Out of Position (43 page)

I’m hitting all the red lights. I desperately want to get to the sandwich shop so I have an excuse to end this conversation. “Great, Dad.”

“I almost got in a fight.”

“Over their progressive view of gay people?”

“Jerry stuck up for you. You remember him?”

“The wolverine who fixed my Buick?”

“He said from the action that car saw, there was no way you were queer.”

Hearing that word from my father makes my fur prickle. “Tell Jerry thanks.” The light changes, finally. I floor it.

“How are things going with Caroll? Is she upset about that?”

I screech around a corner. “I’m seeing her Wednesday.”

“Ask her about suing for libel. Those Hollywood people know all about defamation of character.”

“Dad—” I hear sirens. Fuck. “I gotta go. I’ll talk to you later.”

I pull the SUV over and sit slumped over with my muzzle resting against the steering wheel. The cop, a big brown bear, comes waddling up to the car. I roll the window down and lean back as he approaches. This is just great. This day just had to get worse, didn’t it?

“Evening, sir,” he says. “License and registration, please.”

I hand it over. He studies it for a moment while I get my credit card ready. He doesn’t go back to his car or anything, just looks at the license, then at me. “Everything okay?” I ask.

“Yes, sir,” he says. He hands me back the scent card and the car paperwork and ignores the credit card I’m handing out to him. “Just wanted to ask you to keep it down a bit in the city.”

“That’s all?” I feel a slow wash of relief.

“That’s all.” He touches the brim of his hat. “Also, good luck against Aventira.” He smiles and waves. “Have a good one.”

I sit behind the wheel until he’s gone. I haven’t gotten out of a ticket since college. It’s as if the thunderclouds parted just for a moment to let through the sun. Finally one thing went right today.

When I do get home, the phone and computer stay off in favor of Football ’08. I arbitrarily proclaim some of the video game players gay as I move them around. I have no idea what to do. The more I dig myself into this hole, this “image,” as Caroll calls it, the more I have to remember what I’ve told people and what I haven’t, and the more alone I feel. So do I go out of my way to loudly proclaim my heterosexuality, like I did when I thought I was? It’d be not so hard to lie. I see those guys every day in the locker room, and it’s not so long ago I was part of that life myself.

But I’d rather just be quiet and have people leave me alone. Nobody around me really wants to know, or seems to care, what I do with my non-football time. Charm just wants me to go to strip clubs with him. My parents want me to find a nice tigress and settle down. Gerrard couldn’t care less as long as I can play. And Fisher… I don’t know what Fisher wants. The only one who knows what I want and cares is up in Hilltown. I want to call him, but I know he’s working hard all week.

I play three games and then Lee calls. I feel better just talking to him, and he seems to know that I don’t want to talk about this whole deal. It’s only toward the end of the conversation that he says, “So how are you?”

“Weren’t we just talking about that?”

He chuckles. “I guess I meant, how are you doing?”

“I know.” I lean back on the couch. “I just don’t know what to do except what I’ve been doing.”

“Seems to’ve worked so far.” He says it with a kind of resignation.

I want him beside me so badly I can feel it, an empty space in the crook of my arm. “It won’t get any worse, will it?” He doesn’t answer. “Lee?”

“I’ll do what I can.”

I rub the sofa fabric. “What do you mean?”

“As much as I can help.”

“Don’t call Brian.”

Another pause. “That’s about the only thing I can think of to do to help. What else is there?”

I squeeze the couch cushion. “Be in Aventira Saturday night when we get in.”

“Of course.”

“And…”

It’s my turn to pause, until he says, “Dev?”

I’m staring at the animation of the video game, the players running in place over and over again. “What should I do? Just… do nothing?”

“Why you asking me?”

“You’re the smart one, doc.” On the screen a player in a non-descript black uniform with the number 54 intercepts a pass and runs off to the right.

“Mmm.” He types on the keyboard a little more. “It’s your life, though.”

A player in a red number 21 runs through tacklers. I watch a quarterback drop back to pass. Number 54 comes back onto the screen. I let Lee’s words trickle into my consciousness and settle there. It’s just what I’ve been thinking, isn’t it? It’s my life and nobody else’s business. But coming from him, it sounds wrong. I know better than to try to work it out in my head when I’ve got him on the phone. “Is it?”

He laughs. “Okay, technically, after the contract you signed, ten percent of it is Ogleby’s and a big chunk of it is Chevali’s.”

I take a breath. “I mean, is it just my life? Or is it…” I have the feeling of plunging into the midst of a play I haven’t studied or figured out, bodies flying around me, trusting to luck and my instincts. “Is it our life?”

The typing stops. Very softly, I hear an exhalation into the receiver. “Stud,” he whispers, “you got a way of makin’ a guy wish he could crawl through telephone lines.”

I let my own breath out. “Phones don’t have lines anymore. It’s all radio signals.”

“Radio signals don’t work for the imagery. Don’t you read anything but video game manuals?”

On the screen, instructions flash on how to play the game with two people. “It’s okay, then, me saying that?”

“Yeah. It’s okay.”

For a moment, it feels like he really did climb through the telephone lines. “Good. So what should I do?”

He snorts, still sounding a bit emotional. “Did you just say the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me simply to get me to give you advice?”

“Nah.” I stretch out on the couch and flip the video game off. “Though I do think it’s a little surprising that you wouldn’t just tell me what to do.”

“I never tell you what to do.”

I grin. “No, you just make it impossible for me to do anything else.” He sighs, and my grin slips away. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.” It’s quick, insincere.

“Bullshit.”

“Really, it’s — “

“Don’t lie to me.”

He starts to say something indignant, then cuts himself off. “Shit. I really don’t want to do this over the phone.”

My paw tightens around the phone. I press it closer to my ear. “Do what?”

“Can you trust me if I say that I need to tell you something Saturday? Will you promise not to worry about what it is?”

“No.” I sit back up.

“Can you wait ’til Saturday anyway?”

“No.”

“Please, Dev. Trust me.”

I crouch forward, tensing. “Is it about Brian?”

“Saturday.”

“Well, shit. Why did you even mention it if you aren’t going to tell me?”

He sounds genuinely baffled. “I don’t know. I couldn’t help it.”

I growl. “I could be on a flight tonight.”

“Don’t miss practice.”

“
You
could be on a flight tonight.”

“Dev, just… Saturday’s not so far away.”

That pleading note doesn’t get into his voice very often, not my confident, assured fox. Even though all the closeness of our moment feels sour, I can’t say no. “You promise it’s nothing bad?”

His claws tap the table. Not the keyboard, not typing, just nervously tapping. “No. But I promise it won’t get worse between now and then. And I promise… I promise I’ve told you as much of the truth as I could. I’ll tell you all of it Saturday night.”

I extend my claws and tap the coffee table in rhythm with him. “You’re not helping me focus on football.”

It works to break the tension. His claws stop their tapping. “Then focus on this: you know how hot you are as a starting linebacker? Don’t lose that job.”

“Can I picture you watching me from the stands?”

His voice gets lower, more sultry, not quite his husky Lauren Bacollie, but close. “You mean you don’t?”

I don’t know how to feel, hanging up. All my questions about him come back, like players dancing around before the snap to disguise the play they’re going to run. I try to see through the questions to the core of things, the way I’d focus on the key players to figure out the play, but all I can come up with is one big question for myself: do I trust my fox or not?

The only way I can get to sleep is to decide that I do. So I do.

I resist the temptation to check the Internet the next morning. I grab breakfast and head right into practice. I get to the parking lot at the same time as Brick. “Hey!” I call, but he ignores me and waddles quickly in ahead of me. For a bear, he gets in there pretty fast. I could’ve caught him, but I know why he’s moving fast and I don’t feel like having a confrontation.

But when I get into the locker room, I kinda wish I had. Most of the offensive line are getting dressed together to one side. As I come in, they all stop talking and look at me. I look back, calm as I can, but I feel the thunderclouds again, the sense of standing all alone on the plain watching them come in. I expect Coach to call me in to his office again, but the only time I see him that day is a couple times when he comes out to work with the position coaches.

It’s our afternoon to watch film. The defensive unit sits together in a session conducted by the defensive coordinator, with Steez and the other defensive position coaches helping out. It almost seems normal, without the offensive line giving me the cold shoulder. We study the film of Aventira over and over again, until we’re able to pick out the patterns and the players. Gerrard, Carson, and I spend some time talking about the film afterwards, breaking down our plays and responses with Steez.

By the time that’s over, we’re all ready for dinner. Gerrard and Carson invite me to dinner at the Bar-None, Gerrard’s favorite steak house. I glance at my missed calls first. None of them are from Lee, so I put the cell phone away and follow them to the restaurant.

I’ve only been there once. It doesn’t have fancy decor, just plain white stucco and dark wood beams inside. “On me,” Gerrard says as we all sit down. “But no eating competitions this time.”

“I’d eat you guys under the table anyway,” I say, glancing at the menu out of habit more than anything else. At the top, it says, “No Frills. Just Great Steak.”

Carson raises an eyebrow. His ear flicks back, and he hides his grin behind his own menu.

We order — steaks and baked potatoes all around, with some imported beer that Gerrard likes. Once the waiter leaves, Gerrard and Carson look at each other, then at me.

“Shit,” I say, looking from one to the other. “Can we not talk about this?”

“I’d like that,” Gerrard says, “but you saw the O-line in the locker room today and on the field. It’s starting to affect practice, and that means Coach is worried about it. I said I’d talk to you.”

I fold my arms, lean back, and stare at him. “Fine. So?”

“So I don’t care.” The coyote points at me. “You can play. Some of the other guys are getting all wound up about it.”

“That’s not my problem.”

He shakes his head. “Not saying they’re right. It pisses me off. But you need to do something, then we’ll deal with them.”

I tilt my muzzle. “What do you mean?”

“You need to commit yourself,” he says. “Don’t just sit and wait to see what develops. Take control.”

“It’s none of anybody’s fucking business one way or another,” I say.

Carson rumbles, in annoyance or agreement. Gerrard acknowledges him with a dip of his muzzle. “This Internet guy has made it someone else’s business, and your agent hasn’t helped. Look, I’m not asking you to tell me one way or the other. I’m asking you to tell the team that it isn’t true. Whether it is or not, that’ll settle it the fastest.”

“Why don’t you just tell them that?”

Gerrard grins a coyote grin, patronizing and sympathetic all at once. “It’s gotta come from you, pal. You can’t let other people fight your battles.”

I stare down at the table, picking at the cloth with a claw. I can feel Carson’s stare. “Okay.”

They both relax. “Good,” Gerrard says.

Carson gets up and heads for the bathroom. I watch him cross the room and turn to see Gerrard’s eyes on me. His expression is hard to read, even with those huge expressive canid ears. Maybe it’s the ears that remind me of Lee, or maybe it’s the long muzzle, but I find myself talking again. “You know, even if it’s not true for me… it’s gotta be true for someone in the league somewhere.”

“Ayup,” Gerrard says with a nod, remaining noncommittal.

“How do you think that guy’s teammates would react?” I try to stay casual.

The coyote’s posture echoes my nonchalance, all except for his focused ears. “Depends on the team, depends on the guy, depends on the coach.”

“You think it could have a happy ending?”

“Probably not the first time.” Watching my expression, he leans forward. “It’s gonna happen sooner or later,” he says. “But for my money, I’d be happy if it never happened.”

That shocks me a little. Gerrard never seemed concerned enough to have that strong an opinion on the matter. “Why?”

“Because it’s got nothin’ to do with football.” His eyes light up, his fingers curl and flex. “If everyone just left their life at the door and got on with the game, we’d all be better off. All this crap about having cubs and cheating on wives—who gives a crap? Can you play the game or not?”

“So, like, a murder investigation?”

He gives me one of those “don’t be an idiot” looks. “I’m not talking about crime. I’m talking about whether you go to church, whether you’re faithful to your wife, whether you’re sleeping with a Hollywood chick, whether you gave money to this or that charity or sucked up to the media or went on “Doing The Macarena With The Stars.” None of that has one bit to do with how you perform when you get out on that field, and it should get exactly that much attention.”

Carson slides back easily into his seat and rolls his eyes. “Give it a rest,” he grumbles.

Gerrard points at him. “That’s why we get along. Respect on the field. Nothing else.”