Well Played

by J. S. Scott

  “Goodbye, Graham,” she said in a quiet, resigned voice.

  I looked up just in time to see her walking away.

  Jesus Christ! I couldn’t let her go without an explanation. Not like this. I couldn’t let all those years be nothing. Lauren and Jack had saved my life when we were young, and they’d been my motivation after that. “Wait,” I bellowed, just as Lauren was reaching for the doorknob.

  I got to my feet and crossed the distance between us. “I did it because I really didn’t feel like I was good enough for you. And I knew that when you woke up, I’d fuck you again. I can’t be with you without wanting that anymore.”

  She froze, but she didn’t turn around. “Why is that so bad? I know we were entering into a relationship we’d never had before, but I wanted it to happen.”

  I had to will myself to speak. “I can’t be with anybody, Lauren. It isn’t you, it’s me. I know that someday, I could drag you down in my issues, and you don’t need that. You deserve everything, and I can’t give it to you.”

  She still didn’t turn around. “Everybody has issues, Graham.”

  I ran an irritated hand through my hair. “Not like mine. Most people don’t have to wonder if they are going to lose their fucking mind. I do.”

  “What are you trying to say?” she asked cautiously.

  I saw her shoulders tense, but she still kept her back to me.

  “I’m trying to tell you that I’m not right in the head. I’m not fucking normal. I’ve always had problems, but it wasn’t until college that I found out why. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, Lauren. I was drinking pretty heavy to try to make it go away, but it didn’t help. It screwed me up even worse. I ended up in the hospital at the university after I’d gotten so confused that my roommates had to take me in. I almost lost my scholarship over it. After they got my medications right, I was able to play football again, but my chances of being picked up pro weren’t very good since I’d spent two years on a fucking roller coaster before they found the right med combination for me. I played well in my last year, so I did get a pro gig, but just barely.”

  Lauren finally turned around as she asked, “Why didn’t you call me if you were in the hospital?”

  “And tell you what exactly?” I asked curtly. “Should I have told you that I’d lost my mind so badly that I needed to be hospitalized for my safety and everybody else’s?”

  “Yes.”

  “I couldn’t. I had to make sure I wasn’t going to end up like my mother.”

  “What was wrong with your mother?”

  “She was bipolar, too,” I told her flatly. “She didn’t care about anything after my father was killed in the line of duty. She didn’t take her meds, and she got to the point where she didn’t even know I existed anymore. And then, she committed suicide. I came home from school one day and she was dead. She’d left me alone, even though she knew I didn’t have anybody else.”

  Forcing myself to stay numb, I turned away from Lauren and returned to the living room, pretty sure that after my confession, she wasn’t going to follow me.

  If nothing else, the truth would force Lauren away, just like I’d wanted.

  CHAPTER 23

  Graham

  “You’re not crazy, Graham,” Lauren said gently as she sat back down in the chair she’d vacated just moments before, which surprised the hell out of me. “Bipolar disorder is a disease. Something that isn’t working right in your brain, and it’s probably hereditary. It’s no different than having any other medical disorder.”

  I let out a bark of bitter laughter. “You don’t have to tell me the clinical definition. Believe me, I already know.”

  “I wish you would have told me,” she said wistfully. “Jack and I could have helped. I would have found a way to get to the East Coast to be with you if I’d known about this when it was happening. I’m sorry about your mom. And I’m sorry about your dad. You never seemed to want to talk about your parents.”

  Now that I’d blurted out my biggest secret, I wanted to pour out the whole story. “He was a Navy SEAL. He died in action. Once he was gone, my mother was so distraught that she stopped taking her medications. Eventually, she lost touch with reality and her only kid. I came home one day from school and she was dead. She’d shot herself in the head with one of Dad’s side arms.”

  “Oh, my God,” Lauren said with a gasp. “You found her? That must have destroyed you.”

  I looked up and met her eyes cautiously as I nodded. “For years, I wondered if it was my fault. I felt like if I had helped her more, it might not have happened. If she loved me more, she would have stayed with me. Eventually, I started to forget both of them. Maybe I wanted to forget. By the time I met Jack in school, I’d already been through all of the relatives I had, and I’d already had multiple foster families. Nobody wanted an angry, crazy kid.”

  “You are not crazy,” Lauren repeated. “Were you having symptoms as a child? Bipolar disorder isn’t usually diagnosed until the effected person is an adult.”

  I didn’t see pity in Lauren’s soothing gaze. All I saw was…understanding.

  I finally answered, “You know I was diagnosed with ADHD as a kid, but my doctor thinks it was probably the early manifestation of bipolar disorder. Getting misdiagnosed happens a lot.”

  “What happened at the college?” she asked, her eyes fixed on my face.

  I shrugged. “Just like I told you. I had manic episodes closely followed by bipolar depression. It happened several times, but I fought it. I wanted to be somebody, and losing my damn mind wasn’t part of my plan. But I eventually found out that my will couldn’t fight my disorder. I had to ask for help. I didn’t have any choice. I was lucky to be at a university that had tons of studies going on with bipolar disorder, and good doctors. It took a couple of years, but they finally got me stable.”

  “You haven’t lost touch with reality since you were in the hospital?”

  I shook my head. “No. But the possibility is always there, and it scares the shit out of me. I don’t want to drag anybody down with me, especially not you or Jack.”

  “It could happen,” Lauren admitted. “But it hasn’t. You were treated young, and there are studies that show early treatment could help you stay stable.” She took a deep breath before she continued, “Nobody can say what the future holds, Graham.”

  My jaw was tight, my body tense as I answered, “That’s why I don’t want to be with anybody. I can’t be with anybody. I don’t know what the hell will happen.”

  “Nobody can predict the future. Bad things happen sometimes, and we don’t have control over those episodes. What about Hope?” she asked.

  “She’s as fucked up as I am in many ways, so we understood each other,” I explained. “I had to tell her, but she didn’t care. Outward images meant more than private ones to her, and she wanted to be married to an NFL player. If I had an episode, she wasn’t going to get hurt. She was what I needed.”

  “No. She’s what you thought you deserved,” Lauren said tearfully.

  I opened my mouth to deny her observation, but I closed it again. She was right. I’d settled with Hope because she’d been safe for me.

  No real emotions.

  No real pain.

  But it didn’t change the fact that I couldn’t be with somebody who cared about me. I’d never know if and when I was going to lose my shit, and the things that could happen during a meltdown could destroy lives.

  “It hasn’t happened, Graham,” Lauren said like she was reading my mind.

  “That doesn’t mean it won’t,” I answered tightly.

  “It’s a very real fear,” Lauren acknowledged. “But you can’t let that possibility change your life. Medications can be changed if it happens.”

  “This whole damn thing has changed my life,” I growled. “One day I’m in college on a footba
ll scholarship with a good chance of going pro, and the next day I’m in the fucking hospital trying to remember what in the hell I’d done the previous night at a party.”

  “You shouldn’t have had to go through that alone,” Lauren said with a hint of admonishment.

  “It was better that way. I didn’t want anybody I cared about to see me like that.”

  Lauren saw me as a hero. The last thing I wanted her to see was me rattling on like an idiot in a hospital bed.

  Honestly, I was pretty surprised she was still sitting in my apartment like I hadn’t just told her that I was fucked up.

  “Better for you, maybe,” she mused. “But I would have preferred to know so Jack and I could have been there to help you get through something that had to have been terrifying.”

  “I’m good now,” I said, wanting to stop talking about my condition. “Now that the doctors have me on the right meds, and I’ve stayed in counseling, I’m playing the best ball of my life. I try to avoid all the triggers. I eat right. I exercise. I try to stay away from anything mind-altering. I succeeded until that night in the cabin when I decided to drink more beer than I should have. Not that I’m all that sure that I wouldn’t have done the same thing sober.”

  “Why didn’t you answer my call after our time at the cabin?” she asked, sounding vulnerable.

  “I thought it would be best if we just ended it. I knew if I talked to you again, I was never going to want to give you up.” I hesitated before adding, “I was being a coward.”

  “I know about your mental illness now,” she pointed out. “And I’m not running away.”

  “Then I have to assume you’re losing your mind, too.”

  “I’m not afraid of you, Graham,” she said, rising to her feet.

  My chest ached, knowing she was going to walk away. But I couldn’t say I blamed her. “You got your closure?” I asked sharply.

  She moved until she was standing in front of me, and then lowered down to sit on her haunches. Taking my hand, she muttered, “What happens between you and me is your decision. I have to go out of state for my new opportunity at a think-tank, but I have my cell phone. You can text me if you still want my help with the accuracy of your throwing arm. Or if you just need to talk.”

  I felt like somebody had opened up my chest and was ripping my heart out with a pair of very sharp claws. “Why? Tell me why you even want to see me again after what I did to you.”

  Her eyebrows scrunched together. “Because I understand that you were motivated by fear. I get that you don’t want to hurt me, but if you want to stay friends, you have to be honest with me from now on. I’m done with fairy tales. I don’t need my friends to be perfect. I just need them to let me know who they really are.”

  “Even now, when you know that I could go off the deep end?” I asked gruffly, my throat suddenly going dry.

  She snorted. “I could go off the deep end, too. And I don’t have bipolar disorder.”

  “I don’t know if I can just be your friend, Lauren.”

  “I think that’s all either one of us can handle right now,” she said with a sigh. “I have to trust you’re not going to bolt, and that’s going to take time. You need to focus on being well and playing football.”

  My heart was racing as I asked, “Did you really do all those things on the list?”

  She smiled weakly. “I have the pictures to prove it.”

  “But not the sea cows?”

  “Not that one. It was one of the things I saved because I’d hoped I could do that with you. You did promise me a trip to Disney.”

  I owed her a hell of a lot more than a trip to Florida. “Thanks for understanding,” I said huskily. “I’m sorry. About everything.”

  Lauren slowly rose to her feet. “Thank you for trusting me.”

  I stood up. “I always trusted you,” I told her. “I guess I just don’t trust myself.”

  There was probably never going to be a day when I didn’t wake up normal and was pretty damn grateful that I’d gone another day without going over the edge.

  When we were face-to-face, I took off her glasses, cleaned the lenses with my T-shirt, and slipped them back on again. “Be careful on your trip.”

  She nodded at me, and then turned to leave.

  I sprinted to the door, catching her just the way I had when she’d wanted to leave before.

  “Lauren, I—”

  She turned and quickly put her fingers to my lips. “Don’t say anything else. Just think about my offer. If I don’t hear from you, I’ll assume you decided to end our friendship, but at least I’ll have my closure. I’m grateful to you for that.”

  “You’ve changed,” I observed. I wasn’t quite sure what had happened to her since I’d left her sleeping at the cabin, but she was different, more confident. The self-assured demeanor suited her.

  “Maybe it was just time for me to grow up,” she said as she turned around and opened the door.

  She left my condo quietly, not saying another word as she walked through the door.

  I closed it behind her, feeling like an enormous weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

  She knew, and it hadn’t changed the way she felt about me. I could see the same look in her eyes that she’d always had when we were together.

  For some reason, I was still her hero.

  Lauren cared, and I’d hurt her pretty badly. I couldn’t expect her to just take me back as a friend. I’d need to prove myself to her.

  But she was willing to give me another shot.

  The ball was in my court, and I knew I was going to take advantage of that for all it was worth. I wasn’t the type of guy who wasted a good opportunity, but this time, I’d be playing ball for something a hell of a lot more important to me than football.

  And I wasn’t planning on losing.

  CHAPTER 24

  Lauren

  The next day I was in my bedroom at my childhood desk looking over my hiring packet from the Jeffersonian. Jack knocked on my door even though it was open. “May I come in?”

  I closed the binder before answering. “Sure.” I hadn’t seen Jack in person since Aspen. He was still on my shit list, but he was also my only sibling. The thought of losing him as well as Graham was unsettling.

  He sat on the edge of my bed and rested his elbows on his knees. “Hope and I broke up.”

  I was tempted to cheer, but I didn’t. Dad had told me several times that he had never seen Jack behave the way he had recently. “Love makes men stupid sometimes,” he’d said.

  I could have told him it wasn’t an exclusively male affliction. No matter how many times Graham pushed me away, no matter what my rational brain told me, my heart refused to give up on him. So, really, could I judge Jack for following his heart? “Sorry to hear that.”

  “Actually, she broke it off with me.”

  If he was looking for pity from me I didn’t have any for him. Not yet. I put a hand on my hip and simply stared at him.

  His shoulders slumped forward. “She was already dating someone new.”

  “Shocker.”

  “I thought she was the one. I’m such a fucking idiot.”

  I moved to sit beside him. “Yeah, you are.”

  He shook his head with a sad smile. “Dad said you saw Graham. How was he?”

  “I thought you no longer gave a shit about him.”

  “You know I didn’t mean that. I was angry.”

  “You had no right to be. You deserved that punch.”

  “I know. I feel like someone gutted me. Nothing matters right now. Not my new job. Nothing. What is fucking wrong with me? Why would I do this?”

  I sighed and remembered something Kelley had once said regarding couple counseling. “Most people don’t set out to hurt anyone. Betrayals start as small lapses in judgment. Like a
married person who goes to bars every night without their spouse. Purely based on statistical probability, eventually they will meet someone who makes them take a second look, then laugh—or yearn. I don’t think you set out to break Hope and Graham up. Knowing you, at first you were just trying to be nice to her. The two of you clicked. That led to—well, we know where that led.”

  “It felt real, you know? When I was with her nothing else mattered. My brain knew it was wrong, but my di—my heart had other plans.”

  I totally understood that feeling. “I’m glad you’re sorry. Not glad you’re sad or that Hope left you, but I didn’t feel like I knew you when you were with her.”

  “I didn’t know myself.”

  We sat in silence for a long time. I didn’t know what else to say and it seemed that Jack felt the same way. Eventually, he asked, “Is Graham okay?”

  It was a simple question that if answered honestly would require a complicated response. Graham had shared a side of himself with me that I didn’t think he’d ever even shared with Jack. It wouldn’t have felt right to divulge what I had learned. One day, if Graham wanted him to know, he would tell him in his own time and on his terms.

  How was Graham? He’d sought treatment early and was maintaining a lifestyle to support it. If he continued on that path, there was no reason to believe he couldn’t succeed both in football and in his personal relationships. Good communication with someone who understood the challenges he’d face and who could support him if he faltered. Medications sometimes required adjustments, but if he remained proactive he would be more than okay.

  Me? I still felt like everything I cared about was sand slipping away between my fingers. How could I be so widely accepted as intelligent and feel so lost when it came to knowing what to do next? Gutted. Yes, Jack had described exactly how I felt. “He’s doing better than I am. I miss him.”

  “Me, too. I didn’t believe Graham really loved her. I knew she didn’t love him. She couldn’t and look at me the way she did. I feel even worse knowing I messed up your friendship with Graham, too. If I could go back and undo it, I would.”