Play Dirty (8 page)

“I’m not scared of you!” he shouted up at Coach.

“Do I have your attention now?”

“Why don’t you pick on somebody else for a change? Phillips missed ten of ten today. I don’t see you making him kick till he gets one between the frigging uprights. How many times did Reynolds fumble during the last game? Three? Four? Why aren’t you on his ass? Why is it always mine?”

“Because Phillips and Reynolds don’t have any talent!” Coach seemed to use up all his breath in that one roar. His voice was much softer when he said, “And you do.”

He flicked sweat off his forehead with the back of his thumb. He looked away, then back at Griff, who was still sitting in the dirt because his butt bone hurt too bad to try to stand.

Coach said, “Not another player on this team, not another one in this school, or in any of our rival schools, has talent to match yours, Griff. And you’re
pissing
it away, feeling sorry for yourself and carrying a chip on your shoulder because your mother was a whore. You’ve had a lousy life up till now, no denying that. But if you let it ruin the rest of your life, who’s the fool? Who will you be spiting? You, that’s who.

“You may not be scared of me, but you’re scared shitless of yourself,” he said, jabbing the space between them with his finger. “Because in spite of yourself, you’re better than the two who made you. You’re smart and good looking. You’ve got more natural athletic ability than I’ve ever seen in any sport. And because of those gifts, you just might make something of yourself.

“And that scares you, ’cause then you wouldn’t be able to wallow in your goddamn self-pity. You wouldn’t be able to hate the world and everybody in it for the shitty hand you were dealt. You wouldn’t have an excuse for being the self-centered, self-absorbed, complete and total jerk that you are.”

Speech over, he stood looking down at Griff a moment longer, then turned away in disgust. “If you’ve got the guts for it, suit up tomorrow and be ready to apply yourself. If not, stay the hell off my team.”

Griff was at practice the following day and for every day after that, and that season he led the team to the state championship, as he did for the three following years. Neither the incident nor Coach’s lecture was ever referred to again. But Griff didn’t forget it, and he knew Coach didn’t.

Their relationship improved. They had ups and downs because Griff constantly pushed him and Ellie to see just how far he could go before they got sick of him and kicked him out.

When he defied his weekend curfew and came in an hour and a half late, they didn’t kick him out, but Coach imposed the worst punishment fathomable—making him wait two months beyond his sixteenth birthday to take his driver’s test and get his license.

They encouraged him to invite friends over, but he never did. He’d never developed friend-making skills and didn’t really have the desire to. Overtures by classmates were rebuffed. Sooner or later people abandoned you, so why bother? In the long run, you were better off keeping to yourself.

Sometimes he caught Ellie looking at him sadly and knew she harbored unspoken worries about him. Maybe she sensed, even then, that the worst was yet to come.

Things rocked along pretty well. Then, early in his junior year, an incident in the locker room got Griff suspended from school for three days. It hadn’t been a fair fight—Griff against five other athletes, three football players and two on the basketball team.

When they were pulled apart by assistant coaches, two of the boys were taken to the emergency room, one with a broken nose, the other needing stitches in his lower lip. The other three had bloody noses and bruised torsos but didn’t require hospitalization.

Griff, instigator of the seemingly unprovoked fight, suffered no more than a few scrapes and a black eye.

“We have no choice, Coach Miller,” the school principal said as he relinquished Griff to him. “Just be glad the parents of the other boys declined to press assault charges. They could have,” he added, glaring at Griff.

Coach took him home, marched him past a subdued Ellie, and confined him to his room for the duration of his suspension. On the evening of the second day, Coach walked into his room unannounced. Griff was lying on his back on the bed, idly tossing a football into the air.

Coach pulled up his desk chair and straddled it backward. “I heard something interesting today.”

Griff continued tossing the football, keeping his eyes on it and the ceiling beyond. His tongue would rot out before he would ask.

“From Robbie Lancelot.”

Griff caught the football against his chest and turned his head toward Coach.

“Robbie asked me to thank you for what you did. And especially for not telling.”

Griff remained silent.

“He figured I was in on whatever it is that you’re not telling. I’m asking you to tell me now.”

Griff pressed the football between his strong fingers, studied the laces, avoided looking at Coach.

“Griff.”

He dropped the football. Sighed. “Lancelot weighs what? A hundred twenty-five, maybe? He’s a nerd, a geek. A pest, you know? People cheat off him during chemistry tests, but otherwise…” He looked over at Coach, who nodded understanding.

“I had finished my workout with weights and went into the locker room. I heard this commotion back by the showers. Those five guys had Robbie backed into a corner. They had his underwear. He was standing there without anything on, and they were making him…you know. Work it. Saying stuff like ‘Are you really, Lance a lot?’ ‘Let’s see this big lance of yours.’ ‘Too bad your lance isn’t as big as your brain.’ Stuff like that.”

He glanced at Coach, then away. “He was crying. Snot was running out his nose. His dick was…he was yanking on it something fierce, but it wasn’t…doing anything.”

“Okay.”

“These guys were giving him hell. So I plowed through them and pulled him away from the wall, walked him to his locker, told him to get his clothes on, wipe his nose for God’s sake, and get the hell out of there.”

“And then went back and beat the crap out of his tormentors.”

“Tried anyhow,” Griff mumbled.

Coach watched him for a long moment, then stood up, replaced the chair beneath the desk, and went to the door. “Ellie says dinner’s in half an hour. You’d better wash up.”

“Coach?” He turned back. “Don’t tell anybody, okay? I’ve only got one more day of suspension, and…and I promised Lancelot.”

“I won’t tell anybody, Griff.”

“Thanks.”

To this day Griff remembered the expression on Coach’s face as he left his room that evening. He was never able to define it, but he knew that something important had happened, that some sort of understanding had passed between them. As far as he knew, Coach had never betrayed his confidence about the incident.

By now he’d made the neighborhood block and for the second time approached the house with the white flowers on either side of the front door and the backyard pool with the slide. He’d wasted enough time. It was do or die.

The two kids with the football were still throwing passes to each other when Griff parked at the curb and got out.

T
HE BOYS STOPPED THEIR PLAY, WATCHING AS HE WALKED TOWARD
them. “Hey,” he said.

“Hey.” They said it in unison, cautiously.

“Is this Bolly Rich’s house?”

“He’s inside,” replied the taller of the two. “He’s my dad.”

“What’s your name?” Griff asked.

“Jason.”

“You play ball?”

Jason nodded.

“What position?”

“Quarterback.”

“Yeah?”

“Second string,” Jason confessed self-consciously.

“Want to play first string?”

Jason looked at his friend, then back at Griff. “Sure.”

“Give me the ball.”

Again Jason first consulted his friend with a look, then passed the football to Griff, keeping himself at arm’s length. “I’m throwing ducks.”

Griff grinned at his use of the term for a slow and wobbly pass. “That happens to everybody once in a while, but you can avoid it.” He took the ball in his right hand, pressed his fingertips against the laces. “See this?” He held the ball for Jason and his friend to observe.

“You’ve gotta keep the pads of your fingers tight, like you’re trying to squeeze the air out of it. So when you let it go…” He motioned for Jason’s friend to run out for a pass. The kid went willingly. Griff drew back his arm. “You’ve got control, better aim, and speed.”

He threw the ball. It sailed straight and sure. The kid caught it and beamed. Griff gave him a thumbs-up, then turned to Jason. “A bullet instead of a duck.”

Jason raised his hand to shade his eyes against the sun. “You’re Griff Burkett.”

“That’s right.”

“I had a poster of you in my room, but my dad made me take it down.”

Griff snuffled a laugh. “I’m not surprised.”

“Griff?”

He turned. A slight man, wearing cargo shorts, a holey T-shirt, and old sneakers, had opened the front door and was standing on the threshold between the flowerpots. He was balder, but his eyeglasses were the same ones Griff remembered from the last time Bolly had interviewed him.

“Hello, Bolly.” He looked down at the boy. “Keep practicing, Jason.” The youngster nodded respectfully. Then Griff joined Bolly at the door and extended his hand. To the man’s credit he shook hands with him—after only a second or two of hesitation. But the eyes behind the wire frames weren’t exactly glowing with happiness to see the most hated man in Dallas at his front door.

“I think Jason has the potential of being good one of these days.”

Bolly nodded absently, still trying to recover from his shock. “What are you doing here, Griff?”

“Can I have a minute or two of your time?”

“What for?”

He glanced over his shoulder at the two boys, who were watching this exchange with undivided attention. Coming back around, Griff said, “I promise not to abscond with the family silver.”

The sportswriter hesitated for several seconds more, then went into the house and motioned for Griff to follow him. Off the entryway, Bolly led him down a short hallway and into a compact, paneled room. Shelving was jam-packed—even overflowing—with sports memorabilia. Framed photographs of Bolly with star athletes took up most of the wall space. There was an untidy desk in the corner dominated by a telephone and a computer. The monitor was on. The screen saver showed fireworks blossoming in multicolored silence.

“Sit down if you can find a spot,” Bolly said as he squeezed himself behind the desk.

Griff removed a stack of newspapers from the only other chair in the room and sat down. “I called the sports desk at the
News.
The guy who answered said you were working from home today.”

“I do most days now. Go into the office only a couple days a week, if that much. If you’ve got e-mail, you can conduct just about any business from home.”

“I used a computer in the library this morning. Felt like a caveman looking at the control panel of a 747.”

“They build in obsolescence. Keep you buying upgrades.”

“Yeah.”

An uncomfortable silence followed. Bolly picked up a stray tennis ball on his desk and rolled it between his palms. “Listen, Griff, I want you to know I didn’t contribute anything to that piece about you that came out during your trial.”

“I didn’t think you did.”

“Well, good. But I wanted you to know. That writer—You know he’s in Chicago now.”

“Good riddance.”

“Amen. Anyway, he pumped me for information on your background. Your folks. Coach Miller. All that. All I told him, the
only
thing I told him, was that you had the best arm and best hustle of any quarterback I’d ever seen. Topping Montana, Staubach, Favre, Marino, Elway, Unitas. You name me one, you were better. I mean that.”

“Thanks.”

“Which makes me all the more pissed off at you for what you did.”

Bolly Rich, a sports columnist for
The Dallas Morning News,
had always been fair to him. Even when he didn’t perform well, like one
Monday Night Football
game against Pittsburgh. It was his rookie year, his first time playing the Steelers on their turf. He played the worst game of his career. Bolly’s column the next morning had been critical, but he’d placed part of the blame for the humiliating loss on the offensive line, which had done precious little to protect the new quarterback. He hadn’t crucified Griff the way other sportswriters had. That wasn’t Bolly’s style.

Griff was hoping to appeal to Bolly’s sense of fair play now. “I fucked up,” he said. “Huge.”

“How could you do it, Griff? Especially after such an outstanding season. You were one game away from the Super Bowl. All you had to do was win that game against Washington.”

“Yep.”

“No way Oakland could have defeated the Cowboys that year. Y’all would have waltzed through the Super Bowl game against them.”

“I know that, too.”

“You only had to get the ball to Whitethorn, who was standing on the two. The two! Nobody near him.”

Bolly didn’t have to recount the play for him. He’d replayed it in his mind a thousand times since he threw that pass while the final seconds of the game ticked off the clock.

Fourth and goal on the Redskins’—
it would be the goddamn Redskins
—ten-yard line. Cowboys trail by four. A field goal won’t do it.

The center snapped the ball into Griff’s hands.

Whitethorn shot forward off the line of scrimmage.

A Redskins lineman slipped, missed the tackle. Whitethorn got to the five.

Skins defenders trying to blitz were stopped dead. They couldn’t climb or penetrate Dallas’s line, collectively named “Stonewall” that season.

A Skins linebacker was charging toward Whitethorn, but Whitethorn was now on the two with space around him. The team was only one step shy of the goal, of victory, of the Super Bowl.

All Griff had to do was lob a short screen pass over the line into Whitethorn’s hands.

Or miss him, and get paid a cool two million by the Vista boys.

Cowboys lost 14–10.

“It was a crushing loss,” Bolly was saying, “but I remember how the fans still cheered you as you left the field that day. They didn’t turn against you until later, when it came out that you’d missed Whitethorn on purpose. And who could blame them? Their Super Bowl–bound star turned out to be a cheat, a crook.”

Talking about it five years after the fact still made Bolly angry. He dropped the tennis ball, which bounced off his desk onto the floor, ignored. He took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes with agitation, and asked brusquely, “What do you want, Griff?”

“A job.”

Bolly replaced his glasses and looked at him as though waiting for the punch line. Eventually, realizing that Griff was serious, he said, “What?”

“You heard right.”

“A
job
? Doing what?”

“I thought a paper route might be available. Could you put in a good word for me with someone in that department?” Bolly continued to stare at him; he didn’t smile. “That was a joke, Bolly.”

“Is it? Because beyond that, I can’t imagine why you’ve come to me asking about a job. You go anywhere near the sports desk at the newspaper and you’ll probably be tarred and feathered. If you’re lucky.”

“I wouldn’t have to go near the sports desk. I could work directly for you.”

Bolly frowned. “What’d you have in mind? Not that I think there’s a chance in hell of this going anywhere. I’m just curious to see how your mind is working.”

“You can’t be everywhere at once, Bolly. You can’t cover more than one game at a time. I know you use people to cover games for you. Provide the color only someone who is actually at the game can get.”

“I use some stringers, yeah.”

“Let me be one. I majored in English. I have a fair command of the language. As much as anybody in Texas.” His quick grin wasn’t returned. “I can at least put two sentences together. Most important, I know the game. I
lived
the game. I could give you insightful play-by-plays that nobody else could, add a perspective that would be unique, based on actual experience. Years of it.”

He’d rehearsed the pitch, and to his ears it sounded good. “I could describe how great it feels to win. How lousy it feels to lose. How much worse it feels to win when you know you’ve played like shit and the win was a fluke.” He paused, then asked, “What do you think?”

Bolly studied him a moment. “Yeah, I think you could give an accurate account of wins and losses with some original flavoring thrown in. You’d probably be pretty good at it. But even with terrific language skills, you couldn’t come close to describing what it’s like to be a team player, Griff. Because you don’t know.”

“What do you mean?” But he didn’t have to ask. He knew what Bolly meant.

“You were a one-man show, Griff. You always were. Going all the way back to high school, when you first started gaining notice from college recruiters, it was all about you, never the team. You led your teams to victory after victory with your amazing ability on the field, but you were a piss-poor leader off it.

“Far as I know, you were never voted a team captain, which doesn’t surprise me. Because the only thing that made you part of any team was wearing the same color jersey. You made no friends. Teammates admired your game. Those who didn’t envy you idolized you. But they didn’t like you, and that was okay with you. You didn’t give a damn so long as they carried out the plays you called.

“I never saw you encourage another player who’d made a mistake, never saw you congratulate one for making a good play. I never saw you extend your hand in friendship or lend a helping hand to anyone. What I did see was you giving back Dorsey’s Christmas present unopened, saying, ‘I don’t do that crap.’

“I saw you rebuke Chester when he invited you to a men’s prayer breakfast for his wife, who was going through horrible chemo and radiation. When Lambert’s fiancée was killed in that car wreck, you were the only one on the team who didn’t attend the funeral.

“You were an outstanding athlete, Griff, but a sorry excuse for a friend. I guess that’s why I’m surprised, and slightly offended, that you would come to me now, like we’d been good buddies, and ask for my help.”

It wasn’t easy to hear those things about himself, especially since they were true. Quietly, humbly, Griff said, “I need the work, Bolly.”

Bolly took off his glasses to rub his eyes again, and Griff knew he was about to turn him down. “I hate what you did, but everybody can make a mistake and deserves a second chance. It’s just…Hell, Griff, I couldn’t get you into any press box in the league.”

“I’d cover college ball. High school.”

Bolly was shaking his head. “You’d be met with the same animosity there. Maybe even more. You cheated. First you broke the rules by gambling. Then you threw a game. You fucking threw a game,” he said with heat. “For money. You robbed your own team of a sure-win Super Bowl. You were in bed with…with
gangsters,
for crissake. Do you think anybody would allow you near kids, young players?” He shook his head and stood up. “I’m sorry, Griff. I can’t help you.”

He had lunch at a Sonic drive-in. Sitting in the borrowed Honda, he gorged on a jalapeño cheeseburger, a Frito pie, two orders of Tater Tots, and a strawberry-lemonade slush. It had been five years since he’d had junk food. Besides, he figured that if he was going to be a despised outcast, he might just as well be a fat one.

On the drive out to Bolly’s neighborhood and up till the time Bolly had told him not only
no
but
hell, no,
Griff had congratulated himself for having the character to seek a job when, by two-thirty this afternoon, his immediate money problems would be solved. He’d sought work
before
going to the bank to check the contents of that safe-deposit box. In his opinion, it had taken a lot of integrity to humble himself and appeal for a job, hat in hand, when after today he wouldn’t have to do any labor, ever, if he didn’t want to. He’d even endured Bolly’s sermon, and the sportswriter hadn’t gone easy on his personality flaws.

Although he had to admit that Bolly’s memory was sound. The man also had a keen insight into his nature. That was why he hadn’t asked forgiveness or tried to justify himself. He’d never been the touchy-feely type. He’d never wanted to pat his teammates on the ass after a big play, and he sure as hell hadn’t wanted any of them patting his. He’d left all that rah-rah bullshit to the benchwarmers, while he was out there on the field doing the bone-breaking, bloody work, getting creamed by tacklers who got marks on their helmets if they sacked him.

But why was he stewing about Bolly’s censure? None of that mattered. Now he had only two teammates, and all he had to do to make them happy was get one of them pregnant. Easy enough.

He had indigestion as he walked inside the bank building. He blamed it on the jalapeños, not nerves. He looked about him, as though expecting to be spotlighted and exposed for the most gullible fool ever to walk the planet.

But it went exactly as Foster Speakman had told him it would. No muss, no fuss. He made an inquiry at the information desk, then was escorted to an elevator that went into a subterranean part of the bank, where a polite, grandmotherly type asked him to sign a card. She compared it with the signature card that Foster Speakman had filed, as promised. Satisfied, the grandmother showed Griff into a cubicle.