8. Gavin
Gavin
I had pictured Xavier as some intimidating guy, the kind who’d take one look at me on his porch and threaten to call the cops the second he figured out why I was there.
Instead, the guy who opened the door was tall, skinny, wearing glasses and pajamas, and he got a question out before I could even open my mouth.
“Gavin Blakley? Are you actually Gavin Blakley?”
I smiled and nodded.
“Penny!” he shouted over his shoulder. “Penny, come here!”
Then he turned back to me. “Oh my gosh, how rude of me. I’m Xavier. Please, come in, Mr. Blakley. I’m a huge, huge fan. Please, come in, come in.”
As I entered their beautiful brick house, I said a silent thank-you to whatever version of me, back in high school, who decided to be a football player instead of literally anything else. It was about to come in real handy, and I fully planned on using it.
A tall woman with brown hair came around the corner from the kitchen, also in her pajamas, and lit up the second she saw me.
“Hey! I’m Penelope. Nice to meet you.” She looked over at Xavier. “Xee, I mean Xavier, is a huge fan. Every single time the Redcoats play, he takes that armchair and sits right there.” She pointed at a spot disturbingly close to the television. “And watches the whole game. Right, Xee?”
She said it the exact way a mom talks when she’s trying to help her shy kid make a friend.
“Yes, yes,” Xavier said, beaming. “You’ve been awesome this season, Mr. Blakley.”
“Please, just call me Gavin.”
“Yeah, yeah, sure.” He beamed even harder. “So, what brings you here, Gavin?”
I opened my mouth to answer, and he cut me right off.
“Sorry, would you like something to eat?”
“Yeah, yeah, please,” Penny said. “I was actually just making breakfast.”
The smell of bacon hit me right then, and I realized I was starving.
“I’m sorry, I really shouldn’t have just shown up unannounced in the middle of your breakfast,” I said. “But I came to ask you both about something important.”
“Let’s talk over breakfast,” Xavier said, already waving me toward the kitchen.
Penny set out plates for all three of us at this beautiful, sprawling breakfast nook, and once we were all sitting, Xavier looked at me.
“So, Gavin, how can we help you?”
I cleared my throat. “This is about Wren.”
Xavier had a forkful of eggs halfway to his mouth. He stopped, fork in midair. Penny went quiet, sipping her coffee, her eyes flicking between us.
“What’s she done now?” Xavier asked.
“I know this might be uncomfortable for you both,” I said. “But it’s really important that I know. I just want to understand what happened between you two, leading up to the divorce.”
Xavier looked deeply uncomfortable. Penny watched him, taking a slow bite of her omelet, not saying a word.
“I don’t need the whole story,” I said. “I’m sorry to even ask. I’m a pretty private person myself, and I’d hate it if some stranger showed up at my house before I even had breakfast and started grilling me about my personal life.”
“I’d hate that too,” Xavier said. “But you’re Gavin Blakley, my favorite Redcoat, so it’s okay. I’m sure you’ve got your reasons for asking. And honestly, I think I can already guess what they are. Wren brought you up more times than I can count.”
“She mentioned me?”
“More times than I can remember,” Xavier said.
“Always right after we’d get into a fight.
” He set his fork down. “You want my honest take on Wren? I’ve thought about it a lot.
She likes powerful men. She married me because I was the ‘it kid’ in this town, grew up with nothing, built a software company from scratch.
Then she got bored of that, and started something with the next it kid, this real estate guy a couple towns over.
So off she went. When I found out, I actually wanted to work it out.
I was willing to go to counseling, all of it.
But she wanted to be with him instead. She still took me to court for alimony, which, honestly, I never even wanted to fight her on.
She got her settlement. She got her guy.
Then a few months later I heard through the grapevine that his real estate business was buried in debt, and next thing I know, my mom’s telling me Wren dropped him and moved to Foxborough. ”
I swallowed the bite I’d been chewing. It suddenly felt like a rock in my throat.
This was it. This was exactly what Bree had been trying to tell me, over and over, and I hadn’t believed a word of it. I’d refused to see past the version of Wren I’d already decided was true.
“I’m sorry for whatever it is that brought you here asking about her,” Xavier said. “But whatever it is, I promise you it’s full of drama and lies. I lived through it for four years. I know.”
Penny nodded and gave me a small, sympathetic smile.
I had one more question, even though part of me already knew the answer.
“Did you visit her at her apartment a few months back?”
Xavier actually laughed, but there was nothing happy in it. “I haven’t said one word to that woman since our divorce was finalized.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Gavin. Sounds like she’s been taking you for a ride.”
By the time I got to the practice field, I was boiling. Full-on furious, all of it aimed at Wren. I knew she’d already be out there with her crew, and I was ready to put her in her place, once and for all. Only after that could I even start figuring out how to get back what I’d lost with Bree.
But I was already running twenty minutes late for drills.
Wren was just going to have to wait.
The first thing on the schedule was the walkthrough, running every play at half speed so your feet know exactly where they’re supposed to be without your brain having to think about it.
I lined up next to Tomlinson at receiver, ran the same three routes about a dozen times each, and the whole time my head was somewhere back in that deli parking lot instead of on the field where it needed to be.
After that, I had media availability, which on a normal Friday I could sleepwalk through.
Smile, say the right things about being focused, being ready, taking it one game at a time.
Some reporter I didn’t recognize asked me how I was feeling heading into the biggest game of the season, and I heard myself say something about trusting the process, completely on autopilot, while the only actual thought in my head was whether Bree had eaten anything that morning.
Right after the press conference, Wren showed up, all bright and bubbly, like she hadn’t watched my marriage explode in a deli parking lot less than an hour earlier.
“Hey, so, photo session’s going to be right after the training room, okay?” she said, resting a hand on my arm like nothing had happened at all.
I didn’t say a single word back to her.
I made it through the training room, getting taped up and preparing my body so it could survive Sunday’s game, but the whole time, Bree’s face was sitting right there in the back of my mind, refusing to leave. After that, I headed to the locker room to shower and change.
I was mid-change when Wren walked in.
“Wren, you should’ve knocked.”
“Why would I need to knock?” she said, laughing. “I’ve already seen everything you’re trying to hide in there. There are no boundaries with me, Gav, you know that.” She grinned. “That was a great practice today, by the way. I got some really good shots.”
“Wren. Go out. Right now. Wait for me outside. We need to talk.”
“Okay, Mr. Moody. I’ll be right outside.” she said, and walked outside.
Was that a bounce in her steps?
I finished getting dressed, walked out, saw a couple teammates milling around the hallway, and decided the locker room wasn’t the place for this conversation.
“Come with me,” I said. “To the game planning room.”
It was empty when we got there, so I shut the door behind us.
“What is it, Gav? You sound different than you did earlier. Is everything okay?”
“No,” I said. “Everything is not okay. I’m going to ask you something, and this is your last chance to tell me the truth.”
She was smiling, but there was something underneath it now, something that looked a lot like fear, like she was already standing at trial.
“Of course. Ask me anything.”
“What was the real reason for your divorce, Wren?”
“Come on, Gavin, you already know it.”
“I’m giving you one chance to come clean.”
Her eyes welled up, as if there was a button she could just press. “My ex was a womanizer, Gav. He used to bring his girlfriends home. It took me so long, so, so long, to finally find the strength to walk away.”
I couldn’t help it. I actually smiled, right there, at how good the performance was.
She looked confused. “What? What’s funny?”
“I already know the truth, Wren. I know you were the one who cheated. And then you dumped the guy you cheated with too.”
Her face went completely blank with shock. “Who is feeding you these lies about me, Gavin? Let me guess. Little Miss Goody Two-Shoes. Bree, right?”
Something in me snapped. “DON’T. Don’t you say one more word about my wife with your filthy, lying mouth. We are done here. Pack your things and leave.”
“What? You can’t just make me leave like this. We have a documentary to finish.”
“Not anymore. You’re fired.”
“Gavin, Gavin, whatever you heard about me, it’s not true. Why would I lie to you? This is all Bree. It’s always been Bree. She’s threatened by our friendship, Gav, I’ve tried to tell you that so many times.”
“I said not one word. About. Bree. So shut the fuck up, Wren.”
I felt something click into place, clean and cold and clear.
“I see everything now,” I said. “I see exactly what you’ve been trying to do to me.
To us. I sided with you, every single time, even when Bree tried to show me the conniving side of you that was right there the whole time.
I shouldn’t have. I failed to listen to my own wife.
I kept making excuses for you. For your manipulation.
For how cruel you’ve been to her. I didn’t want to believe that someone I basically grew up with could be trying to sabotage my own marriage.
And the only reason I even know a fraction of what you did to her is because she told me herself, and I brushed it off every single time. ”
It hit me like a truck, all at once.
All the times Bree had tried to tell me things. That Wren had body-shamed her when I wasn’t around. That Wren had gone into her studio, looked through her old illustrations, and made little comments designed to make Bree feel small about her own career. And every time, I’d sided with Wren.
Wren stepped closer, reaching for my arm. I stepped back.
She started crying again. “So that’s it? You’re just giving up on me? On us?”
“THERE IS NO US.” My voice came out louder than I meant it to.
Loud enough that the door being shut didn’t matter.
I could see a couple of players slow down in the hallway outside the little window, and I did not care one bit.
“THERE IS NO US, WREN. There hasn’t been since we broke up in high school.
And there never will be. Do you understand me? ”
“So our friendship means nothing to you now? You might be caught up in whatever domestic little life Bree built for you, but I’ve known you longer than she has, Gavin.
You are not built to be domesticated. You’re built to be free.
Right now you think she’s the best thing that ever happened to you, but look at her.
She’s gone. She left you, three days before the biggest game of your entire season, and she didn’t even think about what that would cost you, running back and forth to her parents’ house.
She’s a baby, Gav. And right now, everything still feels fine to you, so you don’t see it.
But you will. You’ll see that I’m the only one who’s actually been standing beside you this whole time.
I drove three hours just to make sure you didn’t miss today’s practice.
I was there for you back when you were just a kid dreaming about a football career.
The only reason we ever broke up was the long-distance thing, when you left for college, remember that?
I was always right there. Your biggest cheerleader.
And I always will be. You’ll figure out soon enough that I’m the girl you’re actually in love with. ”
“What the hell, Wren! You’re hallucinating. We are not a couple. I am not in love with you. I never will be. How could you have possibly convinced yourself of that?”
“I didn’t mean love like a couple,” she said quickly, backpedaling the second the words left her mouth. “I meant it platonically. Friendship love, Gav.”
I watched her correct herself in real time, and for the first time, I could see the whole thing for what it was. Every single word she said was calculated, adjusted on the fly, whatever kept her in the room another minute.
“Wren, I am wasting my time on you. Pack your bags. Leave.”
“You’re firing me after I’ve already finished most of the documentary? You cannot do this to me.”
“I absolutely can,” I said. “And I’m doing it right now. I’m terminating our contract. I’ll pay out whatever the termination fee is.”
“Oh, and just so you know,” she said, her voice suddenly ice cold, “if you terminate, I don’t hand over anything. Any of the footage. Per the contract.”
“I already knew you’d pull that on me, Wren.” I felt strangely calm saying it. “Keep the whole documentary. It’s worthless to you without my name attached to it anyway. So pack your bags, grab your camera, and get the hell out of my life, you conniving bitch.”
There. I said it. That word. I used it for the first time in my life. And I used it for the person who had really deserved it.
And honestly? That was the first thing that had felt good since the second Bree walked out on me.