by Nancy Star
“What are your thoughts about it?” Winslow asked.
This was a first, Winslow asking for his opinion. Roy took his time answering.
“There are a lot of tough girls on that Center Lovell team,” he said for openers. “I think they targeted Nadine from the get-go. Because of how good she is. And also because of her size.”
Winslow got that look in his eyes, like Roy wasn’t getting the point.
“What exactly is it that you heard?” Roy asked.
“I heard the new girl, Charlotte, is absolutely amazing on the field.”
“That’s it?” Roy said.
“Why? Was there something else?”
“No,” Roy said. “That was the main thing. The girl is good. For a new kid, she’s a pretty good player.”
“Very interesting,” Winslow said. He started to walk away.
“Winslow,” Roy said. “About winter training.”
“Right. Yes. I’ve got to go prepare for a staff meeting right now, but let’s discuss it later, shall we?”
“I really need to talk to you now. And it’s not just about winter training. I need to talk to you about Nadine. About her future.”
“Absolutely. Will do. No problem.” Winslow touched his watch. “I’ve just got a couple of calls to return first. Can you give me a few minutes?” He walked backward toward his office. “We’ll do it in a bit. I promise.”
Roy started to protest but Winslow was too quick. He ducked into his office, closed the door, and turned the lock.
Roy picked up his crowbar, walked into the girls’ bathroom, and smashed the center of the concrete floor. It buckled into several large chunks that would take him hours to repair. But even that did nothing to make his rage recede.
Twenty
Annie didn’t sleep long, but she slept enough to function. She picked Charlotte up at eight and was relieved to hear that the night with her cousins had been fun, her scalp no longer burned, and the forecast for the rest of the week was cloudy with rain, meaning day camp was back on the schedule.
“I spoke to Daddy last night,” Charlotte added.
“You did?” Annie had missed two of Tim’s calls. She’d called back each time, but both times Tim hadn’t been there.
“He said to tell you he’ll be in meetings all day but he’ll see you later.”
“Did he say where he was calling from?” Annie asked.
“No,” Charlotte said. “Why? Where is he?”
“Atlanta,” Annie said and hoped she sounded more convincing than she felt.
They picked up Charlotte’s swimsuit and towel at home and drove to camp, where Nurse Pike examined Charlotte’s head under a bright light and cleared her to stay.
On the way back home, Annie stopped off and got coffee. She figured three extra-large cups should help offset her all-nighter with Sondra. She finished one in the car, drank the second on her commute up the stairs to her office, and drank the third as she wrote her Plan for the Day.
Today she would write the brochure. Of course, Sondra still had to get the approval from Ralph. But Annie knew that wouldn’t be a problem. After all, at that very moment Ralph was in the meeting, finding out for himself that Annie did great work.
She read through all the papers Sondra had given her to take home, memos about Zaxtec’s corporate culture, the time line of its history, and copies of all previously produced pamphlets of now-out-of-date corporate goals.
When she finished reading, Annie checked her watch. It was eleven thirty. Sondra should have called by now. The meeting should be over. They had timed the presentation to the minute.
At twelve thirty Annie wondered if it was possible that a meeting she’d organized had actually turned out to be a disaster.
At one o’clock she concluded Sondra must have forgotten to call. So Annie called her.
“This is Lois,” said the woman who picked up the phone. “How can I help you?”
“This is Annie Fleming. I was wondering if the meeting was over yet.”
“What?” said Lois.
“The H-ROC meeting that was scheduled from nine to eleven this morning. Is it over?”
“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” Lois said.
“May I please speak to Sondra?” Annie asked.
“She’s out of the office,” Lois said. “Who shall I say called?”
“Annie Fleming. I helped put together the presentation deck for this morning’s meeting. Is Sondra somewhere I can reach her?”
“And you are with?”
“Could you put me through to Sondra’s voice mail, please?”
“And your company is?”
Annie hung up and called Sondra’s cell. She left a message and sent an email. She left a message on Tim’s cell too. Where was Tim? She pushed the thought out of her mind and tried Sondra again.
“This is Annie,” she told Lois. “Can you tell me when you expect Sondra to be back?”
“Are you Annie Fleming?” Lois asked.
“Yes.”
“Oh, good. Sondra told me to give you a message. She said don’t call her. She’ll call you.”
“I don’t understand. Does she want me to wait until she calls me before I start working on the next presentation deck? Or does she want me to move forward without waiting to talk to her?”
“I have no idea,” Lois said.
“Is she going to call me this afternoon?” Annie asked.
“I don’t know anything about that,” Lois said.
“Would you please ask Sondra to call me as soon as she gets in?” Annie asked.
“She’s in,” Lois said. “I’ll tell her I gave you the message.”
Annie heard a click and then a dial tone. She tried Tim again.
“Where are you?” she said into the phone. She knew, but couldn’t help, that she sounded forlorn.
She pushed on. By the time she left to get Charlotte from camp, Annie had what she felt was a good rough draft of the brochure. But still no call back from Sondra or Tim.
When Annie and Charlotte got back home, Gerri was on their front step, waiting for them.
“Did I remember wrong?” Gerri asked. “I thought today was our first training session.”
“I apologize,” Annie said. “I completely forgot.”
“That’s okay,” Gerri said. “Charlotte’s here. I’m here. If you still want to have some socca-rific fun, I’m ready. What do you say, Charlotte?”
“Good,” Charlotte said.
Annie left them to their soccer and went back to work revising the brochure. An hour later, she heard the sound of the back door opening. Charlotte and Gerri walked inside, laughing. Annie joined them in the kitchen.
“That was a blast,” Gerri said. “Wasn’t it, Char?”
Charlotte nodded. Her face was flushed, her hair curled in the damp summer heat, her shirt sweaty. Annie could see right away she was happy.
“Lord, I wish I could concentrate more on coaching,” Gerri said. “Coaching is what I love. You know, most teams have a coach and a manager. I’m one of the few who does both. Boy, would I love to give up managing.”
“You should do it, then,” Annie said. “It’s just a matter of restructuring your responsibilities. You have to identify someone from your core audience who has the skills to be the manager. You have to sell the opportunity and sweeten it with an offer to train the person. Then you can realign your time to concentrate on what you like. Coaching.”
“Realign my time. That sounds so good. That’s what I need to do. Realign my time. Except who am I realigning with? No one wants to manage the team. At least no one I trust.” Gerri stopped. “Wait a socca-minute. What about you?”
“She can’t,” Charlotte piped up. “She doesn’t know anything about soccer.”
There was that defeatist attitude again. It made Annie’s entire body go rigid. “I can learn,” Annie said. “I can watch and learn.”
“We can teach her together,” Gerri told Charlotte. “And if she
’s anything like you, she’ll pick it up in a minute and a half.”
“She can’t,” Charlotte said. “She doesn’t have time.”
“Actually,” Annie said glancing at the phone, which still wasn’t ringing. “I don’t have a lot of work right now. It’s kind of perfect timing.”
In fact, it was amazing timing. She’d spent so many years at PC&B, patiently waiting to make partner, and nothing had come of it. Now, after just a couple of weeks, she was being offered the plum job of manager of a soccer team. Tim wasn’t going to believe it.
Where was Tim?
“Would you do it?” Gerri asked.
“Absolutely,” Annie said. The more she let it sink in, the better it felt.
“Let me go to my office and get you all the paperwork you’ll need,” Gerri said. She winked. “My office is the front seat of my car.” She ran to her car and returned a moment later with a large cardboard box. She slid its contents out onto Annie’s kitchen table.
“You’ll probably want to organize this a little better,” she said. “I’m not good at sorting. Also, there are a couple of forms missing from some of the girls. You’ll have to follow up on that. And I started a log that needs to be input on a spreadsheet. Wins, losses, strikes, assists—like that.”
“That’s no problem,” Annie said. “I’m very organized.”
“Oh—and this weekend I convinced Winslow to invite us to a scrimmage at his Soccer-Plex. It’s not officially opened yet but he did put together a small tournament. Only now I have a conflict. I can get to the Soccer-Plex, but I’ll be late. You think you could get there a little early to get everyone started?”
“She doesn’t know anything about tournaments,” Charlotte said.
Gerri smiled. “Well then, you’ve got five days to teach her.”
After Gerri left, Annie asked Charlotte to tell her about tournaments.
Charlotte said she didn’t know anything either and went up to her room.
Charlotte had a right to be skeptical. Annie would have to prove herself. And she could do that. She could show her daughter that she had the ability to be a great team manager. All it would take was work. And work was something Annie knew how to do.
She took one of the empty file boxes from the dining room and put all the team paperwork in it. She made a master list of all the missing forms—most players were short at least one. When that was done she went online to find a soccer rule book. That was easy too.
This was great. She printed out a manual and started studying it.
She was on the final chapter, “How to Be a Winner and a Good Sport Too,” when she heard the front door open.
“Daddy,” Charlotte called out.
“How’s my favorite girl?” Tim boomed back.
“Good,” Charlotte said.
“Just good?” Tim asked.
“Super good,” Charlotte said.
Annie went into the living room, where they were sitting close together on the sofa.
“I was just hearing about Charlotte’s training session with Gerri,” Tim said.
“It’s nice to have you home,” Annie said. She knew Tim could hear the edge in her voice. “I’ll be in the kitchen,” she added. “But I’d love to hear about your trip when you get a chance.”
“Last night I played poker at Aunt Trissy’s,” Charlotte told her father as Annie walked out of the room.
“Did you win?” Tim asked.
Annie returned to the kitchen, and the soccer manual. She reread the chapter on offsides for the second time, but still didn’t understand a word of it.
Tim walked in a few minutes later. He sat down across from her.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Say what’s on your mind. You’re mad. I can tell.”
“I’m not mad,” Annie said. “I’m worried. You didn’t leave me an itinerary. You didn’t answer my calls.”
“I answered every one of your calls.”
“But you never picked up when I called.”
“I was in meetings,” Tim explained.
Annie thought Tim looked nervous. She had to say what was on her mind.
“Trissy told me you weren’t in Atlanta,” Annie said. “Hank told her you were at a conference in the city. They think we’re having problems.”
Tim shifted over to the chair next to Annie. He covered her hand with his long fingers. “It has nothing to do with you.”
“Oh no,” Annie said.
“It’s not what you think,” Tim said. “It has nothing to do with us.”
“Who does it have to do with, then?” Annie asked.
“I’m going through a tough time at work. That’s all. Scout’s honor.”
“You were never a scout,” Annie said.
“I was hoping you wouldn’t remember that.”
Annie felt herself soften. It was hard to stay mad at Tim for long. “Were you in Atlanta?”
“Yes,” Tim said.
“Why does Hank think you weren’t?” Annie asked.
Tim took a deep breath and sighed out the world. “Because I told him I wasn’t.”
“You lied to your brother?”
“Not exactly,” Tim said. “I did go to Atlanta. But I didn’t go to the Atlanta office.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I don’t want you to worry,” Tim said.
Annie took a hard look at her husband and suddenly she saw it. He didn’t look right. Tim, whose hair was always perfectly in place, who never gained weight or caught the family colds, who slept like a rock, ate heartily, drank moderately, and could have coffee at eleven and still sleep through the night, did not look good at all.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. Diagnoses presented themselves in her mind. Liver disease, blood disease, kidney failure, stroke. Brain disease, diabetes, cancer of the throat.
She thought of all the infirmities of their combined ancestors. The ones with mysterious undiagnosable symptoms—-numb feet, neck pain, blurry vision, rash. And the others—-celiacs, heart attacks, maniacs.
She took a breath. Tim was her partner for life. There was nothing they couldn’t handle together. She braced herself. “What’s wrong with you?”
Tim let out a deep breath and told her. “I’ve got fire-aphobia.”
“Pardon me?”
“I’m a fire-aphobe. I’m fire-aphobic. It’s a thing. I saw a doctor.”
“What kind of thing? What kind of doctor?”
“I’ve got a phobia about firing people. It’s not that un- common.”
Annie was so relieved she almost laughed. But she quickly realized that would not be an appropriate response.
“No one likes to fire people,” she said. “Who would? It’s not fun.”
“I’m not talking about not having fun,” Tim said. “I’m talking about going to Atlanta three times in the past two weeks and not being able to do my job. I’m talking about not leaving the airport hotel.”
“But you’re so good at firing people,” Annie said. “You’ve got that great mix of kindness with a little bit of mean thrown in. I mean you’re tough, not mean. I mean, I don’t really have a job right now,” she reminded him, in case he forgot.
“I know,” he said quietly.
“Okay,” Annie said. “You know what? You need a vacation. That’s all. Why don’t you tell Hank you’re going to take two weeks off and that he’s got to close down the Atlanta office himself. Then you can go away to some beach or someplace, and when you come back you’ll feel refreshed and ready to fire again.”
Tim smiled. Annie was relieved. At least he hadn’t lost his sense of humor.
“What did the doctor say?” she wanted to know.
“He said I should try relaxation techniques. Practice deep breathing. Make some lifestyle changes. Eat well. Sleep more. Exercise.”
“Is that the reason for the sudden treadmill use?” Annie asked.
Tim nodded. “So, I’m doing all that. But I still haven’t been able to close down the office. I to
ld Hank I was going to a conference because I thought this time I might not be able to get on the plane. But I did. I got on the plane. I went to Atlanta. I ordered the doughnuts. I had them delivered to my room, and I ate them.”
“All of them?”
Tim nodded.
“You have to tell Hank. He’s your brother. He’ll want to help you.”
“It’s complicated,” Tim said. “Hank’s been away a lot lately. He’s basically never around.”
“Why is that?” Annie asked.
Tim shrugged. “I’m not sure.”
“What can I do?” Annie asked. “How can I help you?”
“There’s nothing you can do,” Tim said. Then he thought of something. “Except maybe to lay off asking about Hot Holidays for a while. I have nothing good to report. And when I’m at home I’d rather not think about it. Can you understand that?”
“Of course,” Annie said. “What do you want to talk about instead?”
“Anything,” Tim said. “Anything good. Let’s talk about you. How did things go with your presentation?”
“Next topic.”
“Oh,” Tim said. “It didn’t go well?”
“It’s fine,” she said, because Tim didn’t really need to hear about her work problems right now. “How about if neither of us talks about work.”
“Just for now,” Tim said.
“Right,” Annie agreed. “Hey, I just thought of some good news. I got a promotion.”
“Congratulations,” Tim said. “I thought we weren’t going to talk about work.”
“It has nothing to do with work. It’s about soccer. Charlotte’s coach promoted me. I’m the team manager. Can you believe it? A month ago all I knew about soccer was that some guy from somewhere hit another guy from somewhere else in the chest with his head. Now I’m managing a team.”
“That’s amazing,” Tim said. “That’s great. That’s the best news I’ve heard all month.”
“I know,” Annie said. “And I’m going to do a great job. I’m going to be the best soccer manager ever. I want to make Charlotte proud.”
“Now, that’s something I look forward to seeing,” Tim said, and he meant it.
Twenty-one
By the morning of the tournament, Annie had everything organized. She dragged the big cooler of Gatorade to the car, then lugged out two large shopping bags filled with snacks.