Chapter Thirty-Eight
Bryan
Even after lovemaking late into the night, I wake up with the morning light. The warm softness of Susie at my back nearly undoes my resolve to get up. I want to say fuck the NFL and the universe, and turn to her, hold her in my arms, and stay in bed forever.
But in spite of my need for her comfort and my stiff dick, I slide from bed without disturbing her, throw on some jeans, and slip from the room. When I make it to the kitchen, I run into Eldy and glance at the clock. It’s almost eight o’clock.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
“Good morning to you, too.”
He smiles, his cheeriness perpetually undaunted by me or the facts of life. I keep waiting with dread for him to be disillusioned, hoping like fuck he won’t be. Ever. And doing my best not to be the one to do it.
I grunt and head for the new Mr. Coffee, sent to us for Christmas courtesy of Eldy’s mom. He already made a pot, and I’m pretty sure it smells better than it’s going to taste, but I pour a cup anyway.
“You’re up early. Susie kick you out of bed?”
I give him the finger, but don’t mention I’m up because I’m expecting a call from my agent. I take a long, scalding swallow of black coffee.
“I’m out of here.”
He lifts his chin in the direction of the door but makes no move. “Are you sure you want to stay here by yourself for Christmas? Come home with me. Dad loves talking football with you.”
I heave a breath because part of me wants to go. But the rest of me doesn’t feel like being a charity case. Of course, I’m not going home except for Christmas dinner if I can hitch a ride back. I don’t need to spend time under the same roof with my dad when the farm’s closed down for the winter. He’d find chores for me, but none of them would be essential or ones that he can’t handle himself. Besides, I have things going on. “No. Thanks, though.”
He studies me for a second and drops his duffel. “What’s going on with you and Susie? Is she staying here with you? Not that I care or mind?—”
“No.”
I don’t know what to tell him. I didn’t tell him about the confrontation with Liz last night, only that I needed to bring Susie home with me. He assumed I wanted to spend the night with her for the obvious reasons. He wasn’t wrong. Not completely.
But about Susie and me, I have no answer. If I’m lucky, I’ll be moving to the West Coast at the end of next semester to play football. If I’m unlucky, I’ll be going back to my family’s farm. Either way, I don’t see Susie joining me.
So what the fuck am I doing with her?
“Spill it. You’re way too quiet—even for you.”
“I’m expecting a call about the 49ers this morning. My agent’s been talking to their recruiter.”
A giant grin lights up his face, and he smacks me on the shoulder. “That’s fantastic, man. Not a big surprise to anyone else but you. The press has you ranked to go in the top twenty-five in the draft.”
I snort. “Like they’re never wrong.”
He discards his jacket in a heap with his duffel and retrieves his used cup from the sink. “I think I’ll stay around for this.”
He pours some coffee and goes to the fridge to add milk.
“What about getting home?—”
“My parents will be glad to see me whatever time I get home. I don’t care if I hit traffic. This is worth it.”
His smile doesn’t diminish, and I know there’s nothing I can say to dampen his pleasure or persuade him to leave. Shit. I hope he’s not disappointed with whatever my agent has to say. I don’t tell him that because he’ll only laugh at me and my so-called cynicism like he always does when I try to be realistic with him.
“What time is he calling? Maybe I should wake Mack and?—”
“No. Don’t. Let them sleep. You can tell them… whatever the news is when they wake up.”
“I’m going to be long gone by then, and you probably won’t tell them a fucking thing.”
He’s right. I’m no good at sharing, especially not about speculation and possibilities. If I don’t have a signed contract, it’s not news fit to share. “You can call them at home later.”
He shakes his head.
The phone rings. I stare at it a second as it rings again and when Eldy looks like he’s going to come after me and force me to answer it, I move, picking up the receiver on the third ring.
He mutters something about me being a bastard under his breath as I say hello.
“Bryan, hold onto your socks. I spoke with the recruiter from the San Francisco 49ers, and they confirmed that they’re interested in drafting you next month.”
He pauses, and I let out a breath. He waits for my reaction, but I have none. Intentions are all well and good, but not real. He clears his throat. “You should be thrilled, young man.”
“I will be. When I have a signed contract.”
My agent chortles. “That’s what I like about you—no nonsense. I think the team will appreciate that too. They’d like to meet you, talk to you to make sure you’re not a crazy person, that you’ll fit in. Not that I haven’t assured them that you’re very mature for your age, but they want to see for themselves.”
“When?”
That’s all I can think to say. I hadn’t anticipated an in-person meeting. That makes playing for them more real. Not real enough. A meeting gives them a chance to not like what they see, to back out.
Hell, I’m not sure I’m not a crazy person.
“They’ll be on the East Coast right after Christmas. I’ll phone you in the next few days when I get the details. Will this still be a good number?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s it. Your Christmas gift from me.”
He laughs. “You and yours have a Merry Christmas, Bryan. Talk soon.”
I murmur Merry Christmas and hang up the phone.
Eldy is grinning at me like a circus clown and slaps me on the shoulder. “I heard every word. Congratulations, man. You’re going to the fucking 49ers. This is so fucking cool?—”
“Take it easy, Eldy. I might need my shoulder.”
He laughs like a kid, forcing me to smile. It’s damn difficult not to get caught up with him in the fantasy. But it’s still a fantasy. Not real. Not yet.
“I’ll believe it when I’m dressed in a uniform on the field for the kickoff of the first regular season game.”
A lot of guys will get cut during training camp and preseason, so I can’t kid myself that I’m there, that this is a lock.
But I’ll do everything in my fucking power to make it.
“The 49ers,”
Eldy says, shaking his head. “All the way on the West Coast. I don’t care—I’ll be at every single fucking game. You’re lucky I love California.”
“I’ve never been.”
Never thought of going. San Francisco may as well be a fictional city from Tolkien’s Middle Earth.
My eye catches movement near the fridge, and I turn. Susie appears in the kitchen doorway, looking like a dream, her long hair slightly disheveled and sexy as hell. My mouth waters, and I swallow, willing myself not to pounce. Then, with a satisfied smile, she walks straight to me, into my arms like she belongs there.
When she tilts her head up, I let go of whatever restraint I have, forgetting why it’s there, and lower my head to find her mouth and kiss her thoroughly. All the warmth and sensations from last night replay in my head, infusing the kiss with all the desire I’m feeling, all the heat?—
A wolf whistle pierces the air, and Eldy laughs. “Wow, guys. I’m still here in the room with you.”
I give Eldy a dirty look that tells him if he wasn’t my best friend, I’d beat the shit out of him right now.
Mack and Chuck stumble into the kitchen dressed in boxers. I stand in front of Susie.
“What the fuck’s going on here—?”
Chuck says, stopping abruptly when he sees me trying to hide Susie’s view.
“Shit,”
Mack says. “I didn’t know we had company. Be right back.”
He disappears back down the hall with Chuck behind him, laughing.
“Did you hear the big news, Susie?”
Eldy starts.
“How could she have heard?” I say.
“What is it?”
she asks me. “Is it about football?”
I nod. “No big deal. My agent says the recruiter from the 49ers wants to meet with me?—”
“That’s fantastic!”
She wraps me in a fierce hug. “I knew it. You’re going to play in the NFL.”
I unwrap her arms as Mack and Chuck return to the kitchen. “It’s no big deal.”
“Are you crazy?”
Eldy says and turns to our roommates. “Bryan’s agent just called and told him the 49ers want to draft him and they want to meet him. They’re coming out here in a few days to?—”
“Hold on. You’re jumping ahead. They’re going to be on the East Coast and they might want to meet with me while they’re here. I don’t have an appointment, and I sure as hell don’t have a signed contract since we’re a few weeks away from draft day.”
“Congratulations, Bryan.”
Mack ignores everything I said and shakes my hand. “You’re as good as on the team. They’d be crazy not to draft you. They need a running back, and you’re one of the best in the draft.”
“I believe in you, man,”
Chuck says, giving me a slap on the back. “You’re as good as in the NFL.”
“We should celebrate,”
Eldy says.
“No. It’s time for you to go home.”
I look around at their grinning faces, and I strangle the lump of joy, pressing it back before I lose control. “We’ll celebrate after I sign a contract,”
I promise. I don’t say it, but I can’t help thinking it.
“We have to get going too, or my mom will kill me,”
Mack says to Chuck.
“I’m ready,”
Chuck says, then he turns to Susie. “Looks like we’ll be seeing more of you around here next semester.”
He winks, and Susie’s laugh is soft and agreeable, finding nothing awkward or wrong with Chuck’s assumption, as if she likes the idea.
I try not to stiffen, not to picture her spending time here, not to get ahead of where we are just because I want her. Badly. I push the idea from my head, keeping myself in the here and now.
Eldy finishes his coffee while Mack and Chuck get their bags and bundle out the front door.
“Guess I’m next to leave,”
Eldy says, putting his empty mug in the sink for me to clean, as usual.
“Do me a favor, Dane. Give Susie a ride back to her dorm on your way out.”
He knows I’m serious when I call him Dane.
He nods. “The semester is over, and Christmas break has officially begun.”
His smile returns.
Susie turns to me, and the look on her face is surprised and disappointed. Then she steps back from me, nodding, her mouth flat as she recognizes reality.
She has some unfinished business to take care of with Liz. We both do.
She turns to Dane. “Thank you. I’ll only need a minute.”
Turning back to me with a soft lovestruck expression that would have made my knees buckle if I didn’t suck in and tighten every muscle against it. She has feelings. The same kind I do, and I can’t let them get exposed, not until I figure out my life. Not until she figures out her life.
Not until we fix things with Liz. Fuck.
“I’m ready to go when you are,”
Eldy says.
Susie grips me tighter, and I hold her, caressing her back as if to reassure her, except I feel like a fool because I have nothing real to give her, and I’m not a guy who deals in empty promises. I don’t make promises, especially not to girls.
The last and only promise I ever made was to my brother: to never quit football until football quits me. I still don’t know if it was a fucking foolish thing to promise or not. But he was dying, and my heart couldn’t say no.
I walk Susie to Eldy’s car, and she asks when she’ll see me again. The question hits me like a defensive lineman, knocking me back a few figurative steps.
“I don’t know.”
Her face falls. Shit.
“I’ll call you.”
I promise. The words are on the tip of my tongue, her beautiful angelic face tempting me to say them out loud, but I don’t.
She nods. “Or I’ll call you.”
That makes me smile, and I kiss her. It’s an urgent, end-of-the-world kiss, and I hate that I feel this way. I want more kisses, more nights together, on and on endlessly with no limits. When I break my lips from hers, I open the car door, ripping her from my arms to help her in.
She says goodbye, and Eldy spouts some nonsense about getting together during break. They both wave. I don’t wave back. I’m not a waver.
But hell if I know what I am right now. I’m officially in limbo—the last place I want to be. If I could choose my future, I’d choose football and playing for the NFL over going back to the farm to work for my old man. Not now, not the way things are between us.
In the future, football could give me the money to improve the farm, improve life on the farm for everyone. Maybe someday I’ll go back—when my old man’s too old to boss me, too feeble to carry a threat, or when he’s gone.
Back inside the apartment, I’m alone, and my mind is crowded with a jumble of nothing but possibilities. Maybe that’s how it’s meant to be—for all of us—at age twenty-one, with all the time and space stretched in front of us, waiting to be filled up with something.
I have choices to make, to pluck something from the possibilities and run with it.
I choose football. If football quits me, if I’m not drafted, I’ll try out in New York or Boston, not too far away to make it impossible. I can hitch to either city in one day. If I try out for the Jets, I could stay with Eldy in Greenwich.
My gut clenches, telling me I’m getting way ahead of myself, letting pipe dreams carry me away, but I fight through it because I’m not discarding the possibility of football, whether I’m disappointed or not in the end. There’s no stopping it.
I made a fucking promise, and I’m going to keep it. To more than keep it. I’m going to embrace it.
Stalking to the phone on the kitchen wall, I rip the receiver out of the cradle and dial my house number. Mom answers.
“I want to talk to Dad.”
For once in a very long time, that’s a true statement.