Divisions (Dev and Lee) (13 page)

Jesus Fox, I still remember most of what Vince wrote.
I’ve been hiding who I am all through college, and it tears me up. I take out my frustration on the football field. I get drunk a lot because I keep trying to hook up with girls so nobody will know I’m gay.
I stare at the screen.

Before I went to the first FLAG meeting, I was scared. Mother and Father weren’t all that religious, though, and they always taught me to express myself. I had no idea what to expect. All I knew was that all through my last two years of high school, I’d jerked off to the male models in magazines, not the female ones. I never drank, never tried to pick up girls; it was easier to be a loner in high school, especially since I wasn’t on a team. I could pick my own social group.

I’d picked Forester, though, partly because it had an active gay student group. So I told myself I would have wasted all that if I didn’t go. I walked in, sat with the four other new kids near the back. And there was Brian, just as young and wary as I was. When he stood up during introductions and said, “I’ve been waiting my whole life to be here,” I knew I liked him. And when he leaned over to me ten minutes into the meeting and said, “I’m glad it’s not just a bunch of queeny fags,” I knew we were going to be great friends. I told him that’s why I sat by the door, and his smile told me he knew we were going to be friends, too.

Vince King had parents who went to church every week and turned there for help. He went to Cobblestone College, pretty liberal—smart kid—but he was part of the football team from day one. You can’t just walk into a Gay and Lesbian student group meeting when you’re on the football team. He never had a Brian, never had anyone to confide in. And when he did, when his secret burst out of him and couldn’t be contained any longer, the people he trusted told him he was sick. They told him they needed an army of closed-minded bigots to pray for his soul to save him from hell. They told him he couldn’t have a normal life unless he gave up part of himself. And he had nobody to talk to, nobody to tell him he
was
normal. Nobody to tell him there was hope.

If I’d gone to talk to Vince King at the game I watched, would that have made a difference? I wrote back to his e-mail, but as me, not as Dev, and Dev was the one he’d written to. He might have seen Kinnel’s article, or he might not. But if I’d introduced myself at the game, if I’d offered to help him out, would he have felt so alone? Would he have hesitated, picking up the gun, and picked up a phone instead?

I know I can’t beat myself up over it, but that doesn’t stop me from doing so. Maybe Hal’s article will change things. Maybe I’ll get more of a public face and I’ll be able to do some good. I pace to the window and stare out at the city. Not so different from Hilltown, if you look past the details: glass office buildings, stone apartments and stores. But there’s more red clay roofs near the edges, out in the suburbs, and beyond that, the hills are pale reddish-brown dotted with cacti like abandoned machine parts in someone’s backyard, and the sun above them glows through a haze that reddens it, too. An older world, here, slower, more conservative. And now it’s my world.

I turn back to the computer, which is also my world, but more familiar. Hours go by, and I succeed moderately well at forcing myself to focus on the college players and their abilities. Wish I had film of them to watch, but I remember most of them from when I was working for the Dragons, and I read up on the games they’ve played since then to get an idea if they’ve improved, declined, or stayed the same.

Dev calls around eight, right when I’m thinking I should either eat some leftover chicken or sweep up all the shed fur from pacing around the apartment. He gets right to it. “You really have to join his group?”

“They’re a national organization, and not a bad one; they focus on political initiatives rather than legal challenges, and that’s why they do more with publicity.” I lean into the phone, sitting on the couch. “It’s not about Brian. There’s nobody else in the area, really.”

“Did they do that prison commercial you showed me?”

“Yeah. It was a little over the top, but it got the message across about what it’s like to be gay in today’s society. And really, I promise I won’t do anything with Brian alone.”

He sighs. “I can’t really tell you not to, can I?”

“You could.”

“It’s fine, fox.” He exhales. “I gotta go. The guys are getting together for dinner.”

“And then Korsat Boulevard?”

He laughs, shortly. “Not for me. But I gave them the places you looked up and Ty and Vonni say they’re going to visit them. Couple other guys said they’ll go Friday night if it’s a good report.”

“It’ll be wilder Friday night.”

“That’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

I wag my tail. “Imagine a bunch of hot football players dancing in a gay club on a Friday night. Hope it all goes well.” A thought occurs to me. “Hey, if they do go Friday night, you and I could go along.”

He pauses. “I don’t think…”

“They look up to you,” I say. “You could show them there’s nothing weird about the scene.”

“If you want an excuse to go to a gay club…”

“Or I could just go with them by myself.”

That stops him. “You’d do that?”

“Well.” I pretend to consider it. “No. I’d want to go with you. But come on, how weird would it look if a bunch of your teammates go and you don’t?”

“It’d look like I care about football.”

“I’m sure you can get Gerrard’s permission.”

He snorts. “Have a good dinner and a good flight.”

“How was practice?”

“Oh, it was fine. New plays and all. But we’re coming along well.”

I grin. “Meaning Gerrard says you need to do an evening practice.”

“We don’t
need
to.” He pauses. “But I want to.”

Which is good. So I let him go off to dinner, heat up the leftover chicken, and eat it while cramming on college players, which is not nearly as fun as it sounds when I say it like that. I hope he’ll let me take him out to Korsat, and going with his teammates would be even better. Might get us into the news, show people that football players can go to gay clubs with gay friends and not be gay. Might get my name out there, too.

Friday I get on a plane to Yerba first thing in the morning. We circle the city coming in, so I get a good first look at it. Where Chevali sprawls out in the midst of brown and tan rock and sand, Yerba is crammed into a peninsula between the ocean and the Bay, a cluster of concrete and glass jutting out of the deep blue like crystals. I even spot the football stadium, Bayshore Field, nestled in a little nook on the bay side of the peninsula.

Yerba’s famous for its bridges and bread, fog and fags. The airport reflects none of that, though, except for the airport logo being a stylized bridge. No recruitment posters for the homosexual agenda, no gay proselytizers, not even any rainbow flags. It’s almost like gay people are just normal. Also, no bakeries in the airport, which I find disappointing.

Driving, too, is like driving in any other big city. The weather is comparable to Chevali’s, though a little less dry, so I roll the windows down and enjoy the breeze through my thick fur, which soon fills the car like snowflakes.

It settles as I leave the freeway, and by the time I pull up to the outdoor mall where my meeting is, I’m glad that the rental car agency doesn’t have a cleaning fee. I brush myself off and walk into the restaurant, a little shop without a flashy sign just called Koto Sushi.

It smells of fish and rice, with tangs of soy sauce and rice vinegar. The chef and hostess are otters, and many of the diners are, too. I don’t see any foxes seated in the crowded dining room. Maybe I’m early. I check my phone and the hostess asks me if I want a table for one.

“I’m here to meet someone,” I say. “But I’m not sure he’s here yet.”

“Oh!” She smiles and half-bows, then gestures for me to follow her.

I weave through the tables somewhat less elegantly than she does. Her thick tail swishes below the hem of her kimono in exactly the right place to miss the chairs. I have to keep mine curled around my leg until we get to the bamboo screen at the back of the dining room.

It looks like the kind of screen that hides the entrance to the restrooms, and in fact we walk past a small hallway discreetly marked “Restrooms.” Beyond that is a small room lit by paper lanterns of many different colors, with only four tables, and only one of them occupied.

The fox stands up as I walk in, extending a paw with a bright smile. “Farrel, right? Peter Emmanuel.” He’s dressed casually, in a polo shirt and slacks. The shirt is in the Whalers’ maroon, with a gold-threaded logo embroidered over the chest. Unobtrusive and classy. He’s probably around my father’s age, maybe a little younger—early forties, late thirties—and about my height. The shirt stretches across his broad shoulders and a bit of a stomach paunch, but he’s still clearly in good shape.

“Pleasure to meet you. Thanks for making the time to talk to me.” I get a nice feeling of species familiarity as we both sit down. He’s taller than I am, with darker ears—almost pure black, where mine are more chocolate brown. And like me, his winter coat is coming in, though his is very sleek. Professionally brushed, I’m sure.

He calls the waitress over with a flick of the paw. “Any friend of Morty’s is worth at least a lunch. Want a beer?”

“Just water, thanks.” Morty, my old boss at the Dragons, likes me. I thank goodness for that.

“Kiku, one more Sapporo in about ten minutes, with lunch.”

She bows. “Hai. Two lunch?”

“Yes.” He glances at me. “Anything you don’t like?”

Not at a job interview meal I am hopefully getting for free. I shake my head. “It all sounds good.”

“It is. This is the best sushi on the peninsula. You want to go into the city, there’s a couple places, but this place gets their fish fresh every morning and the chef is amazing. I dread the day some other place steals him away.” He drinks from the half-empty beer bottle. “Have you had good sushi before?”

I lift my nose again to sniff the air. “Never in a place that smelled like this. I guess I thought it was good at the time.”

He laughs. “You are in for a treat. And it’s on me, let’s just get that out of the way. So look, Morty and I worked together for a few years back in Kerina. He still smoke?”

“Like a chimney.”

He shakes his head and waves the air in front of his nose. “How’d you stand it?”

“I got really good at holding my breath.” I grin.

He laughs. “Good. So tell me about your experience with football. Play in high school? College?”

I shake my head. “But I love the game. I’ve been watching it for fifteen years now, and I have this thing that when I love something, I need to figure out how it works. So I watched football and read articles and took it apart. And then in college I went to every game.” Bit of an exaggeration. A couple I watched in the bar. “You start to see which players are doing well and which ones are just holding the team back. And you see which ones have potential.”

“And that’s what you saw in Miski.”

I’m not sure how to handle that. He’s looking evenly at me and I can’t tell if he wants me to comment on the personal relationship or what. “Yes,” I say finally. “He had potential and he was just wasting it.”

“Uh-huh. Well, you were right about that. He’s a solid starter. Who else did you scout? Let’s talk about last year; I know you probably can’t talk about this year yet.”

“Right.” So I list off some players I’d recommended to the Dragons, the ones they’d gotten and the ones they hadn’t. Emmanuel gives quick nods to each name, ears flicking, checking them off in his head, I suspect, against a list he got from Morty. Four are doing well, two are okay, and one would be doing a lot better if they gave him a chance. “Like Dev,” I say.

“Off the record,” Emmanuel says, “Hilltown is shit at developing their players. Morty’s doing great work scouting there and he turns up gems like, well, like Miski, and they can’t figure out what the hell to do with them.”

“Tell me about it,” I say. “I had to watch them every week.”

“So tell me about our players.” He says it quickly, casually, but I don’t miss the significance of it.

“You guys are a lot more fun to watch.” I take a breath and launch into my prepared analysis of Yerba’s rookies and the team’s continuing needs. He nods throughout, but doesn’t take notes or make another sign. Just the way I’d do it, playing it close to the vest. “If not for Crystal City, you’d be in the playoffs for sure.”

He shrugs. “If we took care of business in the other games, we could nab the wild card spot. But I think your Firebirds or the Pilots are going to lock up one of those spots, whichever one doesn’t end up winning the division. We need to beat Highbourne in two weeks to have a chance at the other. You know how it is—last year’s beatdown in Peco just demoralized everyone.”

I nod. “Not sure what the Dragons’ excuse is.”

“Years of losing become a habit. The staff here is pretty good about not letting that happen.”

“Three playoff trips in seven years,” I say.

He nods. “So what would you say is our top need? Who would you take in the first round?”

“Now,” I say, “I can’t share specific research I did for Hilltown this year.”

“Of course.” His whiskers twitch. “I meant, which position.”

“Well, for the positions you need—linebacker and center—the top guys are pretty much public knowledge.”

The waitress arrives just then with two edgeless, narrow bamboo trays upon which glisten six pieces of fish on small pedestals of rice. A green pyramid of wasabi makes my eyes water as it passes in front of my nose, and a yellowish pile of pickled ginger next to it smells mouth-wateringly sharp. Between two shallow bowls, she sets a small pot of soy sauce, and lastly, she replaces Emmanuel’s Sapporo with a fresh one. “Anything else?” she asks.

“Good for now.” Emmanuel pours a few drops of soy sauce into his dish and mixes in wasabi. I do the same.

“Anyway,” I go on when the waitress leaves the room, “Where you’re going to be in the first and second rounds, approximately, here’s what I would look for with those picks.” I give him three names and briefly explain their histories while we add more soy sauce to our mixtures. “This is all stuff you could get on the Internet. I checked.”

He grins widely. “That’s very interesting.”

Even though he doesn’t say good or bad, his vulpine body language tells me that I did pretty well. At least, I hope the smile and relaxed ears are more than just reacting to the arrival of the sushi. His tail flicks around and comes to rest beneath his chair. I relax my tail as well, and am pleased to find that I remember how to use chopsticks.

“Enjoy,” he says.

“I will.” I look down at the fish. I can tell the tuna by its deep red color, so I pick that first, dip it in the sauce, and delicately lift it to my muzzle as Emmanuel is doing the same with a paler fish.

He watches me start to chew, and I’m sure I look startled and pleased as the fish melts with hardly any pressure from my teeth, the fresh flavor spreading across my tongue with the sharp wasabi and the salt of the soy sauce. “Wow,” I say.

“Fresh.” He nods at me. “No substitute for it.”

“I guess not. That’s amazing.” Immediately, I want to bring Dev here if we have time. He likes fish—usually cooked, but I bet he’d eat sushi if I told him how good it is.

While we eat our fish, and I try to savor each one, he tells me a little about Yerba and their organization. Good group, he says, smart and open to new ideas. They’re probably losing a senior scout at the end of the year. “Won’t say where he’s going,” he tells me with a sly smile and a wink, “but I’ll tell you I’m hoping we can hire Morty over here soon after. We’ll make a position for him. Senior scouting consultant or something. But we’ll move the scouts up the ranks and there’ll be room for a young, driven guy to come in. Even if he hasn’t played the game. I think that’d be good for our guys.”

Am I hired? “It sounds like a great family to be part of,” I say.

“We can’t do anything official ‘til after the championship, of course.” He takes a piece of ginger. I can smell it on his breath as he chews. “I’d like you to come up and meet the rest of the guys. Maybe come up during the championship game, if you don’t have seats reserved. You could bring Miski with you, though we’re not allowed to talk to him about next year or anything.”

“You interested in him?” I hold up my paws, realizing my error before his expression goes stony. “Sorry. Forget I asked.”

“Forgotten.”

“But, so…” I try to figure out how to phrase this. “Me and him…that’s okay?”

“It’s a weird situation.” Emmanuel leans back. “Never had anyone in a front office dating a player, much less on another team. I mean, front offices are mostly male. Far as we know, no other players are gay.”

“Chances are someone is,” I say.

“I said, as far as we know.” He grins at me. “I’m sure some of them are. And a few of them might even be dating football players, maybe on other teams. Everyone moves around so much, Christ, it’s hard to stop that from happening. And the sad truth is that if we found out about that, we’d have to fire them. Not because they’re gay, but because of the undisclosed relationship.”

“I’m familiar with that policy,” I say, as dryly as I can.

“Right. But you’re out in the open, so we can talk about it. Would you be willing to sign an NDA proscribing you from telling your boyfriend anything about the team operations?”

“Yes,” I say, and then, “I’ll discuss it with him, too, but I’m a professional. So is he. I never talked to him about the Dragons, and I never talked to the Firebirds about anyone I was scouting.”

“Wouldn’t have to give him inside info to help against the Dragons, would you?” Emmanuel grins. “Anyway, that’s kind of a side benefit, far as I’m concerned.”

“Me not telling him anything?”

“Us hiring a gay player’s boyfriend. Shows we’re open-minded.” He sets down his chopsticks and looks around the room. “I don’t know how this’ll pan out. Might be nothing. But statistically there’s gotta be something like, what, five percent of all athletes out there that are gay?”

“Something like that.” I nod.

“So if we’re the open-minded team…maybe that would give us an advantage in recruiting gay players.”

Again, he’s very casual, but his eyes are intently focused on me. This idea is obviously pretty important to him. Me, I’m thinking about Vince King again. “I know that would be a major thing for at least a few college athletes. Might save their lives in some cases.”

“Right. Now, there’d be negative consequences too. There might be some guys who’d decide not to come here because we’re too gay-friendly. But that’s okay. Really, I know which way the world is going and I don’t think that will hurt us long-term. And most of these guys will just go play anywhere.”

“The pull for gay athletes is stronger than the push for most non-gay athletes.”

“Exactly.” He picks up his chopsticks again and takes another piece of fish, his next-to-last.

I put mine down. Things are going well. I’ll take a chance. “So would you be open to…” I take a breath as he watches. “Sponsoring some public service initiatives? Outreach to gay college athletes?”

“Sponsoring? We could talk about it.” He keeps his eyes on mine. “You know how busy scouts are, right?”

I nod. Back when I was working for the Dragons, it was film every day, travel on the weekends. I barely had time for a relationship, let alone a second job. “I know. I guess just…just sponsoring.” I pick up my last piece of sushi and hold it while I talk.

He grins, showing his canines. “We’re gonna work you hard. You thought the Dragons was a tough gig, wait ‘til you join a winning team.”

“I’ll look forward to the championship and meeting the rest of the guys,” I say.

His last piece of fish disappears between those gleaming fangs, and he sets his chopsticks down again. “I’m sure they’ll like you. You going to want anything else? They do a pretty good mochi ice cream here.”

“No, I’m fine.” I set the rice and fish on my tongue and chew, and as with all the other pieces, the fish is soft and bursting with flavor. This one has a more fishy taste, with nutty overtones. Still delicious. Definitely going to have to bring Dev here.