I took my dinner into my room to eat alone, but I didn’t have much of an appetite. Logically, everything Cazzie said made perfect sense. Claiming to be a lesbian was probably a good way to keep the guys away when she was in the Army. I’d heard horror stories from my sisters about men who couldn’t take no for an answer, and all the shit they dealt with when they turned down someone’s advances. If I were in their shoes and could tell a small lie to make all of that go away, I probably would have done so without thinking twice.
But it still ate away at me all night, and throughout football practice the next two days. I ate dinner on Saturday night in the living room with her, but we didn’t talk. Even though one wall had been pulled down, an even larger one had gone up between us.
We played the Raiders at home on Sunday. I started off rusty, but the roar of the crowd and my competitive spirit soon helped me push Cazzie out of my mind entirely. I ended the game with six receptions and one touchdown.
“You okay, partner?” Brody Carter asked me in the locker room after the game.
I finished toweling myself off and stepped into a pair of jeans. “I’m great. Why?”
Brody sat on the bench outside my locker. “You practically sleep-walked through your media interviews. It was like those reporters were pulling teeth trying to get you to say more than two words at a time. It’s a woman on your mind, isn’t it?”
I let out a bewildered chuckle. “How’d you guess?”
“It always is, partner. It always is. You want to talk about it?”
“Not really, no.”
“Let me rephrase that. How about you talk to your good buddy and extremely handsome gentleman Brody Carter about it, or I’ll tell Double-D you need cheering up. And he’ll drag you to every strip joint in this city until you start smiling, which Iknowisn’t your kind of scene.”
I laughed, and decided I didn’t want to find out whether or not Brody was joking. “My bodyguard? Cazzie? Turns out she’s not a lesbian. She lied to me.”
Brody whispered. “Oh, damn. You’d better keep that info to yourself, or we’ll have half the team breathing down her neck for a date.”
I winced internally. Brody’s comment was reinforcing why she had lied in the first place. “I’m upset she lied to me. I don’t know why it’s bothering me so much, but it is.”
“Aw, that’s simple,” Brody said.
“I’m all ears.”
“Did I ever tell you what it was like when I first came here?” Brody went on without letting me respond. “The Stallions were a brand new expansion team. Their first season in the league. I was a rookie like you, drafted right out of the University of Texas. Hook ‘em horns!” He paused to make a horn shape with his index and pinky fingers. “Back in college, I felt like I was part of a family. Half the guys on the team were the same class as me, so I’d known them since I was a freshman. I didn’t realize how good I had it, because when I came here? I didn’t knowanyone. I tried making friends, but it wasn’t easy. Since we were an expansion team, everyone knew we would be terrible for at least a few years. And we were. That first year was really lonely for me, let me tell you. I only had one good friend, a free safety named Angelo Sherman. We were thick as thieves. We lived in the same apartment building, but he spent most of his time playing videogames at my place. We rode to practice together, ate all our meals together, went to the bar together.”
“Angelo Sherman?” I asked. “Isn’t he on the Dolphins?”
“He is indeed,” Brody said with a sad smile. “And he’s on the Dolphins because halfway through that first season, he demanded that the Stallions trade him. I didn’t find out until I got the notification from the ESPN app on my phone. Partner, let me tell you: I felt betrayed. It felt like he was requesting a trade away fromme. That put me in a funk for at least a month.”
“I’m not sure how this relates to my situation,” I said.
“The thing that upset me the most was that he never told me he wanted to be traded,” Brody explained. “If we were such good friends, why didn’t he tell me he was unhappy on the Stallions? That lie tainted all the good times we did have together. It made me feel even lonelier than I was before we became friends.” Brody stood and squeezed my shoulder. “It ain’t the exact same situation. Not by a long shot. But you and that foxy bodyguard of yours remind me of me and Angelo. Y’all go everywhere together. You’re practically besties. And now that you know she’s been lying to you, it makes you feel like you were never really friends at all. Am I right, or am I right?”
“You’re… not wrong,” I admitted.
“The good news? She’s not getting traded to Miami. You can hash your shit out and go back to the way you were before. Yeah, she lied to you about something personal. But she had a good reason. My advice? Talk it out with her. Yell and shout at each other if you need to. But then move on. If she’s going to keep being your bodyguard—which it seems like she is—then you don’t want anything making things awkward between you two.”
We definitely don’t want anything awkward between us, I thought as I resumed getting dressed.Like, for example, a kiss we shared at the mall.
I joined Dallas and a few of my teammates for celebratory drinks after the game. Cazzie ordered a tonic water and lime at the bar, then kept an eye on our booth while trying to act casual. When Brody caught me watching her, he elbowed me in the ribs and raised his eyebrows.
When we got home later that evening, Cazzie made her rounds checking the apartment the way she always did. Then she quietly said goodnight and headed for her room.
“Caz, wait.”
She stopped and turned to face me, frowning.
“I’m mad you lied, but I understand why you did it,” I said. “You don’tneedmy forgiveness, but I forgive you anyway. I didn’t realize until today, but I consider you my friend, and your friendship is important to me.” I took a deep breath. “And the kiss at the mall…”
I didn’t know what I was going to say. I hadn’t rehearsed it. But the kiss had been planted at the forefront of all my thoughts since Thursday, and I desperately needed to bring it up. Because deep down, I realized, I desperately wanted it to happen again.
“You don’t need to say it,” she interrupted. Were her fair cheeks suddenly red? “It was a vulnerable moment. You’d just had a panic attack. I promise it won’t happen again. I’ll go back to focusing on my job. You have my word.”