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Authors: Mike Lupica

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BOOK: Last Man Out
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TEN

G
RECK
'
S
MOM
DROVE
T
OMMY
HOM
E
. Greck tried to make conversation in the backseat, but finally gave up. Tommy didn't want to talk. He just wanted to stare out the window, mostly thinking about the last thing Coach Fisher had said to him before he left practice:

“Football can help you through this, son. Football can, I can and your teammates can. But I don't want anybody to get hurt in the process, starting with you. Because you're hurting enough already.”

Tommy just stood there, not knowing what he should say, just knowing he had come to this field to feel better, even for a couple of hours. Only now he was going home feeling worse.

Finally he said, “I'll try harder on Saturday.”

“It's not about trying,” Coach said. “It never has been about that with you and I doubt it ever will be. But if this game isn't fun, there's no point in being here. It wasn't fun tonight, for you or your teammates. I understand why you're mad at the world right now. Lord knows you have a right. You just can't take it out on everybody else.”

“I didn't mean to hurt anybody.”

“Guys rarely do in this sport.”

Tommy walked through the front door of his house, feeling like it was the saddest place in the world. He smelled food from the kitchen, and then heard his mom call out to him.

“How was practice?” she said.

“Okay,” he said, starting to walk up the stairs.

“Just okay?”

He thought about telling her what had happened, but then he knew she'd want to talk it out with him. But he didn't want to talk about it with her any more than he'd wanted to talk about it with Greck. Or Coach Fisher. What he really wanted to do was forget what had happened at practice, the way he wanted to forget the past few days.

He tried to make a joke. “It was just a lot of what you hate about football.”

“You mean the tackling?”

“Yeah, Mom,” Tommy said. “We've got to eliminate that someday.”

“Very funny,” she said. “Now go change for dinner, it's getting late. And step on it. Pretend you're chasing the guy with the ball.”

When he got to his room, he took off his practice jersey and pants and put them in his laundry basket, knowing his mom would wash them first thing in the morning. He put his helmet and spikes and pads in his closet, took a two-minute shower, then changed into a T-shirt and jeans. When he sat down on his bed, tired all of a sudden, knowing his mom was waiting for him downstairs, he didn't feel like leaving his room. Almost like he
was waiting for his dad to come in and give him some advice about what had happened at practice.

When his door opened suddenly, he thought it would be his mom, telling him his food was getting cold. But his mom usually knocked before she came in.

It wasn't her. It was his sister.

She didn't come into his room. She just stood there in the doorway, still in her soccer uniform and cleats, staring at him with her big eyes, more blue than anybody else's in the family. Emily Gallagher was the best travel player her age in Brighton, by a long shot. Tommy still didn't know a lot about soccer, mostly because he never played the sport, but he was trying to learn. He knew enough, though, to appreciate how fast and talented Emily was. When she was in the open field, she could handle the ball in ways the other girls couldn't dream of.

“What?”
he said.

He knew he sounded angry, even though his kid sister hadn't done anything except open his bedroom door. But he was still steamed—and confused, and embarrassed—about the way practice had ended.

He opened his mouth to apologize. But the idea of one more apology tonight made him feel even more exhausted. The best he could do was soften his voice.

“Did you want something, Em?”

She just stood there, still staring, until she finally shook her head, no.

“It's nothing,” she said, and closed the door.

It was just Tommy and his mom at the table. When Tommy
asked why Emily wasn't with them, his mom said she'd already eaten.

“How did her practice go?” Tommy said.

Emily's team had called off practice the day before, just like the Bears, because of the funeral. A lot of her teammates, and their parents, had shown up at St. Columbkille, too, supporting her the way Tommy's teammates had supported him.

“She didn't go. I ended up keeping her home today after you went to the bus.”

Tommy went to Brighton Middle School. Emily, in fifth grade this year, was still at Brighton Country Day. Sometimes she took her own bus to school; sometimes Mom drove her.

“Was she sick?” Tommy said, thinking maybe that was what Emily had come to his room to tell him.

“No,” his mom said. “She just wasn't ready.”

“To go back to school?”

“To go back to school, to be with people, to
talk
to people, even her friends. You may have noticed she hasn't had much to say the past few days.”

“But then why was she dressed up in her soccer clothes?”

“She was wearing them when she went out in the yard to kick the ball around by herself,” his mom said. “But that didn't last too long. I guess she didn't feel like changing just yet.”

They ate in silence for a few minutes until his mom said, “But I think she needs to be around people right now. I think she needs soccer, too, just to make her feel more normal.”

Tommy couldn't stop himself. “Mom, please stop talking about normal.”

He didn't say it in a mean way, but she reacted as if he'd yelled at her. The look on her face made Tommy think she was about to start crying again, which pretty much would have been a perfect ending to the night he'd already had. She never cried in front of him or Em. But sometimes, when Tommy would quietly pass by her bedroom, he could hear the sound of her crying from inside.

“I'm sorry,” she said, placing her fork quietly on the plate in front of her.

“You don't have anything to be sorry for.”

“I'm trying so hard.”

Another Gallagher trying her hardest.

“Mom, don't you think I know that? I promise I know.”

“I just keep trying to do what I've been telling you and your sister to do: continue putting one foot in front of the other.”

“Mom,” Tommy said. “You've been awesome. You're as brave as Dad was.”

“No, I'm not,” she said. “I could never be.”

“Well, I think you are.”

She managed a small smile. “We'll agree to disagree on that one. But if you really think that, it just means I'm fooling you the way I've been fooling everybody else.”

“Not true.”

“Yes, honey, it is.” Somehow she managed another smile. “Let's change the subject, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I knew Em couldn't practice if she didn't go to school, but I thought I could get an exception because . . . well, you know. But then she said she didn't want to practice, anyway. I told her
it would make her feel better the way football was going to make you feel better.”

“Right,” Tommy said.

His mom raised her eyebrows. “That didn't sound very enthusiastic.”

“It was just kind of weird tonight, is all.”

“Weird in what way?”

So much for not talking about practice. “I wanted to be out there so bad and playing again that I kept messing up.”

“You've got a lot on your mind. Don't beat yourself up over it. Anyway, I'm sure it wasn't as bad as you're making it out to be.”

“Not sure about that,” Tommy said. “I just kept making bad choices. And Dad always said there was no excuse for that.”

She made her voice sound deeper, imitating his dad. “Bad plays, yes. Bad choices, never.” She reached across the small kitchen table and put her hand over Tommy's. Lately they'd been eating dinner at this table, as if they were avoiding the dining room, where they'd always eaten family dinners when it'd been the four of them.

“You had to know it was going to be at least a little weird tonight,” she said.

“But I made things worse for myself,” he said. “
Much
worse.”

“Want to tell me what really happened?”

He shook his head. “It's not that big a deal, Mom. I'll figure it out.”

“I know it's football,” she said, “but maybe I can help with the figuring out part. Even though I'm not your dad.”

“Don't want you to be,” Tommy said. “Just want you to keep on being my mom.”

Her hand was still over his. She squeezed his now. “Deal,” she said.

“Deal,” he said.

“Dessert? I bought those chocolate chip cookies you like at the market.”

“No thanks.”

“Uh-oh. Now I know it was a rough practice.”

“I'm just full.”

“That's never stopped you before.”

“Maybe I'll have some later. Thursday Night Football is on tonight.”

“Pats?”

She always guessed the Pats were playing when there was a game on television, even though she knew as much about the NFL schedule as she did about video games. Which meant a whole lot of nothing.

“Nope,” he said. “The hated Jets against the hated Dolphins.”

She started to say something then, but stopped herself, because they both heard the siren.

Neither Tommy nor his mom moved. It didn't sound like it was coming from their street. But it was close enough. Maybe a block or two away. His mom turned to her left, looking out the kitchen window.

Tommy watched her eyes, which looked scared and hurt at the same time, staring out into the dark, until the sound quickly faded into the distance.

ELEVEN

T
OMMY
G
ALLAGHER
HAD
NEVE
R
BEEN
big on texting, once his dad and mom decided he was old enough to have a cell phone. Texting to him was just another form of talking, and he had never been a big talker, even before this week.

His dad always said that you learned more with your mouth shut than you ever would with it open, that you learned by listening. He said he never knew anybody who made himself much smarter by talking.

There it was again, he thought, lying on his bed.

His dad always said.

His dad used to say.

His dad told him one time.

How long did he go in a day without thinking that way about something? He wondered if it would ever change, if he'd do it less as the weeks went by, then the months and years.

But did he want to do it less? Maybe that was the question he ought to be asking himself. Was this just Tommy's harmless way of keeping his dad's memory alive inside him?

Everybody kept talking about moving on. But how much did he want to, really?

He heard his phone buzz and saw he had a text from Greck, asking if he was doing okay. He put the phone back on his nightstand.

He wasn't okay, so why should he lie and pretend otherwise?

Tommy thought briefly about calling Nick and apologizing, really apologizing this time, for what had happened at practice. He even picked up the phone, about to speed-dial Nick's number, before he changed his mind. He started thinking more about what had happened. Even though he'd gotten benched tonight, there was still a part of him that didn't think he should have been punished.

Seriously? When did coaches start punishing guys for trying too hard?

Tommy had always been taught that in football you were
supposed
to try harder than everyone else. The best players never left anything on the field. It was the football version of being the last man out, like his dad used to be when he was fighting fires.

He and Nick Petty would have to work things out.

Just not tonight.

He opened his laptop and went to NFL.com. The Dolphins were ahead of the Jets 7–0 late in the first quarter, their quarterback having already thrown a touchdown pass. Tommy figured he'd go downstairs in a few and watch the game until it was time for him to go to bed, even knowing that his heart wasn't in it tonight. It was just one more part of the general weirdness of his life, not being interested in watching a football game, even
though he'd once told his dad that he'd be happy if there was a game on every night of the week.

Tommy sat up suddenly, taking in big gulps of air, feeling as if all of the quiet in his house was sitting on his chest, making it difficult for him to breathe, like he was at the bottom of a dog pile in football.

After a while, struggling to inhale and exhale, he regained control of his breathing. He decided to get out of his stuffy room. He opened his door and walked toward the stairs. Then he looked down the hallway and saw Emily's door was still closed, no light sneaking out from inside her room, no music playing, no sound at all. He remembered Em, standing in his doorway before, like there was something she wanted to ask him.

Tommy walked toward her door. “Em?” he said softly, not wanting to wake her if she'd already gone to sleep.

Nothing.

He gave a light knock. “Em? You awake?”

He stood there waiting, but heard no response. Maybe she was asleep.

Tommy went downstairs to watch football, just because he couldn't think of anything better to do. He would watch the game alone. He knew he'd have to get used to that. He hadn't watched any football last Sunday, the day after his dad died. But he'd watched some of the Monday night game, by himself, just to finally get away from the crowd of people who'd come to pay their respects.

It hadn't been the same, not without his dad there to talk
X
's and
O
's.

Now here he was again. Alone. Trying to study what was happening on the field the way his dad had taught him, trying to be a good reader.

But even as he tried to do that, his mind wandered to a place that he kept coming back to, no matter how hard he tried to stay away.

Why hadn't his dad read the situation better in that burning house?

After all the times he'd gone into houses like that, surrounded by fire, why hadn't he gotten out of that one when he'd gotten the chance?

Why hadn't he made a bigger hole in that window and jumped out of it himself after the little girl was safe in Uncle Brendan's arms?

At the worst possible moment, why had it been Patrick Gallagher, the dad who'd always told him to be a step ahead instead of a step behind, who'd been a couple of steps too slow?

Tommy felt like he'd asked his dad a million questions in his life. Now he'd never get the answer he wanted the most.

The answer he needed the most.

BOOK: Last Man Out
3.78Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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