Crazy Thing Called Love

by Molly O'Keefe

  He kissed her. Once. Again.

  “Billy—” she sighed, but he shook his head.

  “You’re thinking too much. This … this is simple.”

  She sputtered with laughter. Nothing between them was simple. Ever.

  “It is. You just make it complicated. For today, let’s just be simple.”

  A coward at heart, she nodded. “Simple.”

  “So do you or do you not have any beer?” he asked.

  “I do,” she whispered and they walked into her living room, bathed in bright daylight.

  But the brightest light brought out the darkest shadows and she was reminded with terrible piercing clarity that love had never been the problem for them.

  It was the stuff that came with it.

  “Oh my God!” Billy breathed and rolled down the windows in the backseat of his car. He was fighting traffic into the city on Monday morning, but there was no way of fighting the smell in the backseat.

  “See,” Becky said. “We shouldn’t have gone swimming yesterday.”

  “It was your idea!” he cried. Becky had woken up this morning looking for blood, his. And he didn’t know how to manage going into Hornsby’s office to beg for his job back and a thirteen-year-old girl’s grudge match at the same time.

  But fighting with her did keep his mind off the groveling, so it had a hidden benefit.

  “I think it was the fruit you were force-feeding him this morning.”

  “Charlie likes cantaloupe.”

  “My tummy hurts,” Charlie moaned.

  “I told you to go easy with the fruit for the first few days since your systems aren’t used to it.” He flashed his lights at the semi that was traveling at a snail’s pace in the fast lane.

  “Don’t worry about our systems,” she snapped.

  “Well, it’s hard not to when Charlie’s is polluting the air.” The semi was slowing down. Honest to God, the world was working against him.

  “You are so crabby this morning.”

  “I’m crabby?” He passed a semi on the right. “Me? You’re the one who’s acting like I’m the bad guy.”

  “You should have just left us at your house.”

  “Yeah. Right.” Billy looked at the girl in his rearview mirror. “Like you’d be there when I got home.” Whatever no-running-away agreement they’d established felt wafer-thin this morning. He thought they’d made progress at Maddy’s, but apparently not.

  Women were such a freaking mystery, at any age.

  Billy rolled down his own window because under his dress shirt he was starting to sweat. How ridiculous was it that he’d dressed up for his meeting with Hornsby?

  And bringing the kids?

  What the hell am I thinking? Becky was a bad-spirited, stubborn foul-mouthed loose cannon. And Charlie smelled like crap.

  But it wasn’t like he had a choice. Even if Becky kept her promise about not running away, it just felt wrong to leave the kids alone. They’d been left alone too much already.

  And there wasn’t anyone he could call. Tara Jean and Luc were away. Maddy had her job.

  He was solo with two kids.

  Welcome to the rest of your life, he thought.

  He’d briefly thought about calling Vince for some backup with Hornsby. But this minor league situation, and needing to clear up the mess he’d made in order to get okayed as a foster parent—it all felt personal.

  Having Vince there would only muddy the waters.

  Besides, he didn’t need any more witnesses to the humiliation fun house of swallowing his pride and begging for another chance.

  A few gag-filled minutes later, he pulled to a stop in the players’ parking lot and turned off the car, just as Charlie let another one rip.

  “You need to go to the bathroom?” Becky asked her brother and Billy turned to look at them. Somehow in the twenty-minute drive from his house to the office, the kid had gotten dirty. His face was smeared with something green.

  “What—”

  “Marker,” Becky said. “He had it in his pocket.”

  “Great.” He sighed. Outside of the green on Charlie’s face, the kids looked good. The trip to Target had resulted in some new duds. Charlie was proudly wearing a Yoda T-shirt. And Becky had on another hoodie, this one purple, the zipper covered in rhinestones.

  “We can wait in the car,” she said, all sneer.

  Billy snorted, climbed out of the driver’s seat, and opened the back door, looking at Becky. She had a Target bag at her feet, full of diapers and spare clothes for Charlie. Some toys and snacks.

  Thirteen years old and the girl knew how to pack a diaper bag. Guilt squeezed his chest down to nothing. One more negative emotion on top of the volcano he was already feeling.

  “Look, this is a big deal for me, this meeting,” he said and Becky rolled her eyes. Ever since he’d told her he wasn’t going to send her back to Pittsburgh she’d been pushing him. He was no stranger to that type of behavior, having perfected it himself when he was a kid, but it didn’t make it any easier to deal with.

  “No. I’m serious. This is my career on the line. Right now.”

  “Okay, fine. What do you want from me?”

  “For you to be good. To not touch anything. To make sure Charlie doesn’t touch anything. Try to make sure he doesn’t gas the receptionist.”

  “I can’t control Charlie’s farts.” Oh man, that attitude. It was so familiar. And so infuriating. He suddenly had a lot more sympathy for every teacher he’d ever had who had reached out a helping hand only to have him snap it off at the bone.

  Billy growled and walked around the car to lift Charlie out of his seat. If he were a cartoon, the boy would have green fumes rising up from his diaper.

  “Charlie.” Charlie smiled up at Billy as he held the boy in his outstretched arms. Becky may have had some terrible change of heart toward him, but Charlie had nothing but love for Billy. Which was strange and slightly uncomfortable, but he would take support where he could find it. He checked Charlie’s diaper—no poo. “Can you hold it in for just a few minutes? Until Becky takes you to the bathroom.”

  “Yes, Uncle Billy.”

  “Good boy.”

  “Whatever,” Becky sighed, and Billy was beginning to think that word was her personal motto or something. But he let it slide, unable to fight every battle.

  They walked in the players’ entrance to the arena and then took an elevator up to the office level.

  “What are you going to do in there,” Becky asked, “that’s so important?”

  Billy watched the numbers climb on the readout above the door. Swallow my pride. Grovel. Throw myself on Hornsby’s turtlenecked mercy.

  “Ask for my job back.”

  “You got fired?” Becky asked, her voice scandalized. He glanced down and realized she wasn’t scandalized, she was worried. Scared, even.

  “Sort of,” he muttered and looked back up at the numbers.

  “I thought you were just in trouble.”

  “It’s a little worse than that.”

  “Because of us?” she asked. “Because of what I said on the show?”

  “No.” He waved her off. The numbers stopped and the doors opened with a bing and he took a step out. But Becky didn’t follow, and when he glanced back at her, she looked stricken. White. Her eyes round.

  Oh.

  “Becky, I’m in trouble because I’m kind of a jerk. It doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

  “You sure?” she whispered.

  “That I’m a jerk? Yes.” She didn’t even break a smile. “It has nothing to do with you,” he said. “I swear.”

  She tucked all that anxiety away, her face closed off again, and she took Charlie by the hand and led him out of the elevator. If Billy had more room in his body, he might try hard to assuage whatever guilt she felt, but he was besieged by his own demons at the moment.

  “Wow!” Charlie cried as they turned the corner into the reception area of the Mavericks’ front office. �
��Fish!” He ran toward the giant fish tank built into the wall, smacking his hands and pressing his face against the glass.

  “Excuse me—” Heather, the receptionist, stood up behind her desk, sending out all kinds of disapproving vibes, which only got worse when she saw Billy. “You’re nearly fifteen minutes late, Billy.”

  “I am?” he said, while Becky tried to pull Charlie away from the glass. “I’m sorry, it’s surprisingly difficult to get a three-year-old out the door.”

  “Well, Coach Hornsby is very busy today.” Heather raised a skeptical eyebrow. Despite her young age she was ironclad. Nothing happened on Heather’s watch that she didn’t expressly okay.

  He thought of Charlie’s gas and smiled. “I understand, if you could just let him know that I’m here?”

  “What …” She glanced over his shoulder. “What are you going to do with them?”

  “You can’t watch them?”

  She literally gasped in horror.

  “I’m kidding, Heather. They’ll be fine.”

  Just as the words left his mouth there was a wild ripping sound and a foul, foul odor filled the air.

  “Charlie!” Becky cried.

  “My tummy doesn’t hurt anymore.”

  “Did he just …” Heather’s lips didn’t move, her face was frozen.

  “Poop? In your office? I think so.”

  “Oh. My. God.” Heather’s lips still hadn’t moved.

  Hornsby’s door opened and the man himself stood there, backlit by the sunlight beaming in through the windows of his office. Like he was God come down to earth.

  “Billy?” he asked. “What’s going on? You’re late.”

  Charlie shrieked and Billy, his heart pounding in his chest, turned around, expecting fecal disaster, but it was only Becky trying to catch her brother, and Charlie running away.

  “Can you just give me a second?” Billy said, distracted by the kids. The smell. Heather’s panic. Hornsby’s judgment.

  Hornsby made an expansive, go-right-ahead gesture.

  Billy cornered the kids near the fish.

  “You need to go change his diaper.”

  “You think?” Becky whispered. “Tell him that.”

  “Charlie, let Becky change your diaper. Why the hell does he still wear those things anyway?”

  Becky turned wide eyes on him. Right. Not the best time to discuss toilet training. He crouched, getting eye to eye with Charlie, who stank more than rotting garbage.

  “Charlie, I will give you anything you want if you just let Becky change your diaper.”

  “Fish?” he asked, pointing at the aquarium.

  “Anything.”

  “Chuck E. Cheese?”

  “God, no.”

  “Billy?” Hornsby looked at his watch. “I have a schedule to keep.”

  Billy looked from Hornsby to Charlie. “Yes. Okay. Chuck E. Cheese.” He turned toward Becky. “I will pay you fifty dollars if you can get him to behave himself.”

  “On top of the hundred for not running away?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “And Chuck E. Cheese?”

  And here he’d foolishly thought that his life could not get any worse.

  “Yes.”

  “Deal.” Becky held out her hand and they shook on it.

  “Here.” He pulled out his phone and tapped the Angry Birds app on the screen. “This should keep him busy.”

  He passed Heather’s desk. “Coach Hornsby has an appointment in ten minutes,” she said pointedly.

  “I’ll only take twenty.”

  She scowled at him and he grinned.

  But the grin faded when he stepped into Hornsby’s office and his coach shut the door behind him. Suddenly all of his failures, large and small, filled the corners of the large office, each waiting for their due.

  He had no clue what to say, where to begin.

  “Those are the kids from the show,” Hornsby said, walking past Billy, toward his desk.

  “My niece and nephew.”

  “Not your children.”

  Billy swallowed the words that wanted to escape—the swearing, ranting protestation that came to his lips. “I don’t have any kids. Those women—”

  Hornsby waved his hand as he sat in his chair. “I know, Billy. It was a joke.”

  “Oh.” Billy managed a very strangled laugh. Hornsby was not funny. At all.

  Unable to sit, Billy stood behind one of the chairs, his hands braced against the back. Nervous, unsure of what to do with his sweaty, panicky body, he nearly tipped the whole thing over.

  “Sorry.”

  “I’d rather you sat in my furniture, instead of breaking it.”

  Now he had no choice but to sit down, and the second he did, he started bouncing his legs, his skin twitching. His mind racing, careening off the walls and windows. If they could just have this conversation on the ice, he might do okay. But sitting in an office, wearing a tie—he had no chance at winning.

  “How old are the kids?”

  “Three and thirteen.”

  “Thirteen is tough. My daughter got arrested for shoplifting around that age.”

  “Really?” Billy tried not to sound slightly delighted, but Christ, that was good news. Maybe Becky wasn’t such a nightmare after all.

  “She did it on a dare, but …” Hornsby trailed off.

  “Becky tried to hot-wire my car three nights ago.”

  “You’re joking.”

  “I wish. They spent the whole night trying to run away. They even jumped out a bedroom window at dawn. They probably would have gotten away if it hadn’t been for the news crews on my lawn.”

  “Ahh. Is that when you shoved the reporter?”

  “He was on my property. Scaring the kids. Am I the only one who thinks that kind of behavior deserves a shove?”

  “No, you’re not. It’s one of the few times I can say you were right to shove someone.”

  The guy was saying Billy was right, but his whole vibe was unforgiving.

  This was exactly like the night he and Maddy had gone to tell her parents they were getting married. He’d sat in that dining room, with the fancy centerpiece and all the china, and gotten bitch-slapped by their silent condemnation. They’d talked about hockey and Maddy going to college, but the only thing he’d heard, the only thing he’d felt, was you’re not good enough.

  “Why are you here, Billy? We can talk about parenting pre-teen girls all day long. But your career is in the shitter and I thought that’s why you called.”

  “It is.” Billy stood because he couldn’t rip out his heart and throw it on the desk while he was sitting. “I’m sorry I didn’t answer your calls and I’m sorry I’ve been such an asshole this year.” Billy laughed, watching the traffic outside the windows. “I mean, I’m always an asshole, but I really took it to new heights this year. And you’re right, I don’t want to go out this way. I’m better than this.”

  And he was. He knew that in his heart. Without Maddy having to tell him, he knew he was better than the way he’d been acting.

  Despite the flop sweat and the panic and the pride-swallowing, the thought made him smile. Gave him a small measure of peace.

  He exhaled, letting go of as much of his anxiety as he could.

  “I might be too late.” Billy turned to face Hornsby, who sat back in his chair as if he’d been blown there. “I fully appreciate that, Coach. You tried harder than just about anyone in my life and I’m sorry to have failed you.”

  “You didn’t just fail me.”

  “I know. Blake, the guys, I failed all of them. And maybe worse, I failed myself. I’ve gotten so good at that, I don’t even see it anymore. But I’d like the chance to be …” God, it sounded so stupid. “To be a better teammate and leader. I’d like to be the kind of player you need me to be.”

  Hornsby stared at him, the silence tense. “Wow,” he finally said.

  Billy laughed.

  “You been working on that awhile?”

 
“All night.” Billy smiled.

  “Christ, Billy, if you’d just called me back on Friday I’d have a fighting chance to change the GM’s mind, but you’ve tied my hands.”

  Billy blew out a long breath. That was the answer he’d been afraid of. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “Well … Nothing is guaranteed, you get that? Even if you do everything I tell you to do, you still might be sent down.”

  “I know.”

  “Okay, the first thing you need to do is go back on AM Dallas and tell your side of the story.”

  “Done.” It rubbed him raw to agree, but he would do anything.

  Hornsby blinked. “You’re going to need something national, too.”

  “I’ll call Dominick Murphy today. He’s been bugging me to do a story.”

  “Dom is an excellent choice.”

  “Is it enough?”

  “To salvage your career?”

  “To … to go out the way I should.”

  Hornsby stared at him for so long, Billy started to feel like a bug under glass.

  “What makes you happy, Billy?”

  Oh Jesus, just when he thought they were making progress, Coach was bringing out the Oprah shit again. But instead of storming out of the office, he decided to answer.

  “Hockey.”

  Coach nodded. “Anything else?”

  Maddy, he thought, but didn’t say. Coach hummed in his throat like he knew it anyway. “This sport gives a lot to its players. But there are some guys it only takes away from.”

  Billy couldn’t blame hockey for his lack of a family. For Maddy. It wasn’t hockey that had ruined their marriage, or even him, it was them. Their youth. Their inexperience.

  He didn’t see all that Maddy had been giving him, had no way of knowing how she’d been eroding away. Even at this moment, years later, he wasn’t sure how he could have stopped that.

  “My mistakes have been my own,” he said.

  A buzz, then Heather’s voice over the intercom. “Your nine-thirty is here,” she said.

  Hornsby pushed a button on his phone as he stood. “Thanks, Heather.”

  Hornsby walked Billy to the door.

  “I’m glad you came in today,” Hornsby said.

  “Me too,” Billy said. “If nothing else, I’m glad I got to apologize. You didn’t deserve the way I treated you.”