Chapter 5
ANNIE – MID-SEPTEMBER
Dirty Laundry
It’s the first time I’ve ever missed the Bear’s first game of the season. Instead of watching my brother and the guys kick off at the Alamo Stadium, I’ll be supporting from right here in my front room.
I’ve got a standing fan blasting at Nelson, who’s wearing nothing but a diaper on account of this afternoon’s heat. The cameras on screen pan the friends and family area, always pausing on the model girlfriends and celebs – the limelight WAGs – but I catch a glimpse of my daddy and Sas.
“There’s Papa, Nelson. Blow him a kiss.”
Nelson is trying desperately to make the transition from crawling to walking. He climbs up my legs, holding on to my shoulder to stand on his divinely podgy and sort of bowed legs.
He blows the cutest kisses at the television, all wide-mouthed and sloppy. I know I’m biased but I really have the most adorable kid in the world. Which almost makes up for the fact my game snacks consist of yoghurt and super squishable finger chips that stick in my molars.
Oh to have a corn dog and some crunchy chips at the ground.
As the Bears run out to “La Grange” by ZZ Top, I flip Nelson onto my lap.
Bouncing him in time to the music, I force aside the FOMO.
I have so much to be thankful for. I just also really love being at the games, in the thick of the atmosphere, cheering for my brother’s team.
After all the support the team has shown us since Mama died, I’m extra invested in every man on the squad.
The last players to run the guard of honor onto the field are the receivers and the quarterback – the stars of the show.
I hold Nelson’s hands and he giggles as I cheer for Omar, then Uncle Colton.
I try to ignore the broadcasters when they start discussing personal matters.
“Eighty-two, Colton Quinn. He had an inconsistent season last year with a lot going on personally for him.”
“Yeah, let’s hope it doesn’t impact his game this year, too,” another says.
“One thing’s for sure, I’m looking forward to when the Bears face the St Louis Archers and these guys come back up against Auston Rogers and his team. First Quinn broke Rogers’ jaw in his sister’s honor, then the Archers defense caused Thieriot’s injury. It’s going to blow!”
They’re talking about your daddy, Nelson.
I’m thankful for the announcement of number eighty-nine, Tanner Pace, and the memory of his last message to me.
“Will he wave to us like he promised?”
Tanner bounds out of the tunnel, hitting the hands of his teammates that are held out to him as pyrotechnics explode around them.
As I scrutinize the way the new season uniform looks on him and hugs his perfectly fine tight end (pun intended), I realize how long it’s been since I’ve been touched by a man.
That’s the only reason I can find for my smutty thoughts and my body feeling all squirmy in ways it really ought not to be.
If I were in the market for a man – even a hook-up – which I am not, a football player is the very last place I would look. Once bitten, twice shy.
As Tanner reaches the end of the team’s guard, the cameras close in on him, so close it’s as if he’s staring right into my lounge. Then he holds up a gloved hand and winks right at Nelson and me as he waves.
I’m sure it’s a well-timed giggle but the sound Nelson makes reflects perfectly the flutters in my stomach and chest.
Last out of the tunnel, Lamar Taylor runs onto the field. Despite everyone wishing that Tommy Thieriot was out there, the crowd gets behind the quarterback for his first ever start in a Bears’ jersey.
I’m so giddy for kick off, I forget how awful these kid chips are and shove one in my mouth, right as the broadcast flips to another game – the St Louis Archers at Pittsburgh Pythons – and those teams run out.
I darn near choke on that anti-choke melty stick when Nelson’s daddy appears on the screen.
In that way he’s always had the ability to do, he takes the air right out of my lungs.
I’m winded. By his whiplash. By the fact he exists even though he hasn’t so much as messaged me about Nelson since the day our baby was born, or the six months before that when he knew I was pregnant.
I’m so busy forgetting how to breathe that it takes me a beat to register the chorus of boos coming from the Pythons’ home crowd.
“Auston Rogers is even receiving boos from the Archers fans who’ve travelled,” the broadcaster says.
“I’ve rarely seen anything like it,” another says. “Even his own team can’t get behind him and I’ve got to say, with everything that went down with Colton Quinn’s sister, it’s hard for anyone to support him, right?”
My body stiffens involuntarily. I’ll never get used to the fact my dirty laundry is being broadcast to millions. My baby’s business, that he hasn’t chosen to make public. Neither of us did.
“We’ve got to separate the game and the personal. We don’t know Quinn’s sister, or the circumstances. What matters to me is whether Rogers can get the Archers in a position to challenge for trophies this season.”
“Of course you don’t care about anything other than the game because you’ve got a dick between your legs,” I mutter, chin resting on Nelson’s head and my arms wrapped tightly around his chubby little waist. “You never repeat that word, baby, it’s nasty.”
But so is what his daddy has done to him.
I pick up the controller, about to turn over the channel, when the focus switches back to the Bears’ game. We have possession and our center snaps the ball back to Lamar to get our first drive of the game underway.
For the first set of downs, I fall into a familiar rabbit warren – how on earth am I supposed to explain to my baby one day that his daddy didn’t want us?
I will not cry. I draw my shoulders back and straighten my spine like I would sitting on my mare.
Screw Auston. Nelson and I are fine.
We’re even better when Tanner Pace runs the football right into the end zone for the first touchdown of the game. Go, Bears!
And they do go… on to win.
They defeat Tampa Bay by two points. It’s scrappy.
After his first touchdown, Tanner spends most of the game blocking.
Colton struggles to get free – a response by the defense to how well my brother ended last season and how great we know he can play at his best – but he does score a touchdown and gets over a hundred yards.
The rest of the offense is hit and miss.
The special teams deserve a lot of credit for the win.
But the real worry is that Lamar throws multiple interceptions and the Bears are indebted to the defense.
Still, a win is a win.