Page 45 of Cleats and Pumps

“That one there—he’s got potential too. In fact, they all do in their own way.”

“Any of them NFL potential?”

I snickered. “For their sakes, I hope not, but no… not really, but if they continue to get out of their own way, they can probably make it to state this year.”

We watched the kids running drills and laughed when one of the upper classmen grabbed one of the younger ones and rolled them both before getting up and dancing off like he’d just made a touchdown.

“I remember how much fun high school football was,” I said, reminiscing about all the antics I got up to.

I glanced over at Tommy who was nodding. “You were like that in college too. Always a cutup. I thought the coach was going to hand you your ass a few times.”

I frowned, thinking of my homophobic college coach. Fucker retired, thank God, ’cause he had no business coaching anything with his badass attitude any longer. “College was great, mostly because of you, but… high school football is something special.”

I leaned back, putting my ass between the two bleachers. “My dad was just as insane then as he is now, maybe worse actually, but when it was just me and my teammates, we used to have a shit ton of fun. Those’re good memories for me.”

“At some point, we probably need to talk about you and me, Amos,” Tommy said, surprising me. I figured that subject was off the table for life.

“Yeah, I’d like that… What about dinner tonight?”

“Like going out for dinner?” he asked.

“Yeah, I mean, there’s not much here, but if we drive up to Carlsbad, there’s a few decent Mexican restaurants. I eat takeout most nights, so I know the score. Julianne’s is my favorite.”

“Sure, if you want to…” Tommy said, then quickly changed the subject. “So what do you think about the coach, Jake?” he asked.

I hung out with him for another thirty minutes until I noticed Jake looking my way. We were going to divide and conquer with a few drills this afternoon, so I guessed he was ready to do that.

“So, um… meet you after practice?” I asked. “I need to grab a shower where I’m staying, then I can pick you up…”

Tommy shook his head. “No, I’ll just meet you at Julianne’s at six, if that works.” When I nodded, he smiled. “Okay,” he said, standing up, “I’m going to snap a few shots of the kids practicing… Oh, and I need all those permission slips to publish photos from the guys. I can’t submit any for publication without them.”

“No problem, Jake sent them home with the boys yesterday after Owen said you were headed this way. We’ll make sure we have permission for any kids that’re in the shots you wanna submit.”

Tommy followed me down, asking Jake if he could be on the field taking pictures while they practiced.

“No problem as long as you stay out of the way. I can’t promise you the boys won’t smear you if you get too close.”

Of course, we all got the unintentional reference, and I cringed as Tommy cocked an eyebrow. Jake just looked embarrassed. All three of us were gay though, and although I had never faced the brunt of that particular high school kid practice, I knew a lot of kids had.

Tommy’s expression showed he wasn’t letting Jake off the hook, but there was humor in his response.

“Yeah, I have practice avoiding that, thanks,” he said before he smiled.

My guy—damn, I wish I could call him that—was smooth even in a tense situation. One of the many things I loved about him.

31

Tommy

“SmeartheQueer”cameto mind, and when I looked at Jake I could tell he’d caught that too. When I responded sarcastically, Jake smiled and shrugged in apology. If Owen hadn’t told me he was gay too, I’m sure that would’ve been more offensive… even if it wasn’t meant to be.

If I’d still been working for the paper, I’d have brought a camera, but for this, I used my phone to snap a few pictures as the kids practiced. I caught some pretty awesome candid shots of Jake and Amos. Damn, this was going to be awesome, I thought as I packed it in for the day.

I needed to grab a shower myself after being out in the New Mexico summer heat. When I got to my hotel room, I quickly sent off a few emails to various magazines with one picture of Jake and Amos. You couldn’t make out any of the kids in the background, and Jake had already given me written permission, so I figured this could be a great teaser to get me the job.

I hesitated before sending the photo and proposed story to my old magazine. They hadn’t done me right, but they hired morefreelance writers than any other and paid almost twice as much as the others. I could use the cash…

I pushed my pride down and sent the photo and short synopsis of the article to my former boss. I had carefully left out where the team was, and Jake’s face was blurred enough I doubted facial recognition would expose the team.. Knowing my employer, I doubted anyone would think this story big enough to go to the trouble of finding where Amos was, or where the coaching was happening. It would be cheaper just to pay me for the article. Money was money, even if they weren’t my biggest fan.

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