Page 75 of Near Miss

All the while my heart whispers to me that I’m a liar.

Beckett

I don’t blow up against Philadelphia like I have been in practice since Coach’s little welcome-back speech.

We still win, but I do miss a kick that old Beckett Davis could have made with his eyes closed. Only 30 yards and a seemingly guaranteed point.

I don’t bother looking Coach Taylor in the eye afterwards, seeing as that’s definitely not the Beckett Davis he knows and loves.

It’s obviously not the Beckett Davis everyone else knows and loves, either, because it was enough to start a different sort of conversation online—nothing about how I shattered the hopes and dreams of a nation, but this more nefarious thing, that maybe I’m past my prime.

That I’ve broken my last record, and if I’ve gone from someone who never misses to someone who’s nothing more than a near miss to inconsistent—that’s the death of a special teams kicking game right there.

That I’m uselessly taking up cap space and they should probably trade me while they can still get something for me. They can get inconsistent for a lot cheaper than they can get me.

Kicking is a fickle business, as stupid as it sounds. Guys get dropped and picked up all the time. It wouldn’t have happened to old Beckett.

I’ve been reliable, I’ve been likeable. I’ve been neither of those things at the same time—but I’ve never been useless.

And maybe this new me—whoever he is, because he’s definitely real, this effervescent, complicated, stubborn, and sort of mean but beautiful woman breathed life into him—is just that.

Useless.

I wonder what my family would think of the word.

I don’t think they’d know what to do with me if I wasn’t providing for them in some way.

Maybe all those things I thought I was learning don’t really matter if no one else learns them, too.

Even though I don’t feel like it, I show up for them today. I’m not sure I’m likeable, but I’m reliable and I do it with a grin.

Our mom even comments on it. Both hands find either side of my face, and she gives this exasperated sigh with a tiny shake of her head, like she can’t quite believe it. “That smile.”

It’s about as close to affection as she can show me. I keep smiling at her, and I try to remind myself that she just doesn’t know what to do with me.

I exist in a weird in between for her: not quite a stranger and not quite a son.

“Your brother will be so happy you’re here,” she whispers, voice breaking, and I know enough to know it’s not emotion for me that’s shining through. She pats my cheek one more time before pointing behind her at the lines of tables taking up residence in the hospital atrium.

Red and white balloons—a bit on the nose if you ask me—float just above the tables, anchored down by weights wrapped in silver. Nathaniel and Sarah stand at the registration table, stacking endless booklets.

I’m about to make up an excuse—that it’s hard for an athlete to find time when they can give blood and it won’t interfere with training, which is true but not entirely the reason I’ve never come—when she says this thing that’s meant to be good-natured, but it’s really, really not. “He’s been wanting you to come to one of his drives for so long.”

My eyebrows pinch together. I kind of feel like she took a football and did the kicking, but instead of going through the uprights, it goes right into my stomach.

I used to donate all the time. I’m the same type as Sarah, and she needed regular transfusions.

I try to smile when my brother and sister glance up, but I don’t think it reaches my eyes, and according to my agent, that’s a pretty crucial part of “the grin.”

Nathaniel raises a hand, and my sister smiles wide and says my name like she’s actually happy to see me. They’ve been doing this together for a long time. Sarah can’t donate blood, but she volunteers at the drives.

My brother claps me on the shoulder when he comes to stand with us. “What are you doing here? Looking for your special friend?”

“Are you still seeing that doctor?” Sarah’s voice rises, nothing but a squeak of excitement.

“We’re not seeing each other,” I mutter, palming my jaw and changing the subject because I don’t feel like telling them she says we’re friends but we sleep together sometimes, I’ve never met anyone like her, she’s got my entire heart in her palms, she told me something only six other people on the planet know, and I’ll only ever have pieces of her in my back pocket.

Oh, and she kissed me one time when she was half drunk.

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