Wood checked his watch and tugged on the cuff of his shirt just below the sleeve of his jacket. He looked down the street. “Shut up and get in the car.” He was exactly what Audrey was looking for. She laughed.
I pointed to the earpiece and mic. “Nice touch.”
Nine minutes later, we walked through the rear entrance of a building. Above us, two different teams of people waited in two different mahogany conference rooms. The first was a slew of endorsement companies—eight in all. The second was the owner and general manager of my new team. In the deal, I had requested, if possible, to take two of my receivers and two of my linemen with me. They were eligible, had declared for the draft, and the team agreed it was a good fit, provided the draft worked in our favor. Between second- and third-round picks and one trade, it had. Those four guys would also be there, waiting to sign alongside me. And as Wood represented each, he stood to have a very good night. It promised to be fun for all of us. Other agencies, those competing against Wood, told me to hold out, wait for more money. Wood said take the money. The team had offered me plenty, more than any rookie ever, there was no reason to hold out, nor did I want to. I wanted to get on the field. Get the ball in my hands. And, in truth, I’d have played for free. Something Wood and Audrey agreed would be our secret.
Last, but certainly not least, sat Coach Ray. Coach Ray wasn’t really a coach, but we all called him that. After almost fifty years in football, he’d earned it. He’d started as a janitor, worked his way into the laundry and then into the training and equipment room. I’d met him eight years ago as a freshman at St. Bernard’s. I was sitting in the film room early one morning when he walked in, looked over both shoulders, and whispered, “Mr. Matthew, would you mind reading me this letter? I can’t—”
We’ve been pals ever since.
He was the first person to greet me before daylight every morning. And the last to turn out the lights after I’d left. He had a great eye for defenses, and as a result we’d watched a lot of film together. He’d been at St. Bernard’s for the thirty-eight years prior, had always wanted a job in a college, and so State made room for him when I said I’d like to declare early and asked if they had any room in their training staff. Then, during contract negotiations the last few weeks, and with Coach Ray’s permission, I asked my would-be team if they had any openings—anywhere in their organization. Ray’s reputation preceded him, and they welcomed the addition. Albeit with a few concessions of my own. In anticipation of tonight, Ray had bought a new striped suit along with a top hat, a cane, and new penguin wing tips with metal heel counters. Audrey said he looked like a cross between Gregory Hines and Fred Astaire and his walk sounded like the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
Audrey was floating. Her feet barely touching the ground. She was wearing this skin-colored dress that wrapped around her hips like a cocoon. A slight slit up the thigh. Stunning. The antique elevator climbed and dinged at each floor while Wood joked about having just met a female track star who’d made the jump to movies. In the lobby, she’d pulled on his coat and asked for his number. “I love what you’ve done with Matthew,” she had said. “Let me buy you a coffee and see if you’d have any interest in representing me.” Wood didn’t bother telling her that not only did he not drink coffee but the smell made him nauseated. Audrey laughed and rested her arm in mine.
We exited the elevator where the two conference rooms sat to our right. Loud, nervous laughter spilled from beneath the door. As did the sound of men holding their breath. To our left, a single room. Wood nodded. “Take all the time you want. They’ll wait.”
Audrey looked at me, confused. Then suspicious. I took her hand and led her in, closing the door behind us. Broadway shone like a runway and the lights of Central Park glistened in the distance. The city sprawled and sparkled below us. A couch and two designer chairs faced the window. Champagne on ice and fresh raspberries waited. A small box, wrapped with blue foil wrapping and tied with the same color bow, sat on the glass table. A lit candle flickered. Eyebrows raised, she said, “And you did this all on your own?”
“Yep.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really.”
I’ve been in a lot of locker rooms and I’m pretty well acquainted with what guys do and where they go to fill up their empty spaces, to find fulfillment. Most are counterfeit. Nothing but emptiness. I stood there, staring at her. Flickering candlelight. The slight upturn of her lips. The small of her back. The beauty that’s her, the part she only shared with me, the part of us that was just our secret, hidden from everyone but me. Whatever it is that God hard-wired into the heart of man, into our very DNA, which is satisfied only in and by knowing the mystery and wonder that is a woman’s heart wrapped in the layers of her external beauty—I’d found it in my wife.
She hung one hand on her hip. “And just when did you have the time?”
“Honey, I do have some experience at calling an audible.”
She studied the room and crossed her arms. “I think you actually just succeeded in surprising me.”
“Good.”
One of life’s simple pleasures, Audrey loved to unwrap gifts. Especially those with a bow. Her finger tapped the box, anxious at the possibility.
I said, “Much of the last couple of weeks… no, let’s be honest, months, even years, has been about me. Before it gets out of hand—”
She smiled. “Before?”
“Okay.… any more out of hand, I want to push the pause button.”
She was half-listening. Her finger still tapping the box. My rehearsed speech would have to wait. “Go ahead.”
My junior year of high school, two women vied for my attention. I only gave it to one.
I was walking to class. Books in one hand, football in the other, going over the film in my mind for Friday night’s game. It was mid-September; we were three games into the season and winning. Decisively. In fact, we hadn’t lost in two and a half years. I’d thrown five touchdown passes the previous Friday night, and my numbers were pretty good. Word about me was spreading. A dozen or so scouts at every game had become the norm. I turned a corner headed to physics and a sultry voice echoed across my shoulder.
Ginger Redman was captain of the cheerleaders, president of the drama club, an undefeated member of the debate team, and number three in her class. To make matters worse, she was six feet tall—most of which was legs—with auburn hair. As a result of her constant overachievement, she was well accustomed to getting her way. I don’t think our meeting was accidental.
I didn’t really know what drove Ginger, or why, but she left little to happenstance. My guess, and it is just a guess, is that she liked the attention I was getting and she wanted it. I suppose she thought we were a match made in heaven.
She thought wrong.
She said, “You always carry that football?”
“It gives my hands something to do.”
A step closer. “Your hands get you in trouble?”
“Not when they’re holding this ball.”
“You sleep with it?”
“Most nights.”
“Linus with his blanket.”
“Something like that.”
“Rather self-effacing, aren’t you?”
“Only if you think football is a fault.”
“Football is a game you use to get someplace better.”
“Well, you and I agree on one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Football is a game.”
“And?”
A shrug. I wanted out of this conversation.
“So now you’re the tall silent type.”
“It’s a game that requires me to give myself to something bigger than me.”
“Like?”
“The idea that eleven men can do what one can’t and never could.”
She knew the answer. As a result, the question was insincere. “Quarterback, right?”
A nod.
“Some say you’re best in t
he country right now.”
No response.
“You don’t care?”
“I care what eleven guys do. Not one.”
She stepped closer, her face inches from mine. “Then that makes you a fool.”
“I’m okay with that.”
She turned to leave, but my question stopped her. She had tried to disguise it, but guys in my position do well to notice the subtleties. “You always bitten your fingernails?”
She paused, didn’t turn, and shoved her hands in her pockets. Her body language suggested she didn’t like knowing that I’d spotted her imperfection. Wanting the last word, she eyed the ball, then me. “Call me when you get tired of holding that ball. I’ll give your hands something to do.”
It was the longest conversation we ever had in high school.
Audrey Michaels was an athlete in her own right. She ran track—the 800 meters and the mile—worked on the yearbook, was three questions shy of acing the SAT, thought cheerleaders were silly girls, started and led the Rose Garden Club, and stole the lead in the high school drama—away from Ginger our junior and senior years. A fact not lost on Ginger.
We met in the training room Saturday morning after a game. The night prior, we had played a rival team from Valdosta. A brutal game played in the rain. I was sacked seven times, had rushed for a couple of TDs, and had taken more than my fair share of shots. By the start of the fourth quarter, I could barely stand up. Come Saturday morning, I rolled out of bed and hobbled to my car for the drive to school. My shoulder was sore, ribs and thigh were bruised, calves were still cramping up. Deep purple contusions dotted my chest and back. Some guy’s fingernails had raked across my neck. Hamburger meat had suffered less than me. I limped into the training room and climbed up on a table, and our trainers pretty much packed me in ice. Audrey had just finished a workout of her own, and lay on her stomach on the table next to me thumbing through a magazine while a trainer worked on her tight hamstring.
Unimpressed, she looked up from her magazine. One eyebrow raised. A slight smirk. “What’s your problem?”
I glanced at her out of the corner of my eyes. I’d seen her before, but we’d never really talked. I grunted. “Everything from the scalp down.”
She lifted an ice bag off my knee and dropped it on my face. “Pansy.”
I lifted the ice and tried to focus on the condescending voice that showered me.
She dropped her magazine and dug in a bag next to her. “You QBs are such prima donnas. A hangnail and you’re screaming for painkillers and ice.”
My head was splitting so I glanced through narrow eyelids. Medium height. Lean. Muscular thighs and calves. A runner’s build. Hair cut short like a boy. Only prettier. Painted fingernails and toes. She had rolled over and was sitting up, leaning against the wall while the trainer worked the ultrasound wand in a circular motion over her left quad and hamstring. While I thought I was the focus of her attention, I was only half of it. Her voice might have been pointed at me but her eyes were focused on her hands—she had begun knitting or something with two silvery-blue needles, each about eight inches long. Spilling out of the bag was what looked like the beginnings of a sweater or a scarf. I didn’t have the energy for a debate, so I lay back down. Thought maybe if I let it go, she would too. She didn’t. She dug at me again. “You disagree, Mr. Street and Smith’s number four?”
Rankings were posted every Saturday morning. Last week, I’d been ranked number seven. The fact that she had checked it today said more about her than she knew. Her hands were moving at the speed of hummingbird wings, suggesting that she’d crocheted a good bit. While she was digging at me, I detected a playfulness in her tone. In a sense, she was befriending me. Albeit while playing her cards close to her chest. Sort of a we’re-sitting-here-so-we-might-as-well-make-the-most-of-it sort of approach. I could take it or leave it. I admit, while she may not have known what I went through last night, there was something in her voice I really liked. And it was refreshing. I said, “You forgot one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“The pillow.”
“Pillow?”
“Yeah, so we don’t bruise our huge, swollen heads during our weekly pedicure.”
She considered this, then spun one of her crochet pins, point out, holding it like a spike. “Hold still and I’ll help you with that.”
That was the moment we became friends. And I’ve loved her every second since.
Nearly a year passed. Our senior year. November, and my birthday, rolled around. I did not know it, but Audrey had worked with a jeweler to custom design a rather hefty silver signet ring carved with my initials. She had made the down payment and was working two jobs to pay for it. Ginger got a whiff of the idea, convinced the jeweler she was Audrey’s emissary sent to collect it, and bought it out from underneath Audrey.
That night, I walked into my room, clicked on the light, and there stood Ginger in her birthday suit, her waist wrapped in a red ribbon, the ring displayed on the index finger of her right hand. The room was bathed in soft music and candlelight. I told her she needed to get dressed and go home. When I stepped out into the hall and pointed toward the front door, she pulled on a trench coat, strolled across the room, and sucker-punched me—with the ring. The ring split my skin above the eye, eventually requiring seven stitches. And no, I wasn’t expecting it. Admittedly, I was distracted. Something all of my teammates, and Audrey, didn’t let me forget. Anyway, with my face covered in my own blood, and my left eye nearly swollen shut, she threw the ring at me. It ricocheted off the doorframe. She then stomped out of my house. To further complicate the night—and my life—somewhere between my house and school the next day, Ginger obtained a black eye and some rather deep bruises on her neck and back.
The following day, the police paraded me out of second period and into an inquisition in Principal O’Shaughnessy’s office. Ginger stood crying, throwing accusations at me. I denied every one. A tense forty-eight hours followed. Fortunately, cracks surfaced in her inconsistent story, not to mention that the bruise marks on her neck were too small for my pawlike hands. Suspicion lifted and I was exonerated, but the mystery of the black eye and bruises remained.
While the issue faded, the ring remained. As did the question of what to do with it. We couldn’t return it, as it was custom made and no one would want it because my initials were carved into it. Not to mention that Ginger had bent it when it impacted the doorframe. We were stuck with it. So, in a turn of good humor, Audrey secretly took it from my dresser drawer only to return it to me for Valentine’s Day. She had slipped it over the trunk of a white plush elephant.
A fun gag.
The ring soon passed between us anytime we needed a good laugh. Audrey had last given it to me just prior to the beginning of my senior college season, when she’d slipped it over one of the arms of a pair of Rock’em Sock’em Robots and placed them on top of the cake she’d baked for our one-month wedding anniversary. Another good laugh. But after a dozen or so passes back and forth, we’d worn out the joke and moved on. The memory of Ginger had faded, and I’d started wondering if I should craft it into something else. Something that mattered. That represented us.
Our bedroom window overlooked a park that we soon learned sat in the migratory pattern of what seemed like most every bird in North America. If it had feathers and it was heading north or south, chances were good it’d pass below our window in the married dorm. To help the throngs along their journey, Audrey hung a feeder. One grew to three, which expanded to five, and soon we were buying hundred-pound sacks of seed once a week. Word must have spread along the bird hotline because we were covered up in color, song, and flight. About once a week, we’d wake to a new melody or different patch of color. And while they were all beautiful, none of them held a candle to the mourning dove.
A couple weeks into this, just after daylight, a mourning dove lit on the sill of our window and began pacing back and forth. Audrey propped her head on my chest, and we watched
the ritual. Once he’d determined the sill was safe, the male—signified by a bluish-gray crown and purple-pink patches on the neck—hopped to the wire “limb” of the feeder where he flicked the seed with his beak, cleaning the seat next to him. Having prepared a place, he then began to lament, in that low, almost sub-audible throat-rattling call to his mate. A sound commonly mistaken for an owl. Seconds later, the more slender, less colorful female descended from the treetops, landing inches away on the same limb. Once stable, she scooted sideways and rubbed her head and face along the sides of his, gently nibbling around his neck, a pair-bonding ritual called “preening.” Eventually, the pair progressed to grasping beaks and bobbing their heads up and down in unison—almost comical—all while calling to the other in a song that gives them their name.
This occurred every morning—their approach and departure accompanied by the whistle of their wings. Sometimes, during the frenzy of afternoon feedings, when the crowd and competition grew, we noticed that when one called, only the mate would answer. Above the noise and chaos of the hundreds of birds surrounding them, they knew each other’s singular voice and could differentiate it. We called it “bird sonar.” Amazed by this, Audrey did some research and learned that doves mate for life.
One morning, when a male sat on the window ledge calling, Audrey tapped me on the shoulder and whispered, “Know what that means?”
“No.”
She tucked her arm inside mine, pulled my cheek to her lips, and kissed me. “Hope is the anchor of the soul.”
When larger, more aggressive birds, like crows and blue jays, migrated through, they’d bully and dive-bomb whatever or whoever happened to be feeding. This did not go well with my wife. One afternoon, I came home from practice to find Audrey lying prone across our bed with a pellet rifle pointed at the feeder. Didn’t take her long to even the score.
The doves and their beautiful songs hung around, filling our mornings and evenings. Out of this, the dove became a symbol of us.