My delusions of believing I’m one of the team clear when Coach James props his backside on his desk before lowering his worldly eyes to mine. “Have you spoken to Carlton today?”
I shake my head. That’s why I’m filled with so much confusion. Elvis and I communicate multiple times a day. . . until yesterday. I was so convinced my cell had crapped itself, I made Skylar call it to check it was in working order. It appears to be functioning fine, but I’ve yet to receive a single returned call or text from Elvis in nearly forty hours.
Coach James scrubs the stubble on his chin. “I know I was a little hard on you two Wednesday night. If that’s the cause for his mood of late, I’m sorry about that.”
I’m grateful I’m not the only one noticing Elvis’s switch in personalities, but I hate it as well.
“He mentioned his accident was around this time of the year; do you think that could be affecting his thoughts?”
Coach takes a few seconds to deliberate on my question before shaking his head. “He’s close with Mr. Beckett and his family. He even paid to fly them out here for the playoffs.”
The sludge my heart has been sitting in the past forty hours clears a little from his confession, but my confusion remains. “Then I am at a loss. He was fine Thursday morning, then poof, he turned into a bigger, grumpier version of you.” My pupils dilate to the size of saucers. I was meant to say my last comment in my head.
I start breathing again when Coach James laughs. “I wouldn’t have minded him being a mini-me if we weren’t heading into the playoffs, but I don’t have time for theatrics this week.” He gathers my hands in his. His are much warmer than mine. “Can you talk to him, see if you can find out what’s going on?”
“I’ll give it a shot, but I don’t see it doing any good. He’s more likely to open up to you than he is me.”
Coach pulls a face like he doesn’t believe me, but he keeps his thoughts to himself while guiding me out of his office. “He’s in the conference room. Down the hall and on the right, then follow the scent of bagels. You can’t miss it.”
He crashes into me when I stop walking. “You want me to talk to him now?” I ask through the lump in my throat. When he nods, I choke on my spit. “But it’s game night. You haveverystrict rules on game night.”
I’m not lying. If I so much as breathe on the players, Coach breathes fire down my neck. He wants the team to enter the field with nothing but the game on their minds. That’s why he makes them hand in their cells at the start of every game. For the two hours before kick-off, he has a zero disturbance statute. If I wasn’t interning as a sport therapist, I wouldn’t be allowed within six hundred feet of the locker rooms.
“I need Elvis’s head screwed on right for tonight’s game. If you do that, I’ll get those tickets for your friend.”
My jaw drops as my heart rate climbs. I asked Coach James last week if he could put me in contact with someone who could grant Skylar cheaper tickets to any 69er home games. Her birthday is coming up, and I want to get her something I know she’ll love. He was apprehensive until I showed him the sneaky picture I took while Skylar wasn’t watching. She was dressed head to toe in 69er gear, and it had her specially-made bedspread in the background of the photo.
“I’ll give it my best shot.”
I glide down the corridor with more spirited steps than only minutes ago. I’ve never been in the “business” part of the stadium, but with my intuition about Elvis guiding me, I soon find him. It’s just not how I hoped. He’s in a storage closet at the side of a conference room. With all the equipment moved out, it looks more like a walk-in closet than a room housing the mugs and glasses board members use on a regular basis.
Unfortunately, he’s not alone. Lillian is standing next to him. She’s leaning intimately close to his shirtless torso, and her index finger is tracing one of the veins in his thick bicep. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but Lillian’s smile reveals everything in sickening detail. She’s in her element. . . and I’m swimming way outside of my depth.
Not willing to watch the nauseating event for a second longer, I pivot on my heels, preparing to race back down the hallway. Like things could get any more awkward, I crash chest-first into a cooler.
While clutching my bruised boob in my hand, I raise my eyes, confused as to why there’s a cooler in the middle of a walkway. My stomach swirls when I’m awarded the same seedy grin Skylar and I witnessed a group of cheerleaders getting last month. It’s Seedy-McWeedy, the drink vendor who cools more than cans of soft drink in his cooler.
“Excuse me.” I push him out of my way, my eagerness to leave spurred on by a deep voice calling my name. I know who the voice belongs to. I’ve heard it shout, chuckle, and moan my name multiple times the past three months, so you can sure as hell be guaranteed I know what it sounds like when it’s full of deceit.
“Willow, wait up!”
Just before I break through the door separating the underbelly of the stadium from its fancier counterpart, I sling my head back. Elvis is following me as suspected. His usually fast pace is slowed by him yanking a shirt over his naked, sweat-slicked torso and buttoning his pants.
When I enter the locker room, things go from bad to worse. Elvis’s teammates have covered his locker with high-resolution photos. That’s nothing out of the ordinary. Whether it is birthday week or a bad photo shared by a fan, if it is embarrassing, it’s displayed. This is both embarrassing and devastating. They’re photos of Elvis and Lillian—intimate photos. Neither of them appear to be wearing any clothes.
The players’ boisterous laughter dulls to barely a hum when Elvis storms to his locker to rip down the photos. His movements are so aggressive, the vein Lillian was toying with earlier protrudes as far as his nostrils. “This isn’t fuckin’ funny.”
After pointing his finger to the aggressors, he dumps the now ruined collage into the nearest waste bin before spanning the distance between us. Although his broody, temper-filled frame sends excitement sparking down my spine, I flee as quickly as his teammates pretended to act busy when subjected to his wrath.
I make it all the way to my cubicle before a blistering hunk of fury catches up with me. Elvis pins my arms behind my back with one of his hands before using his other to raise my weighted head. He peers down at me, the baby oil slicking his skin more concerning than soothing.
“It’s not what you think.”
My eyes roll skyward, and for the first time in my life, they make it all the way around without twitching. “Geez, could you be any more original?” My voice is as vile as the vomit creeping up my esophagus.
Elvis is about to respond when a deep rumbling rolls into the room. “Two hours until kickoff; let’s get this room on lockdown.”
Coach James claps two times, sending the usually quiet room into a hive of activity. The only player ignoring his demand is Elvis. He continues staring down at me, his concentration only breaking when Coach James taps him on the shoulder. “Room is on lockdown; you can finish this later.”
