A Viral Moment
A video clip from five years ago
“It’s a beautiful day here in the sunshine state, wouldn’t you say, Marshall?” a man in a plaid suit jacket asked, nudging the gentleman next to him in the announcer's booth. Marshall smiled tightly, a strand of dark brown hair falling over his face.
“Yeah, it’s great to be here in …” Marshall chewed his lip for the briefest of moments before forcing out the word, “Florida.”
“Ah, come on, Marshall.” The older gentleman nudged him again. “You might not be able to play anymore, but it happens to the best of us.”
“I know,” Marshall grumbled. “I just thought that when it happened to me, I’d be closer to … well, your age, Lowery.”
“Ha!” Lowery threw his head back, long gray hair flopping over his shoulders. “Well, I was lucky. But don’t focus on that, you’ll drive yourself insane.”
“I mean, I’m already in Florida, what’s more insane than that?” Marshall huffed and Lowery patted his shoulder sympathetically.
“Forgive our dreary friend, folks,” Lowery said, focusing on the camera set in the corner of the booth. “He’s a little down about his early retirement.”
“Down is one way to put it.”
“But what isn’t down,” Lowery pushed on, “is our Destin Dastards crowd! Let’s take a look at them. I think I saw a few signs welcoming you to the Okaloosa Stadium.”
The big screens on the sides of the stadium went from a full shot of the two announcers, to them in the corner of the screen while the rest was filled with shots of the crowd. There were several signs welcoming the recently retired player to the Dastards team.
“See, you’re more than welcome here,” Lowery said, nudging Marshall again. The younger man let out a huff that was half a laugh and half a sigh. Though the corner of his lips did tilt up slightly.
The camera shifted to a group of college-aged white girls, all wearing Marshall’s jersey. Once they noticed the camera was on them, they jumped around, screaming, and grabbing on to each other. One girl with long brown hair at the center of the group waved her hands and screamed something at the cameras before bending over to pick up a sign that read, “Marry me, Kiran Marshall” in red letters.
“See, you’re already getting proposals. Isn’t it great to be in Destin?”
“Ha, it is flattering but —”
The announcers' laughter died as the woman lifted her shirt to expose her breasts, both covered in black and white paint to look like soccer balls, bouncing as she jumped and screamed, her friends dying from laughter beside her.
“Oh sh—”
The display screens cut out and the crowd roared in a mixture of disgust and disappointment.
An Almost Successful Interview
Kodi
“Mr. Hansen, Ms. Davey is here for you,” the receptionist said into her corded phone. I resisted the urge to ask how often she actually used that or if it was a thing because the higher-ups refused to learn how to use Teams.
“You can go ahead and have a seat,” she said, waving to the stiff chairs in the corner of the room. I gave her the best smile I could manage with my nerves going absolutely haywire and sat down.
It was weird being in this part of the Okaloosa Stadium. I’d gone to dozens upon dozens of games back in college, even done the “backstage” tour thing. But this part was just … a boring office. I mean, it made sense that this side wasn’t part of the tourand had to exist for everything else to function. But it was weird to see it in person.
And yet as weird and dull as it was, I was buzzing with excitement thinking about how I could work here if I nailed this interview. I could be the next Destin Dastards’ social media manager.
Even just thinking about that title had me bouncing in my seat.
I worked my ass off in college to get my degree in marketing with a focus on social media, only to be offered internships and freelance positions for the last five years. I’ve had to make my career a side hustle and I was dying for that to change, to finally have the job I went to school for, a job with trajectory.
And not to mention this was a job managing social media for my favorite sport, with my favorite team.
I was fucking swooning. I’d do anything to get this job.
The only problem was … I’d gotten banned from the stadium for a season because of a little public nudity.
