Hometown Favorite: A Novel (25 page)

Robert Dewayne Jobe III was born at 5:32 a.m. three weeks
ahead of schedule but quite healthy and sporting a full head of
curly hair. During training camp the team remained sequestered, but Dewayne had been in constant phone contact with
Rosella, and he had forewarned the staff the baby might arrive
at any time. Joella had moved in a few days before Dewayne
left for camp, and Cherie was just about to take her two-week
vacation to come to Houston and relieve Joella when she got
the call she was now officially a grandmother. By the time
Franklin arrived, little Robert was out of the incubator and in his mother's arms with only another few days left in the
hospital.

Dewayne still showed up for camp every day, but for the
first few nights after Robert was born, Coach Gyra allowed
him to stay at the hospital instead of the forced team retreat in
the downtown Plaza Hotel. He loved the game, but the separation from his family at this time was harder than any hit Colby
could deliver.

"Split right ... three sixty-seven, and let the fun begin;" the
quarterback said, and the huddle began to break. "The ball
will be there"

The last statement was directed to Dewayne. It was his first
play in the first game of his first NFL season, and he was going
to get the ball. Special teams had taken the touchback, and the
Stars were starting on their own twenty-yard line. He jogged
out to the right side of the field.

All Dewayne could think was, Do not drop the ball. It was
a simple one-step up, one-step back route. He just needed to
make a big target and catch the ball, just catch the ball, no heroics necessary. He did not want his first pass to slip through
his fingers. Seventy-eight thousand people filled the stadium,
millions more could be watching the game at home, bookies
had made their odds and taken their bets, Cherie and Franklin had brought the kids to the game, while Joella and Rosella
stayed home with the baby and watched it on television. All
he needed to do was to get this first play behind him. He did
not need to do anything fancy or score a touchdown, and by
all means he didn't want to jump offsides. Just a solid catch, a
few positive yards, and that would be enough.

Out of respect for his speed, the Chicago cornerback assigned to cover Dewayne was playing about ten yards off the line
of scrimmage. The center snapped the ball, and as Dewayne
completed the step-up, step-back routine, the ball was already
hurtling through the air to him. Everything slowed down as he
watched the point of the ball sail right into the large diamond
shape he had made with his thumbs and index fingers.

The second it touched his gloves, his fingers gripped the ball
tight enough to make it squeal, and he spun around upfield.
Mission accomplished until the cornerback buried his helmet
into Dewayne's chest, stopping his forward progress and robbing him of the one yard he had gained.

With the ball tucked into his right side, Dewayne grabbed
the back of the cornerback's shoulder pads with his free hand
and tossed him aside like an annoying branch hanging over
a trail. The cornerback waved his arms and his hands tried to
grasp any part of Dewayne to slow him down until help arrived,
but he fell empty-handed to the ground.

The safety had a good angle of pursuit, but by midfield, he
gave up the chase and watched helplessly as Dewayne outran
him. By the time he reached the ten-yard line, he pulled back
his engines like an airplane preparing for descent and glided
into the end zone.

When he saw the officials raise their arms to signal his first
NFL touchdown, it was as though he had crossed into a madcap
Wonderland, and he did not know what to do. The stadium
was on the verge of collapse from the exploding fireworks, the
rock music booming from the speakers of the JumboTrons
on either end of the field, and the announcer screaming his
name over and over. He went down on one knee and said a
short prayer of gratitude, and by the time he got to the amen,
the gang tackle the defensive team had hoped to use on him
eighty yards back was now administered by exultant teammates who escorted Dewayne to the Stars bench without his feet ever
touching the ground.

The offensive linemen dropped Dewayne beside the bench
after going through the cheerful slaps of coaches and players
to his head and shoulders. He took off his helmet, waved to
the fans behind him, and then found his family twenty rows
back on the forty-yard line.

Bruce and Sabrina obviously appreciated Cherie's revelry
for her son's accomplishment and made an equal spectacle of
themselves. Even the internationally renowned architect, once
disdainful of what he considered low forms of entertainment,
who had refused to watch a collegiate or professional football
game until Dewayne came into his life, was now on his feet
straining his vocal cords, adding to the dissonant sound rising
out of the stadium.

Colby waited for Dewayne to stop waving to thousands of
his new best friends and step off the bench before he slipped
up beside him.

"That `going down on one knee, praying in the end zone'
thing ... nice touch," he said before he pounded Dewayne on
the shoulder with his fist, a gesture that was far from congratulatory. "So I guess I'd better get used to seeing you do that little
humble-pie act every time you score, huh?"

"I'd like to think so," Dewayne said, turning away from the
fans and grabbing a cup of Gatorade off the table.

"Well, well. My man has himself a direct line to God," Colby
said, his derisive chuckle a slight to Dewayne's pleasure of this
moment.

"I do" Dewayne took a swig of Gatorade, sloshed it around
in his mouth, and spit the backwash at Colby's feet. "And I'm
not your man:"

Colby looked at the splatter on his new game shoes and sneered as he stretched his helmet over his bald head before
heading onto the field. He was smart enough to expend his
displeasure at Dewayne's comeback upon the opposing team,
and it was a good investment. Chicago scored only field goals,
two of them, both in the second half, while Houston added
three more touchdowns to their score.

When Dewayne returned to the bench after a repeat of his
pious end zone ritual, Colby folded his hands in front of him
and bowed in mocking reverence. But Colby's ire was raised to
a new level when he watched Dewayne in the locker room for
a postgame television interview and heard him acknowledge
how he had incorporated his faith into his whole life. When
the reporter tried to single out his first NFL stats, Dewayne
deflected the credit to his teammates and singled out Colby
for "leading a great defensive effort by holding Chicago to six
points" Colby could not bear to receive praise from someone
he believed to be so self-righteous, and he stormed out of the
locker room, rejecting all requests for an interview.

The season progressed much as it started. In ten games,
Houston lost only twice, and with the schedule of remaining
games, the Stars were confident that going to the play-offs
was a sure thing, a prospect that had eluded them the past
two years. This fact was not lost on the public or the media,
and Dewayne Jobe was usually the first name out of everyone's
mouth about why the Stars' fortunes were beginning to turn.
He had been named "player of the week" twice since the first
game, an unusual feat for any player but rare as hen's teeth for
a rookie.

Not all was perfect in Jobe-world, however. His image of
faith and integrity had a polarizing effect on people. For most
Houston fans, as long as the Stars were winning, Dewayne could
believe in fairies and dress like one. For fans of other teams, it was easy to dislike someone who sprinted by his defenders
as if they were running through tar on his way to the end
zone, then did his "going to the chapel" kneel, as some sports
commentators had dubbed it, each time he crossed the goal
line. There were those in the media and even within the Stars
organization who felt he should go easy on the God speak,
but Rosella and his mother reminded him how he had gotten
this far with God's help and it was not smart to take him out
of the equation now.

Even if his public image suffered a bit from his expression
of faith, it did not damage the number of offers for product
endorsement that flooded into Jobe Enterprises, Inc. Often
Dewayne was on the phone in the locker room discussing the
particulars of deals with Rosella. Most advertisers were able
to accommodate the demands of his schedule and shoot a
commercial with a crew in Houston. But there was that rare
trip to Los Angeles or New York, and Rosella had him in and
out of a location within thirty-six hours. He never missed a
practice and his health never suffered under such a demanding schedule, nor did his bank accounts. By midseason, what
he had made in endorsements and investments was ten times
what the Stars had paid in a signing bonus.

What did suffer was the level of respect and goodwill Dewayne had gained with his teammates early in the season. His
"Bull Durham, Ah Shucks, Glory to God" public oratory was
beginning to wear thin on many players, and it did not help
that his fame and business deals were increasing week by week.
Dewayne was oblivious of the general resentment until none
other than Colby pointed it out to him.

After a second straight loss, which put their record at ten
and four-not bad enough to jeopardize their play-off chances,
but not conducive to building strong momentum going into those last two games-Colby strode through the locker room
and went over to Dewayne, sitting on the bench in front of his
locker heedless to the volume level on his phone as he debated
the price of a national car rental company endorsement with
Rosella. Colby got within inches of his face and glared at Dewayne until he told Rosella he needed to call her back.

"You and me;" Colby said. "We're going for a drive"

Dewayne thought it would be a good idea to have some oneon-one with Colby away from football. They pulled out of the
stadium parking lot in Colby's SL500 Mercedes convertible
and headed toward downtown Houston. The drive was befitting Colby's reputation as a linebacker, weaving through traffic
at NASCAR speed, and Dewayne was glad he buckled in the
second he shut the door. When they pulled into the parking
lot of the End Zone Bar & Grill, Colby spoke to him for the
first time since leaving the stadium.

"No need for you to take a knee thing once you walk through
that door" Colby pointed to the sign. "It ain't the same kind of
end zone"

It was, however, the only smart investment Colby had made
with his Stars money. He was the majority owner of the eatery,
and his reputation brought in a large and loyal clientele of those
who identified with Colby's personality or were just wannabe
bad boys. Everyone spoke to Colby, none to Dewayne, as they
followed the hostess sashaying her way through the tables in
her too-tight, too-short skirt to Colby's back corner table where
he could observe and be observed. Two ice-cold beers and platters of Colby's favorite appetizers appeared on the table almost
as soon as he and Dewayne had taken their seats. Dewayne requested the waiter trade out his beer for a cranberry juice,
and it was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

"I'm gonna make this quick and painless," Colby said before
guzzling a third of his beer. "The locker room is tired of hearing
you go on about God and your endorsement deals. You got
a life outside the locker room ... ;" he waved to the universe,
"... keep it there"

"Are you a spokesman for one, or do you speak for others?"
Dewayne asked and nodded his head in thanks to the waiter
who had brought him his cranberry juice.

"I speak for me, but I know my team. I know what they're
thinking when they listen to your God crap during interviews
or you haggling about what endorsement you're going to do
this week. Am I making this easy enough for you to understand?"

Dewayne was in a public place, and worse, it was not a neutral place. It was Colby's territory, and it was well marked, so
any outward display of the turmoil flaring inside his gut would
not have been the correct path to follow. He wanted to smash
Colby's face into the spinach dip appetizer, but thought that
was not a suitable turn-the-other-cheek response to this plotted entrapment and verbal abuse.