War of the Roses: Redux Edition
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Captain Canada
- Posts: 2183
- Joined: 01 Dec 2018, 00:15
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
And so it begins.
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
Shine’s Gone
"This is the one thing that I still haven’t be able to get used to out here,” Hayden said as he leaned forward to wipe the condensation of the inside of his car’s windshield. The constant tug of war of trying to keep the inside of the car comfortable while fighting the humidity from the previous night’s storm that hung heavy in the air.
Devin nodded as he leaned back in the passenger seat to avoid the blast of heat bouncing off the windshield. The junior safety was from Pittsburgh and while Devin didn’t know a lot about the weather up in that part of the country, he was sure that it was nothing like what the Crescent City managed to throw at its residents.
He pulled his phone out of his pocket and powered it back on. In the wee hours of the morning, sleeping in a recliner in Hayden and Christian’s apartment with a dozen other guys because they lived closer to the stadium than anyone else, Devin experienced a part of being a known entity in the college football world that he wasn’t prepared for.
He’d gotten so many notifications that his phone died – three times.
He responded to the first few dozen before it became overwhelming and by then it seemed like not even airplane mode would stop the phone from calling it quits.
As the screen came back to life, the deluge resumed almost instantly. It made Devin uncomfortable to say the least. He’d never liked being in the spotlight and it seemed like he’d become the main attraction overnight.
Silencing the notifications, he put the phone back in his pocket figuring the bulk of the attention would’ve died down by then.
“That’s how y’all get down on the real bayous, huh?” Hayden asked, breaking the silence. He pointed in the direction of two college-aged guys manning a pirogue to paddle through the remnants of the flood waters that hadn’t quite been pumped over the levees and into the Mississippi.
Devin shook his head. “They would’ve been outside last night trying to catch fish and frogs if they were down one of Terrebonne’s bayous.”
“You say that like there wasn’t anyone doing that here, bruh.”
“Fair enough.”
Hayden swung into a parking space outside the residence hall and put the car in park. He held out his hand to dap Devin up, which Devin returned.
“We’re probably going to be trying to find somewhere to eat later so hit us up if you ain’t with your girl or something,” he said. “Judging by this weather though, it’s probably just going to be a run to the store and something at someone’s spot.”
“Will do, but I gotta get some sleep first. That Rent-A-Center recliner you and Christian have in there must have been used at Angola for the death row inmates because that shit is uncomfortable,” Devin said as he grabbed his duffel bag from the backseat and got out of the car.
“You would’ve been on the floor if it wasn’t for those picks, freshman!” Hayden shouted, laughing, just before Devin closed the door.
Fishing his keys out of his pocket, Devin walked over to his own car and opened the door. He let out a sigh of relief as no water came rushing out of it being that the parking lot outside of his dorm was known for flooding from even the smallest rains. He grabbed a couple old fast food bags off the floor to toss in a nearby garbage can and shut the door.
The campus was unusually quiet for the day after a big win, but the weather probably dampened a lot of people’s moods. And, it likely didn’t help that there was more rain in the forecast for that day and the next few.
For his part, he was already dreading the next week.
Vanderbilt was being billed as a tune-up game for the Green Wave ahead of their credential-proving game against Alabama, but Devin had already watched their game against LSU back a few times and he couldn’t see where they were supposed to be so bad.
He knew his mind would be elsewhere, though. A good game like he had meant more publicity, and more publicity meant more attempts by his grandfather to rope him into some shady get rich quick scheme that he would have to spend a few days fighting off.
As he got onto the elevator, though, he just wanted to get a few hours of good sleep before seeing what the day would bring. Navigating the five days between then and the next Saturday would be there when he woke up.
Unlocking the door, Devin stepped into his room and initially recoiled when he noticed the pair of bodies in Caesar’s bed amid the likely flood of nagging that he’d have to endure from Carla if he saw her cousin naked.
But he’d seen enough of the Parfait women to know that their hair didn’t come in the shade covering the face of the girl with her arms haphazardly thrown across Caesar.
Shaking his head, Devin walked into the room and quickly grabbed a few things from his closet before tossing his duffel bag on the bed. He figured that there would come a time that he’d walk in on such a situation given Caesar’s habits, but he was still a bit surprised all the same.
He shot a text to Carla to ask if she was awake before leaving the room, slamming the door behind him.
Gia sat up at the sound of the door slamming. She looked around the room, sleep still clouding her mind as she tried to piece together where she was. The duffel bag emblazoned with Tulane’s angry wave mascot on the opposite bed shook any cobwebs away. Covering her face, she cursed to herself.
“Caesar, get up,” she said through clenched teeth, smacking him on the shoulder until he stirred.
He propped himself up on his elbows and sighed as he rubbed his eyes. “What?”
“I think your roommate just came in here.”
“So?”
“I’d rather not be locker room talk for anyone.”
Caesar laughed as he rolled to his back then swung his feet out of the bed before reaching for his phone on the night stand. “Devin King is the last person that is going to talk about what I do with my life. We’re not friends and he knows better than to have my name in his mouth.”
She took a deep breath, running her hand through her hair roughly. “We shouldn’t have done this. It was a bad idea.”
“Which time was a bad idea? Last night? Yesterday afternoon? Friday night? If you are going to regret doing something then you probably shouldn’t do it in the first place. Makes life a whole lot easier that way.” He tossed his phone back onto the night stand and stood up to find some clothes to throw on.
“You don’t feel bad about cheating on Kaley?”
He shrugged. “Sure. I’ll get over it. So will you. Just don’t say anything and don’t act weird and she won’t know anything is different.”
“She’s my roommate and my friend. We are around each other almost all day every day. How do you expect me to not ‘act weird?’”
“You can’t erase the past, Gia. If you want to tell her the truth, go ahead. Full disclosure though, if you do, I’m going to deny it. Good luck convincing your roommate and friend of six months that you’re more credible than her boyfriend of two years,” he said as he sat down at his desk. He grabbed a pair of socks from under the chair to put on.
“Where are you going?”
“Where do you think?”
“But -- Shouldn’t you – I don’t know? Not? Maybe shower first?”
He stood up, shoving his feet into a pair of shoes. “Make sure you lock the door behind you whenever you decide to leave.”
…
Caesar sighed as he looked at his phone to see that Kaley hadn’t answered his text then he knocked on the door again, this time a little louder than the first three times. He was just about to turn and leave when he heard shuffling inside the room.
Kaley opened the door and leaned against the frame with her arms crossed over her chest. Her eyes were red and puffy and she wore a scowl on her face.
“I know we aren’t still mad at each other,” Caesar said, leaning down to kiss her but she turned her head and shoved him away. “C’mon, Kaley. That shit was days ago.”
“I saw you. Last night. It was Gia, wasn’t it?” The tone of her voice didn’t sound like someone who was asking a question, rather someone who was looking to confirm something that they already knew.
He waved off the comment and laughed. “Saw me where? I was in my room all night sleeping and you were at the game. I don’t know who told you I was somewhere else but they were fucking lying to you. And I know we aren’t going to act like it’s some big secret that Gia got a couple rich men out there paying for it. If she wasn’t at the game, maybe she was in Metairie with a Congressional staffer or something. Your math ain’t mathing right, Kaley.”
She didn’t respond, only continuing to stare at him.
“I wasn’t with her. I was alone,” he said.
Again, she didn’t say anything nor did her expression change. Caesar waited a long, uncomfortable moment for her to argue with him but she didn’t so much as move. He threw his hands up and exhaled sharply.
“You were cheating on me, too! With that frat boy and probably some other ones. I only did it once. How about you?!” he shouted.
Her only reaction was to raise her eyebrow for a moment then shake her head.
“You’re not going to say anything? You’re really just going to stand there? We’re both wrong in this, Kaley. If anything, you should be mad at your roommate for sneaking around behind your back with your boyfriend. That’s pretty low.”
Running her hand through her hair, she looked up at the ceiling and sighed before returning her gaze to him. “We’re done, Caesar.”
“What do you mean ‘we’re done?’ You’re going to throw everything away because of one night? You started the whole thing. We wouldn’t be standing right here if it wasn’t for you. I think you should be taking some of the blame for this and we can just move on right past it.”
“We’re done,” she repeated with very little emotion in her voice. The sense of finality hung heavy on the two words.
“You’re not being reasonable at all. Can we just talk about this?”
Shaking her head, she reached for the door and stepped back into the room. The door closed in Caesar’s face when he tried to follow her. Closed as one would normally close a door, but didn’t slam as he expected, as he was used to from the many times he’d had similar conversations in the past.
He pounded his fist against the door while trying the handle to find that it was locked. “Kaley, open the fucking door!”
His outburst drew the attention of the other people going about their business in the hall. Cursing under his breath, he turned and headed for the elevator before any of them decided to call campus police and add to his problems.
"This is the one thing that I still haven’t be able to get used to out here,” Hayden said as he leaned forward to wipe the condensation of the inside of his car’s windshield. The constant tug of war of trying to keep the inside of the car comfortable while fighting the humidity from the previous night’s storm that hung heavy in the air.
Devin nodded as he leaned back in the passenger seat to avoid the blast of heat bouncing off the windshield. The junior safety was from Pittsburgh and while Devin didn’t know a lot about the weather up in that part of the country, he was sure that it was nothing like what the Crescent City managed to throw at its residents.
He pulled his phone out of his pocket and powered it back on. In the wee hours of the morning, sleeping in a recliner in Hayden and Christian’s apartment with a dozen other guys because they lived closer to the stadium than anyone else, Devin experienced a part of being a known entity in the college football world that he wasn’t prepared for.
He’d gotten so many notifications that his phone died – three times.
He responded to the first few dozen before it became overwhelming and by then it seemed like not even airplane mode would stop the phone from calling it quits.
As the screen came back to life, the deluge resumed almost instantly. It made Devin uncomfortable to say the least. He’d never liked being in the spotlight and it seemed like he’d become the main attraction overnight.
Silencing the notifications, he put the phone back in his pocket figuring the bulk of the attention would’ve died down by then.
“That’s how y’all get down on the real bayous, huh?” Hayden asked, breaking the silence. He pointed in the direction of two college-aged guys manning a pirogue to paddle through the remnants of the flood waters that hadn’t quite been pumped over the levees and into the Mississippi.
Devin shook his head. “They would’ve been outside last night trying to catch fish and frogs if they were down one of Terrebonne’s bayous.”
“You say that like there wasn’t anyone doing that here, bruh.”
“Fair enough.”
Hayden swung into a parking space outside the residence hall and put the car in park. He held out his hand to dap Devin up, which Devin returned.
“We’re probably going to be trying to find somewhere to eat later so hit us up if you ain’t with your girl or something,” he said. “Judging by this weather though, it’s probably just going to be a run to the store and something at someone’s spot.”
“Will do, but I gotta get some sleep first. That Rent-A-Center recliner you and Christian have in there must have been used at Angola for the death row inmates because that shit is uncomfortable,” Devin said as he grabbed his duffel bag from the backseat and got out of the car.
“You would’ve been on the floor if it wasn’t for those picks, freshman!” Hayden shouted, laughing, just before Devin closed the door.
Fishing his keys out of his pocket, Devin walked over to his own car and opened the door. He let out a sigh of relief as no water came rushing out of it being that the parking lot outside of his dorm was known for flooding from even the smallest rains. He grabbed a couple old fast food bags off the floor to toss in a nearby garbage can and shut the door.
The campus was unusually quiet for the day after a big win, but the weather probably dampened a lot of people’s moods. And, it likely didn’t help that there was more rain in the forecast for that day and the next few.
For his part, he was already dreading the next week.
Vanderbilt was being billed as a tune-up game for the Green Wave ahead of their credential-proving game against Alabama, but Devin had already watched their game against LSU back a few times and he couldn’t see where they were supposed to be so bad.
He knew his mind would be elsewhere, though. A good game like he had meant more publicity, and more publicity meant more attempts by his grandfather to rope him into some shady get rich quick scheme that he would have to spend a few days fighting off.
As he got onto the elevator, though, he just wanted to get a few hours of good sleep before seeing what the day would bring. Navigating the five days between then and the next Saturday would be there when he woke up.
Unlocking the door, Devin stepped into his room and initially recoiled when he noticed the pair of bodies in Caesar’s bed amid the likely flood of nagging that he’d have to endure from Carla if he saw her cousin naked.
But he’d seen enough of the Parfait women to know that their hair didn’t come in the shade covering the face of the girl with her arms haphazardly thrown across Caesar.
Shaking his head, Devin walked into the room and quickly grabbed a few things from his closet before tossing his duffel bag on the bed. He figured that there would come a time that he’d walk in on such a situation given Caesar’s habits, but he was still a bit surprised all the same.
He shot a text to Carla to ask if she was awake before leaving the room, slamming the door behind him.
-*****-
Gia sat up at the sound of the door slamming. She looked around the room, sleep still clouding her mind as she tried to piece together where she was. The duffel bag emblazoned with Tulane’s angry wave mascot on the opposite bed shook any cobwebs away. Covering her face, she cursed to herself.
“Caesar, get up,” she said through clenched teeth, smacking him on the shoulder until he stirred.
He propped himself up on his elbows and sighed as he rubbed his eyes. “What?”
“I think your roommate just came in here.”
“So?”
“I’d rather not be locker room talk for anyone.”
Caesar laughed as he rolled to his back then swung his feet out of the bed before reaching for his phone on the night stand. “Devin King is the last person that is going to talk about what I do with my life. We’re not friends and he knows better than to have my name in his mouth.”
She took a deep breath, running her hand through her hair roughly. “We shouldn’t have done this. It was a bad idea.”
“Which time was a bad idea? Last night? Yesterday afternoon? Friday night? If you are going to regret doing something then you probably shouldn’t do it in the first place. Makes life a whole lot easier that way.” He tossed his phone back onto the night stand and stood up to find some clothes to throw on.
“You don’t feel bad about cheating on Kaley?”
He shrugged. “Sure. I’ll get over it. So will you. Just don’t say anything and don’t act weird and she won’t know anything is different.”
“She’s my roommate and my friend. We are around each other almost all day every day. How do you expect me to not ‘act weird?’”
“You can’t erase the past, Gia. If you want to tell her the truth, go ahead. Full disclosure though, if you do, I’m going to deny it. Good luck convincing your roommate and friend of six months that you’re more credible than her boyfriend of two years,” he said as he sat down at his desk. He grabbed a pair of socks from under the chair to put on.
“Where are you going?”
“Where do you think?”
“But -- Shouldn’t you – I don’t know? Not? Maybe shower first?”
He stood up, shoving his feet into a pair of shoes. “Make sure you lock the door behind you whenever you decide to leave.”
…
Caesar sighed as he looked at his phone to see that Kaley hadn’t answered his text then he knocked on the door again, this time a little louder than the first three times. He was just about to turn and leave when he heard shuffling inside the room.
Kaley opened the door and leaned against the frame with her arms crossed over her chest. Her eyes were red and puffy and she wore a scowl on her face.
“I know we aren’t still mad at each other,” Caesar said, leaning down to kiss her but she turned her head and shoved him away. “C’mon, Kaley. That shit was days ago.”
“I saw you. Last night. It was Gia, wasn’t it?” The tone of her voice didn’t sound like someone who was asking a question, rather someone who was looking to confirm something that they already knew.
He waved off the comment and laughed. “Saw me where? I was in my room all night sleeping and you were at the game. I don’t know who told you I was somewhere else but they were fucking lying to you. And I know we aren’t going to act like it’s some big secret that Gia got a couple rich men out there paying for it. If she wasn’t at the game, maybe she was in Metairie with a Congressional staffer or something. Your math ain’t mathing right, Kaley.”
She didn’t respond, only continuing to stare at him.
“I wasn’t with her. I was alone,” he said.
Again, she didn’t say anything nor did her expression change. Caesar waited a long, uncomfortable moment for her to argue with him but she didn’t so much as move. He threw his hands up and exhaled sharply.
“You were cheating on me, too! With that frat boy and probably some other ones. I only did it once. How about you?!” he shouted.
Her only reaction was to raise her eyebrow for a moment then shake her head.
“You’re not going to say anything? You’re really just going to stand there? We’re both wrong in this, Kaley. If anything, you should be mad at your roommate for sneaking around behind your back with your boyfriend. That’s pretty low.”
Running her hand through her hair, she looked up at the ceiling and sighed before returning her gaze to him. “We’re done, Caesar.”
“What do you mean ‘we’re done?’ You’re going to throw everything away because of one night? You started the whole thing. We wouldn’t be standing right here if it wasn’t for you. I think you should be taking some of the blame for this and we can just move on right past it.”
“We’re done,” she repeated with very little emotion in her voice. The sense of finality hung heavy on the two words.
“You’re not being reasonable at all. Can we just talk about this?”
Shaking her head, she reached for the door and stepped back into the room. The door closed in Caesar’s face when he tried to follow her. Closed as one would normally close a door, but didn’t slam as he expected, as he was used to from the many times he’d had similar conversations in the past.
He pounded his fist against the door while trying the handle to find that it was locked. “Kaley, open the fucking door!”
His outburst drew the attention of the other people going about their business in the hall. Cursing under his breath, he turned and headed for the elevator before any of them decided to call campus police and add to his problems.
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Captain Canada
- Posts: 2183
- Joined: 01 Dec 2018, 00:15
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
The descent into Hell continues 
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
Reversal
“...because of the evolving nature of this investigation and the breadth of the information that we are gathering, the process has moved slowly and we at the NCAA apologize for that. But we do not apologize for taking the interests of amateurism and fairness seriously. While we do not speak about individual student-athletes due to federal laws, schools are today being notified of the eligibility of their student-athletes going forward. That does not mean that our investigation is over, rather that it is entering a new stage. We anticipate...”
The woman speaking’s voice faded away as the screen flipped back to a studio in Los Angeles. An anchor holding a tablet gestured to another screen behind him.
“Welcome back, folks. Our very own Krystal Sandoval is live in Indianapolis where the NCAA just wrapped up its press conference. Krystal, what does this mean in the short term for college athletics?”
“Thanks, Mike. In the short term, it means that we’ll see a significant number of athletes who’ve spent the last few weeks in administrative limbo as universities scrambled to avoid playing potentially ineligible players return. As you know, most of the players who were suspected of recruiting irregularities were football and basketball players, so on the football side of things, some big names will be back in action unless otherwise unavailable. The SEC was the hardest hit conference, and seemingly, the epicenter of the entire investigation.”
“I suspect Tulane will be happy to welcome back receiver Caesar Jenkins, who is still their leader in yards and touchdowns despite not playing the last three games. But if we’re talking about star freshman named Jenkins, LSU is teetering on the verge of missing a bowl game for the first time in decades and getting Erik Jenkins back will be a shot in the arm that they’ll be happy to have. More on the weekend’s games here in a bit, but first, is Illinois about to snag the top quarterback prospect in the nation...”
Instead, he stood outside of the building waiting for her to either leave or come back.
He knew how to fix everything. He’d done it numerous times before. He just needed to say what she wanted to hear, and everything would be back to normal.
Glancing up from his phone after sending her the umpteenth text of the day, he spotted her walking toward the building – with Carla.
Carla noticed him walking in their direction first and fixed him with a cold stare.
“Why don’t you fuck off somewhere, Caesar?” she asked, not bothering to lower her voice and drawing a few people’s attention in the quad.
“Says the person that is on the campus of a university she was too dumb to get into.”
“You’re just wasting everyone’s time. Save us all some trouble and just go fuck yourself.”
Kaley shook her head and put her hand on her cousin’s shoulder to get her attention. “It’s fine, Carla. I’m fine. I’m going to go put this stuff down in my room and I’ll meet you in the student center. You remember where it is?”
“Kaley, don--”
“Really, I’m fine. I’ll catch up.”
Carla sighed before giving Caesar one last nasty look and heading in the opposite direction. Caesar waited until she was well out of earshot before turning to Kaley.
“Why aren’t you answering my texts and calls?” he asked her.
“We don’t have anything to talk about, Caesar. I already said what I needed to say to you.” Her voice was flat and monotone as it was the last time the two of them spoke.
He rubbed at his temple with his left hand, furrowing his eyebrows as he felt the beginnings of a headache pounding in his head. “Can you just let me apologize and we forget this ever happened? It was one mistake.”
“If only it were that easy,” she said, shrugging.
“Why does it feel like I’m the only one fighting to keep us together? You’ve just checked after what? Two days? You don’t even seem mad about it. I’m sure that the time we’ve been together means enough that we can try to fix everything back to what it was before.”
She exhaled heavily. “I wish I could say I felt that way, but trust is a funny thing, Caesar. I don’t think you could apologize enough for me to forget about this.”
“So, that’s it then? You’re just going to leave me? Can you please just let me earn back your trust?”
She offered him a sad smile and stepped to the side to walk past him. She stopped when she was next to him. “Hey, I heard that you’re going to be able to play Saturday. That’s great news. I know you’ve been waiting to hear that.”
He turned around when she started walking again. “Don’t walk away from me, Kaley.”
She didn’t so much as break her stride as she continued toward the building. He had half a thought to chase after her, but his ego got the better of him.
“Well, fuck you then, bitch.”
Taking his phone out of his pocket, he got started removing all traces of their relationship from his social profiles. For the time being, he ignored the messages from the guys telling him that coach was looking for him to talk about his status for the Vanderbilt game.
At the back of his mind, the irony wasn’t lost on him that on the same week they would be playing a school called Vanderbilt, something that had roots for him all the back at a school called Vandebilt had taken its last breath.
None of that mattered though.
If Kaley wasn’t going to take him back, he was going back to the old him.
She put her stuff down and ran her hands through her hair, pulling on the strands when her fingers were near the roots.
A wayward glance as Gia’s side of the room showed her that it was just as Gia had left it when they left for the game Saturday. She hadn’t seen her roommate in a few days, and it had been radio silence from her in the group text. If she was trying to hide what she’d done, she was doing a terrible job at it.
She sat down at her desk and buried her head in her hands. She hoped that her classes would be able to take her mind off everything. The semester was more than halfway over, and she wanted to maintain her GPA from start to finish.
It was one less distraction in her life, she’d told herself numerous times over the last few days. Either the truth or a compelling lie.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She looked at her watch, one of the many gifts from Caesar that she was debating getting rid of, and saw it was a text from Carla wondering where she was. With a heavy breath, she stood up from the desk.
But she paused when she heard the door opening.
Gia stepped into the room slowly, like a mouse that had been caught stealing food from the cupboard. She had an overnight bag slung over her shoulder and smelled like Bourbon and wintergreen even from across the room. That was usually the tell-tale sign that she’d spent the night with that older man who paid for her attention.
Nights in this case.
The two of them stared at one another for a moment before Kaley shook her head and grabbed her meal card from one of the drawers on the desk.
“Hey,” Gia said quietly.
Kaley didn’t answer.
“Don’t we have a meeting tonight?” she asked as she set down the bag.
Kaley shrugged.
Gia took a deep breath. “Uh, I have something to te--”
“I already know. I saw you.”
“Saw-- what? What do you mean saw me?”
“I mean what I said. I saw you with Caesar. Or rather on top of him.”
“Oh,” was all Gia said.
The two lapsed into silence for a moment before Kaley headed for the door.
“You aren’t mad?” Gia asked.
Kaley stooped at the door and turned around. “I’m furious, but I’m not surprised, and I’ve cried all the tears I’m going to cry over this. You might want to take a shower before you go to that meeting. You smell like an old man.”
And then she left her in the room alone.
“Not this fucking shit again. I really think you’re on the fucking spectrum,” the team’s photographer Jacques said as he angrily tossed an expensive looking camera into a bag on the floor.
Devin awkwardly scratched his chin as he tried to figure out what the man was asking for when he was telling him to pose for the marketing photos that were needed.
After his performance in Tulane’s last game against Texas A&M, he was named the conference’s freshman player of the week. And while he appreciated the accolade, he didn’t care for bullshit that was attached to it.
“I mean, I think I understand what you’re saying,” Devin said, trying his best to sound sincere but he still had no idea about this side of things.
The man waved his hand in Devin’s direction dismissively. “Don’t fucking worry about it. I’ll just use something we already have. At least you haven’t gone gotten any damn tattoos yet. No one will know that it’s old pictures.”
Before Devin could try to apologize, Jacques had gathered all his stuff and stormed off in the direction of his office that was buried in far flung corner of the athletics building.
Devin figured that’s why he was always so angry. He hadn’t seen it, but he was sure that the office wouldn’t have windows.
Picking up his duffel bag, Devin headed for the exit – at least he didn’t need to don his jersey and helmet for this photoshoot – hoping that the likely drama that Caesar was off creating would keep him out of the room a little longer than usual.
As he stepped outside, he dared not take a look at his phone knowing the absurd amount of notifications that would probably be on the screen after a few hours of keeping it on silent. The attention felt overbearing, and it was already beginning to weigh on him.
A couple years ago, he wasn’t on any college’s radar. A couple months ago, he was being billed as a four- or five-year college athlete that would disappear into the ether once his career was over, probably selling insurance or working in local media.
Now, people are putting him in mock drafts – in 2055, only two years away.
Struggling to cope would be an understatement.
A part of him was happy about the news that Caesar would be allowed to play again because he was a spotlight eater if nothing else. With a game against a bad team like Vanderbilt coming up, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility that he has a big return game.
And Devin was more than willing to let him takeover as the team’s top freshman once again.
“You’ll catch a cold if you keep walking so slow in this weather, Devin!”
He looked around to find the source of the voice, seeing Sol waving out the driver’s side window of a car nearby. He started to walk over to the open window, but she gestured to the passenger side.
Before he got into the car, she picked up a half-eaten hamburger from the seat and brushed it off.
“Sorry. I was eating lunch,” she said, folding the wrapper back over the burger.
“You know there’s an entire cafeteria, stocked to brim, only a few feet away, right? I heard there is some student who works in there who has all the connections and can get better food than the athletes they’re trying to feed.”
She laughed. “I wonder who that student is, because I definitely don’t have any connections with anyone.”
“So, you say. But it’s cold as fuck out here so why are you sitting in your car to eat? That can’t be all that enjoyable.”
She shrugged as she reached for a fry from the carton in the cup holder. “It’s not too bad, and I needed a break.”
“Fair enough.”
He reached up and turned what looked like a medallion hanging from the mirror toward him. It featured a black circle with some words and a flag on it with an anchor and two oars jutting from the circle.
“My brother gave me that when I came here. It’s Corinthians’ crest,” Sol explained. “They’re the team that he plays for. Futebol. When he was little. Well, I guess he’s still little. But when we were younger, our uncle would take us to every match. Even the reserve games that Josue played in.”
“I’m guessing this is soccer? I don’t know anything about it, to be honest.”
“I’m not surprised. You’re a football player from the American South. No offense, but you all are kinda backward sometimes.”
He laughed. “No offense taken.”
She took the crest off the mirror and held it to look at. “You know, you are a lot like Josue. I mean, like in your sporting careers. He just turned 18 and everyone thinks that he’s the next big thing for Corinthians. My uncle said that some European clubs have been asking about him.”
“Is that good?”
“Very good. He’s already a professional at a young age. Now, people thousands of miles away want to pay millions of dollars to bring him to Portugal or Spain or Italy or Germany. Maybe even here to the US. But I don’t think he gets an opportunity to enjoy anything. I just wish he could play like he used to when he was 6 or 7 and do it for fun.”
Devin nodded slowly, taking in what she’d said. “Yep. I can relate.”
“I think that a lot of times with sports that everyone forgets that it’s a game. A game with a lot of money in it, yes, but they’re all just games. It’s not like Josue needs to make the money to support the family. Afonso—”
She trailed off and he decided that he wouldn’t push on that.
Putting the crest on the dashboard, she grabbed her phone from the cup holder, suddenly excited. She smiled at him. “Look, I’m going to teach you about futebol so you can be a bit more cultured than everyone else in Louisiana.”
“I’m sure there are people who watch soccer here,” he laughed.
“Yes, yes, but not Brazilian futebol. It’s the most beautiful,” she said, waving her hand at his comment.
She pulled up a video and set the phone on the dashboard. On the screen were two teams with names Devin wouldn’t even try to pronounce and commentators speaking a language that he couldn’t even pick out words of.
Nonetheless, he leaned back in the seat and listened as she tried to explain what was going on.
“...because of the evolving nature of this investigation and the breadth of the information that we are gathering, the process has moved slowly and we at the NCAA apologize for that. But we do not apologize for taking the interests of amateurism and fairness seriously. While we do not speak about individual student-athletes due to federal laws, schools are today being notified of the eligibility of their student-athletes going forward. That does not mean that our investigation is over, rather that it is entering a new stage. We anticipate...”
The woman speaking’s voice faded away as the screen flipped back to a studio in Los Angeles. An anchor holding a tablet gestured to another screen behind him.
“Welcome back, folks. Our very own Krystal Sandoval is live in Indianapolis where the NCAA just wrapped up its press conference. Krystal, what does this mean in the short term for college athletics?”
“Thanks, Mike. In the short term, it means that we’ll see a significant number of athletes who’ve spent the last few weeks in administrative limbo as universities scrambled to avoid playing potentially ineligible players return. As you know, most of the players who were suspected of recruiting irregularities were football and basketball players, so on the football side of things, some big names will be back in action unless otherwise unavailable. The SEC was the hardest hit conference, and seemingly, the epicenter of the entire investigation.”
“I suspect Tulane will be happy to welcome back receiver Caesar Jenkins, who is still their leader in yards and touchdowns despite not playing the last three games. But if we’re talking about star freshman named Jenkins, LSU is teetering on the verge of missing a bowl game for the first time in decades and getting Erik Jenkins back will be a shot in the arm that they’ll be happy to have. More on the weekend’s games here in a bit, but first, is Illinois about to snag the top quarterback prospect in the nation...”
-*****-
Caesar tapped his fingers against his arms as he leaned against the wall outside the residence hall where Kaley’s room was. She hadn’t answered any of his calls in the last couple of days and hadn’t so much as read any of the texts he’d sent her. She hadn’t blocked him on social media, but he felt that was a bridge too far in his attempts to get her to answer him.Instead, he stood outside of the building waiting for her to either leave or come back.
He knew how to fix everything. He’d done it numerous times before. He just needed to say what she wanted to hear, and everything would be back to normal.
Glancing up from his phone after sending her the umpteenth text of the day, he spotted her walking toward the building – with Carla.
Carla noticed him walking in their direction first and fixed him with a cold stare.
“Why don’t you fuck off somewhere, Caesar?” she asked, not bothering to lower her voice and drawing a few people’s attention in the quad.
“Says the person that is on the campus of a university she was too dumb to get into.”
“You’re just wasting everyone’s time. Save us all some trouble and just go fuck yourself.”
Kaley shook her head and put her hand on her cousin’s shoulder to get her attention. “It’s fine, Carla. I’m fine. I’m going to go put this stuff down in my room and I’ll meet you in the student center. You remember where it is?”
“Kaley, don--”
“Really, I’m fine. I’ll catch up.”
Carla sighed before giving Caesar one last nasty look and heading in the opposite direction. Caesar waited until she was well out of earshot before turning to Kaley.
“Why aren’t you answering my texts and calls?” he asked her.
“We don’t have anything to talk about, Caesar. I already said what I needed to say to you.” Her voice was flat and monotone as it was the last time the two of them spoke.
He rubbed at his temple with his left hand, furrowing his eyebrows as he felt the beginnings of a headache pounding in his head. “Can you just let me apologize and we forget this ever happened? It was one mistake.”
“If only it were that easy,” she said, shrugging.
“Why does it feel like I’m the only one fighting to keep us together? You’ve just checked after what? Two days? You don’t even seem mad about it. I’m sure that the time we’ve been together means enough that we can try to fix everything back to what it was before.”
She exhaled heavily. “I wish I could say I felt that way, but trust is a funny thing, Caesar. I don’t think you could apologize enough for me to forget about this.”
“So, that’s it then? You’re just going to leave me? Can you please just let me earn back your trust?”
She offered him a sad smile and stepped to the side to walk past him. She stopped when she was next to him. “Hey, I heard that you’re going to be able to play Saturday. That’s great news. I know you’ve been waiting to hear that.”
He turned around when she started walking again. “Don’t walk away from me, Kaley.”
She didn’t so much as break her stride as she continued toward the building. He had half a thought to chase after her, but his ego got the better of him.
“Well, fuck you then, bitch.”
Taking his phone out of his pocket, he got started removing all traces of their relationship from his social profiles. For the time being, he ignored the messages from the guys telling him that coach was looking for him to talk about his status for the Vanderbilt game.
At the back of his mind, the irony wasn’t lost on him that on the same week they would be playing a school called Vanderbilt, something that had roots for him all the back at a school called Vandebilt had taken its last breath.
None of that mattered though.
If Kaley wasn’t going to take him back, he was going back to the old him.
-*****-
Kaley unlocked the door to her room and stepped inside, her nerves frayed from the conversation with Caesar only moments earlier. She was doing all she could to hold it together and it was wearing on her mood, dragging it down.She put her stuff down and ran her hands through her hair, pulling on the strands when her fingers were near the roots.
A wayward glance as Gia’s side of the room showed her that it was just as Gia had left it when they left for the game Saturday. She hadn’t seen her roommate in a few days, and it had been radio silence from her in the group text. If she was trying to hide what she’d done, she was doing a terrible job at it.
She sat down at her desk and buried her head in her hands. She hoped that her classes would be able to take her mind off everything. The semester was more than halfway over, and she wanted to maintain her GPA from start to finish.
It was one less distraction in her life, she’d told herself numerous times over the last few days. Either the truth or a compelling lie.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She looked at her watch, one of the many gifts from Caesar that she was debating getting rid of, and saw it was a text from Carla wondering where she was. With a heavy breath, she stood up from the desk.
But she paused when she heard the door opening.
Gia stepped into the room slowly, like a mouse that had been caught stealing food from the cupboard. She had an overnight bag slung over her shoulder and smelled like Bourbon and wintergreen even from across the room. That was usually the tell-tale sign that she’d spent the night with that older man who paid for her attention.
Nights in this case.
The two of them stared at one another for a moment before Kaley shook her head and grabbed her meal card from one of the drawers on the desk.
“Hey,” Gia said quietly.
Kaley didn’t answer.
“Don’t we have a meeting tonight?” she asked as she set down the bag.
Kaley shrugged.
Gia took a deep breath. “Uh, I have something to te--”
“I already know. I saw you.”
“Saw-- what? What do you mean saw me?”
“I mean what I said. I saw you with Caesar. Or rather on top of him.”
“Oh,” was all Gia said.
The two lapsed into silence for a moment before Kaley headed for the door.
“You aren’t mad?” Gia asked.
Kaley stooped at the door and turned around. “I’m furious, but I’m not surprised, and I’ve cried all the tears I’m going to cry over this. You might want to take a shower before you go to that meeting. You smell like an old man.”
And then she left her in the room alone.
-*****-
“Not this fucking shit again. I really think you’re on the fucking spectrum,” the team’s photographer Jacques said as he angrily tossed an expensive looking camera into a bag on the floor.
Devin awkwardly scratched his chin as he tried to figure out what the man was asking for when he was telling him to pose for the marketing photos that were needed.
After his performance in Tulane’s last game against Texas A&M, he was named the conference’s freshman player of the week. And while he appreciated the accolade, he didn’t care for bullshit that was attached to it.
“I mean, I think I understand what you’re saying,” Devin said, trying his best to sound sincere but he still had no idea about this side of things.
The man waved his hand in Devin’s direction dismissively. “Don’t fucking worry about it. I’ll just use something we already have. At least you haven’t gone gotten any damn tattoos yet. No one will know that it’s old pictures.”
Before Devin could try to apologize, Jacques had gathered all his stuff and stormed off in the direction of his office that was buried in far flung corner of the athletics building.
Devin figured that’s why he was always so angry. He hadn’t seen it, but he was sure that the office wouldn’t have windows.
Picking up his duffel bag, Devin headed for the exit – at least he didn’t need to don his jersey and helmet for this photoshoot – hoping that the likely drama that Caesar was off creating would keep him out of the room a little longer than usual.
As he stepped outside, he dared not take a look at his phone knowing the absurd amount of notifications that would probably be on the screen after a few hours of keeping it on silent. The attention felt overbearing, and it was already beginning to weigh on him.
A couple years ago, he wasn’t on any college’s radar. A couple months ago, he was being billed as a four- or five-year college athlete that would disappear into the ether once his career was over, probably selling insurance or working in local media.
Now, people are putting him in mock drafts – in 2055, only two years away.
Struggling to cope would be an understatement.
A part of him was happy about the news that Caesar would be allowed to play again because he was a spotlight eater if nothing else. With a game against a bad team like Vanderbilt coming up, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility that he has a big return game.
And Devin was more than willing to let him takeover as the team’s top freshman once again.
“You’ll catch a cold if you keep walking so slow in this weather, Devin!”
He looked around to find the source of the voice, seeing Sol waving out the driver’s side window of a car nearby. He started to walk over to the open window, but she gestured to the passenger side.
Before he got into the car, she picked up a half-eaten hamburger from the seat and brushed it off.
“Sorry. I was eating lunch,” she said, folding the wrapper back over the burger.
“You know there’s an entire cafeteria, stocked to brim, only a few feet away, right? I heard there is some student who works in there who has all the connections and can get better food than the athletes they’re trying to feed.”
She laughed. “I wonder who that student is, because I definitely don’t have any connections with anyone.”
“So, you say. But it’s cold as fuck out here so why are you sitting in your car to eat? That can’t be all that enjoyable.”
She shrugged as she reached for a fry from the carton in the cup holder. “It’s not too bad, and I needed a break.”
“Fair enough.”
He reached up and turned what looked like a medallion hanging from the mirror toward him. It featured a black circle with some words and a flag on it with an anchor and two oars jutting from the circle.
“My brother gave me that when I came here. It’s Corinthians’ crest,” Sol explained. “They’re the team that he plays for. Futebol. When he was little. Well, I guess he’s still little. But when we were younger, our uncle would take us to every match. Even the reserve games that Josue played in.”
“I’m guessing this is soccer? I don’t know anything about it, to be honest.”
“I’m not surprised. You’re a football player from the American South. No offense, but you all are kinda backward sometimes.”
He laughed. “No offense taken.”
She took the crest off the mirror and held it to look at. “You know, you are a lot like Josue. I mean, like in your sporting careers. He just turned 18 and everyone thinks that he’s the next big thing for Corinthians. My uncle said that some European clubs have been asking about him.”
“Is that good?”
“Very good. He’s already a professional at a young age. Now, people thousands of miles away want to pay millions of dollars to bring him to Portugal or Spain or Italy or Germany. Maybe even here to the US. But I don’t think he gets an opportunity to enjoy anything. I just wish he could play like he used to when he was 6 or 7 and do it for fun.”
Devin nodded slowly, taking in what she’d said. “Yep. I can relate.”
“I think that a lot of times with sports that everyone forgets that it’s a game. A game with a lot of money in it, yes, but they’re all just games. It’s not like Josue needs to make the money to support the family. Afonso—”
She trailed off and he decided that he wouldn’t push on that.
Putting the crest on the dashboard, she grabbed her phone from the cup holder, suddenly excited. She smiled at him. “Look, I’m going to teach you about futebol so you can be a bit more cultured than everyone else in Louisiana.”
“I’m sure there are people who watch soccer here,” he laughed.
“Yes, yes, but not Brazilian futebol. It’s the most beautiful,” she said, waving her hand at his comment.
She pulled up a video and set the phone on the dashboard. On the screen were two teams with names Devin wouldn’t even try to pronounce and commentators speaking a language that he couldn’t even pick out words of.
Nonetheless, he leaned back in the seat and listened as she tried to explain what was going on.
-
Captain Canada
- Posts: 2183
- Joined: 01 Dec 2018, 00:15
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
Needed that return, glad to have a new update in this
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
Back Like He Never Left
“The Vandy social media buzz is saying they’re going to pull off another upset this Saturday over a Louisiana school. I’m Shawn Guerrero and with me is my co-host Dex Caldwell, and we’re going to run through the scenarios where that just might be possible. But before that, let’s talk about the Pac-12 race and who’s looking like championship contenders.”
“Hold on, Shawn. I don’t know if you saw the videos on social of Tulane’s practice today, but I did and well…”
“And?”
“You remember that old meme from way back in the day of the kid saying, ‘I’m in danger?’ Just slap a Commodore hat on it, because there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Vanderbilt is going to even keep this game close. They have a very big player with a very big chip on his shoulder.”
Sucking his teeth, he walked out of the empty locker room and headed for the field.
It felt like it had been an eternity since he’d heard the clack of cleats against the concrete in the tunnel and smelled the whiffs of gameday food being prepared a little too early, only for it to be shipped next door for a soccer game or somewhere else for basketball. Like the neglected helmet, it only served to make him angrier.
Someone hundreds of miles away had decided he cheated because he was too good. Someone miles away decided that because he didn’t go to Alabama or USC or Ohio State and therefore something was wrong, and he cheated.
And to say he cheated was wrong on its face.
He didn’t take anything. He didn’t cut any corners. He didn’t lie on any forms. He was simply better. Better than everyone else.
So, because they couldn’t stop him on the field, they stopped him in some boardroom somewhere in Indianapolis.
And look where that left them.
The team was already in the midst of practice by the time he stepped on the field, made late by a medical clearance check-up to see if he was ready to return to action after a few weeks on the sideline – on his couch, rather. More NCAA bureaucracy meant to avoid lawsuits; he was told.
He pushed his way to the front of the players before him, pulling on his helmet as he did.
Coach Shuman glanced to his right, tapping a tablet against his hand as he watched the team. The old ball coach raised his eyebrow and gave Caesar a once over.
“You don’t think you need to go stretch and warm-up, Jenkins?” the man said, nodding toward the far endzone where Caesar would have space to do so.
Caesar only shook his head.
Coach Shuman blew his whistle and gestured toward Arion, beckoning for the junior to make way for Caesar. Arion fist bumped Caesar as the two receivers walked in opposite directions.
The journalists who were watching practice perked up when they say #17 back in the huddle. The story shifted for them. It wasn’t about whatever Coach Shuman would update them on after practice anymore. Many of them moved so close to the action that they were almost blending into the team’s staff.
“That boy back, baby,” Tyrone said, dapping Caesar up when he got to the huddle.
Darren slapped him on the back of the helmet before turning to Coach Harley for the next play.
Caesar listened to the play call but still simmered with anger. He walked to his – his – spot out wide when the huddle broke and stared at Christian lined up opposite of him. Marcus shouted an adjustment from safety and the defense shifted.
Darren called for the snap. Caesar jogged forward, planted his foot and burst toward the middle of the field. Finding a soft spot in the zone the coverage had fallen into, he settled down and turned toward the line of scrimmage. Moments later, Darren fired the ball into him for an easy catch.
He turned upfield and was almost immediately met by Blair. The linebacker wrapped him up, but Caesar all but punched the senior in his head. Blair was known for his physicality, but even he was shocked by a stiff arm like that in practice and loosened his grip, allowing Caesar to get his legs moving forward and dragging Blair along.
It took another two players to get his momentum slowed to the point Coach Shuman blew the play dead before one of them got hurt.
The journalists moved a little closer.
…
Devin gave Kendall a little shove before turning to run with the receiver. The senior got on the inside of him, planted his foot and broke toward the numbers before planting his foot again and cutting back toward the sideline.
It was all Devin could do to not bite too hard on the double move. Kendall glanced back over his shoulder and brought his hands up so Devin lunged forward and got just enough of his hand in the way to bat the ball away without bundling into Kendall first.
Kendall cursed under his breath as whistles from back down the field were heard. He scooped up the ball and threw it in the general direction of where the rest of the team was.
“I thought I had your ass,” the senior said, laughing and smacked Devin on his shoulder pads as the two of them jogged back.
“I got lucky.”
Ahead of them, Hayden was getting into it with Caesar and the two of them had to be separated by the coaching staff.
“Calm your fucking ass down. This is practice, you goofy motherfucker!” Hayden shouted as he was shoved back by Coach Major. He lunged toward Caesar again, but enough space had already been created between them that they wouldn’t come to blows.
“I just chipped you, pussy,” Caesar said, shrugging as he walked back to the offensive huddle, led away by Coach Simmons and Coach Scott.
“How the fuck you chip someone ten yards down field? We rewriting the rules of football out here now? Y’all better not send his ass across the middle or it’s light outs for y’all boy,” Hayden said to Coach Harley, pointing at Caesar.
Devin and Kendall looked at one another. Devin shook his head. Kendall shrugged.
“There goes the fucking neighborhood,” Devin said under his breath to himself as he walked back to the defensive huddle.
He’d begun to enjoy football without Caesar again and was probably the only person on the team that was hoping his suspension would turn into something more permanent than a few games.
And it looked like he had only come back as a bigger piece of shit than he had been before the suspension which wasn’t going to do anything but cause headaches for everyone on the team when what happened on the field mattered.
…
Caesar burst off the line and got to the inside of Christian after the junior’s attempt to jam him at the line. He made a slight cut toward the middle of the field and brought in Darren’s pass with one hand with only the smallest hitch in his stride.
He saw Hayden running toward him and picked up speed, making a bee-line for the safety. They both lowered their shoulders. The two collided at full speed with the thud of pads hitting one another sounding.
Caesar stumbled over Hayden as the force of the collision knocked Hayden back. As he fell over, Caesar landed crotch-first on Hayden’s helmet.
The safety quickly shoved him away as he sprung to his feet.
“How’s my dick taste, bitch?” Caesar asked, throwing the ball at him.
Hayden grabbed Caesar’s facemask and swung him around in an attempt to throw him to the ground, pulling the helmet awkwardly up over his face. Caesar threw a punch at Hayden but only succeeded in hitting him in the helmet with his arm.
Caesar’s helmet eventually came off and he threw another punch but missed again. Hayden dropped the helmet and lunged at him to try to take him down again.
The two of them were broken up before things could escalate beyond the insults they continued to throw at one another as the coaching staff shoved them to opposite sidelines.
Caesar walked behind the others, not engaging in the conversation as he adjusted the bag of ice that he’d wrapped around his arm and stared off into the distance. The almost bitterly cold air whipping off the lake and the river made the ice feel colder than it was, but he’d survive a short walk out in the elements.
“We gotta hit Bourbon or something. Celebrate that boy Caesar bein’ back out on the field, ready to rumble,” Tyrone said, pointing over his shoulder at Caesar.
“It’s Tuesday,” Darren said, raising an eyebrow. “The last place I want to be tonight is at a strip club on a motherfucking Tuesday. They are sorority houses all around here if you want to see some titties that you don’t have to watch your step around.”
“Older the berry, sweeter the juice, bruh.”
“It’s blacker the berry. It’s always been blacker the berry,” Junie said. “Old berries are rotten. Fuck I look like puttin’ century year old coochie in my face?”
“How often you get 20 year old coochie in your face, my nigga?’ Tyrone asked, earning a shove from Junie. “You better take what you can get. Kerby, tell ya brother that ain’t nothin’ wrong with some well-seasoned women.”
The younger Greer brother held his hands up. “Hey, man. I’m just along for the ride. I finally realized them Divine Nine bitches where it’s at and now I ain’t got to do shit. Y’all could learn a thing or two instead of messin’ with them white girls.”
“Bro,” Darren said, looking at Kerby and shaking his head. “Really? I know you’ve seen all that Delta shit Ramona has. You’re new to the game.”
“And I got the kufi back at the house,” Tyrone said. “As-salamu alaykum, my good brother.”
“You goin’ to hell for sayin’ that shit after lyin’ your ass off,” Junie said.
Caesar’s phone pinged twice in his pocket. Pulling it out, he glanced at the two texts that were on top of the long list of notifications before putting the phone back in his pocket. He broke off from the group and started to head to his building.
Hearing the sound of the grass crunching, Darren looked over his shoulder.
“Hey, man! Where you going? You can’t leave us hanging on your first day back off the porch,” he said as he stopped walking.
“I’ll catch up,” Caesar said over his shoulder. “Just text me where y’all end up.”
“Man, stop playin’ and bring your ass on. That girl probably tired of seein’ you after the last month. Give her a break!” Tyrone shouted.
Caesar ignored Tyrone’s joke and continued walking toward the dorm.
…
Gia stood outside of the building, shivering from the falling temperature. If there was ever a reason that she would leave Louisiana behind for good, it would be the constant extremes of the weather. Only a few hours ago, it was a balmy 83 degrees in New Orleans. Now, it was in the 50s – and she had been waiting for what felt like all those hours.
She spotted Caesar walking toward her and waited as he took his time to get to where she stood. She pulled her arms, crossed over her chest, closer to get more warmth from the sweatshirt she was wearing.
“You should have told me when you were going to get here instead of that vague bullshit you said,” she said.
He hiked his duffel bag up on his shoulder then gestured to it. “I’m coming from fucking practice. We’re done when Shuman says we’re done. If you want to take up a problem with time management then you can take it up with him.”
She rolled her eyes and dropped her arms to her sides. “What do you want, Caesar? I don’t think we should be talking. Everything’s fucked up enough as it is.”
“Yet here you are,” he said. He opened the door to the res hall and held it open for her to walk into the building ahead of her.
She took a step toward the door but hesitated and stopped.
Shrugging, he stepped inside and let the door begin to close, but she stopped it before it shut and followed him to the elevators.
The two of them walked through the halls in silence, and they got onto the elevator in silence. Caesar wore an almost bored look on his face as he waited for the elevator to start moving. However, Gia moved a bit further from him and began absently swiping on her phone.
“No one’s going to think you’re not in here with me,” he said as the elevator doors slid open on the fifth floor.
“I— Well— I—”
“Right. Award winning speech right there.”
The two of them made their way to Caesar’s room and stepped inside after he unlocked the door. He tossed his duffel bag on the floor and walked over to the unmade bed, sitting down on it. He pulled out his phone and answered a few texts.
Gia stopped just in front of the door and looked around at the mostly disheveled room. Clothes were strewn across chairs and things looked out of place. When she was last in there, you could easily see whose side of the room was whose from how clean Caesar’s side was.
It looked like a tornado had hit the whole room.
“Fall cleaning?” she asked, nudging an expensive looking shirt that was on the floor with her foot.
“I’m throwing all that shit away and buying new shit,” he said, waving his hand at the mess.
“Why is your roommate never here?”
He put his phone down on the nightstand. “You’ve been in here like three times. I don’t think you can make the call that my roommate is never here, but fuck that kid. He’s a little bitch and I’m glad he keeps his time in here to a minimum.”
Gia whistled.
“Guess you two aren’t all that close.”
“You want to keep fucking?” he asked, changing the subject abruptly.
“Wait—what?”
“Does thou wish to continue engaging sexual intercourse with me on the occasion that you are requiring of penis?” he asked, his tone mocking.
“What about Kaley?”
He shrugged.
“What about her? That’s your sorority sister. She’s nothing to me. I’m single. Don’t know how someone could get mad about someone doing shit that has nothing to do with them.”
“So, are you trying to replace her with me?” she asked. “No offense, Caesar, but I don’t think I trust you all that much to stay faithful considering. Cheat with me, cheat on me, you know?”
“Who the fuck said we’d be together? I asked you if you wanted to keep fucking not if you wanted to get married,” he said. He brought his hands up and made a triangle with them. He tapped his index fingers together. “It would be like a hierarchy of bitches. You’re at the top then all the other bitches I fuck are backups. Make sense?”
“Wow. That makes me feel great.”
“I mean, I’m not saying you can’t go be unsatisfied with other dudes if I’m otherwise occupied. Again, not trying to be with you. I just thought you had some good pussy and you seemed to enjoy yourself. I prefer to have something reliable in case the chick I find for the night a bit lacking.”
“This is the most unconvincing argument I’ve ever heard,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
He sighed. “But you’re still listening to it and you walked your ass all the way across campus and all the way up here. You clearly aren’t that uninterested in it.”
“I’m not going to be some dirty secret for you.”
“I’m not the only one in this room with secret lovers, Gia. But fine, we can hang out and shit if that makes you feel better.”
“Fine, but I’m not going to hide it from Kaley. I’m going to be honest about what this is with her.”
Standing up from the bed, he walked over to his desk. He pulled his wallet from a drawer and put it in his pocket.
“Again, that’s your friend. Whatever you do or don’t tell her is no concern of mine,” he said as he squeezed by her and opened the door. He waved for her to leave.
She furrowed her eyebrows but didn’t move. “That’s all you asked me to come over here for?”
“I’m leaving. We’re going to Bourbon. I’ll text you on the way back to see if you want to fuck if I don’t run into something else out there.”
“Already fucking regretting this,” she said, pushing past him into the hall. “Maybe I’ll have found something better for the night.”
“You won’t.”
He shut the door and followed her to the elevator.
Devin recognized a few of them either from his attempts to take more of an interest in sports other than football or from passings by in the athletics building. But he did feel a bit bad for not knowing more of them. After all, these were the types of people who would best know his plight of trying to navigate life at a what many would consider a Southern Ivy while being an athlete.
“We all meet once a month. Meet and greets, basically. We’re all in the same boat so it’s good to know each other. Besides, all good people. This is the closest thing you’re ever going to get to a union at an American university until someone gets the labor board to see athletes as employees of the universities,” Christian said, gesturing to the other people in the room as he explained.
“We’re not employees?”
“Nah. Everyone considered that a closed question when NIL came around, but we still have power in numbers even if not on the books, right? Grambling used to have terrible facilities. Black mold and everything. Then all their athletes kept refusing to play. You’d get threats to pull scholarships and shit, but what are you going to do? Recruit another 500 athletes next year? Good luck with that.”
“Makes sense,” Devin said.
“You always have to keep an eye on what the folks up front are doing. We don’t have the problems here that Grambling had because we’re private and they’re an HBCU relying on, unfortunately, Louisiana for their budget but that doesn’t mean they can’t try to fuck us over. We make them money by putting our bodies on the line. And whether they want to admit it or not, they’ll push that to the limits for a few extra dollars. Tulane didn’t rejoin the SEC because it’s a collection of universities with stellar academics,” Christian said.
Devin nodded as he listened. It all made sense to him, as much sense as it could make with his limited understanding of things beyond football and class.
Of course, Christian would be the one involved in this. No one could figure out how he had the time for everything he did but he made it happen.
Out of curiosity, Devin had checked the mock drafts for the upcoming NFL Draft and while his scout report was glittering as one of the top corners in the country – he was slated as a third-round pick as best.
Because, according to the site, general managers were unsure if his heart was in football at the pro level.
That didn’t seem to bother Christian, though.
“C’mon. You have to move around and meet folks,” Christian said, dragging Devin along as he moved through the crowd of people.
He stopped when he came to two guys and a girl. They paused their conversation to greet him.
“What’s up, bro?” a tall, lanky white guy said, dapping up Christian. He was taller than both Christian and Devin by a couple of inches. To Devin, the guy just looked like the stereotypical baseball player even without the Tulane baseball hoodie he wore.
“Another day in paradise as you would say.” He turned to Devin. “This is my boy, Drew Gautreaux. He’s from down your neck of the woods, I think?”
Drew nodded. “You went to school with my little cousin. He lived in Dularge. I went to H.L. though and been here and there for a few years before you even sprung up.”
The other guy nudged the girl with his elbow and pointed between Drew and Devin. “You know how happy he is that he’ll be able to say that Cajun French shit and someone will understand him now? Man been waiting for that for years.”
“Do I have to remind you that we’re in New Orleans? On parle tous un peu français! Right, Devin?”
Devin shrugged. “I only know a little from one of my ex’s parents.”
“Mais, c’mon now,” Drew said, shaking his head. “You can’t be coming up here making us look bad. I’m going to have to teach you some of our language so you can represent right.”
Christian laughed. He pointed to the other two in the group. The other guy dwarfed Drew a bit. “Cortez Vail, or as I like to call him fake ass Victor Wenbanyama.”
“You still mad about that time I dunked on your bitch ass at the rec, huh?” Cortez said, laughing. He turned to Devin. “Yo, when I tell you that some people need to stick to what they do best and not try to play any other sport? Christian that dude. This man got a jumper that a toddler can send. And don’t even get me started on his handles.”
“You just tall, bro,” Christian said. “Anyway, this is—”
“I’m a grown ass woman. I can speak for myself,” she said, raising her eyebrow.
Christian held his hands up. “My bad.”
“Tyesha,” she said to Devin.
Devin nodded his greeting. He’d heard of her before. A transfer from LSU, she was a track star. A future Olympian depending on who you asked. If you asked other people, they just said she was Sha’Carri Richardson 2.0 in more ways than one.
“How’d you get unlucky enough to have this clown following you around?” Tyesha asked, pointing to Christian.
“He ain’t so bad once you get used to him,” Devin said with a shrug. “I just don’t know when I’m going to get used to him. Maybe by the time he graduates.”
“We’re supposed to be family, man,” Christian said, holding his hand against his chest. “I’m going to tell the guys to put your ass out the group chat for that one.”
“If family can’t clown you from time to time, then who can?” Devin asked.
Cortez pulled his phone out of his pocket. “If you really want to get a laugh at my boy’s expense, let me show that time I dunked on him.”
“Why do you even still have that?” Christian asked, shaking his head but glancing down at the phone all the same.
Drew laughed. “If I dunked on anyone, I would keep that shit for the rest of my life, too. Especially if I dunked on someone who is actually athletic.”
Tyesha leaned over to Devin. “I’m not saying it’s a stereotype that he can’t dunk, but don’t you think someone who is like 6’5” should be able to at least grab the rim?”
“I would say so,” Devin said, nodding.
“I heard that shit. It’s 2052. We have to stop putting people down for their inability to dunk,” Drew said.
“I mean, you are like 6’5” and baseball players jump all the time.”
“Outfielders jump all the time. All I do is throw it and hope they aren’t jumping at the wall because it got cracked,” he said. “But if Christian can claim that family bit, I should be able to! We’re from the same city, man!”
“Again, if family can’t clown you from time to time, then who can?”
“Yo, I like him already,” Tyesha said, laughing. “You ain’t shit because you football niggas get all the good shit but you alright. Just help me out and slide me some of the shit they give you that you don’t want.”
Devin looked her over.
“I don’t think we’re the same size.”
“For free shit? I’ll make it work.”
Christian looked up. “What happened to ‘ain’t shit free about you,’ Tyesha?”
“About me,” she corrected. “Don’t stick your nose in grown folks business. We negotiating over here. Just let me know when you don’t want something. I’ll make it work.”
“You got it,” Devin said, laughing.
“The Vandy social media buzz is saying they’re going to pull off another upset this Saturday over a Louisiana school. I’m Shawn Guerrero and with me is my co-host Dex Caldwell, and we’re going to run through the scenarios where that just might be possible. But before that, let’s talk about the Pac-12 race and who’s looking like championship contenders.”
“Hold on, Shawn. I don’t know if you saw the videos on social of Tulane’s practice today, but I did and well…”
“And?”
“You remember that old meme from way back in the day of the kid saying, ‘I’m in danger?’ Just slap a Commodore hat on it, because there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Vanderbilt is going to even keep this game close. They have a very big player with a very big chip on his shoulder.”
-*****-
Caesar grabbed his helmet from the top shelf of his locker, noticing the thin layer of dust that had begun to form on it after not being touched for weeks. A part of him was angry that they didn’t even have the decency to redo the marked-up decals after the last game he played in. It was like as soon as he was ineligible he no longer existed.Sucking his teeth, he walked out of the empty locker room and headed for the field.
It felt like it had been an eternity since he’d heard the clack of cleats against the concrete in the tunnel and smelled the whiffs of gameday food being prepared a little too early, only for it to be shipped next door for a soccer game or somewhere else for basketball. Like the neglected helmet, it only served to make him angrier.
Someone hundreds of miles away had decided he cheated because he was too good. Someone miles away decided that because he didn’t go to Alabama or USC or Ohio State and therefore something was wrong, and he cheated.
And to say he cheated was wrong on its face.
He didn’t take anything. He didn’t cut any corners. He didn’t lie on any forms. He was simply better. Better than everyone else.
So, because they couldn’t stop him on the field, they stopped him in some boardroom somewhere in Indianapolis.
And look where that left them.
The team was already in the midst of practice by the time he stepped on the field, made late by a medical clearance check-up to see if he was ready to return to action after a few weeks on the sideline – on his couch, rather. More NCAA bureaucracy meant to avoid lawsuits; he was told.
He pushed his way to the front of the players before him, pulling on his helmet as he did.
Coach Shuman glanced to his right, tapping a tablet against his hand as he watched the team. The old ball coach raised his eyebrow and gave Caesar a once over.
“You don’t think you need to go stretch and warm-up, Jenkins?” the man said, nodding toward the far endzone where Caesar would have space to do so.
Caesar only shook his head.
Coach Shuman blew his whistle and gestured toward Arion, beckoning for the junior to make way for Caesar. Arion fist bumped Caesar as the two receivers walked in opposite directions.
The journalists who were watching practice perked up when they say #17 back in the huddle. The story shifted for them. It wasn’t about whatever Coach Shuman would update them on after practice anymore. Many of them moved so close to the action that they were almost blending into the team’s staff.
“That boy back, baby,” Tyrone said, dapping Caesar up when he got to the huddle.
Darren slapped him on the back of the helmet before turning to Coach Harley for the next play.
Caesar listened to the play call but still simmered with anger. He walked to his – his – spot out wide when the huddle broke and stared at Christian lined up opposite of him. Marcus shouted an adjustment from safety and the defense shifted.
Darren called for the snap. Caesar jogged forward, planted his foot and burst toward the middle of the field. Finding a soft spot in the zone the coverage had fallen into, he settled down and turned toward the line of scrimmage. Moments later, Darren fired the ball into him for an easy catch.
He turned upfield and was almost immediately met by Blair. The linebacker wrapped him up, but Caesar all but punched the senior in his head. Blair was known for his physicality, but even he was shocked by a stiff arm like that in practice and loosened his grip, allowing Caesar to get his legs moving forward and dragging Blair along.
It took another two players to get his momentum slowed to the point Coach Shuman blew the play dead before one of them got hurt.
The journalists moved a little closer.
…
Devin gave Kendall a little shove before turning to run with the receiver. The senior got on the inside of him, planted his foot and broke toward the numbers before planting his foot again and cutting back toward the sideline.
It was all Devin could do to not bite too hard on the double move. Kendall glanced back over his shoulder and brought his hands up so Devin lunged forward and got just enough of his hand in the way to bat the ball away without bundling into Kendall first.
Kendall cursed under his breath as whistles from back down the field were heard. He scooped up the ball and threw it in the general direction of where the rest of the team was.
“I thought I had your ass,” the senior said, laughing and smacked Devin on his shoulder pads as the two of them jogged back.
“I got lucky.”
Ahead of them, Hayden was getting into it with Caesar and the two of them had to be separated by the coaching staff.
“Calm your fucking ass down. This is practice, you goofy motherfucker!” Hayden shouted as he was shoved back by Coach Major. He lunged toward Caesar again, but enough space had already been created between them that they wouldn’t come to blows.
“I just chipped you, pussy,” Caesar said, shrugging as he walked back to the offensive huddle, led away by Coach Simmons and Coach Scott.
“How the fuck you chip someone ten yards down field? We rewriting the rules of football out here now? Y’all better not send his ass across the middle or it’s light outs for y’all boy,” Hayden said to Coach Harley, pointing at Caesar.
Devin and Kendall looked at one another. Devin shook his head. Kendall shrugged.
“There goes the fucking neighborhood,” Devin said under his breath to himself as he walked back to the defensive huddle.
He’d begun to enjoy football without Caesar again and was probably the only person on the team that was hoping his suspension would turn into something more permanent than a few games.
And it looked like he had only come back as a bigger piece of shit than he had been before the suspension which wasn’t going to do anything but cause headaches for everyone on the team when what happened on the field mattered.
…
Caesar burst off the line and got to the inside of Christian after the junior’s attempt to jam him at the line. He made a slight cut toward the middle of the field and brought in Darren’s pass with one hand with only the smallest hitch in his stride.
He saw Hayden running toward him and picked up speed, making a bee-line for the safety. They both lowered their shoulders. The two collided at full speed with the thud of pads hitting one another sounding.
Caesar stumbled over Hayden as the force of the collision knocked Hayden back. As he fell over, Caesar landed crotch-first on Hayden’s helmet.
The safety quickly shoved him away as he sprung to his feet.
“How’s my dick taste, bitch?” Caesar asked, throwing the ball at him.
Hayden grabbed Caesar’s facemask and swung him around in an attempt to throw him to the ground, pulling the helmet awkwardly up over his face. Caesar threw a punch at Hayden but only succeeded in hitting him in the helmet with his arm.
Caesar’s helmet eventually came off and he threw another punch but missed again. Hayden dropped the helmet and lunged at him to try to take him down again.
The two of them were broken up before things could escalate beyond the insults they continued to throw at one another as the coaching staff shoved them to opposite sidelines.
-*****-
Caesar, Darren, Tyrone, Junie and Kerby walked across the quiet campus after practice, aside from the sounds of the cars passing around them and the typical noises that the night in New Orleans provided on a daily basis. Caesar walked behind the others, not engaging in the conversation as he adjusted the bag of ice that he’d wrapped around his arm and stared off into the distance. The almost bitterly cold air whipping off the lake and the river made the ice feel colder than it was, but he’d survive a short walk out in the elements.
“We gotta hit Bourbon or something. Celebrate that boy Caesar bein’ back out on the field, ready to rumble,” Tyrone said, pointing over his shoulder at Caesar.
“It’s Tuesday,” Darren said, raising an eyebrow. “The last place I want to be tonight is at a strip club on a motherfucking Tuesday. They are sorority houses all around here if you want to see some titties that you don’t have to watch your step around.”
“Older the berry, sweeter the juice, bruh.”
“It’s blacker the berry. It’s always been blacker the berry,” Junie said. “Old berries are rotten. Fuck I look like puttin’ century year old coochie in my face?”
“How often you get 20 year old coochie in your face, my nigga?’ Tyrone asked, earning a shove from Junie. “You better take what you can get. Kerby, tell ya brother that ain’t nothin’ wrong with some well-seasoned women.”
The younger Greer brother held his hands up. “Hey, man. I’m just along for the ride. I finally realized them Divine Nine bitches where it’s at and now I ain’t got to do shit. Y’all could learn a thing or two instead of messin’ with them white girls.”
“Bro,” Darren said, looking at Kerby and shaking his head. “Really? I know you’ve seen all that Delta shit Ramona has. You’re new to the game.”
“And I got the kufi back at the house,” Tyrone said. “As-salamu alaykum, my good brother.”
“You goin’ to hell for sayin’ that shit after lyin’ your ass off,” Junie said.
Caesar’s phone pinged twice in his pocket. Pulling it out, he glanced at the two texts that were on top of the long list of notifications before putting the phone back in his pocket. He broke off from the group and started to head to his building.
Hearing the sound of the grass crunching, Darren looked over his shoulder.
“Hey, man! Where you going? You can’t leave us hanging on your first day back off the porch,” he said as he stopped walking.
“I’ll catch up,” Caesar said over his shoulder. “Just text me where y’all end up.”
“Man, stop playin’ and bring your ass on. That girl probably tired of seein’ you after the last month. Give her a break!” Tyrone shouted.
Caesar ignored Tyrone’s joke and continued walking toward the dorm.
…
Gia stood outside of the building, shivering from the falling temperature. If there was ever a reason that she would leave Louisiana behind for good, it would be the constant extremes of the weather. Only a few hours ago, it was a balmy 83 degrees in New Orleans. Now, it was in the 50s – and she had been waiting for what felt like all those hours.
She spotted Caesar walking toward her and waited as he took his time to get to where she stood. She pulled her arms, crossed over her chest, closer to get more warmth from the sweatshirt she was wearing.
“You should have told me when you were going to get here instead of that vague bullshit you said,” she said.
He hiked his duffel bag up on his shoulder then gestured to it. “I’m coming from fucking practice. We’re done when Shuman says we’re done. If you want to take up a problem with time management then you can take it up with him.”
She rolled her eyes and dropped her arms to her sides. “What do you want, Caesar? I don’t think we should be talking. Everything’s fucked up enough as it is.”
“Yet here you are,” he said. He opened the door to the res hall and held it open for her to walk into the building ahead of her.
She took a step toward the door but hesitated and stopped.
Shrugging, he stepped inside and let the door begin to close, but she stopped it before it shut and followed him to the elevators.
The two of them walked through the halls in silence, and they got onto the elevator in silence. Caesar wore an almost bored look on his face as he waited for the elevator to start moving. However, Gia moved a bit further from him and began absently swiping on her phone.
“No one’s going to think you’re not in here with me,” he said as the elevator doors slid open on the fifth floor.
“I— Well— I—”
“Right. Award winning speech right there.”
The two of them made their way to Caesar’s room and stepped inside after he unlocked the door. He tossed his duffel bag on the floor and walked over to the unmade bed, sitting down on it. He pulled out his phone and answered a few texts.
Gia stopped just in front of the door and looked around at the mostly disheveled room. Clothes were strewn across chairs and things looked out of place. When she was last in there, you could easily see whose side of the room was whose from how clean Caesar’s side was.
It looked like a tornado had hit the whole room.
“Fall cleaning?” she asked, nudging an expensive looking shirt that was on the floor with her foot.
“I’m throwing all that shit away and buying new shit,” he said, waving his hand at the mess.
“Why is your roommate never here?”
He put his phone down on the nightstand. “You’ve been in here like three times. I don’t think you can make the call that my roommate is never here, but fuck that kid. He’s a little bitch and I’m glad he keeps his time in here to a minimum.”
Gia whistled.
“Guess you two aren’t all that close.”
“You want to keep fucking?” he asked, changing the subject abruptly.
“Wait—what?”
“Does thou wish to continue engaging sexual intercourse with me on the occasion that you are requiring of penis?” he asked, his tone mocking.
“What about Kaley?”
He shrugged.
“What about her? That’s your sorority sister. She’s nothing to me. I’m single. Don’t know how someone could get mad about someone doing shit that has nothing to do with them.”
“So, are you trying to replace her with me?” she asked. “No offense, Caesar, but I don’t think I trust you all that much to stay faithful considering. Cheat with me, cheat on me, you know?”
“Who the fuck said we’d be together? I asked you if you wanted to keep fucking not if you wanted to get married,” he said. He brought his hands up and made a triangle with them. He tapped his index fingers together. “It would be like a hierarchy of bitches. You’re at the top then all the other bitches I fuck are backups. Make sense?”
“Wow. That makes me feel great.”
“I mean, I’m not saying you can’t go be unsatisfied with other dudes if I’m otherwise occupied. Again, not trying to be with you. I just thought you had some good pussy and you seemed to enjoy yourself. I prefer to have something reliable in case the chick I find for the night a bit lacking.”
“This is the most unconvincing argument I’ve ever heard,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
He sighed. “But you’re still listening to it and you walked your ass all the way across campus and all the way up here. You clearly aren’t that uninterested in it.”
“I’m not going to be some dirty secret for you.”
“I’m not the only one in this room with secret lovers, Gia. But fine, we can hang out and shit if that makes you feel better.”
“Fine, but I’m not going to hide it from Kaley. I’m going to be honest about what this is with her.”
Standing up from the bed, he walked over to his desk. He pulled his wallet from a drawer and put it in his pocket.
“Again, that’s your friend. Whatever you do or don’t tell her is no concern of mine,” he said as he squeezed by her and opened the door. He waved for her to leave.
She furrowed her eyebrows but didn’t move. “That’s all you asked me to come over here for?”
“I’m leaving. We’re going to Bourbon. I’ll text you on the way back to see if you want to fuck if I don’t run into something else out there.”
“Already fucking regretting this,” she said, pushing past him into the hall. “Maybe I’ll have found something better for the night.”
“You won’t.”
He shut the door and followed her to the elevator.
-*****-
Christian and Devin walked into a meeting room in the school’s student center. Inside a number of athletes from Tulane’s various sports mingled in conversation with one another.Devin recognized a few of them either from his attempts to take more of an interest in sports other than football or from passings by in the athletics building. But he did feel a bit bad for not knowing more of them. After all, these were the types of people who would best know his plight of trying to navigate life at a what many would consider a Southern Ivy while being an athlete.
“We all meet once a month. Meet and greets, basically. We’re all in the same boat so it’s good to know each other. Besides, all good people. This is the closest thing you’re ever going to get to a union at an American university until someone gets the labor board to see athletes as employees of the universities,” Christian said, gesturing to the other people in the room as he explained.
“We’re not employees?”
“Nah. Everyone considered that a closed question when NIL came around, but we still have power in numbers even if not on the books, right? Grambling used to have terrible facilities. Black mold and everything. Then all their athletes kept refusing to play. You’d get threats to pull scholarships and shit, but what are you going to do? Recruit another 500 athletes next year? Good luck with that.”
“Makes sense,” Devin said.
“You always have to keep an eye on what the folks up front are doing. We don’t have the problems here that Grambling had because we’re private and they’re an HBCU relying on, unfortunately, Louisiana for their budget but that doesn’t mean they can’t try to fuck us over. We make them money by putting our bodies on the line. And whether they want to admit it or not, they’ll push that to the limits for a few extra dollars. Tulane didn’t rejoin the SEC because it’s a collection of universities with stellar academics,” Christian said.
Devin nodded as he listened. It all made sense to him, as much sense as it could make with his limited understanding of things beyond football and class.
Of course, Christian would be the one involved in this. No one could figure out how he had the time for everything he did but he made it happen.
Out of curiosity, Devin had checked the mock drafts for the upcoming NFL Draft and while his scout report was glittering as one of the top corners in the country – he was slated as a third-round pick as best.
Because, according to the site, general managers were unsure if his heart was in football at the pro level.
That didn’t seem to bother Christian, though.
“C’mon. You have to move around and meet folks,” Christian said, dragging Devin along as he moved through the crowd of people.
He stopped when he came to two guys and a girl. They paused their conversation to greet him.
“What’s up, bro?” a tall, lanky white guy said, dapping up Christian. He was taller than both Christian and Devin by a couple of inches. To Devin, the guy just looked like the stereotypical baseball player even without the Tulane baseball hoodie he wore.
“Another day in paradise as you would say.” He turned to Devin. “This is my boy, Drew Gautreaux. He’s from down your neck of the woods, I think?”
Drew nodded. “You went to school with my little cousin. He lived in Dularge. I went to H.L. though and been here and there for a few years before you even sprung up.”
The other guy nudged the girl with his elbow and pointed between Drew and Devin. “You know how happy he is that he’ll be able to say that Cajun French shit and someone will understand him now? Man been waiting for that for years.”
“Do I have to remind you that we’re in New Orleans? On parle tous un peu français! Right, Devin?”
Devin shrugged. “I only know a little from one of my ex’s parents.”
“Mais, c’mon now,” Drew said, shaking his head. “You can’t be coming up here making us look bad. I’m going to have to teach you some of our language so you can represent right.”
Christian laughed. He pointed to the other two in the group. The other guy dwarfed Drew a bit. “Cortez Vail, or as I like to call him fake ass Victor Wenbanyama.”
“You still mad about that time I dunked on your bitch ass at the rec, huh?” Cortez said, laughing. He turned to Devin. “Yo, when I tell you that some people need to stick to what they do best and not try to play any other sport? Christian that dude. This man got a jumper that a toddler can send. And don’t even get me started on his handles.”
“You just tall, bro,” Christian said. “Anyway, this is—”
“I’m a grown ass woman. I can speak for myself,” she said, raising her eyebrow.
Christian held his hands up. “My bad.”
“Tyesha,” she said to Devin.
Devin nodded his greeting. He’d heard of her before. A transfer from LSU, she was a track star. A future Olympian depending on who you asked. If you asked other people, they just said she was Sha’Carri Richardson 2.0 in more ways than one.
“How’d you get unlucky enough to have this clown following you around?” Tyesha asked, pointing to Christian.
“He ain’t so bad once you get used to him,” Devin said with a shrug. “I just don’t know when I’m going to get used to him. Maybe by the time he graduates.”
“We’re supposed to be family, man,” Christian said, holding his hand against his chest. “I’m going to tell the guys to put your ass out the group chat for that one.”
“If family can’t clown you from time to time, then who can?” Devin asked.
Cortez pulled his phone out of his pocket. “If you really want to get a laugh at my boy’s expense, let me show that time I dunked on him.”
“Why do you even still have that?” Christian asked, shaking his head but glancing down at the phone all the same.
Drew laughed. “If I dunked on anyone, I would keep that shit for the rest of my life, too. Especially if I dunked on someone who is actually athletic.”
Tyesha leaned over to Devin. “I’m not saying it’s a stereotype that he can’t dunk, but don’t you think someone who is like 6’5” should be able to at least grab the rim?”
“I would say so,” Devin said, nodding.
“I heard that shit. It’s 2052. We have to stop putting people down for their inability to dunk,” Drew said.
“I mean, you are like 6’5” and baseball players jump all the time.”
“Outfielders jump all the time. All I do is throw it and hope they aren’t jumping at the wall because it got cracked,” he said. “But if Christian can claim that family bit, I should be able to! We’re from the same city, man!”
“Again, if family can’t clown you from time to time, then who can?”
“Yo, I like him already,” Tyesha said, laughing. “You ain’t shit because you football niggas get all the good shit but you alright. Just help me out and slide me some of the shit they give you that you don’t want.”
Devin looked her over.
“I don’t think we’re the same size.”
“For free shit? I’ll make it work.”
Christian looked up. “What happened to ‘ain’t shit free about you,’ Tyesha?”
“About me,” she corrected. “Don’t stick your nose in grown folks business. We negotiating over here. Just let me know when you don’t want something. I’ll make it work.”
“You got it,” Devin said, laughing.
-
Captain Canada
- Posts: 2183
- Joined: 01 Dec 2018, 00:15
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
Just read through. Quality as per usual, keep it coming
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
A Different Path
Anna failed to hide the grimace on her face as Ron stood next to an old sedan that looked like it hadn’t seen a good day since it rolled out of the factory. She adjusted the scarf around her neck and shoved her hands back into her pockets.
“I get that you’re just trying to get any car, but does it have to be one that looks like it still runs on gas? You aren’t leaving tomorrow. I’m sure you want some kind of comfort between now and whenever it is that you are,” she said as a gust of cold air caused a shiver to run through her body.
It was a cold, blustery day in Texas. An arctic blast had swept over the state and the concerns that the power grid couldn’t handle the surge of power being used that night still lingered over the Lone Star State from the ‘20s when that was a regular occurrence. Temperatures had already plummeted into the teens the night before and threatened to go lower in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
In other words, not the best day to be car shopping – especially for a jalopy.
He looked up at her and shrugged. His goal was to get the cheapest car on the lot and as far as he could tell, the one they were standing next to fit the bill. The tires were a little bald and the touchscreen in the center console looked like it was cracked from the outside – or the window was cracked. They hadn’t decided which one yet.
“I don’t go anywhere. Class, practice, film, whatever. It’s all on campus. I don’t need anything better than this. I’m not going to drive it.”
“$5,000 is $4,500 too much for this car on a good day and this isn’t a good day. Besides, you do take me out from time to time. Having to get out to push a car is really going to kill the mood on a date, don’t you think?”
“You have a car,” Ron said as he tested the door to see if it was unlocked. “We’ll take yours, so you don’t have to worry about pushing.”
A man dashed out of the office in their direction, rubbing his hands together to try to stave off the numbing that had already begun. His face lit up when he noticed a local celebrity standing on the lot next to a junker. Hell, there was a billboard with Ron’s face on it just a couple lights down the road from the dealership.
“Bennie Johnson, what can I do you for?” the man asked in a heavy Texan accent before he’d even closed the distance with Ron and Anna. He stuck out his hand out for Ron to shake which he did. He nodded to Anna. “Ma’am.”
Ron pointed to the car. “I want this one.”
“I can’t have you riding around campus in that, son! I got some better stock on the other side over there. A couple 2050 Teslas with only 70,000 miles on them. A lot of wear on them boots but still going strong,” the salesman said. He pointed to the opposite side of the lot. “If you’ll just walk over with me, I can let you check them out!”
“I’m good. This one will do,” Ron said.
Bennie Johnson failed to hide his disappointment at not being able to get a slice of the NIL mega bucks Ron had racked in, but a sale was a sale, so he shrugged and beckoned for them to follow him back into the office.
“Are you going to be financing?” Bennie asked. “I think we can work something out for you if your credit is looking kinda shaky. I know not having to take out them student loans mess you boys up when it comes to building that up.
Ron pointed to his car, parked in front of the lobby. “Trade-in.”
“That car is worth at least 40 grand. Maybe 30 – depending on if our mechanics find anything when they give it a once over, you know? It got a lot of miles on it? Clean title?” he asked. “You’re not trying to pawn something off on me that the cops are going to be looking for, are you?”
“Everything’s on the up and up. I’m just downsizing. Whatever it’s worth to you is what I’m going to take,” Ron said before nodding over his shoulder. “And that car, of course.”
The man rubbed his hands together, both in glee and to warm them up again. He was already thinking about the flip he would be able to get on a mostly new car that he could say belonged to one of the more favored adopted sons of the area.
“Come on inside and let’s talk numbers. Y’all want some coffee? Hot cocoa? I think they cleaned the pot this morning.”
…
A couple hours later, Ron and Anna sat in her car outside of a local Chick-Fil-A as he waited for the dealership to get his “new” car ready for him to take ownership of.
“You going to eat your fries?” Anna asked, jostling the bag as her hand had already reached for the carton that was sitting untouched inside.
He shook his head and held out the half full carton of chicken nuggets to her as well. “You can have those, too. Never really been a fan of bigot chicken. Them saying ‘my pleasure’ doesn’t exactly make their food better.”
She took the box from him and placed it into the empty box in her lap. “We passed a Popeye’s, Cane’s and Zaxby’s before we got here, and you didn’t say anything until now? Sounds like you can’t do much complaining, buddy. Closed mouths don’t get fed.”
“Those options aren’t much better. Those people just aren’t bigots, but it’s still fast food chicken. I do have practice this afternoon, you know?”
“Yeah, you don’t do much out there so that dog don’t hunt. They could run the whole thing without you and would still win on Saturday. Matter of fact, I’d argue that you really bring down the quality of play out there. I would bench you if I was the coach,” she said, but teasing was evident in her tone.
“Oh yeah?” Ron said, laughing. “I think you need more credentials than ‘has nice tits and a decent ass’ to coach an elite college football program.”
She wagged her finger at him. “I don’t need to know what I’m doing but we’re talking about managing a bunch of 18-, 19- and 20-year-old boys. Y’all will do a lot for a set of nice tits and an amazing ass. Especially backups. You think the guys behind you get pussy? Walking up to sorority girls and saying, ‘I’m the sixth string quarterback for the Frogs, baby.’ Yeah, doesn’t have the same umph.”
That elicited another laugh from Ron.
“Guess it’s a good thing that like three of those dudes are married.”
“Really? At 20, 21?” she asked, eyebrow raised.
“Israel is 24, couple of redshirts and waivers. Calvin is at least 28. That motherfucker has two grown children. Played in the minors. Nick’s just a Mormon and got married at 19.”
“Nick’s the in then. He’s never seen titties. That’s why he came to Texas instead of going to BYU.”
“Well, good luck with that plan, coach. I’d imagine he’s seen at least two,” Ron said, joking.
“Have you told anyone else that you are planning on enlisting at the end of the season?” she asked, shifting the conversation to more serious matters.
He shrugged and shook his head. “Just you and Caesar. I don’t want that getting out and the media going all crazy about the shit while we’re in the middle of the season. I think have to enroll for spring classes to be eligible to play in the national championship so that makes shit all wonky because I’ll enroll then withdraw.”
“Are you sure you still want to do this? You know you could join the Coast Guard or National Guard? Hell, join the Texas Rangers.”
“That sounds like an awful lot of concern coming from someone who didn’t want to let me fuck because they didn’t want to be a politician’s wife or a step on a social climber’s ladder.”
She smacked him in the shoulder. “Don’t be a dick about it.”
“My bad,” he said, holding up his hand as an apology. “Yeah, I’ve been pretty set on this for a while now. It’s not something I’m doing to just look good to other people, you know? I feel like this is what I need to do with my life. Football’s run its course for me. When I finish my time, I can figure out what’s next but that’s the near future.”
“Alright,” she said with a sigh. She moved all of the boxes and bags into the backseat. “I’m going to go piss before we go back to the dealership and see what’s taking them so long to get that piece of shit you just bought running.”
“They probably have to handcrank a generator to charge it up.”
She snorted and rolled her eyes as she got out of the car.
Laying his head back against the headrest, Ron rubbed his eyes. His phone buzzed with messages from agents and those with offers of likeness deals, mixed with the slowly dwindling number of texts from women trying to get a payday from him -- the fact he never answered them surely starting to get out and prompting them to seek better options.
He reached down and cleared all the notifications a few times without opening any. Bringing up his contacts, he scrolled down to Caesar and hit call.
The phone rang a few times before going to a voicemail box that had been full since they were still teenagers. Knowing the rigors of a college football player’s schedule, he shrugged before shooting Caesar a text asking that he give him a call back when he could.
Anna all but ran back to the car, barely avoiding a wipeout when she skidded to a stop on the icy pavement. She jumped back in the car and cranked up the heat.
“I fucking wish the way Republicans talked about climate change was what actually happened because this winter shit in Texas is for the fucking birds,” she said, rubbing at her arms. “If I wanted to piss icicles, I would’ve moved to Oregon.”
He shook his head and laughed.
Since his suspension, he’d taken to running the levees every afternoon and well into the night. And if he wasn’t on the levees, he was using the URec’s rudimentary weight facilities or joining some would-be MMA aficionado at one of the gyms around the city. The lifting of that suspension got him back in LSU’s world class weight room, but he’d grown to enjoy running on those earthen works that had protected the city for over a hundred years.
Now, he was only a couple of days away from getting back on the field.
He felt like a caged animal ready to be unleashed and that was bleeding into his play even in practice. Despite appreciating a cruise missile safety, Coach Justice had told him multiple times over the past week to tone it down – at least against his own guys.
In his mind, he bore the responsibility of the Tigers’ 3-5 record and the uphill battle they were looking at to even reach bowl eligibility in the final four games of the season. Pundits had already tabbed at least two more losses in those four meetings, and one toss-up that could go either way.
He had become a distraction to a team that was already ailing from the walking wounded quarterback room LSU had. They didn’t need anything added on top of that and the man who donated the sperm to create him’s chase for money had done just that.
It made the post-Thanksgiving game against Tulane that much more important.
Whether LSU got to a bowl game this season was irrelevant. They would bounce back next season. But there would be no sweeter revenge for him than stopping Deion Jenkins’ golden child from finishing a season 12-0 – if the Green Wave didn’t slip up before then.
Glancing down at his smart watch, he turned around and started to make his way back toward the campus.
…
Stepping over a pair of garbage bags that Hasan had left next to the counter, Erik headed toward the door where the sound of soft knocking could be heard. He looked through the peephole despite knowing who was on the other side, more out of habit than anything else. It was the same reason that he peeked through the blinds to the side of the door to check if anyone else was standing outside before he started unlocking the door.
One could never be cautious enough if they wanted to avoid having their door kicked in.
He sighed, shaking his head at the ridiculous ritual before opening the door and stepping aside so the girl on the other side could get out of the cold. Erik didn’t make a secret of checking out her ass as she walked by him.
He and Denyse had been in a “situationship” for a couple months, both dancing around making things more serious. She said she didn’t trust him because men were “dogs” and men who were athletes were the “dirtiest of dogs.” For his part, he didn’t have any interest in relationships considering his upbringing.
“I’m going to start making your black ass walk across campus if you keep making me wait forever outside to open the door,” she said, rubbing her arms.
Erik held up his hand, fist clenched except his pinky which pointed up and tapped the windbreaker she wore with the other hand. “Don’t they give y’all thicker jackets, soror? I know it’s Louisiana, but you can’t possibly get a good ‘skee-wee’ out when you step into the party like them AKAs on the Bluff if you freezing your ass off.”
She smacked his hand down. “Keep playing with me. I’m not one of them white girls y’all probably usually have up and through here.”
“Hasan Farrakhan back there?” he asked, turning to walk down the hall to his room.
She followed him as he did.
“He the one that brings them over! You too quiet. They don’t like that because you’re not going to make them famous.”
“You got the whole thing scoped out, huh? Sounds like you been following me,” he said. He stepped out of her way when they walked into his room to close the door behind her.
Despite Erik laying claim to the biggest of the three rooms in the apartment, it was also the sparsest. Only the bed under the window, a nightstand, an ottoman, and a desk and chair filled the room – and everything was clean from a daily regiment of tidying up the entire room each morning when he woke up.
One thing broke up the spartan décor, however. On the wall hung a set of tattered and worn through football jerseys. Six black and red jerseys and one white, one from every team Erik had been a part of over the last seven years.
“There’s nothing that needs to be scoped out. Campus is big, but it ain’t that big. And y’all type been the same for decades. I watch the NFL and NBA Draft just like everyone else,” she said, sitting down on the bed to take her boots off.
She put them next to the bed, but Erik moved them into the corner before walking around to lay down in the bed himself.
Denyse didn’t say anything about his quirks of things needing to be in certain places. She’d thought about it a couple times but figured he had OCD and left it at that. It wasn’t as if he asked anything of her to move things around. He’d just do it. That was fine with her.
She laid down as well and snuggled up next to him, tossing her leg over his and her arm over his stomach.
“Y’all going to Alabama tomorrow, right?” she asked.
He nodded despite her not being able to see his face with her head on his chest. “Auburn, yeah. I don’t know if all my shit is going to be together by then, but I’m getting on the plane.”
“You’re not as tense as you been the last few weeks. Shit, week before last, you were wound up like a top.”
“Wound up like a top?” he asked, laughing. “Is that something y’all say up north?”
She smacked him in the ribs. “First of all, kiss my ass. Second of all, I don’t know when St. Louis became ‘up north.’ I’m pretty sure Missouri been considered the South since Missouri been a thing.”
“It snows in Missouri. That shit is the north.”
“It’s snowing in Texas tomorrow! You one of them northern negroes?”
“That’s not normal, though. That’s every year up there. I know y’all don’t have much culture that you didn’t steal from us but maybe y’all should’ve been stealing from New York City and wearing Tims and Yankee fitteds for the last 60 years.”
“I don’t think they wear Tims and Yankee fitteds anymore. But you can’t be trying to clown no one when you’re from somewhere where motherfuckers be riding horses on city streets and wearing cowboy hats,” she said, laughing. “Talking about any ‘Howdy, ma’am. Can you point me to the nearest saloon? My hoss is parched and I gotta get back on that old dusty trail.’”
Her attempt at a Texan accent made him laugh as well.
“But for real, I’m just glad that shit with the NCAA is over. I never had to cheat for what I got, but you know, guilty by association. Ain’t but a little set back, though,” he said.
She leaned back so she could look up at him. “Well, shit. I bought you something to try to help you de-stress but if you all good now then I guess you don’t need it.”
He reached his hand into her jacket pocket, but it was empty. “I might not need it, but I still want it. Where is it?”
“Not in my pockets. I got it on.”
“Got it on?”
She nodded and climbed over him to get out of the bed on the side he was laying on. She made a show of taking off her jacket and the sweater she wore underneath it. Erik sat up when he saw the red lacy lingerie bra under the sweater. He pulled her between his legs and unbuttoned her jeans for her, revealing the matching panties.
He took a moment to take in how it perfectly complimented her skin before his lust took over and he pulled her down on top of him.
She laughed and playfully shoved him.
… then his phone began vibrating on the nightstand.
Denyse looked back first and reached for the phone.
“Reject it,” he said, still focused on her body.
She moved off him and handed him the phone. An incoming video call was on the screen. When he saw the name on the screen, his mood changed, and he quickly sat up before accepting the call.
“Jazz, what are you doing awake? It’s one in the morning,” he said when the phone connected.
On the screen was a young girl, only six years old.
“They’re arguing outside, and it woke me up. I’m scared,” she said.
He knew that when she said people were arguing outside that she was referring to the people who typically milled around the apartment complex he grew up in. It wasn’t the safest neighborhood and tempers were prone to boil into violence if cooler heads didn’t prevail.
“Where’s your dad? Or my mom?”
Jazz shrugged. “I don’t know. Daddy said he was going to grandma’s. I tried to call him, but he didn’t answer so I called you.”
Erik had to take a deep breath. Jazz, or Jazzmine, was basically his stepsister. Her father, Eugene, and his mother had been in some kind of relationship since she was only a baby. Her mother left them as soon as she gave birth. Over the years, Erik had done more raising of Jazz than her father did. Babies raising babies as some would say.
But he’d been old enough to know Eugene had an alcohol problem. Typically, when he told Jazz that he was going to “her grandma’s,” he was actually going to a bar. Erik had dragged him out of more than a few of them once he was big enough.
“Then why aren’t you at Ms. Johnson’s?” he asked.
“Your mom told me that Ms. Johnson doesn’t want me there anymore,” she said in a small voice.
He sighed. “I’m going to call my mom and Ms. Johnson in the morning and see what the problem is. But you need to go to sleep because you have school in the morning. Go sleep in my room.”
“Can I turn on the stars?!”
“Yeah, go ahead.”
He always left out that his room was safer than hers because it was on the side of the apartment that was furthest away from the balcony where people hung out all hours of the day and night. One day, she’d probably figure that out either if she was still living there when she got older, or it’d be a childhood memory to discuss on a therapist’s couch.
She almost fell out of the bed running to Erik’s old room. He could see her fumbling with a set of wires along the wall.
“Just plug it in, Jazz,” he said. “Be careful.”
“Oh,” she said and did as she was told, turning on a set of lights that cast stars on the ceiling. She then she jumped under the covers that probably hadn’t been changed since he left for Baton Rouge – but probably still clean.
“Remember what you are when the stars are on?”
“A superhero!”
He nodded. “And superheroes aren’t scared of nobody, especially some bums outside, so now go to sleep.”
“Can you stay on the phone with me until I do?”
“I would, but I don’t want your phone to die so I’m going to hang up but call me back if you need to. I’m going to turn the ringer up, so it’ll wake me up if I fall asleep. Okay?”
“Okay,” she said with a tinge of sadness in her voice. “Night, Erik.”
“Night, Jazz.” He waited until she hung up to switch the ringer to the loudest setting then he set the phone down and run his hand down his face.
He looked up at Denyse having forgotten she was in the room. “Sorry about that. You know she can be a handful sometimes.”
Denyse smiled and put the phone back on the nightstand. She pushed her pants over her hips and to the floor before pushing Erik onto his back.
“Let me take care of you now,” she said, reaching for the waistband of his sweatpants.
Anna failed to hide the grimace on her face as Ron stood next to an old sedan that looked like it hadn’t seen a good day since it rolled out of the factory. She adjusted the scarf around her neck and shoved her hands back into her pockets.
“I get that you’re just trying to get any car, but does it have to be one that looks like it still runs on gas? You aren’t leaving tomorrow. I’m sure you want some kind of comfort between now and whenever it is that you are,” she said as a gust of cold air caused a shiver to run through her body.
It was a cold, blustery day in Texas. An arctic blast had swept over the state and the concerns that the power grid couldn’t handle the surge of power being used that night still lingered over the Lone Star State from the ‘20s when that was a regular occurrence. Temperatures had already plummeted into the teens the night before and threatened to go lower in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
In other words, not the best day to be car shopping – especially for a jalopy.
He looked up at her and shrugged. His goal was to get the cheapest car on the lot and as far as he could tell, the one they were standing next to fit the bill. The tires were a little bald and the touchscreen in the center console looked like it was cracked from the outside – or the window was cracked. They hadn’t decided which one yet.
“I don’t go anywhere. Class, practice, film, whatever. It’s all on campus. I don’t need anything better than this. I’m not going to drive it.”
“$5,000 is $4,500 too much for this car on a good day and this isn’t a good day. Besides, you do take me out from time to time. Having to get out to push a car is really going to kill the mood on a date, don’t you think?”
“You have a car,” Ron said as he tested the door to see if it was unlocked. “We’ll take yours, so you don’t have to worry about pushing.”
A man dashed out of the office in their direction, rubbing his hands together to try to stave off the numbing that had already begun. His face lit up when he noticed a local celebrity standing on the lot next to a junker. Hell, there was a billboard with Ron’s face on it just a couple lights down the road from the dealership.
“Bennie Johnson, what can I do you for?” the man asked in a heavy Texan accent before he’d even closed the distance with Ron and Anna. He stuck out his hand out for Ron to shake which he did. He nodded to Anna. “Ma’am.”
Ron pointed to the car. “I want this one.”
“I can’t have you riding around campus in that, son! I got some better stock on the other side over there. A couple 2050 Teslas with only 70,000 miles on them. A lot of wear on them boots but still going strong,” the salesman said. He pointed to the opposite side of the lot. “If you’ll just walk over with me, I can let you check them out!”
“I’m good. This one will do,” Ron said.
Bennie Johnson failed to hide his disappointment at not being able to get a slice of the NIL mega bucks Ron had racked in, but a sale was a sale, so he shrugged and beckoned for them to follow him back into the office.
“Are you going to be financing?” Bennie asked. “I think we can work something out for you if your credit is looking kinda shaky. I know not having to take out them student loans mess you boys up when it comes to building that up.
Ron pointed to his car, parked in front of the lobby. “Trade-in.”
“That car is worth at least 40 grand. Maybe 30 – depending on if our mechanics find anything when they give it a once over, you know? It got a lot of miles on it? Clean title?” he asked. “You’re not trying to pawn something off on me that the cops are going to be looking for, are you?”
“Everything’s on the up and up. I’m just downsizing. Whatever it’s worth to you is what I’m going to take,” Ron said before nodding over his shoulder. “And that car, of course.”
The man rubbed his hands together, both in glee and to warm them up again. He was already thinking about the flip he would be able to get on a mostly new car that he could say belonged to one of the more favored adopted sons of the area.
“Come on inside and let’s talk numbers. Y’all want some coffee? Hot cocoa? I think they cleaned the pot this morning.”
…
A couple hours later, Ron and Anna sat in her car outside of a local Chick-Fil-A as he waited for the dealership to get his “new” car ready for him to take ownership of.
“You going to eat your fries?” Anna asked, jostling the bag as her hand had already reached for the carton that was sitting untouched inside.
He shook his head and held out the half full carton of chicken nuggets to her as well. “You can have those, too. Never really been a fan of bigot chicken. Them saying ‘my pleasure’ doesn’t exactly make their food better.”
She took the box from him and placed it into the empty box in her lap. “We passed a Popeye’s, Cane’s and Zaxby’s before we got here, and you didn’t say anything until now? Sounds like you can’t do much complaining, buddy. Closed mouths don’t get fed.”
“Those options aren’t much better. Those people just aren’t bigots, but it’s still fast food chicken. I do have practice this afternoon, you know?”
“Yeah, you don’t do much out there so that dog don’t hunt. They could run the whole thing without you and would still win on Saturday. Matter of fact, I’d argue that you really bring down the quality of play out there. I would bench you if I was the coach,” she said, but teasing was evident in her tone.
“Oh yeah?” Ron said, laughing. “I think you need more credentials than ‘has nice tits and a decent ass’ to coach an elite college football program.”
She wagged her finger at him. “I don’t need to know what I’m doing but we’re talking about managing a bunch of 18-, 19- and 20-year-old boys. Y’all will do a lot for a set of nice tits and an amazing ass. Especially backups. You think the guys behind you get pussy? Walking up to sorority girls and saying, ‘I’m the sixth string quarterback for the Frogs, baby.’ Yeah, doesn’t have the same umph.”
That elicited another laugh from Ron.
“Guess it’s a good thing that like three of those dudes are married.”
“Really? At 20, 21?” she asked, eyebrow raised.
“Israel is 24, couple of redshirts and waivers. Calvin is at least 28. That motherfucker has two grown children. Played in the minors. Nick’s just a Mormon and got married at 19.”
“Nick’s the in then. He’s never seen titties. That’s why he came to Texas instead of going to BYU.”
“Well, good luck with that plan, coach. I’d imagine he’s seen at least two,” Ron said, joking.
“Have you told anyone else that you are planning on enlisting at the end of the season?” she asked, shifting the conversation to more serious matters.
He shrugged and shook his head. “Just you and Caesar. I don’t want that getting out and the media going all crazy about the shit while we’re in the middle of the season. I think have to enroll for spring classes to be eligible to play in the national championship so that makes shit all wonky because I’ll enroll then withdraw.”
“Are you sure you still want to do this? You know you could join the Coast Guard or National Guard? Hell, join the Texas Rangers.”
“That sounds like an awful lot of concern coming from someone who didn’t want to let me fuck because they didn’t want to be a politician’s wife or a step on a social climber’s ladder.”
She smacked him in the shoulder. “Don’t be a dick about it.”
“My bad,” he said, holding up his hand as an apology. “Yeah, I’ve been pretty set on this for a while now. It’s not something I’m doing to just look good to other people, you know? I feel like this is what I need to do with my life. Football’s run its course for me. When I finish my time, I can figure out what’s next but that’s the near future.”
“Alright,” she said with a sigh. She moved all of the boxes and bags into the backseat. “I’m going to go piss before we go back to the dealership and see what’s taking them so long to get that piece of shit you just bought running.”
“They probably have to handcrank a generator to charge it up.”
She snorted and rolled her eyes as she got out of the car.
Laying his head back against the headrest, Ron rubbed his eyes. His phone buzzed with messages from agents and those with offers of likeness deals, mixed with the slowly dwindling number of texts from women trying to get a payday from him -- the fact he never answered them surely starting to get out and prompting them to seek better options.
He reached down and cleared all the notifications a few times without opening any. Bringing up his contacts, he scrolled down to Caesar and hit call.
The phone rang a few times before going to a voicemail box that had been full since they were still teenagers. Knowing the rigors of a college football player’s schedule, he shrugged before shooting Caesar a text asking that he give him a call back when he could.
Anna all but ran back to the car, barely avoiding a wipeout when she skidded to a stop on the icy pavement. She jumped back in the car and cranked up the heat.
“I fucking wish the way Republicans talked about climate change was what actually happened because this winter shit in Texas is for the fucking birds,” she said, rubbing at her arms. “If I wanted to piss icicles, I would’ve moved to Oregon.”
He shook his head and laughed.
-*****-
Erik jogged at a brisk pace on top of the levees that protected Baton Rouge from the waters of the mighty Mississippi River. Despite being only a few dozen feet from the busy city streets of Louisiana’s capital, the only sounds he could hear was that of his feet hitting the ground, his breathing, the plates moving in the weighted vest he wore and the occasional ship passing on the river jostling the water.Since his suspension, he’d taken to running the levees every afternoon and well into the night. And if he wasn’t on the levees, he was using the URec’s rudimentary weight facilities or joining some would-be MMA aficionado at one of the gyms around the city. The lifting of that suspension got him back in LSU’s world class weight room, but he’d grown to enjoy running on those earthen works that had protected the city for over a hundred years.
Now, he was only a couple of days away from getting back on the field.
He felt like a caged animal ready to be unleashed and that was bleeding into his play even in practice. Despite appreciating a cruise missile safety, Coach Justice had told him multiple times over the past week to tone it down – at least against his own guys.
In his mind, he bore the responsibility of the Tigers’ 3-5 record and the uphill battle they were looking at to even reach bowl eligibility in the final four games of the season. Pundits had already tabbed at least two more losses in those four meetings, and one toss-up that could go either way.
He had become a distraction to a team that was already ailing from the walking wounded quarterback room LSU had. They didn’t need anything added on top of that and the man who donated the sperm to create him’s chase for money had done just that.
It made the post-Thanksgiving game against Tulane that much more important.
Whether LSU got to a bowl game this season was irrelevant. They would bounce back next season. But there would be no sweeter revenge for him than stopping Deion Jenkins’ golden child from finishing a season 12-0 – if the Green Wave didn’t slip up before then.
Glancing down at his smart watch, he turned around and started to make his way back toward the campus.
…
Stepping over a pair of garbage bags that Hasan had left next to the counter, Erik headed toward the door where the sound of soft knocking could be heard. He looked through the peephole despite knowing who was on the other side, more out of habit than anything else. It was the same reason that he peeked through the blinds to the side of the door to check if anyone else was standing outside before he started unlocking the door.
One could never be cautious enough if they wanted to avoid having their door kicked in.
He sighed, shaking his head at the ridiculous ritual before opening the door and stepping aside so the girl on the other side could get out of the cold. Erik didn’t make a secret of checking out her ass as she walked by him.
He and Denyse had been in a “situationship” for a couple months, both dancing around making things more serious. She said she didn’t trust him because men were “dogs” and men who were athletes were the “dirtiest of dogs.” For his part, he didn’t have any interest in relationships considering his upbringing.
“I’m going to start making your black ass walk across campus if you keep making me wait forever outside to open the door,” she said, rubbing her arms.
Erik held up his hand, fist clenched except his pinky which pointed up and tapped the windbreaker she wore with the other hand. “Don’t they give y’all thicker jackets, soror? I know it’s Louisiana, but you can’t possibly get a good ‘skee-wee’ out when you step into the party like them AKAs on the Bluff if you freezing your ass off.”
She smacked his hand down. “Keep playing with me. I’m not one of them white girls y’all probably usually have up and through here.”
“Hasan Farrakhan back there?” he asked, turning to walk down the hall to his room.
She followed him as he did.
“He the one that brings them over! You too quiet. They don’t like that because you’re not going to make them famous.”
“You got the whole thing scoped out, huh? Sounds like you been following me,” he said. He stepped out of her way when they walked into his room to close the door behind her.
Despite Erik laying claim to the biggest of the three rooms in the apartment, it was also the sparsest. Only the bed under the window, a nightstand, an ottoman, and a desk and chair filled the room – and everything was clean from a daily regiment of tidying up the entire room each morning when he woke up.
One thing broke up the spartan décor, however. On the wall hung a set of tattered and worn through football jerseys. Six black and red jerseys and one white, one from every team Erik had been a part of over the last seven years.
“There’s nothing that needs to be scoped out. Campus is big, but it ain’t that big. And y’all type been the same for decades. I watch the NFL and NBA Draft just like everyone else,” she said, sitting down on the bed to take her boots off.
She put them next to the bed, but Erik moved them into the corner before walking around to lay down in the bed himself.
Denyse didn’t say anything about his quirks of things needing to be in certain places. She’d thought about it a couple times but figured he had OCD and left it at that. It wasn’t as if he asked anything of her to move things around. He’d just do it. That was fine with her.
She laid down as well and snuggled up next to him, tossing her leg over his and her arm over his stomach.
“Y’all going to Alabama tomorrow, right?” she asked.
He nodded despite her not being able to see his face with her head on his chest. “Auburn, yeah. I don’t know if all my shit is going to be together by then, but I’m getting on the plane.”
“You’re not as tense as you been the last few weeks. Shit, week before last, you were wound up like a top.”
“Wound up like a top?” he asked, laughing. “Is that something y’all say up north?”
She smacked him in the ribs. “First of all, kiss my ass. Second of all, I don’t know when St. Louis became ‘up north.’ I’m pretty sure Missouri been considered the South since Missouri been a thing.”
“It snows in Missouri. That shit is the north.”
“It’s snowing in Texas tomorrow! You one of them northern negroes?”
“That’s not normal, though. That’s every year up there. I know y’all don’t have much culture that you didn’t steal from us but maybe y’all should’ve been stealing from New York City and wearing Tims and Yankee fitteds for the last 60 years.”
“I don’t think they wear Tims and Yankee fitteds anymore. But you can’t be trying to clown no one when you’re from somewhere where motherfuckers be riding horses on city streets and wearing cowboy hats,” she said, laughing. “Talking about any ‘Howdy, ma’am. Can you point me to the nearest saloon? My hoss is parched and I gotta get back on that old dusty trail.’”
Her attempt at a Texan accent made him laugh as well.
“But for real, I’m just glad that shit with the NCAA is over. I never had to cheat for what I got, but you know, guilty by association. Ain’t but a little set back, though,” he said.
She leaned back so she could look up at him. “Well, shit. I bought you something to try to help you de-stress but if you all good now then I guess you don’t need it.”
He reached his hand into her jacket pocket, but it was empty. “I might not need it, but I still want it. Where is it?”
“Not in my pockets. I got it on.”
“Got it on?”
She nodded and climbed over him to get out of the bed on the side he was laying on. She made a show of taking off her jacket and the sweater she wore underneath it. Erik sat up when he saw the red lacy lingerie bra under the sweater. He pulled her between his legs and unbuttoned her jeans for her, revealing the matching panties.
He took a moment to take in how it perfectly complimented her skin before his lust took over and he pulled her down on top of him.
She laughed and playfully shoved him.
… then his phone began vibrating on the nightstand.
Denyse looked back first and reached for the phone.
“Reject it,” he said, still focused on her body.
She moved off him and handed him the phone. An incoming video call was on the screen. When he saw the name on the screen, his mood changed, and he quickly sat up before accepting the call.
“Jazz, what are you doing awake? It’s one in the morning,” he said when the phone connected.
On the screen was a young girl, only six years old.
“They’re arguing outside, and it woke me up. I’m scared,” she said.
He knew that when she said people were arguing outside that she was referring to the people who typically milled around the apartment complex he grew up in. It wasn’t the safest neighborhood and tempers were prone to boil into violence if cooler heads didn’t prevail.
“Where’s your dad? Or my mom?”
Jazz shrugged. “I don’t know. Daddy said he was going to grandma’s. I tried to call him, but he didn’t answer so I called you.”
Erik had to take a deep breath. Jazz, or Jazzmine, was basically his stepsister. Her father, Eugene, and his mother had been in some kind of relationship since she was only a baby. Her mother left them as soon as she gave birth. Over the years, Erik had done more raising of Jazz than her father did. Babies raising babies as some would say.
But he’d been old enough to know Eugene had an alcohol problem. Typically, when he told Jazz that he was going to “her grandma’s,” he was actually going to a bar. Erik had dragged him out of more than a few of them once he was big enough.
“Then why aren’t you at Ms. Johnson’s?” he asked.
“Your mom told me that Ms. Johnson doesn’t want me there anymore,” she said in a small voice.
He sighed. “I’m going to call my mom and Ms. Johnson in the morning and see what the problem is. But you need to go to sleep because you have school in the morning. Go sleep in my room.”
“Can I turn on the stars?!”
“Yeah, go ahead.”
He always left out that his room was safer than hers because it was on the side of the apartment that was furthest away from the balcony where people hung out all hours of the day and night. One day, she’d probably figure that out either if she was still living there when she got older, or it’d be a childhood memory to discuss on a therapist’s couch.
She almost fell out of the bed running to Erik’s old room. He could see her fumbling with a set of wires along the wall.
“Just plug it in, Jazz,” he said. “Be careful.”
“Oh,” she said and did as she was told, turning on a set of lights that cast stars on the ceiling. She then she jumped under the covers that probably hadn’t been changed since he left for Baton Rouge – but probably still clean.
“Remember what you are when the stars are on?”
“A superhero!”
He nodded. “And superheroes aren’t scared of nobody, especially some bums outside, so now go to sleep.”
“Can you stay on the phone with me until I do?”
“I would, but I don’t want your phone to die so I’m going to hang up but call me back if you need to. I’m going to turn the ringer up, so it’ll wake me up if I fall asleep. Okay?”
“Okay,” she said with a tinge of sadness in her voice. “Night, Erik.”
“Night, Jazz.” He waited until she hung up to switch the ringer to the loudest setting then he set the phone down and run his hand down his face.
He looked up at Denyse having forgotten she was in the room. “Sorry about that. You know she can be a handful sometimes.”
Denyse smiled and put the phone back on the nightstand. She pushed her pants over her hips and to the floor before pushing Erik onto his back.
“Let me take care of you now,” she said, reaching for the waistband of his sweatpants.
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Captain Canada
- Posts: 2183
- Joined: 01 Dec 2018, 00:15
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
Side character update that was so refreshing. Good to see this updated brodie.
War of the Roses: Redux Edition
i got that boy writing again lol i'm really him