CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Ray shook me awake an hour later. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and met him on the porch, where he offered me a cup of coffee. I knew what he was doing. We both did. He was saying good-bye. We propped our legs on the railing, blew the steam off our mugs, and sipped in silence for several minutes. Finally, I said, “I’ll miss the Bucket.”

A nod. “I’ll miss seeing you on it.”

I glanced at him. “Will you help Audrey with—”

He held up a hand and stopped me. “Who you think drove him to the orthodontist? Taught him to drive? Got him his first pair of cleats? His job at the grocery? Don’t plan to stop now.”

“Thanks.”

He continued, “In truth, he be taking care of her now.” Tux curled up at Ray’s feet, letting out a deep sigh. Ray finished his coffee, stood, dusted off his pants, and, stopping behind me, put his hand on my shoulder. “I’ll come see you.” He wiped his eyes with a handkerchief. “Soon as you get settled.”

I patted his hand, and he disappeared through the trees.

Tux and I spent the day alone—and out of sight—on top of the Bucket. If they came to the cabin, I’d at least see them coming. I napped, ate a little, drank lots of water, and stretched late in the afternoon. I climbed down around five p.m. when Wood appeared. He rolled his window down and gave me a thumbs up. “All set.”

We were quiet a minute, neither really knowing what to say. Wood knew where this was going, and he knew there were no easy answers. Finally, he spoke. “You sure about this?”

“No. But…” I shrugged.

He attempted a joke. “It’s nice to know you’re human.”

“Oh, I’m human all right.”

“You can still call it off.”

“You know better than that.”

“I’ll be with you on the other side of this.”

“You’d do well to get on with your life. Put all this behind you.”

“I’ll get on with my life, but I’m not putting you behind me.” He paused. “Matter of fact, I, uh… I been meaning to ask you something.” His tone had changed. Something tender. Caught me off guard. “Laura and I were wondering if you minded if we named our son Matthew.”

“She’s expecting?” I had no idea.

He nodded, smiling.

“How long have you known?”

“Had the ultrasound this week. He’s definitely a boy.”

I laughed. “Wow. Really?”

He chuckled. “Laura’s been telling me we need to get cable, but I just never listened to her.”

“Evidently not.”

“So?”

“Yes. Yes, absolutely.”

“While you’re in such an agreeable mood—” Wood wasn’t finished. He had something else on his mind. “How would you feel about being his godfather?”

“That might be tough from prison.”

“Doesn’t matter where you are.”

“Laura really said that?”

He looked up at me. “When I told her about today, about what you’re planning, she broke down. Told me if I didn’t talk to you about all this that she was coming down here herself.”

I chuckled. “You married well, Dunwoody.”

He smiled, chest swelling. “That I did.”

“I’d really like that. Yes. Thank you.”

We were quiet a few minutes. Finally, he spoke. “You know, if you want, I could get out of this car, give you the keys, and you could just start driving. And I’d be willing to bet that when they found out you did that, everything would settle and disappear. You could start over someplace other than here.”

I considered this. “The thought did cross my mind.”

He waited. “But?”

“You remember that Orange Bowl?”

He closed his eyes. “My head still hurts. What were those two brothers’ names?”

“Chip and Dave—”

He cut me off. “Russell.”

“Yep.”

He pressed his hand to his head as if the memory still hurt. “Those guys were tough. One would stand you up and hold you a second while the other just cut you in half.”

“And you remember how they shut us down for fifty-eight minutes.”

“I do.”

“What finally worked?”

Wood chuckled. “Sneak up the middle.”

“Didn’t work the first time, did it?”

“Nor the second or third.”

“Then came—”

He laughed from his belly and cut me off again. “Fourth and forever.”

We both paused as the memory replayed itself across our minds.

I said, “You remember standing in that huddle? Before that last play?”

Wood kept laughing. “Man, Roddy was so pissed.”

I stopped him. “Wood, this is fourth and forever.”

He stared out through the windshield. His lips were tight when he spoke. “I miss that.”

“There’s someone I miss more. And she needs to know it.” The clock was ticking. I tapped on the side of the door. “Better get going.”

“Yeah. I want to get there in time to make sure everything’s in order and to tell Damon where he can shove his clipboard.”

“I’d like to see that.”

“Want a ride?”

“I’ll walk.”

Wood stared out his windshield and his voice softened. “Last time through the tunnel.”

I nodded. “See you in a few.”

At a quarter to six, I peered through the trees at the stadium. The sidelines were packed with people. Television crews had brought cranes onto the track to get a close-up and elevated view of the field. The knot in my stomach tightened. Could I pull this off?

Roddy had made good on his promise to get the word out via Twitter, and it must have worked because the lower section of the stands was packed. Must have been a thousand people. Wood stood on the sideline, deflecting a vocal barrage from Coach Damon, who was effectively muted by the crowd of reporters, scouts, and coaches swarming the field. True to form, Wood had changed into a suit and what looked like his secret-service earpiece, which I thought was a nice touch.

Dee quietly appeared next to me. If his father had been black, his father’s influence on his skin color had drained out of him. Completely. He looked at me. “What’d you say?”

I let out a deep breath. “I said I’d like a chance to reenter the NFL. Formally.”

“It worked.” His excitement grew. “You’re really trying out?”

“Something like that.”

He shook his head, mesmerized by the crowd. Awe pulled down on his jaw while his smile spread his lips. “Must be twenty-five to thirty teams over there. And twice as many cameras.” He snapped his fingers. “I just met a photographer from SI. Coach, Sports Illustrated is here. The lens on his camera must have been”—he extended his arms widely as if he were telling a fish story—“three feet long.”

Mesmerized, he was staring at the field. I was staring at him. “Dee?”

He turned, curious. Oblivious. “Yeah?”

“I need you to do me a favor.”

His eyes returned to the field. One toe started tapping the ground. “Anything. Name it.”

I placed a ball in his hands. “Try out with me.”

The toe stopped tapping and the last of the color drained out. “What!”

“One last workout.”

“But—” This is about the time he understood what was going on and began shaking his head. “No.”

“Dee. Look at me.”

He wouldn’t.

“Dee?”

Still nothing.

“Men are coming to my cabin today. They may be there now—” Slowly, he lifted his face. “They’re going to arrest me. Send me back to prison.”

He shoved me hard in the chest. “Why’d you do this? Why didn’t you walk away when you could?”

“Dee, she’s just using you.”

“Who? Why?”

“That’s not important. If not you, she’d be using someone else. She tends to come at what I love. No matter who it is. Always has.”

He turned. Faced me. Eyes asking the question his heart had long since wanted to voice.

“Do this for me, please. Walk out there and play a game with me.” I tapped his heart. “Just play a game with me.”

He dropped the ball and began shaking his head. Finally, his shoulders shook. The sobs came soon after. His voice broke. “But prison—”

I straightened him up, lifting his chin. “Steel bars can’t kill me. But these bars on my heart?” I searched the stands for Audrey. “I need a little help with those.”

The cameras caught our movement when we walked out of the trees on the far side, sending people scurrying off the sideline. We met them in the end zone. Everybody in the bleachers stood and began chanting, “Rocket! Rocket! Rocket!”

Wood managed the crowd around us and made space for Roddy to pass through with a few of his friends. They were younger guys, and I only knew them by reputation. Roddy introduced them. “Guys, Rocket. Matthew…” He gestured to his buddies. “Posse.”

I shook their hands. “Thanks for coming. Guys, this is Dee, but I call him Clark Kent. If it’s all right with you, I’ve asked him to help me out.”

Roddy handed me a pair of cleats. “As you requested. You need me to remind you how to put them on?”

I laughed. “Probably.”

He held up a second pair and pointed to Dee.

I responded, “Yep.”

He handed the cleats to Dee, who held them like an egg. Dee looked at me. “Can I accept these?”

I laughed.

I turned to the crowd of reporters. There must have been fifty video cameras pointed at me. “I’d like to thank everybody for coming out on such short notice. I realize that’s rather high maintenance of me, and—” Most everybody laughed. “That’s not my intention. After a short layoff…” More laughter. “I am officially expressing my intent to reenter the National Football League.” Several reporters began shouting questions, but Wood raised his hands and silenced them. I continued, “I know all of you have questions, and we’ll get to each one. But I’ve invited you here this afternoon to assess my ability. To let you see me in person and determine for yourselves if you think there’s a spot for me in the league. I know many of you have doubts about a video made of me in prison. If I were you, I’d have doubts, too, so you’re in good company. I have a bit of a history with rather fantastic and unbelievable videos.” Most got the joke and the uncomfortable laughter spread. I paused. “I’ll address that on the field.” I turned to Dee. “I’ve asked a good friend of mine to join me today.” All the cameras moved to Dee. What color had slowly returned to his face immediately fled. “This is Dalton Rogers.” I smiled. “You might keep an eye on him, as you’ll be hearing more about him.” I turned back to Wood. “You got the bird?”

He held his earpiece with one hand while speaking into the other. Whoever was listening on the other end quickly responded. Wood smirked. “Ready.”

“Mount up. We’re headed south. You can catch up.” I turned back to the reporters. “If I were you, one of my first questions about me would deal with my level of fitness. Of strength. Can I play through the fourth quarter and into the fifth?” I paused to let that settle in. “For the record, this is the same workout I’ve done since I was here in high school. For those of you who have vehicles, you’re going to need them. For those of you who don’t, don’t worry. Have a seat. Get comfortable. The show will start momentarily.” I turned to Roddy, his guys, and Dee. “You ready?”

Roddy laughed. “Old man, I’m ready for whatever you think you’re man enough to dish out.” He pointed at my and Dee’s tattered black boots. The video cameras followed. “You sure you want to run in those?”

I placed a ball in Dee’s hands. “Show them how it’s done.”

We ran through the woods, climbed up on the tracks, and started south. I watched Dee out of the corner of my eye. He’d turned the corner. He was running like a deer. When the helicopter appeared overhead and filed in behind us, with Wood staring down and a harness-mounted cameraman recording our every move via live-feed, Roddy thumbed over his shoulder and said, “What is that?”

I patted him on the back. “That’s Wood. Broadcasting what we’re doing on a giant screen on the field we just left. You always did like an audience.” Roddy cussed under his breath and quickened his step.

After a mile, Dee stretched his legs, covering two railroad ties at a time, then three. He followed the drill to the letter. At five miles, we turned around. One of Roddy’s fellow receivers had dropped off, the other was sucking wind and lagging behind. Roddy was talking in my ear. “You’re trying to kill me, aren’t you?”

“Nope.” I pointed at Dee. “Just trying to show them what he’s made of.”

He hollered beneath the noise of the helicopter. “My contract doesn’t say anything about running on any railroad track, and if it weren’t for that camera above my head, and the fact that Roderick Nation is watching this live, I’d give you the finger and tell you where you could put this railroad track.”

I always loved playing with Roddy. The trash-talking was priceless.

At ten miles, we were clicking off close to five-minute miles. We ran down off the tracks, up the dirt road, past the cabin, and hit the base of the Bucket at full stride. We were all suffering, but we were also flying.

Behind me, I heard Roddy laughing. Halfway up, I tapped Dee on the shoulder. “Go on.” He found his last gear—the one we’d spent all summer creating—and Roddy struggled to catch him. When we got to the top, Roddy put his hands on his knees and looked at Dee, “Boy! Who is you? What college you play for? You SEC? PAC 10? Big 12?”

I laughed and started trotting down. “Come on, you’re about to find out.”

On the field, we laced up our cleats and started throwing the ball around. Pretty soon, we led into drills. Then patterns. Routes. Multiple reads. We spent a lot of time at twelve-to fifteen-to twenty-yard routes. Hitting outside shoulders, timing patterns. These were the bread and butter. The money routes. A lot of folks put a lot of emphasis on long balls, but it’s the short, quick routes that win. Death by a thousand cuts.

I stayed close to Dee, stayed in his ear, and talked him through. “Remember the junkyard. The throws are just the same.” I pointed at Roddy and his posse, helping Dee make the connection. “Michelin, B.F. Goodrich. MINI Cooper. Pirelli. Goodyear. Remember the catapult. And follow through.” He nodded, settled in, did everything I did, and began firing bullets.

Somewhere in here, he threw a pass to one of the other receivers and it tore the receiver’s glove at the seam. “Oohs” and “aahs” erupted out of the receiver core. Pretty soon, they started calling him Superman and Kryptonite. The banter proved to be a windfall, as the other receivers were soon lining up to run routes for him. Dee was in the middle of his count, audibling to his receivers, when he stopped, turned to me, winked, and then finished his count.

That’s when I knew.

I stood back behind him, letting him have the center of the field. A few minutes later, Damon broke his clipboard over his knee and walked out of the stadium through the tunnel.

After about twenty minutes of underneath routes, Dee called an audible at the line and hit one of Roddy’s guys on a forty-two-yard post with very little air beneath it that brought the scouts to their feet. And when he hit Roddy in stride on a fifty-five-yard fly, everybody in the stadium hit their feet and ESPN began broadcasting live from the field. Roddy brought the ball back to me and whispered, “You done playing, prison boy?”

I looked out across the field and heard the echo of my father. His smile. Our laughter. I saw Wood’s sweat-stained face in the huddle. The scoreboard. I remembered the smell of cut grass, wet paint, and the singular sound of a girl who held my heart in one hand and a penny-filled milk jug in the other—screaming at the top of her lungs.

Despite my pain and the conclusion that was swiftly coming, I remembered the wonder and majesty and beauty of this game. I remembered my love.

And when I lifted a heel, setting Roddy in motion, and began my count, “Blue forty-two, blue forty-two. Hot check razor. Hot check razor,” the bars melted.

Roddy ran behind me, taunting me. “You sure you can throw it that far? Don’t want you embarrassing yourself in front of all these people.”

Roddy reached the left hash. “Hut-hut-hut.”

I snapped the ball to myself, and Roddy looked as if he’d been shot out of a gun. While everyone in the stands and on the sideline saw just me and Roddy on the field, I read the linebacker’s outside swim of the corner, telling me that he was closing off the inside and Roddy was going long into the corner of the end zone. I dropped five steps, read my weak side receiver who’d been stuffed at the line, faked to a back in the flats to draw the safeties, and then turned, ducked under the defensive tackle who’d beat my leftside tackle, rolled right evading the outside linebacker, set my feet, pulled down on my left arm, and launched a rocket into the corner of the end zone, where Roddy wasn’t yet but would be in about two and a half seconds. The ball spiraled, turned nose down, and Roddy caught it seventy yards downfield, in stride, over his left shoulder in the corner of the end zone.

That one got them talking and silenced the critics.

Turning, I spotted Audrey for the first time. She was sitting in “her seat,” cheering, wearing Dee’s jersey. I waved once. She placed her hand over her heart and mouthed the words, “Thank you.”

I pulled down slightly on my collar and showed her the dove around my neck.

I threw for almost an hour and ESPN2 covered the entire workout live.

At eight p.m., Wood blew the horn and Dee and I gathered in the middle of the field where we began fielding questions. The first reporter shoved a microphone in Dee’s face and said, “Dalton, what college do you attend?”

“Um—” I smiled as Audrey slipped through the crowd where Dee could see her and she could hear him. “I’m a senior here at St. Bernard.”

The response was effusive.

One of the reporters asked, “How old are you?”

Dee looked at me and I nodded. He said, “I’m seventeen.”

That brought the volume up until one young reporter in the front put two and two together. I watched his face as the pieces fell in line. He eyed my ankle, then Dee, then me. When he asked the question, I heard the words leave his mouth in slow motion. “But Matthew, isn’t that a violation of your parole?”

You could hear a pin drop.

I spoke loud enough so everyone could hear me. “Yes, it is.”

While silence settled over the crowd and no one knew what to say, a black Crown Vic drove out onto the track. I was thankful she hadn’t gotten here sooner, but maybe she had and was just waiting for those three words. I turned to Dee as she elbowed her way through the crowd. “I don’t think you’ll have any trouble playing this year.” I smiled. “Or next.”

The reality of what we’d just done, of what he’d done, of what I’d done, began to set in. He nodded, and Audrey slipped her arm inside his. I was glad he had her. And she, him.

Debbie stomped onto the field and spoke with great volume so everyone knew she had the floor. Which she did. “Matthew Rising, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say or do—” Her agents spun me around, handcuffed me, and were leading me to the car when Audrey stepped between us. She stared up at me. Her whisper was broken. “You have something that belongs to me.”

I bowed my head and she lifted the dove off my neck, holding it in her hand. The chain draped over her shaking hand and dangled between us. Dee noticed she was shaking and put his arm around her.

What bars remained, shattered.

I pressed my forehead to hers and said words twelve years in the making. “And you have something of mine.” I kissed her cheek. “Always have.”