Hot Stuff

by Kim Karr

  I drew in a breath. Then another. I wanted to kiss him, but even though he was only a few steps away there was so much distance between us. He stepped forward as if realizing this and pulled me into his arms. I tucked myself against him, my hand covering his heart.

  “I wasn’t sure you were going to come.”

  He covered my hand with his, curling his fingers tight around mine. When he looked down at me, the darkness in his pupils had nearly swallowed up his blue eyes. “I know I should have called, but I had a lot to take care of before exit interviews and then well, shit, Gillian—”

  I shook my head. “You don’t have to say it. I already know.” My voice cracked and I had to look away. “At least tell me you still have a position on the team. Tell me you’re still the quarterback for the Bears.”

  Gently, Lucas lifted my chin. “Your father didn’t threaten to take my position from me.”

  “Then what did he do?”

  Lucas stepped back. “Gillian, we said from the start this would be over when you left for school, but then we allowed ourselves to get carried away. We shouldn’t have. You have college and a new job to worry about, and I have the team. We’ll both be so busy we won’t have time for anything else, especially not each other.”

  My knees felt weak, so I went over to the bed and sat down. “You know as well as I do that isn’t true. You can pretend you believe it, but I know you don’t, Lucas. I know!”

  He came over to me and knelt down, placing his palms on my knees. “You’re wrong. I do believe that. Just like I believe you will be okay, and so will I.”

  “What did he say to you?” I screamed.

  Lucas pushed my hair from my eyes. “Like I said, he didn’t threaten my position, and that’s all you need to know.”

  I shook my head. “Don’t do this!”

  “Close your eyes, Strawberry Fields,” he said, his voice hoarse.

  I did. And when I did, I waited for him to kiss me. I waited for his touch. I waited for him to throw me down on the bed and take me, even if it was for the last time.

  But then I heard the soft click of the door, and when I opened my eyes . . . he was gone.

  And I was not okay.

  I would never be okay.

  HUT, HUT, HIKE

  Lucas

  THE FIRST NFL game I would ever play in was going to be at Soldier Field.

  It was bitter fucking sweet.

  The love/hate relationship I had with the Bears had nothing to do with the team or this city and everything to do with my father.

  The Bears had been his favorite team, and during the times in his life that he decided to be a part of mine, he shared that love with me.

  Wanting his attention so badly, I learned everything I could about his favorite team. By the time I was eight, I knew every stat, every player, every detail of that team. I knew McMahon was his favorite player and that he wore jersey #9. I knew Ditka was one of the best coaches that ever walked this earth. And I knew no one ever questioned the toughness of Jim McMahon.

  Shit, I had wanted to be just like him.

  The goalposts stood like fluorescent yellow glow sticks in the dark of the night. I still couldn’t believe I was here wearing jersey #9.

  I’d grown up coming here my entire life. Sometimes with my old man, sometimes with my brother, sometimes alone. There were times I couldn’t get in because I didn’t have enough money to buy a ticket. There were times I snuck in. And then there were times I flat out refused to even watch the game, and those times were when my father was manic.

  You see, my brother refused to admit my father suffered from something very close to being bi-polar. He blamed my father’s mood swings on our mother leaving him, but what my brother didn’t know was that I’d found our mother and discovered the truth.

  The woman who looked like me, had the same color hair and eyes as me, told me what I needed to hear. And other than the resemblance, I’d found no connection worth pursuing.

  That one time I met with her she told me why she’d left us. It wasn’t because she was in love with someone else, like my brother had thought. Although she was, and it had made leaving easier. Still the truth was she’d left because of him.

  My father.

  He was unstable.

  Crazy, she’d said, and she couldn’t take it.

  She had to get out of there. She’d wanted to take my brother and me with her, or so she’d said, but my father had threatened to kill us all if she did. And she truly believed he would. I had to admit, she probably wasn’t wrong.

  The last thing she said to me before I left was what stuck in my head. She told me that if you loved someone, you set them free. And since my father refused, she ran away.

  Sure, I had a person I could call Mom and one I could call Dad, but neither was my parent. No, my parent had been my brother, who was only ten years older than me. It was Nick who took care of me, made sure I was fed and bathed and went to school. And because of that I would never tell him I’d found our mother. He believed what he believed, and that was how he’d made it through life.

  Who the fuck was I to rock his foundation?

  He was here tonight up in the box seats reserved for him, as they would be for every game. With him were Tess and their three kids, as well as his two best friends and their families.

  Tess had given birth to their second daughter. Celia was tiny and had the bluest eyes just like my brother. Just like me. Just like our mother.

  When I held her for the first time, I thought of Gillian and what our kids might have looked like had we been able to stay together. Would they have had her strawberry blond hair or my brown strands? Her green eyes or my blue ones? Would they be tall like us?

  That was the one and only time since saying goodbye to her I’d allowed myself to wonder about what might have been.

  The lights flicked on and the stadium lit up. I was nervous. So fucking nervous. My stomach wasn’t feeling that great earlier, so for dinner I’d passed on the meal and ate two Power bars and two bananas.

  Not sure if that was the best choice.

  On the sidelines of the field, I stretched and then picked up a ball to start rotating my arm like a windmill.

  When the whistle blew, it was time to gather as a team.

  “This is our time,” Coach said.

  We all nodded.

  “Today, Pittsburg is going down.”

  Again, we all nodded.

  Coach blew the whistle again, and we all took to the field to warm-up.

  Soon, we were headed back to the locker room.

  Thor walked up to me near the lockers. “Did you hear?”

  “Hear what?”

  “Over seventy thousand people are estimated to be in the stadium tonight. It will be the largest football crowd in Soldier Field history.”

  I stared at him. “Seriously?”

  “Yeah, the Bears haven’t come this far in so long, I guess all the fans that have died off over the years must have decided to show up.”

  For some reason this news made me feel even sicker. I ran to the bathroom stall to kneel over the toilet. Suddenly my dinner came up.

  The rap on the door annoyed me. Couldn’t a guy have a case of nerves in private?

  “Lucas, it’s me, Nick.”

  “Nick?” I yanked the door open in disbelief.

  “Hey, you okay?” he asked, taking a step back.

  I smiled and strode out. “Yeah, just nervous. What are you doing in here?”

  He gave me a shrug. “Couldn’t let you take the field for the first time without saying good luck to your face.”

  I washed my hands and then turned to lean against the counter. “Big brother,” I said.

  He leaned against the counter beside me. “Yeah, little brother?”

  “I don’t think I’ve told you this, but I owe you everything.”

  His eyes filled with emotion.

  I turned and pulled him to me, hugging him like I never had. “Thank you.”
<
br />   He slapped my back and then whispered, “You never have to thank me. I owe you everything too. Without you, what the hell would I have done with my life?”

  I’d never looked at the two of us as needing each other, but maybe he was right, we were who we were because of one another.

  Just then Coach called everybody in.

  Nick gave me one final squeeze and then headed for the door, tossing over his shoulder, “Make Chicago proud, brother, make Chicago proud.”

  I choked down every single emotion I felt as I headed toward my team.

  The locker room was packed as we all took a knee.

  The veins were pulsing in Coach’s neck and forehead when he spoke. “We are going to win tonight!” he shouted.

  All fifty-three of us responded with primal yells. “Hell, yeah.”

  After giving us some time to chant, he led us in reciting the Lord’s Prayer, and then it was time.

  As I put my helmet on, my brother’s words were still fresh in my mind.

  The moment I looked through my facemask though, I let everything go. This was my time to shine. As Gillian would say, it was time to show my stuff.

  It was her voice I heard as I propelled through the cramped locker room doorway into the tunnel. “You think you’re hot stuff.”

  Yeah, I did, and I wished I could tell her so.

  Condensation dripped from the low ceiling above my head. The click clack of cleats was loud in my ears as it echoed in the tunnel, but the rumble of fans was even louder.

  Together as a team we stopped at the end of the tunnel and waited.

  I took it all in.

  When the announcer thundered, “Lucas Carrington!” I stepped to the ledge and darted out.

  Jogging under the goalposts and through the gauntlet of teammates, I looked around in awe. Ushers in yellow jackets surrounded the entrances to the field. The cheerleaders were lined up, high-kicking and shaking their pom-poms. Gillian would be rolling her eyes right now if she could see them. And the Chicago fans were screaming loudly.

  Although I’d wanted to abandon this city once, Chicago was my city, and in this moment I knew I wanted to take it back. Make it mine again. More than anything I hoped I could give these people what they wanted, what they needed to believe again—a win.

  Maybe it was what I needed too.

  Pittsburg won the coin toss and elected to receive. On the fourth play of the game, one of ours picked off their quarterback and returned the ball for a touchdown. We were ahead 7–0.

  It was a great start.

  Except by half time we were down, and in the locker room Coach focused on what we’d done right, not wrong. It was so unlike him.

  During the third quarter we made a comeback and by the near end of the fourth we were tied 24–24.

  “Don’t let up!” Coach was loud in my ear.

  I wasn’t about to.

  It was my time to shine. To show Coach he’d made the right choice in choosing me. To win this game.

  On the snap, I took three quick steps back to pass, but then Thor came like a lunatic around one end and created a brief opening for me.

  Taking advantage, with the ball tucked under my arm, I headed for the end zone.

  I was almost there when a linebacker hit my legs. I bounced off him, but he wrapped up my feet as another linebacker went for my head.

  Fuck them. Fuck them all.

  I ducked just in time to land hard inside the end zone.

  Touchdown!

  The crowd loved it. My teammates loved it. Coach loved it. I loved it! And I knew if Gillian were watching, first she’d be worried I’d been injured and insist she check me out, but then once she knew I was fine, she’d love it, too.

  As we celebrated our very first victory of the season, I couldn’t help but wonder whether Gillian had been watching. And then I let myself do something I vowed not to.

  I wished she were here to celebrate with us . . . with our team.

  LINE OF SCRIMMAGE

  Gillian

  I WAS OKAY.

  Or I would be okay soon. That was what I told myself every day over the past four and half months as I went through the motions of finishing school and job hunting, both of which were now complete.

  The Mayo Clinic Sports Center in Minneapolis had offered me a job three days ago, and I had two weeks to give them a decision. I was going to take it, of course. I just hadn’t told them yet.

  I would, soon.

  Things with my father were better. He had come to Gainesville for my graduation in December. It was the first time I’d seen him since that morning in the dorm. Sure, we’d spoken on the phone, but the conversations had been bland, and we’d never spoken of Lucas again.

  I was no longer upset with my father. I knew from the start how he’d react when he found out, if he found out, so what happened shouldn’t have shocked me like it did. The thing about it was he didn’t care about the feelings I had for Lucas, or I should say, didn’t want to hear about them, and I think that was what still bothered me.

  Was it easier that way for him?

  In the end, did it really matter? It was Lucas’s decision to end things. He was the one who told me he loved me and then left me without saying goodbye.

  It was the final game of the regular season. I hadn’t flown up for a single one all year, and my father hadn’t asked me to either. But this was one I couldn’t stay away from. This game meant everything to the Bears, and despite the tension between my father and me, and despite my complete break with Lucas, I loved this team and wanted them to succeed.

  With three minutes and twenty-two seconds left in the fourth quarter, the Bears had taken over at their own eight-yard line. The Packers were up 27–21. They’d scored three touchdowns and kicked two field goals, and we’d scored three times.

  The Green Bay Packers had already sealed a playoff spot, so you would have thought they would have rested their starters to avoid an unnecessary injury, but that was not the case. Chicago versus Green Bay was one of the league’s most storied rivalries.

  It seemed that back in the nineteen twenties, Chicago pounded the Packers 20–0, and for extra measure, one of their guards threw a sucker punch that broke the nose of one of the Packer’s tackles. And ever since then the two teams shared a love/hate relationship, which is why they weren’t about to back down now, even with their own spot secured.

  At eleven wins and four losses for the season, the Bears were a far cry from last year’s complete reverse. But their position in the playoffs rested on this one game.

  Snowflakes fell over Soldier Field, but the cold drizzle did nothing to dampen the mood of the Bears fans. They wanted this for Chicago. The team wanted this for Chicago. I wanted this for Chicago, for my father, and for Lucas.

  The clock was ticking and I found myself biting my nails. I’d opted against being on the sidelines with the trainers like I always had been at every game before, because . . . well, just because.

  On the first and ten, Lucas handed the ball off to the running back, who ran it for one-yard. Running it all the way wasn’t going to be easy. The Packers defense was one of the best in the league.

  On the second down, Lucas changed strategies and passed it to Preacher, but the play was incomplete.

  Tick-tock.

  Time was running out. Finally, after getting a clean snap, Lucas dropped back. With his feet firmly planted beneath him, he had just pulled the ball back to throw it for a pass when a Packer’s tackle blitzed him, and he fumbled the ball.

  The ball was on the ground, but it was live at least, and when Lucas stood and dove for it, I held my breath. This wasn’t a dropped snap though. He couldn’t fall on the ball and cover it. No, he had to reach for it. With several three hundred pound tackles converging on him, he extended his right arm.

  Oh, my God, I felt like I couldn’t breathe.

  Was he hurt?

  But then he recovered the ball and I finally exhaled.

  The crowd around me roare
d, and I swiped a stray tear away. It was nothing. It didn’t mean anything. I had not allowed myself to cry for all this time, and I wasn’t about to start now. I would force myself to laugh when this was over and I knew he was okay before I cried.

  Moments before Lucas hit the ground, he threw the ball to Kutch. There were only twenty seconds left on the clock. The ball was safe, but Lucas was not. With the play already in motion, Kutch caught the ball. At the same time, the Packer’s defensive tackle did what every defensive tackle would do in that situation; he took a legal shot at the quarterback—at Lucas.

  The force of the collision was ferocious, and I gasped, “Lucas.”

  The team box was filled with people, but it was only then I noticed a man off to my left that looked so much like Lucas, only he was a bit older. He had to be Nick, and he was holding his hands over his face in distress.

  That hit that Lucas took hadn’t come alone. It came with the weight of the other tackles that were now piled on top of each other, on top of Lucas.

  With the Packers going after Lucas, Kutch was more than able to run the ball all the way. It was unbelievable, but somehow he managed to score a touchdown before the whistle blew.

  Everyone cheered, except for Lucas’s brother, and me. We were both holding our breath. Yet after the immediate roar of the crowd, there was a stunned silence throughout the stadium as the fans, and me, and Nick, waited for the bodies to lift and for Lucas to emerge.

  One by one they stood until Lucas was the only one still on the ground. “Get up,” I willed, “get up!”

  When he rolled over, and struggled to push himself up with his left arm, I knew something had happened to his right shoulder. It was still compromised from when I’d struck him with the water cart at training camp.

  The team converged on him, but Thor was the first by his side, bringing him to his feet. By the time Lucas had stood, the medical staff had flown into action.

  Watching him was terrifying, and my heart was nearly pounding out of my chest. He looked like he was in agony as he walked toward the sidelines, and all I wanted to do was run down there.