by Kyell Gold
He stares out the windshield. “The one thing she told me about Fisher was that the doctor’s report said there were burns around the lips and gunpowder residue on the teeth.”
“Burns? Like from…”
“From the mouth of the gun.”
The words come out clinically, almost emotionless, and the only indication of how much they affect him is how tightly his paws are twined together.
So Fisher had the gun in his mouth when he fired it. “He’s a lousy shot,” I say roughly.
Now Lee does turn my way. “I think that probably he just wanted to see what it would feel like, or maybe he was going to shoot himself and then stopped. If he only caught his jaw, then maybe he was taking the gun out of his mouth. Maybe he’d reconsidered and it really was an accident.”
“Maybe he fired too early as he was putting it in,” I snap back, paws tight on the steering wheel. I’m angry at Fisher again, at my friend, for turning his back on me and his family, for being so blind to life outside football that he’d rather die.
“We’ll probably never know.” Lee reaches over to hold my paw. “But wouldn’t you rather assume the best? Assume he changed his mind?”
“What if he tries again?”
“He’ll be watched pretty closely. I think once he gets over the retirement and realizes that he still has a lot of life left, he won’t want to do that again.”
“But you don’t know that.”
“No.” He rubs his fingers through the fur on the back of my paw. “But we have to hope for the best, right?”
“I guess so.” I understand what he’s saying, but it’s hard for me to do it. I keep seeing Fisher’s muzzle covered in blood, picturing him putting the gun to his mouth. I keep thinking, this is what he wanted. I can’t wrap my head around that. Was it so grim, the life without football? I’m looking forward to the off-season, for time away from the relentless practices and feeling sore and beaten up, for time to spend with Lee and time to play video games and watch movies. Maybe I don’t want that to be my whole life yet, but I can’t fathom the feeling that there’s nothing left. Especially when he has a family.
Hope for the best.
Stopped at a light, I turn to Lee, who’s quiet and thinking again. “We have to worry about the things we can change, right?”
“Ideally. But we can’t always control what we worry about.”
“I hope he’s okay,” I say. “But I don’t know what I’ll say to him next time I see him.”
“Let’s worry about that when it happens. For right now I think I want to go home and just hold you, if that’s okay.”
“That’s just fine,” I say, and I speed through the light to get to that moment as fast as possible.
Wednesday morning, my phone buzzes, startling me awake. I lunge for it and fumble until I can read the message, thinking it’s something about Fisher.
Ty: Tell Lee he can tell you. Went okay, not great.
Lee lifts his head from the pillow and looks in my direction. “Fisher?” he asks quietly.
I shake my head and show him the message. He stares and then laughs softly, rolling onto his back and snuggling against me, loose and relaxed. “Ha. Okay, I’m glad.”
“What?” I put the phone back on the nightstand and rest a paw on his stomach.
He grins widely and rests his muzzle against my collarbone. “Ty was going to bottom for the first time. That’s about what I’d expected him to say.”
It takes me a moment to process the words. “Wait, what? The guy who was all worried about who was on top? He was going to let that wolf—wow, he went from zero to gay in like a month.”
He flicks his tail under the covers. “It’s often the guys who are all obsessed about it who want to try it, right?”
“If you say so.” I squint down at him. He doesn’t seem particularly concerned one way or another about it, but he’s also good at hiding things.
“I’m glad it went okay, though. A lot of guys might freak out about it. Hope he stays in touch with Arch.”
“Yeah,” I say, still thinking about stuff. “I don’t think he wants a long-term thing. He’s just messing around.”
“That’s what he told me. Arch doesn’t really want that either,” Lee says, resting a paw on my arm, which reminds me that my paw’s on his stomach, and I move my fingers around, pressing in on his fur and skin. “Anyway, I think Ty’s bi, not gay.”
“I’ve never actually met a bi guy,” I say. “Hey, if he’s bi, that means there are fewer bi guys in the league than gay guys.”
“Yeah?”
“So I’m not the smallest minority.” I grin.
“Ty’s not out, so you still are.” He looks up, sees my whiskers droop, and cranes his head up to kiss me. “Aw, that just means you’re special.”
“Yeah, yeah.” I kiss him back, grumbling.
He runs his claws up and down my arm, but it’s casual, comforting. My fingers move down near his sheath, but he’s not aroused and neither am I. “Anyway,” Lee says, “at least someone’s having a good day.”
“I’m not sure Ty is. I think he’s back home now interviewing wives again.” I reach for my phone and send him a quick text, Glad to hear it. I pause, wondering whether to send a wink or not, and decide on a joke. Would you say that visit was hard to top?
Lee rolls away from me and grabs for his phone as well. “Nothing from Gena,” he says. “We’re supposed to meet Hal and Pol for dinner today, but…”
I send the message to Ty and meet Lee’s eyes over our phones. “As long as we don’t say anything about Fisher.”
“Okay.” He checks his e-mails. “And Father’s in town, wanted to know if dinner’s still on today. I’ll see if we can do lunch, or drinks after.”
My phone buzzes. Ty: Har har. Actually that was the easy part. ;) Like they told us in rookie camp, it’s easier to be on top.
“No word from Gena yet?”
“No.”
I hold my phone and lean back. “Let’s put off the flight to Hilltown for a couple days. I’ll see if there’s anything we can do for Fisher. And I can see Gerrard, too.”
He nods. “I’ll see when Father’s going back. If he’s here through Friday, maybe we can see him tomorrow.”
We lie next to each other working out our schedules with our phones and then get up to shower, because neither of us is quite in the mood for sex. That doesn’t mean we can’t shower together, and I still enjoy rubbing my paws along his body and through his fur, and it’s an interesting, intimate sensation washing each other without either the afterglow of sex or the exciting anticipation of it.
Of course, what’s foremost on our minds is how Fisher is doing. We wait for the call from Gena all morning, but the only call is from Gerrard, calling to tell me that we can work out on Friday (the 13th, he notes without further remark) as Carson should be back then. I ask how his home situation is and he cuts me off with a comment to bring Zillo “if he wants to come.”
Lee’s father replies that dinner Thursday would be fine, and that he’s flying back to Hilltown Saturday morning, so I check to see if we can change our tickets to get on his flight. “This off-season is harder to manage than the season is,” I grumble, booking two first-class seats on his laptop as we sit on the couch watching sports news.
My fox leans against me and grins, his tail curling along the couch. “You’ve got all these relationships to manage now. Not like in Hilltown when basically you knew a few guys from the team and you’d go get drunk with them, or come visit me.”
“This is only a few guys from the team,” I point out. “Just their lives are a million times more complicated.”
“Willie and Shaz were what, nineteen? No families—no wives and kids, anyway—and nothing to do but spend the hundreds of thousands they got their rookie years on booze and video games and strip clubs.”
“And I spent a lot of time at home, too.” While Gregory was starting his successful career, buying his new house, showing off h
is pregnant wife. “That felt like summer vacation, only in spring.”
“Counting the week in San Rojo.”
“Mmm.” I lean over and nip at the tip of his ear, which is just within reach.
He grins and squirms, and then his phone rings and he takes the call. “Oh, hi, Gena,” he says, and both of us sit up straight. He makes a couple of acknowledging noises and then, “I’m glad to hear it. Will he be in shape for visitors?” He meets my eye and nods in response to Gena. “Okay. Keep us informed.”
When he hangs up, he puts the phone away and says, “They’re bringing Fisher home this afternoon. It sounds like Gena’s got a nurse lined up, and we’ll be able to go over there tomorrow.”
I do want to talk to Fisher, to tell him that if he felt like killing himself, he should have talked to me or Gena or someone, anyone. I have no idea how to have that conversation, but I’m worried that if I don’t have it, I’ll feel guilty if he decides to try again. And if I’ve learned anything from three years with Lee, it’s to forge ahead if you know something is right but aren’t sure you’ll have the strength to do it.
We both ask in a half-hearted way if the other wants to go out, and end up sitting at home and watching sports news on TV. It’s a slow month; college basketball is heating up, but neither of us really cares about that. Still, we watch, because every so often they talk about the college football draft, and I like to think about who might be new teammates of mine next year.
Lee is already worrying about his job with the Whalers; I can see that when the TV turns to a feature on one of the quarterbacks who’s declared for the draft and his ears flick in that direction. He unmutes the TV to listen to the feature, even though he’s still looking down at his phone.
I ask what he thinks of that guy, and he looks up at me, ears still swiveled to the TV. “You mean the quarterback or the guy evaluating him?”
“Either.”
“Don’t know much about the QB. The guy doing the feature is pretty good. We always trusted his judgment.” He grins at me and his tail rustles against my back. “You know you’re going to sign an agreement that you can’t talk about anything I tell you like this with your teammates or anything.”
“Yeah,” I say, though I hadn’t thought we were doing anything but having an innocent conversation. I guess if he said the Whalers like that quarterback and I happen to mention it around the locker room, it could get out and make trouble. So I watch the feature and keep quiet. It’s nice to have football be the distraction, for once.
When the sports news cycles around again, we clean up the apartment. Lee’s not shedding as much now but there’s still fox fur in the corners and floating around, so he vacuums and I do some laundry. Gena calls to let us know Fisher got home okay and is sleeping, and the rest of the day goes by peacefully until we have to leave for dinner.
18
Conflicting Reports (Lee)
Hal says Pol wants to go to a museum exhibit and asks if we’d like to meet them there or do dinner later. The exhibit is art by immigrant teens, and Dev’s initial reaction is lukewarm, but then we both decide we could use some culture and so we dress up and meet the swift fox at the entrance to the Chevali Museum for Community Art.
He’s standing against a dingy plaster wall along with a short, pretty coyote. She comes up to just below my eye level, a nice change from hanging out with the six-foot-plus Dev and Ty, Peter and Jocko, Aran and Jay, even Arch and Jocko’s sister-in-law. “Wiley,” I say as she takes my paw with a firm grip, “but you can call me Lee. Everyone does.”
“Polly,” she replies, “but call me Pol.”
Dev shakes her paw. “So what’s so interesting about this exhibit?” he asks.
She doesn’t seem intimidated by his size or grip. “I’m a parole officer for juveniles, and one of my charges has some art in it.”
“A parole officer? Hal didn’t tell us.” I look past the entrance to the first piece of art I can see, a painting in shades of grey of what looks like a post-apocalyptic landscape. “All right, I’m sold.”
We go first to Pol’s cub, and there’s a photo of him beside his three pieces. He’s a jackrabbit with a brand of some sort on his shoulder. “He’s doing really well,” she says. “Been out for a year, he’s working at a grocery store, and he got his focus back on his art. It’s so easy to get distracted from what’s important when life gets in the way, you know?”
I feel the weight of Dev beside me. “Oh, we know,” I say, and turn my attention to the lovely charcoal sketches. “Are any of these of you?” There’s one canid lady, but the detail is so light that I can’t tell whether it’s Pol.
“No. His mom is a coyote. It’s probably her.” Neither Dev nor I says anything, but Pol goes on. “And before you ask, no, not all my charges are adopted. The proportion of adopted cubs who get in trouble with the law is about the same as the proportion in the overall population.”
“I had adopted friends in high school,” I say, and Dev nods agreement. “And one adopted boyfriend in college.”
Pol relaxes, her tail losing the tension in its curl. “Good.”
“I guess you get a lot of that stereotype?” I ask.
“Only from the people in state and local government who fund my agency.” She shakes her head. “Let’s not talk about it.”
As we move on, Hal asks about the trip to Yerba, and I talk about the apartments and then about Jocko and his sister-in-law showing us houses. “And,” I say, and then stop myself. “Well, there were a couple surprises I can’t talk about.”
Hal glares. “Then why’d you bring them up?”
I study a textured piece made of burlap bags and pretend not to be very smug about having secrets. “Because the rest of the trip sounds boring.”
“I don’t think looking at houses is boring,” Pol says. “So are you married, or…?”
“Hah,” Dev says. I give him a raised eyebrow, and he composes his features into a smile. “I mean, not yet. We’re both waiting to settle our careers.”
“I told her you’re not married,” Hal says.
“I wanted to see what they’d say when I asked,” Pol says sweetly.
Ah, coyotes. I smile. “I approve of her, Hal.”
“You would.”
“I don’t understand this one,” Dev says. “Is it just a bunch of bags stapled to the wall?”
We read the small plaque, which doesn’t help much (“Antonio Villareal uses the medium of the bags of coffee from his native country to illustrate the loneliness of coming to the States on his own, along with his gratitude to his parents for sending him.”) and Pol points out that Villareal is a zorro, and when you smell the bags, you get coffee, dirt, and some asphalt odor. “The dirt and asphalt maybe contrast his old home and new home.”
“The smells are intentional?”
“Oh yes, they have to be.” She leans in and smells again. “I get the scent of some kind of fox, too. Probably him.”
“Don’t see the point of it if not everyone can get it,” Dev grumbles.
Farther along, there are more paintings, a couple embracing goats and a desert scene with cacti. Not too complicated. Dev and Pol examine them more closely as Hal and I stand back, and the swift fox lowers his voice. “If you can’t answer this, I understand, but…couldn’t help but notice that Kingston wasn’t at his own retirement speech.”
Dev hears, though, and turns around. We’d managed to push the hospital out of our minds for a short time, but I see it come back in his eyes when we look at each other, and if Dev isn’t any good at hiding his feelings, I’m not much better in this case. I bring my ears up and wait to see if Dev says something.
He does, though I can see the struggle he has; his ears stay down and he doesn’t look Hal in the eye. “Yeah,” he says, “he didn’t take the retirement well.”
The swift fox clears his throat. “Not well like locking himself in his house and refusing to come out?”
“Uh.” Dev still doesn’t look up,
but he does turn his head toward me.
“He thinks he can play another season,” I say, desperate to think of something. “The retirement is being driven by, uh, his agent and…”
“Wow,” Hal says. “Would’ve thought his agent would want him to keep playing.”
“Well, more the team.” Dev clears his throat.
Hal looks between us. “Something else is going on.”
“We don't really need to know the details,” Pol says.
We all turn to look at the coyote. She’s got her gaze fixed on Hal, and he flicks his ears back and says, “Sure, okay.”
She turns to me and Dev with a definite “I’m changing the subject” air. “I know a little of your story from him,” she gestures to Hal, “but how did you meet?”
I let Dev tell the polite-company sanitized version of that story. “And how about you two?” he asks.
I know they met on a dating site, but I’m interested to hear what they’ll say, so I perk my ears and keep quiet. “It’s hard to meet people in my line of work,” Pol says. “I try to avoid reporters, in general.”
“Computer dating,” Hal says, shortly.
“You didn’t tell me what Pol did, though.” I nudge him. “Worried I’d tease you about dating a cop?”
“You had enough trouble with the law,” he says smoothly.
Pol raises an eyebrow. “I’m not technically on the police force. I’m a parole officer. I work with the police.”
Dev leans forward. “You ever work with, like, gay cubs?”
I perk up my ears, surprised. Hal and I glance at each other and I give him a look that I hope conveys, Hey, I’m rubbing off on him.
“Sometimes.” Pol taps the side of her muzzle. “This one jackrabbit is. He told me. And there’s a wolf, I think she might be from the way she looks at me.”
“They live at home?”
“She does. He was on the street but is in an apartment now with a couple other guys.” She raises a paw. “I don’t ask, and he doesn’t tell.” Her expression changes as she looks our way. “Um. Sorry if that’s offensive.”