5. Beckett
Beckett
The steak wasn’t good, and the protein probably wasn’t worth the risk.
Greer took two bites of hers before she wrinkled her nose, pushing the plate to the side.
But the company was nice.
It was refreshing to talk to someone about something other than last season, how I dealt with all the memes, TikToks, general national hatred, whether I was working with a mental performance consultant, and what my strategy was for this season.
She didn’t ask me anything about football, she mostly just listened to me. And I definitely talked too much, but it sort of felt like I was a whole, real person again after a really, really long time.
Trees boughed down with leaves, lifting in the breeze, looking a bit like they’re ready for fall, obscure most of the two-level bungalows lining her street.
“This is me.” She points to one just ahead. It’s almost identical to every other one, except for the wide, white wooden arches wrapping around the porch.
I nod, pulling up alongside the sidewalk. “Nice place.”
“Oh, thanks.” Greer glances at her porch, illuminated by one single light mounted in a brass sconce beside the door. “It’s just a rental. But it’s nice. Spacious. Lots of exposed brick, a great kitchen and bathroom. And there’s a big balcony around the back that’s got a ton of privacy.”
“Spacious and private? What more can you ask for?” I toss her a wry grin and put the truck in park.
She gives me a flat look. “There’s more of that in the east end. Where do you live? Yonge and Eglington?”
“Ouch.” I grip my chest. “I’ll have you know, I live in the west end.”
A mocking sort of gasp comes from her, and she makes a surprised face. “Oh? Are you secretly a big, crunchy hipster? What with this massive gas-guzzling truck?”
I raise my eyebrows and give her a noncommittal jerk of my chin. “Nah, it’s just close to the field.”
“Well.” Greer tips her head, studying me, before turning to the door. “Thank you for dinner. Even though I think we have legitimate cause to be concerned about E. coli.”
“Good thing you’re licensed to practice medicine.” I bring my hands back to the steering wheel. I don’t really want her to go. I’m not good at being alone anymore. “Wait—can I get your number?”
“You’re asking for my number?” she turns and repeats, voice deadpan and eyes sharp.
I hold my hands up before pulling my phone out of my pocket. “Business only. I’ll text you when I think I can come by the hospital, and we can try to coordinate?”
“Business only,” she agrees, plucking my phone from my outstretched hand. Her fingers fly across the screen, and her eyebrows lift when she hands it back to me. “Here you go. I don’t give unsolicited medical advice, and I don’t write prescriptions for painkillers or sedatives, so don’t bother.”
“I’ve got a team doctor for that.” I hold up the phone. “I’ll text you.”
Greer tips her head, and her ponytail falls across her shoulder. Her nose wrinkles, but it’s not out of distaste this time. “But if you find yourself lying awake at night, crushed under the expectations of a city and its sports fans alike, and you want to talk to someone who doesn’t care, who doesn’t hate you—that counts as business, too.”
A grin stretches across my face, and it’s not the one I’ve grown to hate. It’s the one I think I used to make all the time. “You want to tell me bedtime stories?”
“No, I’d be terrible at that.” She looks at me for a minute longer, before finally opening the door and jumping out of the truck. “Good night, Beckett.”
“Night, Dr. Roberts.” I lean forward, about to grab the handle of the door, when she turns back, rolls her eyes at me, and slams it shut.
I wait and watch to make sure she gets in safely, even though a potential intruder should probably be afraid of her.
But I think I might actually wait to watch her a bit longer because she’s not as mean as she thinks—she’s actually quite thoughtful, and she’s actually quite beautiful.
Bile in her hair and all.
“Again. Sixty yards this time.”
Coach Taylor’s voice cuts across the field, and one of the equipment managers runs out to set up another ball 3 yards back from the last one.
My quads are on fire. Kickers don’t often break a sweat, but I’ve been sweating on this empty practice field under a particularly oppressive August sun for the last two hours. I lost count of how many kicks he’s asked me to attempt, each getting progressively farther back, and I have a feeling he’s making his way back to that record-breaking 67 yards I’ve hit before—just not when it mattered.
“I need him for kickoffs on Friday morning. Don’t kill his fucking legs,” Darren calls from the sidelines. His voice is sharper than it should be when he’s talking to his boss, but technically, he manages me. Not Coach Taylor.
“Last one then, Davis.” Coach Taylor’s eyebrows rise, and he eyes the football, innocuous and propped up there on the stand. He holds up a hand to stop me before I can start to line up, and he whistles to get the attention of the equipment manager, beckoning him back across the field. “Move it to 67 yards.”
“Is that really necessary?” Darren cuts in again. I can see the whites of his knuckles against the grip of his clipboard from here. “The last thing we need is him”—he punctuates his words by jerking a thumb at me—“losing confidence before preseason even fucking starts. He’s broken the record, we’ve seen it. Leave it.”
Coach Taylor’s lips pull into a thin line, nostrils flaring. But before he can reprimand Darren the way he probably should, and before they can keep talking about me like I’m not even here, I follow the equipment manager down to the 67-yard line. “I can do it.”
“See?” Coach Taylor raises his shoulders before clapping his hands in that weird, sharp way only coaches ever seem to. “Let’s see it then, Davis.”
I’m actually not sure I can do it. At least not this version of me. The other version of me—whoever that was, because I’m not sure he was a real person at the end of the day if he crumbled into nothing so fucking easily—he would have been pretty confident.
And he was pretty confident when he stepped up to kick during that game last year. But the second my foot connected, I knew it was wrong.
I’ve thought about it a lot, and I’m thinking about it now, while I swing my leg and pound my fist into my quad to try and delay the inevitable cramping that’s going to have me in an ice bath for hours. I’m not sure where I went wrong in my approach, I did the same thing I always do.
But I don’t think about it.
It feels okay when my foot connects. It goes far enough.
But it’s just off. It hits the uprights before it goes in.
“Dead ball.” Coach Taylor claps his hands again.
I know it’s a fucking dead ball. I feel a bit like kicking another one at him, or at the very least telling him to fuck off—but the old Beckett Davis made a career on being nice and reliable, so I scrub my face instead.
I grin, lifting one shoulder. “Kick went far enough though.”
His eyes sharpen on me, and Darren starts shouting again about how I’m done for the day because I’ll be no good to anyone if I tear a muscle before preseason starts next week.
I’m already no good to anyone, but I don’t say that.
“Jesus Christ, Darren, he’s done. I need to talk to him for a few minutes. Is it alright with you if I talk to one of my players?”
I don’t turn to watch Darren inevitably run away with his tail between his legs. I scrub my face again and walk towards Coach Taylor, my hand firmly clamped on my jaw to hide the wince I make with every step.
His eyes cut to my thighs, my quad muscle twitching away under the bright light of the sun.
I swallow, exhaling and ready to start making excuses. “I can make the kick, it’s just because—”
“I know you can make the kick, Davis.” He cuts me off with a sharp jerk of his head. “I want you to break records as much as you want to break records. But that’s not what this is about. You played with Pat Perez in college?”
“Uh, yeah. He was my QB when I was a wide receiver. He transferred after I started kicking though.” Back when I was perfectly content to be a wide receiver who was just good. Nothing more. Nothing less. No real potential there. No real pressure after a lifetime of too much.
Coach Taylor nods, rubbing his jaw. “We’re going to trade Diggs for him. Love is going to retire soon enough and Diggs isn’t a viable enough QB2.”
“Oh.” I shrug. I get along with Diggs—I get along with everyone even when I don’t feel like it—but he’s right. He can’t hold a candle to Love’s passing or leadership in a locker room. “That’s smart. Pat’s too talented to ride the bench. He’s been unlucky since he was drafted. He’s always stuck under a veteran, and he hasn’t really had his chance to shine.”
“I happen to agree. You’re smarter than you give yourself credit for.” Coach Taylor rests a hand on my shoulder, like he’s going to give me a nice old clap for being such a team player, but he doesn’t let go. His hand lingers there, like he’s some sort of paternal figure to me, and he’s about to impart some sage advice. “He’s thrown to you before. It would be much appreciated by me, and everyone else, if you’d walk through some routes with him. But don’t do anything stupid. You might be off right now— but those legs are worth twenty-five million over the next three years.”
Running routes with someone who used to know me when I was nothing, when I was finally able to breathe, to do something and not really care about it and have it not really matter, doesn’t appeal to me. It’s not how I want to spend my time before the season starts. But Beckett Davis is a team player.
“Sure, happy to.” My voice sounds fake even to me.
He does clap me on the shoulder this time and points at me before he starts walking backwards, leaving me alone on the practice field with another failure. “Don’t kill your legs like this ever again.”
He says it like I had a choice. But I’m not really sure I’ve ever had much of a choice about anything.