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He was obviously trying to buy himself some time, but for what reason, I didn’t know. If I walked away from him and went to the police, he’d make my life even more hellish. If I went inside, I could call the police and he wouldn’t have time to wriggle out of it.
“Fine,” I told him. “I’ll talk to her.”
Chapter Thirteen – Substitute
Jesse
“My career’s over, isn’t it?”
I sat on the edge of my bed, my fingers gripping the sheets so hard my knuckles turned white. I tried to remember to take deep breaths, to not cry in front of Radleigh McCoy, but at the end of a day when everything seemed to be against me, I was fighting a losing battle.
After physical examinations, an X-ray and an MRI scan, I was given the news I’d been dreading, with a little bit of extra bad news I hadn’t counted on. As well as a fully torn ACL, I’d also torn my PCL too.
Basically, I’d seriously damaged the two major ligaments in my knee.
The doctor had just left the room to give me some time to come to terms with the diagnosis, and I’d asked everyone to leave me alone, but McCoy wouldn’t go. He arrived while I was being X-rayed, and the first time I got to see him was when the doctor broke the bad news. I was glad he stayed. If anyone would understand my fears, it was him.
“You’re career’s not over,” McCoy said, pacing the room slowly. “It might not come to that.”
“But it could. It could be the end.”
“It’s a possibility, yes.”
A tear ran down my face, and I angrily wiped it away with the back of my hand. I knew it was more than a possibility and McCoy did too.
All this because of Leon. Thinking of him made me think of Georgia and Isabelle, and how she wouldn’t step up and help dig me out of the mess he’d landed me in. I’d been ignoring calls from Richard all afternoon, presumably about the news story stating I was drunk and disorderly.
“What do I do now?” I asked. “I don’t know … there’s nothing else I ever wanted to-”
I trailed off, lowering my head because I couldn’t hold back any longer. It was like the shock, disappointment and fear all came flooding out of me at once. I heard the sound of a chair scraping across the floor, and McCoy sat down directly in front of me.
“Look at me,” he said, firmly.
Raising my head, I wasn’t sure whether I would find annoyance, or mocking in his eyes at my lame breakdown. It was neither. It looked more like determination.
“I can’t tell you what you want to hear,” he said. “I’m not qualified to tell you that you can recover from this, and that you’ll be playing on the team again soon. But what I can tell you is that when you get home, you’re gonna get the best medical care there is. If something can be done, it will be.”
“But what if it can’t?”
“One step at a time. We can talk to the doctors here and find out what you can do in the short term to help yourself. When you get back to L.A, you’ll have the team to support you, and then you can start to figure out everything else. Right now, the only thing you need to worry about is getting some ice on that knee, then getting some rest.”
“I need to talk to Richard. He’s gonna be mad that I haven’t answered his calls but I’m scared of what he’ll say about all the stories in the papers.”
“I’ll deal with him. Probably best to do that sooner rather than later. You know how he gets.”
I nodded. Richard could cope with all kinds of pressure, but when something happened to one of his team, whether an injury or some kind of scandal, it made him crazy. I could imagine him sitting in his office, drumming his fingers on the desk and trying to stay calm, while figuring out the best way to punish me for humiliating the Warriors.
Radleigh stood up. “I’ll go call him now, then I’ll get the doctor back in here so you can ask any questions before they discharge you. Did you call your parents?”
“Yeah. My mom was pretty serious about flying over, but at this time of year, most of the flights are already booked up. I told her that I’m being well looked after, and when I told her you were coming, she felt a lot better about staying away.”
“If it helps, I can call your parents too,” he said, but laughed when I let out a sigh. “I get it,” he went on, “I know you’re not a kid, and I’m not your babysitter. But I’m thirty-one, and my mom still treats me like I’m ten years old. So if it gets her off your back, I’ll do it.”
I’d been nervous about the idea of spending time with McCoy because it wasn’t something we’d ever really done before. We weren’t friends, we were team mates. But he’d driven for hours to visit me when he could have just talked to me on the phone. It’s pretty cool when the guy you’ve always looked up to lives up to your expectations. Even harder to believe when a few months before, I sorta hated him for some of the things he did.
“Thank you,” I said. “Thanks for being here.”
“Not a problem, man.”
