The One & Only: A Novel (2 page)

I allowed myself a fleeting glimpse of his profile now, afraid of what I would find, but comforted that he appeared as strong and rugged as ever. Not at all like a widower. He was a fit fifty-five, but looked a decade younger thanks to a full head of hair, olive skin, and a strong bone structure. It wasn’t fair, I had thought for years, whenever I saw Lucy’s parents together. Mrs. Carr was beautiful, fighting age almost as viciously as she fought death, but her husband just kept getting better-looking, the way it was for a lot of men. And now. Now it
really
wasn’t fair. It was a proper funeral musing—the inequities of life and death—and I felt relieved to be maintaining an appropriate train of thought, if not actual prayer.

But in the next second, the pendulum swung in the opposite direction, as I thought of football. Lucy said it was all I
ever
thought about, which was pretty close to true, at least before Mrs. Carr got sick. Even afterward, I found myself escaping to the game I loved, and I knew Coach did the same. It upset Lucy because she didn’t understand it. She would ask me, through tears, how he could care so much about signing a recruit or winning a game. Didn’t he see how little it mattered?
I tried to explain that his job was a distraction, the one thing he could still control. Football was our touchstone. A constant. Something to hold on to as a bright light burned out in Walker, Texas, our little version of Camelot.

A few seconds later, Lucy and Lawton sat down, flanking their father, and the sight of three of them, instead of four, was more than I could take. My throat tightened as the organ began to play. Loud, mournful notes filled the church. I could hear my mother softly weeping between chords, and could see Lawton and Lucy wiping their eyes. I glanced around so I wouldn’t cry, anything to distract me in that final lull before the service began.

I spotted my boyfriend, Miller, who had played for Coach years ago, during my faded era, standing with a few former teammates in the far aisle. They all looked lost in their ill-fitting suits and shined-up shoes, unaccustomed to Walker gatherings that weren’t celebratory in nature—pep rallies, parades, and booster dinners. Miller gave me a two-finger wave with a half smile as he fanned himself with his program. I looked away, pretending not to see him. Partly because I knew Lucy didn’t approve of him. Partly because I still felt a knot of guilt for having been in bed with him when she called with the final news, my ringer accidentally turned off. But mostly because it just wasn’t the time to be waving at your boyfriend, especially one you weren’t sure you really loved.

“No riffraff at the house,” Lucy declared immediately after the burial as she marched down the grassy embankment toward Neil’s freshly washed Tahoe. I’d known it was only a matter of time before her sadness turned to anger—and was actually surprised that she had held out this long. Coach had once joked that Lucy had only two gears—happy and angry.

“Define
riffraff
,” I asked—because I really wasn’t sure what she meant other than that she cast a wider net than I did when it came to such categories.

“Boosters. Fans. All players, past or present. Except Ryan. Mom
loved Ryan,” she finished decisively, tightening the belt of her long black trench coat.

Mrs. Carr
did
love Ryan James, who happened to be Walker’s only Heisman Trophy winner, but she had also adored every sorry benchwarmer and earnest walk-on ever to come through the program. I exchanged an anxious glance with Neil, who calmly said his wife’s name.

“Don’t ‘Luce’ me,” she snapped under her breath. “I mean it. I’ve had enough. Family and close friends only.”

“How do you plan on enforcing that?” Neil asked, glancing around at the droves of acquaintances making their way to the circular drive surrounding the Carr family plot. He pushed his retro oversize glasses—the kind you could only pull off when you were as boyishly cute as Neil—up on his nose and said, “Half the town’s on the way over there now.”

“I don’t care. They weren’t even supposed to be at the cemetery. What part of
private
don’t they get? And they aren’t coming to the house. They aren’t. Tell them, Lawton,” she said, turning to look at her brother.

“Tell who what?” Lawton asked, appearing completely disoriented, useless as ever.

“Tell Shea and Neil that it’s time for family and close friends only,” she replied, for our benefit more than his. She reached up to make sure that no loose strands of hair had escaped her tight, low bun. They hadn’t, of course.

“But they think they
are
family, Lucy,” I said and could hear Mrs. Carr saying it now, referring to virtual strangers as part of “the Walker family.”

“Well, it’s offensive,” Lucy said, stumbling a bit as her heels sank into the fresh sod. Neil slipped one arm around her, catching her, and I contemplated how much worse this would be if she were in my shoes, alone. “I’m sick of these people acting like this is a tailgate at a damn bowl game. And if I see one more teal tie … Who wears teal to a funeral?” Her voice cracked just as Miller, in his teal and gold striped tie, loped toward us with an expression that neared jovial. I made eye contact
with him and shook my head, but the gesture was far too nuanced for him.

“Yo. Shea. Wait up,” he called out as I noticed that he not only had donned his school colors but also had a “Class of 2001” Broncos pin centered on his lapel. How he’d managed to keep track of that thing for over a decade was beyond me, especially given that he’d lost his wallet twice since we’d been dating.

Lucy pivoted, squaring her slight frame to all six feet, four inches of Miller. “I’m sorry, Miller,” she said, her chin quivering. “Did you want to sing the fight song for us? Or just relive the glory days when you were … relevant?”

“Whoa, whoa, girl. What’d I ever do to you?” Miller said, his emotional instincts on par with his sartorial sense. “Why you gotta call me unrelevant?”

“
Ir
relevant, Miller. Not to be confused with
irregardless
, which, by the way, also is not a word. And I’m calling you
irrelevant
because you
are.
” Lucy’s long, delicate fingers made artistic flourishes in the air.

“Fine, then,” Miller said, his cheeks even ruddier than usual, his curly sideburns damp with sweat despite the brisk February day. I had told him twice to get a haircut, but he hadn’t listened.

“I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry. Very sorry. For your family. For your loss. I really liked your mom. She was an awesome lady.”

The speech was heartfelt, I could tell, but Lucy refused to cave. I braced myself as she crossed her arms and said, “Oh, puh-lease, Miller. The only loss you ever cared about was the one to Nebraska when you fumbled on the four-yard line because you were so coked up.”

“I wasn’t
coked up
,” Miller said. “I just … dropped the damn ball.
Jesus
.”

I bit my lower lip, shocked that Lucy recollected the play, even the yardage. But she got the rest wrong. It was T. C. Jones who failed the drug test after the game, not Miller, who never really did coke, vastly preferring the mellowing effect of marijuana. In fact, based on his glassier than normal expression, there was a distinct possibility that he had smoked this morning. Maybe even on the car ride over.

“Luce,” Neil said, sliding his grip from her elbow to her forearm and gently guiding her to his car. A child psychiatrist, he had a calming effect on the most high-strung children—and the rare ability to soothe Lucy. “Come on now. Let’s go, honey.”

She didn’t reply, just gracefully climbed into the car, crossed her slender legs, and waited for Neil to close the door. As Lawton collapsed into the backseat, Lucy stared down at the pearl bracelet that once belonged to her mother.

“Are you coming with us?” Neil asked me. “Or going with your parents?”

I glanced back toward my mom and dad, walking toward her car. Although long divorced, they had managed to be civil to each other through this ordeal, and, to my relief and surprise, my dad had left his wife back in Manhattan.

Lucy answered for me through her half-open window. “Neither,” she said. “I want her to ride with Daddy. He shouldn’t be driving alone. He’s being so stubborn.” She stared at me. “Okay, Shea?”

I hesitated.

“Just do it. And make sure he wears his seat belt. One death in the family is plenty,” she said as I looked up the hill, finding Coach Carr in a cluster of dark suits.

“But don’t you think he’d rather be alone?” I asked. “I’m sure he doesn’t want to make conversation—”

“Well, you’re different,” she said, cutting me off. “He actually
likes
talking to you.”

I
waited, squinting in the winter sun and watching as Coach Carr talked to the last few graveside stragglers. Lucy was right. They really
were
insensitive, as everyone knew he didn’t like to talk after losses, and if you didn’t know this, you probably shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

He finally broke free and walked toward me. My mind raced, wondering how I was going to tell him he had an assigned chaperone back to his house.

“Hi, Coach,” I said when he was directly in front of me. We made fleeting eye contact before I stared back down at the ground.

“Hi, girl,” he said, sounding weary. “You need a ride?”

“Um … Lucy wanted me to go with you … to make sure you wear your seat belt,” I stammered.

I looked up as he shot me a sideways glance. “All right … But am I allowed to dip?”

“I thought you quit?”

Some of his Levi’s still had a telltale imprint of a Copenhagen tin on his back right pocket, but it had been years since I had seen him take a dip. His quitting tobacco was all Mrs. Carr wanted one Christmas. That and a Cotton Bowl victory—both of which she got, along with a diamond tennis bracelet she hadn’t asked for.

“I did quit. I was joking,” he said.

“Oh,” I said, forcing a smile, realizing that the circumstances had dampened my keen radar for his brand of humor.

He gestured toward his car as if granting permission to ride with him but, to my relief, didn’t open the door as he usually did for me. For
any
woman, including and especially his wife of thirty-plus years.
Every single time
, Lucy once said when I pointed out the spousal chivalry. I remember the cute way she had smiled, prouder of this fact than she was of any of her father’s on-the-field accomplishments. It was the only thing Lucy had that I ever felt genuinely envious of, my own parents being unified only in their hatred of each other. Only now, bizarrely, I was the lucky one. Because divorce was better than death.

Coach Carr went around to the driver’s side of his old Ford Explorer, and we got in and closed our doors in unison. He started the engine and did an efficient three-point turn while I calculated that we were about four miles from the Carrs’ house. Ten minutes at most, but an eternity when I couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Asking him how he was doing didn’t seem like my place, and telling him I was sorry felt like too much of a mammoth understatement. So I said nothing, just watched out of the corner of my eye as he reached for his silver Walker thermos, the same one I had seen Mrs. Carr fill with freshly brewed coffee at least a hundred times over the years. Probably more than that. I wondered who had made his coffee this morning and if he even knew how to work their fancy European machine. Befuddled by modern gadgetry, he was the least handy man I knew in the state of Texas. He still had a flip phone and did without a computer, insisting that it was the only way to avoid all the Monday morning quarterbacks who would inevitably track down his email address. He took a sip of
coffee and made a face, replacing the thermos in the cup holder near the dashboard.

When I could no longer bear the silence, I cleared my throat and imitated what I had heard others say between the ceremony and burial. That the service was really nice. That Lucy did a great job with the eulogy.

“Yeah. She sure did. I’m proud of her.” His voice cracked, and, for a few seconds, I held my breath and looked away, terrified that he was finally going to break down.

But when he spoke again, I realized it was all in my head. He was still composed, in complete control. “Lawton said you helped Lucy write it?”

“I just helped a little,” I said, which wasn’t exactly true. They were all Lucy’s ideas and feelings, of course, but I had rewritten and rearranged whole sections because she said her own words didn’t sufficiently honor her mother.

“Please make it better,” she had pleaded until I broke out my highlighter and red pen. Lucy was probably smarter than I was and had always done better in school, but writing was my thing.

Coach gave me a look that said he didn’t quite believe me. “Well. I think Connie would have been pleased.”

I caught that he said
would have
—instead of
was
—a clue that he wasn’t one hundred percent sure about God these days either, and I felt a stab of despair followed by a more dire emptiness. At that moment, I desperately wanted Coach Carr to have real, enduring faith, although I wasn’t sure why that mattered to me so much.