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47
Brody
We lost the Super Bowl.
The big game was held in Arizona. I had never seen so much excitement and spectacle for a football game before—and that includes the college championship Dallas and I played in back at Texas. Fireworks, a huge pre-game show, and a flyover with so many aircraft I would have sworn we were being invaded.
I played great. At least there’s that. Almost two hundred yards receiving, plus three touchdowns. Dallas was even better. I had never seen my friend so sharp, dodging tackles and firing the ball on the run like a madman. If not for the outcome of the game, he would have been the MVP hands-down.
But the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, led by an ageless Tom Brady, tore our defense apart. Every time we scored, he marched his old-man body out onto the field and scored right back. It was like a heavyweight boxing match, with two juggernauts pummeling each other with blows.
We led the game for as much time as the Buccaneers did, but they happened to have the lead when time expired. It was the highest-scoring Super Bowl in history, and we lost, 39 - 43.
The locker room had a funereal feel to it after the game. We had fought so hard this season and gotten so far. We had the best offense in all of football, and were firing on all cylinders by the time we made the playoffs. And then our defense blew it. There was a sense among the team that this was our big chance, and we wouldn’t get another.
But beneath the disappointment at the outcome, I was pretty damn happy. I did the best I could in the game. That’s all a man could do in life, and whatever happened after that was out of their control, so why spend time dwelling on it?
I was learning to accept things like that these days.
“You sure you’re okay?” Taylor asked me that night in the hotel room next to the stadium. We were curled up together in bed, fully clothed, too exhausted from the events of the day to bother undressing.
“Yeah, I’m all right,” I said. “Granted, it helps I’ve got one of the most beautiful redheaded paleontologists in all of Arizona in my arms right now.”
She twisted to look up at me, raising an eyebrow. “One of the most beautiful?”
“Hey, I don’t know what they’ve got going on down at Arizona State,” I replied. “It’s a party school. Probably a lot of hotties down there. Might check it out before our flight tomorrow afternoon.”
“Oh, okay then,” she said with a cavalierness that surprised me. “While you’re doing that, I’m going to look for the Buccaneers tight end. The one in the USAA insurance commercials.”
“Gronk?” I scoffed. “He’s a meathead. Even more than I am.”
“Yeah, but he’s pretty hot. And he has a very nice tight end.”
“Not as nice as this one.” I leaned over and grabbed a handful of Taylor’s ass, digging my fingers into the flesh.
“Or this one.” She reached over and grabbed my ass too, and the two of us giggled together in bed until our laughter turned into kisses.
I had told her the truth. I felt pretty damn good for a guy who had just lost the Super Bowl. But that’s how Taylor made me feel. A constant layer of support in my life. That’s how good relationships should have been, I now realized. Holding you together when things didn’t work out, and building you back up so you could fight another day.
I hope I’ll always be there for Taylor that way.
The NFL off-season began when we flew home. The free agency market was a flurry of rumors, transactions, and contract negotiations. I wasn’t part of any of it since my contract with the Stallions didn’t expire for another three years, but I was still aware of it. The Stallions were a family to me, so the Twitter rumors and big signings kind of felt like losing some brothers and gaining new ones.
But it wasn’t the off-season for Taylor. Aside from the Monday after the Super Bowl that she had taken off work, she had the rest of the spring semester to teach. She spent the plane ride back to Salt Lake City reviewing papers on her laptop while chewing on the end of a pen, like a sexy librarian.
A few days after that, I went back to Texas. Luna hated being boarded on flights, so we spent two days driving down to the Lone Star State. Luna would have been miserable in the Texas summer heat, but she loved visiting in the winter. More specifically, she loved the eighty-five acres of land my parents owned halfway between Austin and Waco. As soon as I let her loose, she sprinted a circuit around the outer fence like it was her job.
Visiting my family during the off-season always helped recharge my batteries. Being home grounded me as a person, reminding me where I came from and who I was when you stripped away the celebrity status and big paycheck.
But after a week, I realized that I was a new man. Being in Utah this past season didn’t exhaust me the way it had in previous years. If anything, it had begun to feel more like home.
“You’re not mad?” I asked my momma as she walked me to my car.
“I’d be mad if you stayed the whole three months,” she replied. Her leathery face tightened with a proud smile. “Surprised it took you this long to put down roots up there.”
So Luna and I drove back to Utah. And instead of feeling sad that I was leaving Texas, it felt like I was going home.
I got into town around noon. After dropping Luna off at my place, I drove straight to the University of Utah. I found the lecture hall where Taylor was teaching, and waited to slip inside until she was writing something on the whiteboard with her back turned. I sat in the back row, behind two very tall girls who looked like they were on the women’s basketball team.
