Cabin Fever (24 page)

He looked out at the players under his charge, feeling paired feelings of pride and regret. They were good kids and good players. It had been terrific – a privilege – to watch them over the last few weeks as they took some of the concepts he was teaching and slowly, steadily started bringing those things into the way they played football. Brad had never thought of himself as a teacher, but now he could see why people would choose to spend their lives teaching history or math or social studies. He wanted every one of his guys to succeed, and he felt a surge of pride with every step they took on the road to becoming better players.

Then something caught his eye, and he let out a blast from the whistle between his lips. “Johnson! Keep your feet underneath you! Every time you let your head get out in front of your body, you’re asking some fat lineman to knock you on your butt!”

The player – a lanky sophomore just now growing into his body – gave a nod and got back into his stance, ready for the next drill. Brad was surprised how much he enjoyed coaching linebackers. He had never played the position, not even when he was a kid, but he found he could focus on fundamentals – conditioning, balance, and letting their instincts carry them to the ball. He realized that the best linebackers he had played against were the ones who didn’t think about the game, they just reacted as the play unfolded in front of them. When they found the ball, they attacked it like a runaway train. Brad knew that the instincts of the best linebackers were based on careful study heading into every game, but he also knew that he didn’t want his players to think too much. He was teaching them to study hard, run fast, hit hard, and love the game with all their heart and soul.

He felt a clap on his shoulder and looked to his right to see Gus standing there, wearing his traditional baseball cap, plus-size jersey, and shorts. Gus nodded in the direction of the linebackers working through their drills. “They’re looking good, Brad. Very good.”

Brad nodded. “They’re good kids, and you recruited well. We should be two deep at every position. Three deep in spots.”

Gus nodded in approval. “We recruited some good kids, but you’re turning them into men faster than I could have hoped. I was thinking that our defense might be a liability this year, but with the way these kids are flying around, I think we might be a damn sight better.”

“We should be good against the run,” Brad allowed. “They’ve still got some learning to do in the passing game, though. They’re so eager to hit someone that they can forget to cover their assignment.”

Gus chuckled. “Yeah, sometimes there can be too much of a good thing.” He watched the drills for a while longer before adding: “You know what I like best about what I’m seeing here?”

Brad shook his head.

“They love playing. Hell, they love practicing! We’re in the middle of the worst heat of the summer, and these kids can’t wait to get out there. That’s you, Brad. You brought that to this team. These kids would run through a wall for you.”

Brad shook his head. “Oh, I don’t know. They love playing because they’re football players. I can’t teach that. I just try not to get in the way of what they’re already good at.”

Gus shrugged. “All I know is that, last year at this time, this same group of players looked like they were showing up to practice because they had been sentenced here by the courts. They suited up and played, but you could tell that they couldn’t wait until it was over so they could go back to the dorm. Same players, same heat and humidity, same everything except for you. You’re a hell of a coach, son.”

Brad, never comfortable with compliments, squirmed a little bit. “I’m just doing my best, coach.”

Gus clapped him on the shoulder again. “And your best might turn out to be our best.” He wandered away to take in more of the practicing players.

Brad watched him go. Part of him swelled with pride at the compliments, but the better part felt terrible. He hated lying, and he particularly hated lying to such a good man. The truth was that he would be abandoning them all – the players, the coaches, the entire team – in a few days or a few weeks, just as soon as he could bring himself to do what he knew he had to do.

He could feel the pressure of the little box against his leg where it lay in his pocket next to his car keys. He had been carrying it with him for days now as a reminder that something remained undone. The decision hadn’t come easily. He had agonized over it, but once he made up his mind he knew it was right. He hated to disappoint anyone, least of all Gus – who had given him a chance when he had every reason in the world to say “no” – and not the kids who looked at him with respect and admiration. Brad figured that maybe they’d admire him a little less when they heard what he had to say, but then again maybe that was just one more thing he had to teach them.

He slipped his right hand into the pocket and took the ring box into the circle of his hand. Coming out here had seemed so right. It was the fulfillment of a dream; it was the beginning of his chance to get back to where he wanted to be. But when his jeep pulled off the freeway into town and Brad began to come to terms with his new life, he realized that it was missing the most important thing.

Sarah.

Brad had broken up with other girls, and sometimes those breakups had left him a little upset. At first he figured that this would be like those times, and that he’d spend a few weeks feeling blue but would gradually get back to his old self. He threw himself into work, getting to know the other coaches on the staff, learning the plays that the defense would be running, taking the measure of the young men who would be in his charge. He kept his mind and body busy. He worked until late in the night studying the playbook and films of his players’ performance until his eyes began forcing themselves shut, but it was no use.

Sarah. She was everywhere.

When Brad woke in the morning, his first thought was of Sarah’s smile. When he brushed his teeth, he thought about her hair and the blue of her eyes. When something went right in the course of his day, he wished that he could share it with her. When something went wrong, he wished that she was there to help him feel better. Brad knew what it was like to miss a woman, but he had never felt anything like this. He felt like he had left a part of himself back in Tall Pines. He felt like half a man.

He had made a terrible mistake. He had carefully added up all the figures in his mind and arrived at an answer that could not have been more wrong. Brad knew now that it wasn’t his dream to get back to the NFL. That was a fantasy – a pleasant one, to be sure, and there was even a chance that it would come true, but it wasn’t his dream. No, his dream could not be more clear: it was to spend his life with someone he loved, and who loved him. His dream was to be with Sarah.

Once Brad arrived at that conclusion, everything changed. It was as if God had swapped out the light bulb that illuminated his life, and now he saw everything differently. The very next day he slipped into a jewelry store in downtown and spent far too much money on an engagement ring. It wasn’t beautiful enough for Sarah, not by a long shot, but he figured it was the closest that he would come. From that day forward he carried the ring box in his pocket as a daily reminder that there was a dream he needed to make real.

It was hard, though. He had been so close to right. He loved everything about coaching with this team and these players, everything except that it came without the woman he loved. Several times he had tried to talk himself into calling her and asking for her to come. Maybe he could find a way to convince her to give up her life to join him in his. But Brad could never quite convince himself. Yes, it would be wonderful if, when he came stumbling back from a long day on the field and in the film room, he found Sarah waiting for him at home, but while he desperately wanted that for himself he still didn’t want it for her.
 

They couldn’t both have what they wanted, and without her Brad no longer wanted what he wanted. He would give it all up, then, and hope that he could find another life in San Francisco that carried some joy for him. It would be hard, but at least he would have Sarah there to help him.

But oh, would it be hard. To look in Gus’ eyes and tell him that he was quitting. To look in his players’ eyes and tell him that he was abandoning them now, just a few weeks before the season began. It would take a long time to get past the memory of what he saw in those eyes when he said what he needed to say.

Something caught Brad’s eye. There was a woman up in the stands, and she was waving. Brad’s first impulse was to turn away and focus back on the players on the field. It wasn’t uncommon for a few people to come to watch practice. The sessions weren’t officially open to the public, but if the girl was pretty and had a sweet smile for the security guard, it wasn’t hard to talk her way in. Over the last few weeks of practice Brad had seen a handful of girlfriends and football groupies up in the stands. He had never paid much attention, because his focus was always on practice and his players. But this time, this time he looked closer.

It was Sarah. It couldn’t be Sarah. But it looked like … was it actually Sarah?!

He began walking towards her, and she began waving more urgently. His walk turned into a trot, and his trot into a jog. She scampered down the stairs and hurried toward him until they met in a hug so fierce that Brad was afraid he might crack one of her ribs. He couldn’t hold her any less desperately, though. He wanted to hug her so tightly that she would be bound to him and could never get away. He wanted this feeling to last forever, until the sun burned out and the world twirled away into a dark and endless sleep.

She was saying something, though, whispering something in his ear, and Brad had to come back out of the moment, far enough to hear what she was saying.

“Don’t let go, don’t let go, don’t let go,” she was repeating. He didn’t know if she was speaking to him or herself. Maybe she was talking to both of them. In any case, he had no intention of letting go, now or ever.

He pulled back so that he could look into her beautiful eyes. God, they were so blue, even more than he had remembered. All of Sarah was more than he remembered, and he could feel himself beginning to stir inside his pants. There was a time when that might have embarrassed him, but now it just felt right. Yes, his woman was in his arms, and his entire body responded to her touch.

“You’re here,” he said at last, his voice a little unsteady.

She nodded, her eyes misting over. “Yeah. I’m here.”

Brad had a sudden fear. “But … San Francisco … your business … you didn’t…?”

She shook her head. “We don’t need to talk about that now. God I missed you!”

He put his forehead against hers. “I didn’t know what it was to miss a person until I woke to a day that didn’t have you in it.”

A tear slipped down her cheek, and he reached up a thumb to brush it away. “Let’s not do that again, OK? Let’s not see what it’s like to live without each other, because it really sucks!”

He laughed, in happiness and relief. “It sucks. Totally and utterly it sucks. And no, let’s not do it again. We don’t need to do it again.” He began reaching for his pocket, but Sarah spoke first.

“I realized that, too,” she said, pulling away from him, but not so far away that his arms could not still encircle her waist. “I couldn’t believe how stupid I had been, how blind I was, once I realized it. The answer was right in front of me the whole time.”

“You don’t have to give up your dreams, Sarah,” Brad said. “I don’t want you to. And I figured out a way that you don’t need to.”

Sarah smiled quizzically. “Well, that’s funny, because so did I. Do you want to hear what I figured out? You’ll laugh at me when you hear it, but that’s OK. I laughed at myself, too.”

Brad was curious now. “Tell me.”

“That thing I was just beginning to work on when we were together, it was a plan for how to resuscitate the newspaper industry. Well, actually it’s more what will take the place of newspapers when papers are gone. I had the core idea when we were still together, and when you were gone I poured myself into working out the full business plan. Two weeks ago I received some seed funding, and now we’re at the point where we can start hiring staff and getting production up and running.”

Brad wasn’t following. “That’s great, honey,” he said, mostly to have something to say. He knew that it didn’t matter what Sarah’s plan was – wherever she decided to go, he would go – but he loved the look of excitement in her eyes when she was talking about her work, and so he let her go on.
 

“Anyway, I’m babbling, but the point is that it was a lot of work that I was able to do in a very short time because you ran out on me!” She slapped her hand on his chest, but Brad could tell it was more in play than any real anger. “And Brad … the plan is for how to run a profitable small-town newspaper.”

She was looking at him expectantly, as if she had come to the punch line of a joke and was waiting for him to laugh, but he still couldn’t quite see what she was getting at. “And…?” he asked.

She threw her head back exultantly. “And look around you! We’re in a small town! I can’t work out of San Francisco or New York and pretend that I understand the small-town market. I have to be here! At least for a few years, to soak in the local flavor and see what’s important and not so important to the people who live here. I have a good plan, and it’s a solid start, but the next few years will be critical to figuring out the long-term business and for that I need to live in a small town!”

Again she was looking at him expectantly, but his mind was whirling as he took everything in and saw the pieces fall into place one by one. Then a shadow passed across her features.

“That is, if you want me to be here with you…” she said in a voice that was suddenly small and scared.

Brad laughed at that, long and hard, and pulled her in tight before releasing her suddenly. In answer, he dropped to a knee and, reaching into his pocket, pulled out the ring box. Opening it before her, he began the speech he had rehearsed in his head a thousand times.