Safety Net (49 page)

In less than a day, the rumors were
debunked by a reputable columnist who had tracked down the source of the
initial trash talk to a die-hard Shane Benjamin fan who blamed Erick for
Benjamin’s retirement. The supporting comments from supposed Crocker students
had actually come from a middle school student in Ohio and a college kid trying
to skew Erick’s points in a fantasy football league. As final refutation the
columnist posted a photograph of Erick and Candace taken at the NFL draft
ceremony.

The central theme of the columnist’s
story was celebrity cyberbullying, not gays in the NFL, and although the
columnist had tried to remain neutral on that subject, the assumption was that
the rumors couldn’t possibly be true. And the accusation itself was one of the
worst things that could be said about Erick.

Erick tried to appreciate the
columnist’s effort for making the gossip go away, but he couldn’t feel happy or
relieved. He wanted to be back on Kauai, at the moment when Lowell gave him the
ring, outside and not caring if anyone saw them.

-----

Kellen Forrester came up to Lowell
during Tobias Jennings’s birthday barbeque and said, “I hear you played
basketball in high school.”

Lowell gulped his beer. Forrester
wasn’t much of a social guy and Lowell had had exactly three casual
conversations with him in two years.

“Yeah, until senior year, when I
decided to concentrate on football. Why?”

Forrester gave him an assessing
look. “We’ve got an offseason b-ball team. Some of the players, staff, coaches.
Want to join? We’re playing Seattle’s offseason team in a few weeks.”

Lowell smiled. “For real? You play
other teams and stuff?”

“Our record with Seattle is
five-two,” Forrester said with a slight grin. “We also play some guys from
Denver and San Francisco, and the L.A. Stars said they might be interested.”

“This is wild,” Lowell said. “Yeah,
I’d love to play. I’m rusty, though. I haven’t played more than one-on-one in
years.”

“That’s why I’m asking now. There’s
time before the game to get you in shape. Come to practice tomorrow.”

Ted Barron joined them and
Forrester said, “Menacker said he’s on board.”

Barron grinned and slapped Lowell
on the back. “Excellent.” He took a drink of beer and looked at Lowell. “You
were good, though, right?”

“I wasn’t bad,” said Lowell
honestly.

Barron smirked. “I hope that’s
modesty talking.”

The Knights’ offseason basketball
team practiced and played in a gym at a private health club owned by one of the
team’s biggest corporate sponsors. It was nothing fancy, as no-frills as the
court in Lowell’s middle school had been.

Lowell was more rusty than he thought
and had a humiliating first practice, but he came back for more and found his
groove again by the second week. Forrester was an excellent player: focused,
fast, sneaky. It was fun playing with him and seeing a slightly different side
to their QB.

The Seattle team came to Portland
for their first offseason match, and the Knights played as if the Super Bowl
were on the line. Lowell had the time of his life, even though the Knights fell
to Seattle, 62-65. In two months they would travel to Seattle for a rematch,
and everyone vowed revenge. In the meantime they had a game in San Francisco to
look forward to.

Lowell traveled to San Francisco
early and spent half a day visiting the Crocker University campus. He hadn’t
been back since graduating. It was May, spring quarter, and the weather was
sunny and cool. Lowell walked around, feeling like a stranger but also like he
was home; it was sweet and painful.

He stopped at the football offices
to say hi, and Coach Miller welcomed him with a hug. They had a good talk, and
Lowell agreed to meet some of the players and give a few words of
encouragement. He knew many of them but was startled by how many he didn’t
know. They all looked like little kids. Could they really be college guys?

As Lowell was leaving the football
offices he paused by the trophy display case. The Golden Hammer wasn’t there.

“Fourteen to thirty-four,” Coach
Miller sighed. “Rockridge had an amazing season. But at least we had it for two
years before that. This year things might be different. Martinez is graduating
from Rockridge and Purcell’s all they’ve got. We have Christiansen for another
year and Vazquez-Byrd and a crop of running talent I frankly have never seen
before at Crocker. I like our chances.”

Lowell missed this so much. He
longed to suit up and join those little kids he’d just met and run onto the
grass field and fight to win the Hammer back. He felt like a very old man until
Coach Miller patted his shoulder and said, “We have a small wager in the
office. Who’s going to get their Super Bowl ring first? You or West?”

Lowell pretended to be shocked. “A
wager? Coach, do I have to report you to the NCAA?”

Coach Miller smiled. “It’s nothing
to do with college ball, so no.”

“Who’re you betting on?”

“I’m splitting the difference by
having side bets,” Coach Miller replied, avoiding the direct answer, and Lowell
grinned.

“My money would be on Erick, too.”

-----

The offseason basketball made the
no-football dog days between minicamps pass quickly, especially after the
Knights traveled to Seattle and reclaimed victory. Lowell did more exploring of
Oregon, taking Bean with him. He sent a bunch of phone pictures to Erick, who
responded by taking pictures of water, his deck, the sky, and his new Range
Rover.

Poser
, Lowell commented on
the Range Rover.

It’s comfortable
, Erick
replied.

Soccer mom
.

Near the end of June Lowell got an
e-mail from Candace. She was going to be in Eugene for a workshop and wondered
if it was close enough to Portland for a visit. Lowell assured her it was no
problem and drove down to Eugene to see her.

He picked her up on the University
of Oregon campus. She looked stunning in a bright summer dress that highlighted
her curves without being too revealing. She smiled broadly and hugged him.

“A pickup truck?” she said as he
opened the passenger door for her. “You sure are living flash in the NFL, aren’t
you?”

Lowell closed the door and got in
the driver’s seat. “Not everyone’s a Range Rover kinda guy.”

Candace laughed. “I told him to get
the Cadillac SUV but he said it was too much like his parents’ car.”

Lowell rolled his eyes.

Neither of them knew Eugene well
but they found a funky coffee shop that was quiet and served sandwiches and
pastries. They sat in a booth and ate and caught up on recent events. Lingering
over coffee, Lowell told Candace about the offseason basketball team, trailing
off when he noticed how quiet she’d become.

“You tired? You’re still on East Coast
time. Should I take you back to your hotel?”

Candace sipped her latte and gazed
at him seriously. “Lowell, honey. I know.”

“Know what?” Lowell asked, and at
the same moment he understood what she meant. His palms went clammy.

Candace looked at him
sympathetically. “Erick told me. That time I came to visit and see the game. He
told me then.”

The blood rushed from Lowell’s face
as he stared at her. “You’ve known since then?”

Candace glanced at her coffee mug. “Not
the details. And please, I don’t need to know the details,” she said with a
little humorless laugh. “When I was there, Erick told me he loved someone else.
And I don’t know why or how, but it just popped in my head and I said, ‘it’s
Lowell, isn’t it?’ and he said yeah.”

“Oh.” Lowell looked down at his
coffee, unable to think of anything to say. Too late and too useless to deny
it. He chewed on his lip. “I...we...never wanted to hurt you.”

“I know, and I appreciate that,” Candace
said, taking a sip from her mug. “I didn’t want anyone hurting, either, so I
didn’t say anything. But... I thought Erick would tell you I knew. And he didn’t.”

“No,” said Lowell, glancing at her
and knowing they were both wondering the same thing.

“Well,” she said with a small sigh,
“I wanted to tell you. Get that cleared up.”

Lowell watched her and said
finally, “Are you and Erick getting married?”

Candace looked at him steadily. “He
hasn’t asked me. I haven’t asked him. And to be honest, right now, if one of us
asked, I’m not sure what the other would answer. Isn’t that sad? I love him.
Something fierce, I love that man. But I’m not the same girl he met in Italy
and he’s not the same angry, lonely, wonderful boy I met. Even if he’s the same
Erick.” She smiled a little. “I don’t know if any of that makes sense.”

“It does,” Lowell said quietly. He
sat back in the booth, running his hands through his hair. He looked around.
The coffee shop wasn’t busy. A few tattooed and pierced young students
clustered up front, tapping on laptops and smartphones.

“I’ve tried to let him go...” he
started. “No. I can’t say I’ve tried because I haven’t. I’ve thought about
trying to let him go. And the thought kills me, but I’d still try if it meant
he could go on and have the life he’s supposed to have. Success, family, kids,
everything. I want him to have everything he wants, and I’d throw myself under
a bus, off a bridge, into a three hundred and fifty pound linebacker to give
him everything, if that’s all it would take.”

Candace’s smile was gentle. “But
part of the everything he wants...” She fell silent.

“Yeah.”

They didn’t say anything while
Candace finished her latte. Lowell toyed with his coffee mug. After a while he
said, “Last year when we were in New Haven, I was talking to his mom. She told
me about his first football. Did she ever tell you that story?”

Candace arched an eyebrow and said
with a smirk, “Mama West and I aren’t exactly BFFs.”

Lowell winced sympathetically. “Oh.
Right. Yeah, I don’t know how I got on her good side. Anyway, what she told me
was that when Erick was born, she immediately went crazy with love for him, he
was her baby boy, all that stuff.” Seeing Candace’s look, he chuckled softly
and said, “Yeah. Like we couldn’t guess that. But the interesting part is that
she didn’t want him to play football. She didn’t want her baby getting hurt. I
couldn’t believe it, huge football fan like her? But she said before Erick was
born she’d never thought about football players being their mothers’ sons.”

Lowell still didn’t know what to
make of that statement from Mrs. West but Candace said musingly, “I can
understand that. It makes a difference when you realize the lamb for the
slaughter is going to be
your
lamb, the one you raised from birth.”

Lowell inwardly grimaced at her
choice of words but continued, “Well, she made up her mind to keep Erick away
from football but one day Mr. West came home with an autographed football he’d
gotten as a gift. And Erick was only two but he was fascinated by the football
and wouldn’t leave it alone. And you know how heavy they are, but Erick tried
and tried until he could pick it up and throw it or at least drop it a few
inches away. That’s how he got started.”

Lowell paused, trying to imagine
it. He had never seen any baby pictures of Erick but now he was completely
curious. “Mrs. West said she had to give up. She watched him and knew she
wouldn’t be able to stop him. So she threw herself into doing everything she
could to support his football career.”

“She may have gone a little
overboard with that,” Candace commented drily.

“You think?” Lowell smiled a
little. “Thing was, while she was telling me this, I understood something about
Mrs. West, about me, about all of us. No one wants to be the person to stop
Erick, to tell him no, to keep him from getting what he wants. It’s not about
spoiling him, not exactly, and it’s not because no one wants to hurt him,
though that’s part of it, too. It’s more like... Erick sees all the potential
in the world, all the great things in it, all the good in people. No one wants
to be the one to tell him the world is actually made of shit and people suck.
And the craziest thing about it, the thing that makes Erick who he is, is that
when we’re with Erick he makes us see what he sees and it’s like, maybe the
world isn’t made of shit after all.”

Candace gazed at him for a long
moment with an odd, slightly sad smile. While they sat in silence the server
came to clear their coffee mugs and bring the check.

Candace said, “I love him but I’ve
let him go once, and he’s let me go once. It didn’t destroy either of us. You’re
right. I don’t want to hurt him. But I can’t stop my own life to wait for him.”

For the first time Lowell saw her
as the vivacious, beautiful, intelligent young woman he had known she was but
had always filtered through the lens of
Erick’s girlfriend
. And she was
right: her life could not depend on Erick’s.

“It will hurt him,” Lowell said
quietly. “I was there before. I saw how much it hurt him.”

Candace reached over and squeezed
his hand. “You were there before. You know it hurt him and he got over it.”

Lowell turned his hand over, palm
up, and held her fingers. “Candace. This isn’t what I ever wanted. I didn’t
want to push you away from him. Okay, maybe I did for a couple of hours back in
college but honestly, aside from that, no. Never.”

“Oh, honey,” she said, smiling and
blinking rapidly. She touched a paper napkin to her eyes. “I know it’s going to
sound funny, but it’s not about you. It’s about me and what I need to do for
myself.”

“But if I weren’t in the picture--”

“No sense in ‘if.’ This is the
reality we’re living in.”

Lowell drove Candace to her hotel.
It was dark by the time they got there and he walked her to the lobby. She
hugged him hard for a long time and he held her gently. When she drew back she
wiped her eyes.