to have some of her teammates on edge.

I try to catch her eye and give her a thumbs-up for luck, but she’s distracted by the rival team entering the field.

AC/DC’s Thunderstruck starts to play from the tinny loudspeakers that sit above the press box, and I can’t help but laugh. It’s like something out of Varsity Blues: the Spitz Hollow players in their matching red-and-white jerseys and eye black smeared across their cheekbones marching onto the field to their own personal soundtrack. Although this sporting event has some unique additions.

Tuft Swallowers young and old are milling about the sidelines, high fiving over coolers and sharing tupperwares of jello salad. Children run in and around the legs of older fans, waving colorful flags and noisemakers, as their parents chat with each other and pass out beers. On the track in front of the 50-yard line, a group of young girls ranging from ages four to ten wave pom-poms and try in vain to follow the choreography of a woman dressed in a flamboyant afghan with long, brown pigtail braids.

Even the town goat–Wilson? William?–is tied up next to the recycling bins, dressed in a knitted turquoise-and-orange scarf and yarn baubles hanging from his curly horns. He’s munching on discarded soda cans while an absolute lumberjack of a man I can only assume is his “Hot Daddy” scowls at him from a makeshift concession stand, where he’s manning a grill lined with hamburger patties and veggie dogs. On one side of his station a Girl Scout troop is selling raffle tickets and boxes of cookies. On the other side, a table of old ladies with crochet hooks and knitting needles are handing out hats and scrunchies in the town colors and collecting names for their crafting club, the Dirty Hookers. Their banner (Sign Up to Become a Hooker Today!) is particularly eye-catching.

And that’s about where I draw the line on getting to know my neighbors a little better. This little dose of hometown spirit is more than enough for me to handle. But as I turn to leave the stadium, something catches my eye on the field that makes my throat go dry.

No, not something. Some-one.

At that very moment, Zeke marches onto the field, and I know in an instant that I won’t be going back home. Without my conscious direction or permission, my feet walk me past the Girl Scouts and Hookers and Winston’s Hot Daddy over to the chain-link fence that separates the crowd from the players.

My only thought is that it’s been almost a whole week since I’ve heard from him, and I’ve missed him so much in the last few days. Every night, I’ve returned to an empty apartment, eaten a microwaved Lean Cuisine alone, and curled up in a cold bed, wishing I could just scrounge up the courage to send him a text or call to hear his voice.

Before I’m even aware of it, I’m weaving my fingers through the holes of the chest-high chain link fence that is the only thing separating me from my ex, and I’m shouting his name.

“Zeke! Zeke! Over here!”

As he looks over, confusion, followed by embarrassment, flashes across his face, and my brain catches back up with my body. Humiliation floods my veins, and he gives a cheeky little wave before nodding to his teammates and laughing. The sound cuts right through the music and the chatter, hitting me like a punch in the gut.

Oh God. He’s making fun of me.

I snatch my hands from the chain link as if it’s burned me, stepping back from the edge of the track and accidentally bumping into an elderly couple in line for burgers, sporting matching turquoise windbreakers. I wince. A couple of Tit Peepers are the last people I want to be bumping into right now.

A pair of gnarled fingers taps my arm.

“Why, Dr. Gosling! What a pleasure to see you out and about in the community. Do you toss bean, as the kids say?”

The old woman’s words bring me back to my last conversation with Zeke.

“There are an awful lot of local hotties that toss bean in the summer and, well. I don’t have to drive an hour to hook up with them, now do I?”

Oh God. Oh my God. Zeke isn’t in some weird-but-sexy British sports league for the summer. “Tossing bean” isn’t a cheeky British euphemism for playing cricket or rugby or polo or something delightfully masculine yet homoerotic like that.

It’s literally bean bag toss. Cornhole.

He plays cornhole.

He dumped me for a backyard picnic game made for drunks. So he would be free to hook up with gaggles of attractive tech bros and laugh at me in front of them.

“Dr. Gosling? Are you alright?”

I stumble forward, out of the old woman’s grasp, shaking my arms out in an attempt to get my bearings again.

“Fine, yes–sorry, Mrs…?”

“Woodcock, dearie. We met just the other day, don’t you remember? This is my husband, Harold. Honey, this is Brian Gosling, the new chiropractor.”

“The one with the boyfriend?”

I feel heat rise to my cheeks and at the same time, bile rises in my throat.

“That’s none of your business,” I say through gritted teeth.

The old man is unperturbed, and surprisingly kind when he says, “Ah, don’t sweat it, Brian. A young fella like you will find someone else in no time. We have no shortage of attractive young men who’ve moved to town, after all!”

I blink at the pair of them, wishing more than anything that I could disappear on the spot.

“Oh hiiiiiii, Dr. Gosling! Kodi! Did you see? Dr. Gosling is here!” A voice that I just barely recognize as the flirty chirp of a redhead’s from the Crowbar and Grill a few nights before calls from across the field. I look up at the same moment Kodi does, and we lock eyes. She tilts her head in confusion, and I look away, embarrassed.

Giving the redhead a wave of acknowledgement, Kodi jogs over to the patch of the fence where I’m standing, and I can’t help myself from looking at her injured leg to see how it’s holding up. I wouldn’t have recommended she be jogging so soon after Thursday’s intense adjustment, but she makes it over to the edge of the field without any apparent signs of distress. Then she goes up onto tip-toes and leans her elbows over the top of the four-foot barrier.

“Brian! What are you doing here?”

I’m far too conscious of the curious eyes of Mr. and Mrs. Woodcock following my every movement, and Zeke and the Spitz Hollow team stretching and pregaming within earshot. I can’t escape now without it looking suspicious. I take a couple of steps back towards her and try to adopt a relaxed posture. It’s harder than I want it to be.

“Oh, you know. Just checking out the society event of the season,” I joke weakly.

“You read about it in the Pecker?” She gives me a knowing look.

My eyes dart to her knee again. “Yeah.”

Her eyes narrow at me, and she pushes herself off the fence. “Oh, I see how it is. Now that you know my whole sob story, you’re gonna be awkward around me, huh?”

“What? No!” I raise my voice without meaning to, and I glance around quickly to make sure I didn’t garner any more unwelcome attention before lowering my volume to a hiss. “No, that’s not why–I’m just–”

“Just staring at my leg like I’m about to collapse all over again?”

She puts her fists on her hips, and I stifle a chuckle at the defiant posture that I’m coming to recognize. This woman is something else.

“No.” I sigh, leaning in closer to the fence. “I’m trying to avoid staring at my ex on the other side of the field.” I glance over her shoulder and tilt my head ever so slightly at the lithe, sweaty form of Zeke, who’s hacky-sacking a bean bag back and forth with a circle of painfully attractive teammates. Okay, maybe cornhole is more sexy and homoerotic than I gave it credit for. Kodi follows my gaze, and her eyes widen.

“That’s your ex? Number 17?”

I grit my teeth. “Yep. In the flesh.”

“Oof.”

“Yeah,” I cough out a humorless laugh. “Oof.”

A contemplative look crosses her face for a moment, and then her lip curls in a Grinch-like smirk. “Well you know what you have to do now, right?”

She’s got that gleam in her amber eyes again. The same one that she had when she suggested we barter her administrative skills for adjustments. I feel the muscles in my cheek tug upwards while I wonder what solution she could possibly be Macgyvering, and she flashes her teeth deviously.

“What’s that?”

“You have to beat his ass in cornhole.”