Chapter 8 #2
Extending his legs, Sandro crossed them at the ankles and let his mind drift.
Everything hurt—no surprise there—but at this point in his life, it was background pain.
He was hungry now that his stomach wasn’t threatening to rebel, but he had a meeting with Roman in half an hour to talk about the mentorship program and wellness initiative that he’d successfully managed not to think about ever since Roman had brought it up.
Him. Leading a mentorship program. Roman had lost his mind. The mere idea was laughable. It was absurd. It was—
“Sarah and I have officially separated.”
“Ah, Prin.” He leaned his shoulder harder into Prinnie’s. “I’m sorry.”
“I guess it was inevitable.”
“What? Why would it be inevitable?”
Prinnie heaved a sigh and rubbed his thighs.
“I was listening to a podcast recently, and a divorce lawyer was talking about divorce rates among professional athletes. Did you know the rate is super high? Almost seventy percent? And of that seventy percent, fifty percent of those marriages end within a year of the athlete retiring, so . . .” Prinnie shrugged, the movement jerky.
“I guess it’s a good thing we’re getting it over with now, huh? ”
“Hey.” Sandro leaned into him. “You guys are separating. That’s not a divorce.”
“Stats don’t lie, Zanetti.”
“No, but seventy percent isn’t a hundred percent. Things could still turn around.”
“They will or they won’t. I just . . .” Prinnie rubbed his thighs again. “I had to get out of the locker room. There was too much laughter, and the noise . . . it was stifling.”
Deeley and Sandbaker appeared in the doorway, probably so they could get a post-practice workout in, but Sandro shook his head and they retreated without a sound.
“I have a spare room,” he told Prinnie. “Why don’t you come stay with me for a bit until you find your footing?”
“Thank you, but no offense—I don’t really want to be around people right now.”
Sandro thought back to when Bennett had dumped him. About how he’d craved human connection afterward because being alone made his mind race. Made him remember all the times Bennett had visited from Chicago and forced him to confront the fact that he never would again.
But Prinnie wasn’t Sandro.
“No offense taken,” he said. “You smell really ripe, though, and that I take offense with.”
“Yes, because you smell like a dream yourself. Asshole.”
Chuckling, Sandro rose and offered Prinnie a hand up.
It reminded him of Bennett hauling him up after the obstacle course, all quietly amused, the wind teasing strands of hair out of his hair tie to brush his face.
He’d looked like a sexy angel looming above Sandro, wielding a clipboard like he was born to it.
Apparently, Sandro was into that.
In the locker room, Prinnie gently punched him in the shoulder. “Thanks, man.”
For what? Sandro was going to ask, but Prinnie was already walking away.
Half an hour later, showered and dressed in jeans and a hoodie, Sandro stepped off the elevator and into the organization’s open-concept offices several floors up. They were empty, so it was almost eerily quiet.
The players and coaching staff hadn’t gotten the day off, but the admin team had. Why Roman had scheduled their meeting for today was a mystery.
Oh, wait—it wasn’t empty. Sitting at a station with his laptop hooked to one of the computer monitors was none other than Bennett Jackson.
Stomach flipping over itself, Sandro paused. Bennett had his back to him, headphones on. His hair was tied into a bun, and the lines of his shoulders were curved as he worked.
The present collided with the past, and Sandro saw himself approaching Bennett from behind to pass a hand over his back and give him a sandwich as he sat at his desk in their shared apartment, working on a college project.
Bennett would soften under his touch. He’d sit back and smile at him, accepting Sandro’s quick kiss before he’d urge Sandro onto his lap so he could show him what he was working on.
What had happened between then and Bennett dumping him? Sandro wanted to ask, but he was afraid the answer was simple—that Bennett had fallen out of love with him.
He wasn’t sure if Bennett heard him or if he noticed Sandro’s reflection in his computer screen, but Bennett turned, lowering the headphones so they hung around his neck. “Hey.”
“Hey.” Sandro nodded at the computer as he approached. “What are you working on?”
“Just a short highlight reel for my producer. He wants daily updates.”
“Daily? Wow, that’s . . .”
“A colossal waste of my time?” Bennett finished for him. “I’m aware.”
“I was going to say that must be annoying—your producer sounds like a hell of a micromanager—but yeah, the colossal-waste-of-time thing too.”
“He isn’t. Or, well, he wasn’t a micromanager,” Bennett said as Sandro rolled the chair from the neighboring station closer and sat next to him.
“But he’s been more involved than usual with this project.
He backed Chain of Command too, and it got panned by critics.
He just wants to make sure his investment pays off this time. ”
“I heard about that,” Sandro said, propping one elbow against the desk.
“I liked it, though. To a degree, the critics weren’t wrong—it was a bit disjointed and the movie couldn’t find its theme if it was written on the Hollywood sign.
But it wasn’t bad by any means. Interesting and informative, if lacking in emotion. ”
Bennett was staring at him. “You watched Chain of Command?”
“Sure.” Sandro shrugged casually, even though he felt anything but casual toward this man. “After I found out you were doing our series, I watched all of your projects to get a feel for your work. Except Man Into the Unknown. Couldn’t find that one anywhere.”
Shaking his head, Bennett huffed a short laugh. “That one was very low budget. Working on it almost felt like a college project. It got some buzz in the indie world for a while before it faded into obscurity. I’m not surprised you couldn’t find it.”
“What was your favorite project to work on?”
“Chain of Command, believe it or not. Which is why it hurt so much when it tanked.”
Sandro’s heart clenched, and he tapped his foot against Bennett’s. “I’m sorry.”
“Someone once told me that you stumble more than you shine in this industry.” Bennett twirled a pencil around on the desk.
“I had a run of good luck before I stumbled, so I can’t really complain.
Trying to prevent this docuseries from suffering the same fate, though .
. . it’s got to balance drama and action with heart, but my producer is a little too focused on the drama. ”
“But drama sells, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah, but if you don’t have heart to go with it, drama turns into angst for the sake of angst.”
Sandro glanced at the computer screen. “Show me what you’re working on?”
Bennett started the video. “Like I said, it’s a short highlight reel.
Cotton coaching Deeley through a play. Eli asking Matty Coates about slapshots.
” Bennett narrated as the video continued.
“CC taking care of a cut on Hughes’ jaw after a bad hit.
Dabbs working with Sandbaker. You doing a little one-on-one with Eli. ”
Surprised, Sandro sat back in his chair. That one-on-one had been after hours when Eli had asked him to stay after practice. Sandro hadn’t realized there’d been anyone around to witness it.
“The problem with these daily highlights is that they’re disjointed,” Bennett said.
“One doesn’t follow from another, and if I don’t have enough material from the day before, I supplement with previous days’ material, like I did with this one.
These don’t tell a story. They’re just .
. . slice of life. And while slice of life isn’t bad in certain contexts, that’s not what this series needs. ”
“What does it need?” Sandro asked, kicking his legs out as he unintentionally fell into a pattern they’d repeated over and over—brainstorming a project, whether it had been for one of his own classes or Bennett’s. “What’s the story here?”
Bennett made a frustrated sound and crossed his arms over his chest. The move tightened his T-shirt around his biceps, and for a moment, Sandro got lost staring at them.
“I wish I knew,” Bennett said. “I haven’t figured it out yet.
My producer keeps insisting it’s that you’re defending Cup champions, but while that’s interesting, it’s not enough for a six-part series.
It’s the story within the story that’s going to be the heart of the show, whatever that story ends up being. ”
“Hey.”
They turned at Roman’s voice. He stood at the end of the long, multi-station desk, eyeing them like the school principal who’d caught them making trouble.
“Are you guys coming, or what?” he demanded before turning on his heel and returning to his office.
“You’re coming to my meeting?” Sandro asked Bennett as he stood.
Bennett swung the headphones over his head and left them on the desk. “Roman invited me.”
“Why?”
“Beats me. He hasn’t told me anything about it. Only that I might find it interesting for the series.” Reaching for his phone, Bennett hesitated. “If you don’t want me there, I can—”
“No, it’s fine. You can help me convince Roman that I’m the wrong person for the job.”
“What job?”
“You’ll see.”
Bennett had set up a couple of cameras in Roman Kinsey’s office prior to the meeting, in opposite corners, to capture a couple of different angles. The tripod setups weren’t exactly discreet, but Sandro merely gave them a passing glance before he focused on the whiteboard against one wall.
“What’s that?” he asked, while Bennett leaned back against the wall next to the door and tried to make himself as unobtrusive as possible. This was Sandro and Roman’s show; Bennett was just along for the ride.