Over Time

by Kyell Gold

  It’s the first time I can remember someone beating Lee to the gay rights punch, and one of the few times I’ve seen my fox speechless. “Uh, yeah,” he says.

  “But anyway.” Damian turns back to me and lifts his ears and whiskers with a warm smile. “Business can wait until after lunch. Is that Uncle Bob’s I smell?”

  His nostrils flare, and Gena beams. “I wouldn’t get anything else for your visit.”

  “Delicious. Have you had it before?”

  He’s addressing me, and I shake my head. He claps me on the shoulder. “Best barbecue in Chevali. You’ll see.”

  I haven’t had a whole lot of barbecue in Chevali, but the ribs Gena serves us are pretty amazing. The meat is smoked and tender and the sauce spicy-sweet. Lee grabs one of the chicken pieces, which is so juicy it stains the white fur under his muzzle. We’re all licking our fingers and reaching for more, and there’s not much conversation other than praising the barbecue. The side dishes go neglected until the meat is gone, and then we start, slowly, on the black-eyed peas and the potato salad, and by the time the carryout boxes have been reduced to a pile of glistening brown-stained cardboard, I’m stuffed. I lean back in my chair and watch everyone else do the same. Even Gena is slow to start cleaning up.

  Lee helps immediately, springing up with energy that makes me feel queasy. He and Gena clear the table as Damian, Fisher, and I talk about other restaurants in Chevali—rather, they talk and I take mental notes. And then Damian says to Fisher, “You ready to talk?”

  “No.” Fisher hunches in and stares down at his paws. “But I’m running out of time, right?” Damian nods. “Fine, then.”

  He shoves his chair back hard and then gets up and stomps toward the den. Damian rises more gracefully and nods to me. “Sorry. This shouldn’t take more than half an hour or so.”

  I sit at the table, wondering what I’m going to do for half an hour, and then Gena comes out of the kitchen wiping her paws and sits down next to me. She looks toward the den. “Would you retire?” she asks softly.

  In Fisher’s situation, she means, and I’ve been thinking about just that so I have an answer ready. “I think so. I mean…” I rub my fingers over her yellow-checked tablecloth. “I don’t know if I would have made a lot of the choices he has, so maybe I’m not the best one to ask about it. But I think I’d retire. If I had two rings and this family…or even my family.”

  “‘Even’?” Lee smiles from the kitchen doorway.

  “You know what I mean.” I lift my paws and notice brown smears on the tablecloth. “Oh…” I rub at them. “Sorry.”

  Gena frowns and then sees what I’m rubbing at and laughs, a little shakily. “That’s what the tablecloth is for. Don’t worry about it. Look.” Even hers and Lee’s, the cleanest spots, have some sauce spilled around them. “I’ll throw it in the wash later.”

  Lee sits down with us. “Life after football is hard.”

  Gena’s quiet for a moment and then says, “I worry about Junior.”

  Neither Lee nor I is expecting that. Lee leans forward. “Because of how he views his father?”

  She shakes her head. “You’ve only seen him the past couple days. Usually when Fisher’s around, he spends time with the boys. He’s coached Junior with his football, he’s talked about the things he does with the team. But now…”

  “Well,” I say, “he has a lot on his mind. It’s only been a couple days.” Lee nods in agreement.

  “It’s not just the last few days.” She rests her paws on the table. “It’s been ever since the injury. He’s been brusquer. He spends more time just sitting in the den. Bradley’s off to college in September; he can’t wait to be gone anyway.” Her voice gets wistful at that. “But Junior has two more years at home, and if his father is distant…”

  “He’ll snap out of it.” Lee’s voice has more confidence than I—and, I think, he himself—feel.

  In the lull of conversation, which isn’t exactly racing along anyway, we all hear raised voices from the den. Lee’s ears go up, and Gena and I both look toward the living room and the hallway beyond. All the doors are open, and the sound carries.

  Lee folds his ears down with a guilty expression. “If you don’t mind,” he says gently to Gena, “I never asked you, but do you have any idea where Fisher would have gotten the somatotropin? It’s not exactly something you can walk over to the drugstore and pick up.”

  Gena shakes her head. “I thought about that, but I never heard anyone else mention it. There was one player, on the Rocs, an older one who used it, we think. There were reports later…Fisher might have called him. He’s retired now.”

  “That was before…” Lee stops. “Well, it’s a possibility. There could also have been players on the Manticores. Or on the Firebirds, for that matter. Just because they haven’t been caught yet doesn’t mean they’re not using.”

  I think about Gerrard and his passion for the game. But he’s a few years younger than Fisher, and he’s still in excellent shape. He probably hasn’t had to face those decisions yet.

  “Why does it matter?” Gena asks. “Is someone else going to get in trouble?”

  Lee shakes his head, and I notice he still has a spot of sauce on the white fur of his chin. “I don’t know if anyone’s going to get in trouble,” he says. “I was just wondering.”

  I reach over and clean up his chin, and he smiles at me. I think again about poor Fisher, and then about Hal’s article. “Gena, do you think it would help Fisher to talk to someone? About life after football?”

  “You mean like a counselor? I don’t think so. He’s enjoyed talking to you, but I don’t think he’d talk to anyone official.”

  Lee meets my eyes and his eyebrows rise as I go on. “Lee’s friend Hal—our friend—is writing an article about players living after football.” I take a breath. “He’s kind of focusing on the damage done by the game. If Fisher would talk to him, maybe he could tell Fisher how some of these other guys deal with it. Maybe put him in touch with them.”

  Gena’s ears go back when I mention writing an article. “He has friends who have retired. I don’t think he would want to talk to the press.”

  “Sure,” Lee jumps in, “and Hal doesn’t want to pressure him. But the reason he’s writing this article is not to tear down the league, but to make the game safer for the people playing it now.”

  Her eyes widen, but she shakes her head again. “I don’t think…I mean, I would love for him to have someone to talk to, but…”

  “It’d be his decision, of course. We’re just trying to figure out how to approach him so he doesn’t immediately shut it down.” Lee talks carefully, earnestly. “And if you think we shouldn’t approach him at all, then we won’t.”

  “For sure not when he’s upset,” I say.

  She holds up her paws. “Okay, all right. I think it’s a good thing, but…I don’t know how he’ll react. I really don’t.”

  “For what it’s worth,” Lee says, “I think the article is going to do a lot of good. It’d be important to have someone as recently active as Fisher contribute, especially if he retires. Maybe next week, once the emotions have cooled down.”

  “And we don’t have to talk about it again until then.” I feel bad for bringing it up already, and not only because I’m back to wondering if Fisher is my future. When I’m on the threshold of losing football, will I grow sullen and withdrawn? And then I think about something else: what if Lee’s stress and anger and all the things that made the last few months difficult stemmed from losing his job and his parents, losing his direction in life, and I reacted like he was specifically trying to inconvenience me?

  I’m glad to change the subject to Bradley’s college; he’s going to Fort Green about an hour north of Highbourne with a lot of his friends from ten years ago. They got back in touch on ScentBook and visited the college together. He’s not going to play football and he might not even play basketball. “He wants to be a doctor,” Gena says with fondness, “Specializin
g in orthopedic surgery. He wants to fix up football players.”

  “That’s great.” Lee starts to add more, but then the den door is yanked open and slammed shut.

  We all turn to look. Fisher stomps through the living room, stops just long enough to call to Gena, “I’m going for a walk,” and then another door slides open and shut.

  A moment later, the den door opens again. Damian walks into the living room on soft pads. He stops and nods to all of us, letting the silence linger for a moment before he breaks it. “He’s going to retire. We were just working up the official statement. I’ll call the Firebirds with it, and then Dev, I’ll sit down with you.”

  He disappears into another room. We stay silent, and even my tiger ears hear Damian on the phone. “I’m calling on behalf of Fisher Kingston. I’m faxing over a statement now. Can you confirm that you’re receiving it? Yes, he’s announcing his retirement. He wants to thank the Firebirds organization for providing him with three years of unparalleled experiences and one more taste of the championship game, but with his sons growing up, he wants to spend time with them during their last high school years and their college experiences. He will always treasure the friendships and memories from his time in Chevali, and most of all the passion of the fans here. Yep. Uh-huh. Sure. Well, do you want to highlight it or bury it? Or don’t care? Okay, then let’s say Monday at nine a.m. We can do it at the Firebirds offices, right? Great, thanks.”

  Gena and Lee and I all stay quiet around the table. “I found a couple good services that provide live-in help,” Lee says when Damian finishes talking and still hasn’t come out. “I’ll send the links along.”

  “Thanks.” Gena’s eyes slide toward the door where Fisher left. “Felice said she’s got a couple friends who have needed help, and she’s bringing some phone numbers.”

  “He’ll be over the concussion in a few weeks.” I don’t know if I believe it, but I want to make her feel better.

  The sentiment lands awkwardly, because neither Lee nor Gena really believes it. I can see it in the splayed ears, the eyes that won’t meet mine. “I hope so,” Gena says finally.

  “This week’ll be hard.” Lee reaches out a paw to her.

  “Oh, God, yes.” Gena exhales and looks between us. “You know, I met some other players who looked forward to retirement. The constant pounding of the season got to them. Maria Johnson in Highbourne said her husband promised her they’d travel when they retired. I got an e-mail from her last month from Firenza. Ally Porter and her husband talk about their cubs on Scentbook all the time. He doesn’t talk about missing football. But Fisher…Fisher only ever talked about it as ‘the day they make me quit.’ He never wanted to.”

  I try not to plunge back into that morass in my own thoughts, even though Lee’s looking at me and probably wondering what those thoughts are. “It had to happen sometime. He’ll get used to it.”

  It sounds lame, so I’m glad when Damian comes out to talk to me. Lee flashes me a smile as I get up and follow the short tiger into the den.

  He sits on Fisher’s desk, which is a little weird, but I guess there aren’t many places to sit, and it lets him be at about my height. I glance around the room; my eyes skip over the trains and settle on the championship display case.

  Damian starts out with a “nice to meet you” and regrets that it’s under these circumstances, and then he turns his head and follows my gaze to the rings. “Is that what you want?”

  “Well, uh. Yeah. Who wouldn’t?” I grin.

  He stays serious. “I mean, what drives you? Some guys want the rings. Some guys just want all the money they can get. Some guys want fame. Some guys want girls.”

  I raise an eyebrow. “You get girls for guys?”

  “No. But I can get them money and teach them how to use it effectively.”

  “Wow, agent and matchmaker.” I flatten my ears. “Sorry, that came out wrong. I just mean…”

  “It’s okay.” He smiles briefly, then returns to being all business. “A sense of humor is a good thing. It’ll keep you sane. Football’s a tough sport. That’s why I encourage my clients to focus on their goals.”

  “Wouldn’t you prefer I get the most money?” This is such a different philosophy from Ogleby, who never even discussed any goals other than “make all the money you can,” that I’m having difficulty processing it. Like if my English teacher had shown up one day in high school and told us we were only going to read sports magazines for the rest of school.

  Damian nods. “Of course. That’s my job and it’s how I get paid. But I’ll be honest with you: even if money isn’t your primary goal, you’re still going to make a lot of it. And so will I. We’re talking maybe a difference of ten million over a career where you’ll make sixty.”

  I gape at him. “Sixty million dollars?”

  “Quick math.” He holds up three fingers. “This is the number of years an average UFL player plays. It’s also the length of your rookie deal. A little over a million total from the team over three years, I’m guessing. I don’t have the file from them yet.”

  “Right,” I say.

  “How much was the Strongwell commercial?”

  “A million.”

  “Okay.” He holds up all ten fingers on both paws. “This is the average length of a career of a player who’s made the starting lineup in his second year. So we’ve got seven more years to work with. Marvell’s making about twelve million this year; Omba’s making three and a half. Let’s say we can get you four in your fourth year and it never goes up beyond that. It will, but just as a minimum. That’s 28 million over the rest of your career, thirty total. Now salaries go up by a little each year. I’m not saying you’ll be getting Marvell’s salary by the end of your career, but if you just play the kind of football you’ve been playing and you stick with teams and so on, probably that number goes up to…” He waggles his paws. “Forty-five, let’s say. There’s a renegotiation of the agreement between the players and owners coming up in four years that might bump that number up or down slightly, but I’m pretty confident that if you play ten years, you’ll have pulled in forty-five million in team salaries, and that’s not including playoff bonuses. You know those go up when you have more experience, right?”

  “Uh…I didn’t. I thought everyone got the same.”

  The fur around his eyes wrinkles when he smiles. “Marvell got more than a forty-thousand dollar check for making the playoffs.”

  “But…everyone got the same check. At the banquet, I mean.” And mine is still at home somewhere.

  “Sure.” He flicks his tail against the desk. “Owners do that to make everyone feel the same. The other checks get sent out privately. Anyway. Not important. The point is, forty-five. And with your recent championship run, you can get at least ten million in endorsements even if you don’t stay in Chevali. If you stay, hometown hero. If you leave, you’ll be the guy bringing the championship experience to a new town. And as the first gay player out, you can probably get at least another five, and that’s a conservative estimate because it’s never been done and I have no idea what the market is like for it.”

  “Wow.” I’m as impressed by his breakdown of the numbers as I am by the numbers themselves.

  “Which reminds me, I meant to add one more potential goal: do you want to be an ambassador? I can set up speaking engagements—paid ones—and I’m sure there are other opportunities if I look around.”

  He has his paws clasped in his lap, and my first thought is, Dammit, Lee got to him already. But I feel bad thinking that and dismiss it. Damian’s very businesslike and clearly is just running through my options. “Lee’s the ambassador,” I say. “I know he’s just starting a new job, but he’s the one who’s all passionate about gay rights and stuff. And he’s way better at speaking than I am. He was an English major.”

  “Okay. Look, we can do all of this stuff. Focusing on winning a championship doesn’t mean you won’t make money. Aiming for the big payday doesn’t mean you can’
t do some outreach stuff on the side. At least you and Polecki can talk to some owners about how to make their teams more accommodating to gay players.”

  I tilt my head. “People want that?”

  “Some owners do. Or at least, they say they do. I’m new to this. But you can do stuff within the league too, and you probably should. It’d be good for your image behind the scenes, which counts for more than you know.” He grins at me. “And it’s a good thing to do.”

  “I got enough of the image talk with Lightning Strike,” I say. “But yeah, I get it.”

  “So? What do you think your top goal is? Off the top of your head. Don’t think too much.”

  “Championship,” I say. “But not to the exclusion of everything else. I do want to do some ambassador stuff, and I want to earn my pay.”

  “Sure, sure.” He smiles and turns his head to look at Fisher’s memorabilia.

  I look, too. “You can’t guarantee a championship, though.”

  “Dev,” he says, turning back to me, “if I could, you’d have one. No, I know you weren’t my client this year, but Fisher was. Couple other Firebirds too, but Fisher was the one I wanted to take care of.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “You got Fisher to go to the Firebirds when they were terrible because you thought they could win a championship?”

  He ticks off points on his fingers. “Most of the pieces of a good defense, but a need for a defensive end. Competent quarterback, borderline star running back. Good wideouts. Most importantly, a GM in his third year who’d been successful elsewhere and had been building the team according to a philosophy I believe in. And it helped that New Kestle and Kerina were going to be terrible, and Hellentown was taking a step back. Well, two out of three, anyway. I thought there was an opportunity last year, but it turns out Coach Samuelson, and maybe you, were the missing pieces.”

  “So would you recommend I stay in Chevali?”

  He considers the question. “Let me see what else is out there. There are a half dozen teams with strong management in place where I could see you contributing to a championship. It depends on which of them need a linebacker. If you’re more focused on a championship than fame or money, you could potentially land as a strong backup to an established squad.”