Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 77051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Me: Like I said, clown porn.
Candice’s eye roll emoji made me grin. She and her husband, Leon, had started working for my parents when I was just a kid. Candice had moved up from house manager to general life manager. She and Leon were the only ones who’d been visibly excited when I was drafted to the Royals.
Candice: Did you call your mom yet?
Me: No. She wants me to call later since they’re on Oz time.
Candice: Don’t forget.
Twenty years later and she was still trying to engineer the whole nuclear family ideal. I didn’t have the heart to tell her outright that just wasn’t in the Whitt gene pool.
Me: Okay, mom2. Game’s back on, so I’ve gotta run. I got the tickets you requested set aside for the first home game. They’ll be at the VIP box office. Friends and family section.
Candice: Okay, sweetheart. We’re looking forward to it! Don’t forget to call your mom!
I sighed at the screen, even though a smile tickled the corners of my mouth at the second reminder.
Me: Heard you the first time. Tell Leon hey for me.
I tossed my phone on the table and got back to the game, where Garrett was tearing up the field all over again. They were definitely going to be a challenge this year, and I was determined to be ready for whatever they threw our way.
I got home a little after ten, tossed my keys onto the kitchen counter, and immediately opened all the sliding doors to the balcony before pouring myself a glass of whiskey and taking it onto the deck with me. The Hollywood Hills house was the first thing I’d ever purchased using my own money.
Back then, my pro football dreams had seemed like a long shot to my parents, which was probably part of the reason they hadn’t given me too much grief over my choice to go to Southern; they figured I’d be back eventually, and I had. Sort of. Southern U wasn’t Stanford, but it’d been the switch I’d needed to kick my game into high gear.
As I sipped my whiskey, I couldn’t shake the image of Tucker from my head. His strength and focus had been intimidating on the field, and it was all I could think about. Maybe it was the fact that he seemed to have it all together. Meanwhile, I felt like I was constantly struggling to keep up with expectations I wasn’t sure were mine or someone else’s. I knew it was stupid to dwell on someone who was little more than a stranger I used to go to camp with and who’d once witnessed a moment between me and my dad that still made me feel exposed and vulnerable when I thought about it. I hated that feeling. Or to dislike him just because he’d been drafted to the Rush instead of me in a plot twist not even the best NFL draft analysts had predicted, but I did, and the sour taste he left in my mouth had lingered even after multiple seasons with the Royals and despite how much I’d grown to love playing for them.
I pulled up a replay of their earlier preseason game via the NFL+ app and fast-forwarded to the end of the game, checking out the team interviews I’d missed earlier. I sped through Ramsey’s and Garrett’s interviews, pausing only when I caught a glimpse of Tucker in the background, high-fiving who I assumed was one of his siblings. I waited to see if they’d interview him, but after another minute and a glance at the time, I closed out the app and called my mom’s phone.
“Evening, Patrick,” she said, “Your father and I were just talking about you. Sure wish we could convince you to fly out here and check out this new warehouse with us.” She did that a lot, just sort of barreled into a conversation without the standard exchange of “hello” or “how are you.”
“I’d love to, but you know I’m knee-deep in preseason stuff,” I responded with rote diplomacy.
“Of course,” she said like she’d forgotten, though I knew she hadn’t. My career was mostly treated as a minor inconvenience rather than the substantial accomplishment and accompanying paycheck it was. I’d gotten used to it. They’d never understood the allure for me or that I didn’t want to just be enfolded into the family dynasty. Hell, most people wouldn’t understand, and I couldn’t entirely explain it myself. I just knew that from the second I’d stepped on the football field, it’d felt right. It had ignited a passion inside me I’d never felt for polo, piano, debate team, math bowl, or any number of other “appropriate” extracurriculars for a Whitt.
“Your father and I watched some of your preseason game,” she continued smoothly. “The team is looking really good this year. Think LaForge can get you all to the Super Bowl?” The second disappointment I’d delivered to my parents was that I wasn’t a quarterback, which was apparently the only acceptable position in football. I’d never been cut out for that, though, definitely not the way LaForge was or Warner Ramsey. I was meant for the grind.