Page 74 of Playing Her Game

She says it lightly enough that someone listening from the next row might think she was recounting an unpleasant dinner party.

Her fingers tighten around the glass. “I couldn't go anywhere without somebody knowing who I was, who I'd been with, what they thought had happened between us, or what they imagined was going to happen next. People who had never met me had opinions about my relationship. They had opinions about me. And the more I tried to get away from it, the more it seemed to follow.”

“I'm sorry.”

She gives me a small shrug. “It was a long time ago.”

“That doesn't mean it didn't hurt.”

“No.” Her gaze returns to mine. “It doesn't.”

For a moment, neither of us speaks. The aircraft’s quiet hum fills the space between us.

“I took time off,” she continues. “Moved to Boston for a while. I needed to get away from the whole thing. From the team, from the family name, from the constant reminder that people thought they knew me because they'd read something about me.”

“And now you're back.”

“On a short-term contract. I was helping with the foundation's holiday campaign.” Her smile returns, though it doesn't quite reach her eyes. “I told them to call me Breanna.”

“An alias.”

“Exactly, and my middle name. I wanted to do the work without walking into every room as a Callahan. Without someone looking at me and remembering the breakup before they remembered anything else.”

“But Hank calls you Bernie.”

“Hank met Bernie.” She gives me a pointed look. “The elf. The woman who refused to give him her last name and then disappeared before breakfast.”

I laugh. “You really did that?”

“I absolutely did that.”

“Poor Hank.”

“Poor Hank, my ass. He survived.”

She takes another drink, and the smile that follows is genuine this time.

“He calls me Bernie because, for some reason, I couldn’t lie to him from the second I met him. Breanna is the name I use when I need a little distance from the rest of it. And being close to Hank,” she sighs. “It’s a heartbreak waiting to happen.”

I think about that distinction. The name a person gives the world, and the name they keep for themselves. The versions we present, the ones we protect, the ones we hope someone will eventually understand without demanding an explanation.

“So,” I say, “you went back to work with the Bears, but on your own terms.”

“That's the idea.”

“And the press?”

“Still exists. Unfortunately, nobody has discovered a way to make journalists evaporate on command.”

“Shame.”

“I'm lobbying for it.”

I smile, and she smiles back. The conversation feels easier now, less like an interview and more like what it is: two women sharing champagne and telling each other things they might not say in a crowded room.

“Can I ask what happened?” I ask. “With your ex, I mean.”

Bernie studies me for a moment. Then she looks down at her glass.