Page 48 of The Hot Shot

Only when my guys surround me do I let my smile fall. “Dex,” I say to my center, “I don’t know what bug crawled up your ass, but get it together and pay attention.”

He’s been addled the whole game and completely misread the defense on this last play, resulting in me being sacked before I could blink. I’m fairly certain the press digging into his personal life is getting to him, but we have a job to do.

Glumly, he nods. “On it.”

I slap his helmet. “Good man.”

But it’s a lost cause. Whatever is going on with Dex spreads like a disease through the line. Soon, everyone is fucking up. Jake and Rolondo both drop passes. North, my tight end, can’t gain yards. Moorehouse, my running back, goes down with a bad hit, and they haul him into the locker room for evaluation.

As for me, I’m battered like a goddamn piñata. I try to focus, try to rally. I might as well be attempting to hold water in my hands. All the while, Coach and my coordinators are havingapoplectic fits. Most of which ring in my ears through the mic in my helmet.

That this is an away game and the crowd is completely loving our defeat doesn’t exactly help.

The distinct shout of, “Eat turf, pussy boy Mannus!” somehow makes it through the din of the crowd.Excellent.

It is, as Chess would say, a complete shitcake of a game.

By the time we hobble off the field, defeated and deflated, I am ready to sink into a hot bath and swallow down a mouthful of painkillers. But I’m not going to get to do that. I’m going to get reamed by my coach and then reamed by the press.

I’ll have to stand at a podium, lights shining on my face, and answer insightful questions such as, “Do you think you could have done something better?” Yeah, I could have fucking won. Or, “Do you think you lost because you failed to score during the second half?” Considering this game is won on a points- based system, I would say not scoring had something to do with it.

In the dank, echoing hall that leads to the locker room, I turn to Jake, who walks wearily at my side. “Give me a reminder.”

Since I ask this question every time we have a shit day, he doesn’t miss a beat. “Fifteen million signing bonus.”

“I’m going to have to put that aside for new hips when I’m forty.”

“When you’re thirty-five,” he counters easily. “And are we getting solid gold hips?”

I laugh. “I’m going full-on cyborg. Try again.”

Jake smirks. “Willing women in every city.”

“I’m too tired to screw.”

Jake shoots me a glance. “Man, you are a sad sack today.”

He’s right. I’m in full-on “pity party of one” mode. “I’m depressing myself,” I tell him.

“Which is why you need to let off some steam. I’m going out as soon as we get back. You want to join me?”

I’m already shaking my head. “I’m going home, taking a bath, and getting some sleep.”

“Jesus, you really are an old man now.”

Maybe I am. But the prospect of going out and looking for a quick hookup is utterly unappealing. I’d rather call Chess and see if she’s up for dinner. Right there is what truly makes me a sad sack.

I don’t get to dwell on that any longer, because we reach the locker room and the reality of my job snaps back into place.

Grimly, I walk through the locker room doors and prepare to defend my performance and my men.

Chess

I’m mopey. Finn is at an away game, and James is in New York with Jamie again.

It’s his second visit, and I gather things are getting serious between them.

I’ve received two texts from James. One selfie of him and Jamie in Central Park by the Bethesda Fountain, the other of them all smooshie-faced in Times Square on the night they went to see a musical—the lucky bastards. A wave of homesickness had hit me, seeing those pictures.