Page 28 of Cruel Promise
When he found out she’d gone behind his back and enrolled for classes after he’d explicitly told her no, he had his assistant call every studio within a one-hundred-mile radius and had her blacklisted.
Then he made a personal call to the headmaster at Suncrest Academy and had his own daughter removed from the school dance team. Indefinitely.
Monique was heartbroken.
It wasn’t the first time I saw him throw his weight around to get what he wanted. But, it was the first time he’d directed his attention toward one of his own children in such a brutal and demoralizing way.
I learned then and there that mine and my sister’s happiness meant nothing to our parents. They cared about appearances and legacy and would let nothing get in the way of the future they’d mapped out for us.
The lesson stuck.
But if I’ve inherited any traits from my father, it is my sheer stubbornness. After seeing what he did to Monique, I knew when it came to me, there could be no half measures.
He insisted I go to an HBCU.
I applied for nothing but state schools.
He refused to let me play college football.
I refused to go to college at all.
I reached the point where I’d spit in my own face just to spite him.
He thought I’d fold, but I didn’t. Like Mount Saint Helens in the spring of 1980, I was an immovable mountain simmering on the edge of explosion.
The more my father pushed, the harder I pushed back.
I was strategic in my rebellion. Every move I made across the chess board of our relationship put me one step closer to getting what I wanted. I weighed each argument. Calculated the risks.
My boldest rebellion was when I sent letters of regret to every single HBCU he submitted an application of admittance on my behalf to. To this day, I’ve never seen him so enraged as he was when he found out. But by then, he’d already refused me the one thing I wanted. There was nothing he could take from me that would bring me to heel.
We fought on and off about college my entire junior year of high school and most of my senior year. The battle was hard fought. And my reward was well earned.
After eighteen months of brutal back and forth, he buckled and agreed to let me play ball, but under two conditions. The first was that unless I agreed to attend an HBCU, I’d have to pay my own way through college. I’d have zero access to my parents' money and I was on my own not only for tuition but also for housing, food, and all of my basic necessities. The only financial asset he couldn’t withhold from me was my Escalade. I’d already paid it off and had the registration transferred into my name the day after I turned eighteen.
My father assumed I’d balk at the prospect of footing my own bills. I didn’t. I was a straight A student and the star quarterback for my school earning me a full ride scholarship to play at Suncrest U—my number one choice.
My father has never understood the fact that I don’t want or need his money. Having a loaded bank account is not a motivating factor for me. He should have seen that when I picked an Escalade as my first car after I turned fifteen.
He gave me the choice of anything I wanted which included rides like a Drako GTE and Bentley Bacalar. There was no budget. No price tag he’d consider too high. Yet of all the luxury cars I could have picked from, I settled on a Cadillac fucking Escalade.
It was a fraction of the price coming in at seventy-seven thousand and most importantly, it was something I could pay off and own. Something that’d be mine entirely.
The second condition my father insisted on was my agreement to walk away from football once I graduated college. I’d expected it but it didn’t make it any easier of a pill to swallow.
I knew Football would never be my future. But I won four more years to play, so long as I agreed to take my rightful place at my father’s side and step into the family business when the time came.
I took the deal.
There was no alternative that granted me the ability to play. And I’ve spent the past three years resigned to the fact that going pro is nothing but a pipe dream.
And Coach wants me now to believe I have a shot? That having something as mundane as a conversation with one man can somehow make a difference?
“Next Sunday afternoon. Your meeting with Andres DeAnde will be after Saturday’s game. You stay one extra night and we play it off to the rest of the team that you’re taking a day to rest. Maybe seeing a specialist about your shoulder. No one needs to be the wiser.”
Before I can stop myself, I nod. “Okay.” I’m going to regret this.
“Glad to hear it. You’re making the right choice, son.”
