Sweetness (69 page)

So euphoric in the moment was Hong that he failed to find it odd how Connie, Walter Payton’s wife for twenty-three years, seemed to be completely unaware that the ring had ever gone missing.

Though a misplaced Super Bowl ring hardly ruined Walter Payton’s life, the symbolism of its fall through the cracks cannot be ignored.

Without a football career, without a racing career, without the potential ownership of an NFL franchise, Walter Payton often found himself suffocated by darkness. Oh, he wouldn’t let on as such. He smiled and laughed and told jokes and pinched rear ends and tried his absolute best to come across as the life of the party. Inside, however, happiness eluded Payton in the same manner he had once eluded opposing linebackers.

Facing increased pressure from Lita Gonzalez to either commit or walk, in August 1994 Payton filed for divorce from Connie in the Circuit Court of Cook County, citing “irreconcilable differences” which “have caused the irretrievable breakdown of the marriage.”

The truth was, Payton neither wanted nor needed a divorce—just a piece of paper to shut Gonzalez up by showing her that he was, indeed, trying. (Said Ginny Quirk: “Being married was inconsequential to Walter. He didn’t deal much with Connie, but having her helped with his image.”) Connie, however, did not take kindly to her husband’s filing, and was especially livid when one of his attorneys leaked word of the potential split to the
Sun-Times
.

On November 29, 1994, Walter received a letter from Connie’s lawyer, Joseph DuCanto, demanding twenty-five thousand dollars for her attorney fees and threatening to shatter his angelic reputation. DuCanto used the correspondence to make clear that, were the details of the “no-holds-barred confrontation” to go public, Payton’s pristine image would likely find itself flushed down a toilet.

Walter read the letter, crumpled it up, and slammed his fist into his desk. He had provided Connie with everything she ever needed—and this was his reward? So what that he cheated on her for years. So what that he was an on-again, off-again father? So what? He was Walter Payton.
The
Walter Payton. If anyone was supposed to be making the threats, it was him. Not Connie.

Around this time, Payton actually began seeing yet another woman, a New York–based medical-supply saleswoman named Judy Choy, and encouraged her to move to Illinois so they could spend more time together. Though aware that Payton’s marriage to Connie was a farce, Choy never knew about Gonzalez. “Judy’s father was a private investigator, and he looked into Walter and found out a lot of stuff about him,” said Linda Conley, a friend of Walter and Connie, as well as a former Studebaker’s employee. “That was it. She was a strong woman, and she had pride.” Months after being dumped, Payton hired his own private investigator to locate Judy, but to no avail. She had moved and disconnected her phone, and wanted nothing to do with him. Gonzalez, on the other hand, stuck around, hoping Walter could change. “It was a joke,” Quirk said. “Walter was Walter. For good and for bad, there was no changing him.”

He turned forty-three in 1996. By now, the stories had grown stale and tiresome. That first game against the Colts. The 275 yards against the Vikings. Battles against O. J. Simpson and Earl Campbell and Eric Dickerson. In the film
Everybody’s All-American
, Gavin Grey, the faded football star played brilliantly by Dennis Quaid, bemoans life as an ex-athlete by wailing, “This shit is killing me. I feel like I’m just some old bullshitter. The more I tell these damn stories, the more I feel like I’m making it up. Like it never even happened to me.” Payton was engulfed within a similarly hellish vortex, the numbing ritualistic mindlessness of former athletic greatness overwhelming any present and future potential. He was a fly stuck in amber—eternally No. 34 for the Chicago Bears, even when he wasn’t No. 34 for the Chicago Bears. “I always wondered whether I did Walter a favor by helping him get so big,” said Bud Holmes. “It’s a fine line whether he would have been happier as a larger-than-life celebrity, or as a man back in Columbia, Mississippi, fathering ten or twelve illegitimate children, getting thrown in jail once a month, working some blue-collar job. If Elvis had it to do all over again, would he rather just drive a truck in Tupelo?”

Payton was the clichéd celebrity—surrounded by admirers, yet alone. “He called me many times at two, three in the morning, just wanting to talk,” said Holmes. “There’s a Norman Rockwell quote—‘Pity the poor genius.’ I pitied Walter.” In his post-football years, many people insisted they were particularly close to Payton—Holmes, the agent; Mike Lanigan, his partner in Payton Power, a heavy-equipment company; Matt Suhey, his former fullback; John Gamauf, the vice president of Bridgestone/Firestone and partners with Walter on a racing team; Linda Conley, his employee at Studebaker’s; Connie, his estranged wife.

While those individuals (with the exception of Connie) did, in fact, find themselves somewhere within the confines of Walter’s miniscule inner circle, the two he confided in most were Ginny Quirk, his executive assistant, and Kimm Tucker, the executive director of the Walter Payton Foundation as well as his director of marketing. Walter Payton, Inc., was now located in suite 340 on the third floor of an office building in Hoffman Estates (Payton was given the space rent-free, in exchange for a couple of appearances on behalf of the landlord), and Payton was there nearly every day alongside the two women. They were, in many respects, his family. “I’ll always remember a talk I had with [former Bears quarterback] Vince Evans when he called the office one day,” said Quirk. “I asked him how he was doing, and he said, ‘Ginny, it’s kind of like being a Vietnam veteran. You go into combat and do things other people don’t. Then you come out of it and you’re supposed to be normal. And you’re not. You work really hard at trying to adjust, but it’s impossible. It’s just impossible.’

“That,” said Quirk, “is what Walter was experiencing.”

Quirk and Tucker came to expect Payton’s manic mood swings—giddy one second, despondent the next. He kept a tub of painkillers inside a desk drawer and popped them regularly. He ate greasy fast foods and gorged on fettuccine carbonara (his favorite dish) and dumped ten sugar packs into each cup of coffee and dunked pork rinds into hot sauce. Though a fast metabolism prevented Payton from gaining excessive weight, they worried how it all impacted his psyche. “He ate junk,” said Conley. “Fettuccine Alfredo with crumbled bacon. Chili dogs. Corn dogs. And fried pork chops, and I mean fried hard.” Never an imbiber as a player, Payton now drank his fair share of beer. He behaved erratically and was prone to strange and confounding moments. Holmes vividly recalled visiting the office for a meeting. “Walter came in and he was bouncing off the walls,” he said. “He was totally incoherent, all hopped up on these painkillers. I remember he turned on his computer and he wanted to show some old porn crap. His eyes were all weird. I said, ‘Walter, what the hell?’ He drank a couple of beers and I couldn’t believe it. Who was this person?”

By this point in his life Payton was convinced that he suffered from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and began taking the Ritalin tablets prescribed to a friend’s son. Quirk and Tucker encouraged him to resume exercising—
Walter, go to the gym; Walter, take a jog
. Nothing. They took his calls at all hours, wondering what odd or exciting or devastating words would emerge from his lips. Payton berated. Payton praised. Payton laughed. Payton cried. He hated his wife—“Why won’t she just fucking leave me?” He hated Gonzalez—“What the fuck is wrong with this bitch?” He wanted Choy back. He wanted Choy dead. What appointments were scheduled for the next day? Cancel them. Don’t cancel them. Let’s do lunch. No, let’s not. I have an amazing idea. I have a terrible idea. Like many Americans, Payton turned especially forlorn during the holiday season. He felt the pressure of having to be everywhere at once—with Lita in New Jersey; with his kids in Arlington Heights; with his mother in Jackson, Mississippi. He said he hoped something bad would happen to him, just so he had an excuse to stay home and hide. “No matter what I do,” he said, “I can’t win.”

Payton made spur-of-the-moment decisions that baffled those around him. He accepted an invitation from the World Wrestling Federation to serve as Razor Ramon’s guest manager for something called SummerSlam. Despite being petrified of deep water, he teamed up with Chuck Norris to try and break the Chicago-to-Detroit 605-mile powerboat record (they failed). He became founding director of the First Northwest Bank of Arlington Heights. He hinted at a run for mayor of Chicago (this from a man who often failed to vote). He tested Quirk and Tucker’s loyalty with insults and threats and, literally, thirty to fifty phone calls per day. Walter on his cell. Walter from his apartment. Walter in the house. Flowers one minute, taunts the next. “It was like having a husband,” said Tucker, “without the intimacy. He was terribly lonely. People loved Walter. People were drawn to him. But he never had the love of a partner who filled him up. It was tragic.”

“He was so manic,” said Quirk. “The flux in his moods was unlike anything I’d ever seen.”

On multiple occasions Payton threatened to commit suicide. Usually following a fight with Connie or Lita. Or after being reminded that, even with such a legendary high-profile career, he still had to worry about finances. Payton looked in the mirror and hated the reflection. He was supposed to be happy and secure, and yet he was anything but. The love he received from fans was wonderful and great, but it wasn’t real. The diehard Bear loyalist wearing the No. 34 jersey knew Walter Payton as a halfback, but he didn’t
know
Walter Payton. Everything was surface and superficial. What would they think, Walter wondered, if they saw him away from the field, cheating incessantly and failing as a businessman?

Once, during a particularly down period, he entered the house at 34 Mudhank with his gun drawn, telephoned a friend, and crying, uttered, “I’m going to end it now.”

“Walter would call me all the time, saying he was about to kill himself,” said Holmes. “He was tired. He was angry. Nobody loved him. He wanted to be dead.” The first time such a threat was made, Holmes dropped what he was doing and flew from Mississippi to Illinois to console his client. By the time he arrived, Payton’s mood had swung positive. Holmes never again took his threats seriously.

Despite the urging of those around him, Payton refused to see a psychologist or social worker. What would that say about his strength and fortitude? He was supposed to be a hero. Heroes didn’t do therapy.

On one particularly dark day, Payton wrote a friend a letter, saying that he needed to get his life in order and that he was afraid of doing “something” he’d regret. In the note, Payton admitted that he regularly contemplated committing suicide. Thinking about “the people I put into this fucked-up situation,” he wrote, “maybe it would be better if I just disappear.” Payton said he imagined picking up his gun, murdering those around him, then turning the weapon on himself. “Every day something like this comes into my head,” he wrote. He was distraught over these persistent thoughts about wanting to “hurt so many others” and not thinking “it is wrong.” Payton ended the letter by admitting that he needed help—but that he had nowhere to turn.

Payton often called Quirk late at night, his voice soft and emotionless. Quirk could usually tell what was coming. Doom. Gloom. “You won’t see me when you get to the office tomorrow,” he’d say. “Enjoy life without me.”

On one occasion, Quirk picked up the phone and heard this: “I’m ending it. I’m no longer going to exist. And if you think I’m not taking you with me, you’re wrong.”

“I usually chose to ignore those threats,” said Quirk. “I never fully believed him. But it was definitely a cry for help.”

Quirk and Tucker often considered leaving. There were certainly other job opportunities out there that didn’t involve this sort of drama. But the women found themselves bonded by a confounding sense of loyalty toward Payton. They saw him at his best, and believed his goodness outweighed the negatives.

“When you love someone,” said Quirk, “you don’t simply throw them away.”