Page 35 of Catch
“Grayson was mumbling a lot about dogs on the drive over here.”
She cringed. “I’m sorry, Sutton. I’ll talk to him when he sobers up.”
I stood. “I have to get back to work, but keep in mind what I said.” I couldn’t believe I was opening myself up like this, but a long time ago, I loved this woman. She didn’t deserve to go through whatever this was alone, and she probably didn’t have a lot of friends since they just moved here.
She put her hand on my arm, something she always did to soothe me. “Thank you. I appreciate your help and discretion.”
“Bye, Parker.” I was more enthusiastic when I said good-bye to Buttercup. I rubbed her ears playfully. “And you’ll have to swing by and play with Crowbar. He’s getting all the attention at work, but I have a feeling you would steal their hearts away.”
I slid into my car and waited for the garage door to fully open. I looked everywhere but at Parker who was standing in the doorway looking at me. When I put the car in reverse, I finally looked at her. She was leaning on the doorframe waiting for me to back out of the garage. Her shoulders were slumped, but there was an iciness in her blue eyes that I hadn’t seen before. I didn’t envy Grayson when he sobered up.
* * *
“Did you find out anything?” Jamal asked me before we started our afternoon coaches’ meeting.
“No, but I told his wife that there would be repercussions. I told her we had therapists available for all the players.” Mental health in sports was finally getting recognition. Too many players struggled with the stresses of the game. There was a lot of pressure to stay on top because there was always a willing player to take your spot if you failed. It was time for Grayson to take advantage of that. “And I told her to have him call you when he sobered up. What did Bill say?”
Jamal shrugged. “He said we have to sit down and talk to him about it and that he might have to miss the next game.”
“Fuck,” I said. I wanted to believe it was an isolated event, but I didn’t know anything about Grayson. I didn’t think Parker would lie to me, but she might lie to protect her husband.
“I know. This sucks. At least no one got hurt and we kept it under wraps. Maybe he does community service and attends AA meetings. We can only hope this is an isolated incident,” Jamal said.
“In the meantime, let’s get back to football,” I said. I didn’t want to talk about the Moatses. “We had a shitty away game. Let’s goover plays that will work against Chicago’s defense.” I could barely concentrate on anything. My mind kept wandering to Parker and what was going on in her marriage. We spent two hours reviewing the Bears’ four games this season. They also had a 3-1 record, but they were favored to win thanks to our recent colossal loss.
Halfway through the meeting, Jamal held up his phone. “It’s Grayson.” He jumped up and stepped out into the hall.
Out of habit, I checked mine for any text messages. There wasn’t anything. We didn’t even try to continue to talk about football. We wanted to hear Grayson’s excuses. When Jamal finally opened the door, it took all my energy not to jump on the table, lunge for his shirt, and yell “spit it out!”
“His best friend died. One of his friends drove to tell him in person and they drank until the early morning. Another friend who wasn’t drinking dropped him off this morning,” Jamal said.
“What do you say to that? What’s our policy?” We had bereavement leave, but it didn’t cover showing up to work drunk. I didn’t want to lose Grayson as a quarterback. If we had to go with our backup, we would be lucky to win two more games this season. With Grayson healthy and his head in the game, we had a chance to make it to the playoffs.
“Let’s get Bill in here and figure it out,” Jamal said.
I was extremely nervous. The five minutes it took for Bill to make his way to us felt like five months. We were all tense.
“So, what’s his story?” Bill’s voice boomed in the small conference room. He slid into the chair at the front of the table and looked at us expectantly. I looked at Jamal.
“Apparently, a childhood friend died last night, and he and his buddies got together to commiserate. Sutton had a conversation with his wife who assured her that this wasn’t like him at all,” Jamal said.
Jamal knew to only give facts and keep explanations short. Most coaches didn’t have time to deal with this kind of bullshit, but we needed Bill to make a decision about playing him. If not, we had to scramble to get Archie ready for the game on Sunday.
“Let’s have him meet with a therapist first thing tomorrow morning. He is coming in tomorrow, right? If he doesn’t, we’ll put in Archie.”
Jamal nodded. “Yes, he’ll be here. And he apologized profusely for screwing up practice today.”
I cringed and willed Jamal to stop talking. Coach made a decision and now we could move forward with the game plan.
Bill pointed at Jamal. “Make sure he gets into a therapist tomorrow. He doesn’t leave here until he sees one.”
“Will do, Coach.”
Bill nodded to us and left the room. We all let out a deep sigh followed by a nervous laugh.
“That wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be,” Brandon said.
“If it gets out to the press, what do we say?” Jamal asked.
