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“I think you’re gonna be one of the greatest quarterbacks in the history of the NFL. And I think they’ll see it.”
“But it feels so quick.”
“Papa asked to see you as soon as possible.”
“And you think I won’t embarrass myself?”
“Claude, you couldn’t embarrass yourself if you tried. So, what do you say? Are you ready to do this?”
Claude looked away in thought.
Seeing his hesitation, I said, “Come on, Claude, say you’re ready to do this.”
“I’m ready,” he replied meekly.
I smiled. “I need to hear it louder than that. I said, are you ready?”
“I’m ready,” he said a little louder.
“I said, are you ready?” I yelled.
“I’m ready,” he shouted with a smile.
“Then let’s do this!” I said, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him excitedly.
With Claude on board, we ran passing drills until his arm tired, and then we each headed home. It was as I packed that it hit me. Everything I ever wanted was now at stake. The team’s owner had wanted me to quit. When I didn’t, he started looking for any excuse to fire me.
If I brought in Claude and he didn’t do well, not only could it be the excuse the owner wanted, but Claude could decide he was done with me. He could get upset because I got him to trust me and then let him down again.
If things didn’t go well, I could lose everything. And more important than that, I could lose Claude.
With my skin tingling like it was on fire, I prepared to check out. Expensing a round-trip plane ticket for Claude, I thought about what it meant. I had three days to convince him not to disappear from my life again. How was I going to do that?
Claude, who never shared anything personal, had shared that he had a problem trusting people. Well, somehow I had gotten him to trust me again. But if things didn’t work out like I had convinced him they would, would I have broken his trust? Would this time be the final straw? Would I lose him forever?
My heart pounded painfully as I packed. Not being able to relax, I didn’t get any sleep. Dragging myself out of bed in the morning, I was exhausted. And picking up Claude to drive us to the airport, I felt like I was losing my mind.
Because I couldn’t focus on anything, I was sensitive to everything. Like how he didn’t invite me in to meet the one person in his life he had told me about. During three years of university together, I hadn’t met his mother. It had made me think that he was hiding her from me. But, in reality, was he hiding me from her?
Pushing that out of my mind as we drove to the airport, I managed not to say anything crazy until we were on the plane. With the doors locked and our trip inevitable, my insecurities got the better of me.
“I just want to point out that we aren’t going to Miami,” I told him as our plane approached the runway.
“I know,” he replied casually.
As we approached our destination, I said,
“Our team is based in the Panhandle. There’s not going to be anything fancy around.”
Claude looked at me amused.
“You just saw where I’m from. I think I’m okay with ‘nothing fancy.’”
“Pensacola’s a little different than your town?”
“How so?”
I considered how unfriendly the city was to gay people. It didn’t make the place much fun for me to live in. But would that affect Claude?
