Isolation Play (Dev and Lee) (10 page)

I glance at the pack as we walk out. “That crap’s no good for you.”

He holds the cigarette in his paw, and turns toward the front door. “Gets me through the day,” he says, and raises his paw in salute as he leaves.

Around quarter to twelve, Alex asks if I want to go to lunch. “Tomorrow,” I say. “I’m meeting some friends.” It’s easier to lie than to say, “I want some time alone to think.”

He scratches behind his ear. “Didn’t know you had friends.”

“
Sure, just most of them are imaginary.” I look at the empty air to my right. “Isn’t that right, Harvey?”

Alex snorts and rubs his long ears. “Tomorrow’s double patty day at Jeffrey’s.”

“
I’m there. Hey, if you’re leaving now, I’ll walk out with you.”

Outside, the wind’s picked up, biting at my nose. Alex folds his long ears down. “What do you think of Miski?”

“
I think it’s great,” I say. “About fucking time.”

“
I mean, you think he’s gonna last?”

I think about that one, my eyes narrowed to slits against the wind. “He’s gotta be pretty tough to come out the way he did. I think he’ll last.”

“
Bet he gets injured before the end of the season.”

I turn to look at him. He’s peering ahead into the wind, same as I am, bouncing the way rabbits do. “Everyone gets injured.”

“
Yeah, but I bet someone knocks him out of a game.”

Instinct overrides thought. “You’re on. Bet you a lunch?”

We shake on it. He goes into Wrap Party, a fast-food place that does good veggie wraps, while I head down to Barlow’s, a slightly more upscale place where you have to sit down to get lunch.

“
Just one,” I tell the squirrel at the hostess’s desk. She guides me to a small two-person table by the windows, removes one of the place settings, and leaves me alone with my thoughts and a menu. I order a glass of white wine and a Cajun chicken sandwich, which is sure to be as Cajun as I am straight.

The columns that appeared that morning from Dev’s interviews were what I would expect from sports media: neutral to favorable, interested in his story, talking about how hard it is for gay athletes these days. The comments were about what I would have expected from the sports fan base: by and large, gay people and Chevali fans are supportive. A few assholes are assholes. And there was a comment that read, “I know his dad, sucks to be him.”

Which makes me think again about visiting Dev’s parents. It just seems like a disaster waiting to happen. I’m the intruder, the symbol of everything they think is “wrong” with their son. I don’t know what I’m most worried about: his parents freezing me out, or Dev getting upset when we don’t magically get along, or me losing it when they make some bullshit conservative remark. I’ll keep a lid on my temper, but it won’t be easy if we’re there longer than a day or two.

It’ll hurt Dev if we don’t leave on better terms than when we arrive. Hell, it hurts him just knowing I’m on the outs with my parents, no matter how much I tell him I don’t mind it. I respect
his
attachment to his parents, whether or not I understand it. That’s why I’m still going to go along with him to his parents’ place, despite all my misgivings. I’ll be on my best behavior, and I’ll figure out a way to make it work.

My fur itches with the idea that I should reach out to my parents to try to get some insight into what to say or what not to say to Dev’s parents. This is important to Dev, and therefore to me. But I can’t bring myself to get out the phone. Father would be drily snide. Mother...I can’t even imagine what she’d say to me.

Halfway through the glass of wine, my thoughts are going around in circles. At least a lunch with Alex would have been a distraction. I fish around in my bag for my notebook, to go through my list of players again, and as I pull it out, a business card flutters to the ground.

Hal Kinnel’s card. I turn it over in my paws. I shouldn’t call him, if only because calling him would give him my phone number. That aside, I also don’t feel like making up a whole fake history of me dating Dev. But thinking about him reminds me of Dev’s press conference, which reminds me of Dev’s courage and my losing the opportunity to come out at my office. I think of Kinnel waiting for Lee White to call him, hoping desperately for his exclusive. I wonder if he’s talked to Corcoran about Dev.

If I’m going to talk to someone, though, it should be Salim. I tried to call him last night and got voice mail. Lunchtime, I know he’ll be at his desk.

So I signal to the waiter that I’ll be right back. I take my phone to one of the phone alcoves in the hallway to the restrooms. I can still see my table and the rest of the dining room from here. Across the hall from me, framed pictures of the championship Dragons teams from earlier years stare back at me.

Two rings, and then I hear Salim’s slightly accented voice. I say hi, and he lowers his voice. “Lee,” he says. “Are you okay?”

“
I’m fine,” I say. “Tried to call you last night.”

“
It was my night with Jeremy,” he says.

“
Can you talk now? Go to a meeting room, or something?”

“
I wish I could. I have a meeting in nine minutes.”

“
Tonight?”

“
Dinner with Fasha’s parents.”

“
I don’t know how you juggle a family, a boyfriend,
and
in-laws.”

“
By neglecting other good friends. I’m sorry. Maybe this weekend.”

I shift my phone. “I’ll be traveling, watching games. Next week?”

He clucks. “Perhaps. You are okay, though?”

“
I’m fine. Work is interesting.”

“
Related to your tiger? I look forward to hearing about it.”

“
I’ll save the story,” I promise.

When he’s gone to his meeting, I hold the phone in one paw, Kinnel’s card in the other. I still have five or ten minutes until my food’s ready. What can it hurt?

He picks up on the second ring. “Hello?”

I put on my Lauren Bacollie voice, with a little less sex than I use for Dev, and identify myself. “I just wanted to get back to you.”

“
That’s mighty kind of you.” I can almost see his ears perk up. “Did you see that interview Miski did with TSN?”

Of course I did. “I think so.”

“
In the interview on TSN, he says that for a year and a half in the league, he hasn’t been able to talk about his relationship.”

Across from me, a tough tiger in a 1960s Dragons uniform glares out of the picture. I wonder if maybe he was gay. “Of course not.”

His voice is soft. “I’m guessin’ he didn’t mean you.”

I realize that he wants to be the one who broke the news to me, so he can get my reaction and be the one to comfort me, too. I put a lot of feeling into my “Oh.”

“
So you didn’t know he had a boyfriend for a year and a half?”

“
Clearly not.”

Here comes the comfort. “Hey, look. Maybe it wasn’t his secret to tell. Maybe his boyfriend wasn’t ready to come out.”

I struggle for words. “That’s gonna be tough, right? I mean, if his boyfriend wants to stay—hidden.”

“
Damn, you’re sweet. So worried about him.” He exhales across the phone. “Like you know, a couple can’t live too long together if they got secrets.”

I need to get off the subject of me and Dev. “Was it your secret or Cimarine’s?”

That gets a surprised cough out of him. “You remember her name. Well, I reckon it was kind of both, and kind of neither.”

“
That’s not a real answer.”

“
Miss White,” he says, “I think we should be tradin’ secrets over dinner, or at least coffee.”

I lean back against the wall, and grin. “Next time I’m in Chevali.”

“
Deal. Hey, Otterman did a thing on Miski, you see it?”

My ears perk. “No.”

“
Top Ten Signs Your Neighborhood Is Becoming Fashionable Again. Number Six: Devlin Miski just moved in next door.”

Despite myself, I laugh. “What was number one?”

“
Something about the President, I don’t remember. Did he see it?”

“
No.”

“
You talked to him?”

My tail swishes, annoyed that he caught me admitting I talked to Dev. “The President?” He laughs. “I called Dev the other night. Straightened some stuff out.”

“
He say he was sorry?”

“
Kind of.” I remember his paws on me, and close my eyes, imagining being a dumped vixen rather than a loved boyfriend. “It was hard.”

“
Hey. It’s good you can talk.”

“
I told him about meeting you. He wanted to know if you saw Corcoran’s remarks to ESPN.”

“
Yeah. Standard stuff.”

I smile. “Standard and sincere, or...?”

“
I haven’t talked to him.” He sounds a bit annoyed.

“
But you know him. Did it sound like him?”

“
We don’t go out for beers every night.” His voice softens. “But yeah. Sounded like him.”

“
Who do you go out for beers with?” Part of me wants to know if he talks to anyone else who might be influential. Part of me wants to know how lonely and desperate he really is.

“
Miss White,” he says, and then stops himself short. “I don’t drink much these days.”

“
She got the friends in the divorce?”

“
Who got your friends?” he parries.

I look across the hall at the team photo, all the guys standing together, shoulder to shoulder. Tigers and foxes, bears and wolves, cheetahs and coyotes. “We didn’t really have much but each other,” I say.

“
You
didn’t,” he points out, and then, immediately, “Sorry.”

“
Do you try to meet people? Maybe not in bars, but...parties? Mixers?”

“
Uh-huh.” His tone’s sarcastic. “’Cause I really wanna meet someone desperate and lonely.”

“
So what are you doing talking to me?”

I say it lightly, but he takes a moment to respond. “Seems like we could help each other out,” he says, slowly.

Deliberately, I keep my tone jokey. “I’m not interested in helping you get back at your ex.”

“
Figured that, since you don’t wanna get back at yours. That’s good. Healthy. No hard feelings.”

My paw rests near my sheath. “None right now, anyway. It’s all history.”

“
History repeats. Hey, y’know, I grew up a Dragons fan.”

The non-sequitur disrupts my train of thought. “In Chevali?”

“
I grew up in Boliat, but my dad was a Dragons fan. He taught me ’bout all those great teams. Kill and Maim, and the Flying Foxes, and Coach Vine.” His voice softens, with a note of longing. “Made me want to write about sports.”

I crane my neck, looking down the hall. Further down, the two bears Killiner and Mamelon bookend the 1968 World Champion team. Behind them, Henderson, one of the two Flying Foxes, wears his trademark smirk. The other fox, Banks, joined in 1970. In 1971 they combined for twenty-one touchdowns, a record that stood for thirty years. They’re leaning against each other, grinning, in the 1972 World Champions photo.

In 1973, Henderson left for Yerba. Neither he nor Banks was ever the same apart. “Great teams. And hey, you’re a real sportswriter. So I know you did that right.”

He’s quiet. My stomach rumbles. Finally, he says, “Yeah. I guess.” Before I can ask what that means, he says, “Dragons’ll be good again.”

“
Maybe in our lifetimes.”

“
Teams go through rough patches. They pull through.” He pauses for what sounds like a drink. “What about you? Did you grow up in Hilltown?”

My hackles rise. I crane my neck, looking the other way down the hall as if I might spot him there, smirking. Then I remember I called him from my cell phone, and he must have seen the area code. “I’m sorry,” I say. “My lunch is ready.”

“
Listen,” he says quickly, “If you could get a quote Miski ain’t already used with another paper...”

“
I’ll do my best,” I say.

“
And Miss White?” I pause, waiting. “It gets easier,” he says, softly. “That’s what they tell me.”

I take a second to feel the emotion in his voice. “Thank you, Mister Kinnel. I’ll talk to you later.”

I make my way past a number of people, keeping my tail clear of brushing their chairs. Their conversations float past my ears, but all I hear is the replay of my conversation with Kinnel. Jesus, the poor fox is still not over his wife. And he thinks I’m doing better at getting over being dumped. Should I give him some tips? Is that even fair?

I can’t think about that right now. So I wonder: What did he do to alienate his wife? It could be about anything. Who knows what drives people apart? Maybe it was something as ordinary as one of them cheating on the other. Maybe it was his drinking. Maybe they have a gay kid and he’s okay with that, and she’s not.

Whatever happened between them, Kinnel clearly didn’t expect it. Teams, now, teams get broken up all the time. Players get traded or cut; they get injured, or they leave for Yerba. Dev might be in a better spot with his team than his parents now, but what if he gets traded? What if Corey Mitchell comes back and takes over the starting spot? Kinnel doesn’t think that’ll happen. Doesn’t think Corcoran will dump Dev. I wonder whether Dev will ever be in a photo in a hallway. I wonder if Kinnel will talk to Corcoran and find out for sure.