Chapter Five
Shane
"This is seriously where you live?" I ask.
I'm standing in the doorway to Julie's apartment, staring at a wall just a few feet ahead of me. A wall that represents the end of her entire living area. She stops in the middle of the tiny living room and shoots a glare in my direction.
"Do you have a problem with it?" she asks.
"Not a problem, I guess. I'm just a little stunned. I'm fairly certain the entirety of your apartment could fit in my bedroom."
"I'll just have to take your word for that one," she snaps.
"I didn't realize people out of college lived in apartments this small," I say. "I don't think the first apartment I lived in after college was anything like this."
"That's because you didn't pay for it," she says.
"What?" I ask, turning away from my estimation of the distance between where I am standing, and the end of her apartment.
"You didn't pay for your first apartment after college," she says. "By the time you got out of college, you were already drafted to your team. They're the ones who paid for your housing. It was part of your initial agreement with them."
I smirk at her.
"How do you know so much about my agreement with the team?"
"Research," she says. "If I'm going to be your representative, I have to know as much about you, and your career as I possibly can. I'm not going to be able to rebuild your reputation, and fix all the damage you've caused, if I don't."
"When did you have time to research me?"
"While we were sitting in traffic," she explains.
I remember her fiddling on her phone in the car, but I assumed she was just trying to avoid having to carry on a conversation with me.
"What else did you find out about me?" I ask.
"Enough to know that I have my work cut out for me."
I let out an exasperated sigh.
"Is there even a bathroom in this place?"
Julie gives an equally exasperated sigh and glares at me.
"You know, Shane, you need to snap yourself back into reality."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You weren't always wealthy," she says. "You didn't always have all this influence and power. People haven't always done what you said without question. You've obviously forgotten where you came from. There was a time when you barely had anything at all. Not everyone from back home got the chances you did. They weren’t just scooped up and put into some charmed existence where they're paid exorbitant, ridiculous amounts of money to run around with other men and play a game."
I feel my jaw clench.
"I'm not just playing a game," I argue. "You're acting like I'm out there with a bunch of toddlers kicking a playground ball around. What I do it takes a lot of hard work, and dedication. Money isn't just thrown at me. I deserve every cent I make because I'm the best there is."
Julie's almond eyes narrow at me from behind her glasses, and I find myself curious about what she would look like without them.
"Maybe you used to be," she says. "But like Mr. Slidell said, you haven't been playing very well recently. Do you still think you're worth all that money they pay you?"
"Where's the bathroom?" I ask, forcing my voice to stay as calm and steady as I can.
Julie directs me to it, and I realize I could probably have found it on my own, considering it's located a mere foot or two down the hallway across from what passes as a living room in this pocket-sized apartment. When I emerge a few minutes later, I've forced myself to calm down from the anger I felt. The unexpected duck adhesive stuck on the bathroom wall helped with that, though I am not sure I like the way he looked at me.
I walk back into the living room to find Julie sitting cross-legged on the center cushion of her old couch. In the few minutes I was gone, she changed from her office clothes into a pair of stretchy black pants and a long-sleeved t-shirt. A laptop sits on her folded thighs, and she's bent over staring intently at the screen. She has a piece of her hair wrapped around her fingers, and pressed to her lips, just like the last time I saw her, all those years ago.
"You change clothes faster than a superhero," I tease.
"Not really," she says. "I change clothes like an incredibly awkward person who never quite got over being the self-conscious girl uncomfortable in her own skin. When you're like that, you learn to change after gym before the rest of the class even makes it all the way into the locker room."
"I thought you didn't like being called a girl."
"I don't like when other people call me a girl. Actually, no. I don't like when arrogant men call me a girl."
"So, why did you change? I thought those were your professional clothes, and we are here to work."
She looks up at me, dropping the piece of hair.
"Those are my 'sitting behind a desk in an office handling administrative issues clothes.' These are my 'get comfortable and settle in because it's going to be hard as hell to figure out how I'm going to drag you up out of this abyss you made for yourself' clothes."
"You really enjoy being dramatic, don't you?"
"Dramatic? You think I'm being dramatic? My boss just told me I won't have a job if I don't succeed with something people with decades of experience on me weren't able to do at all."
"So, you don't think you can do it?"
I knew she was all talk back in that office.
"No, I'm sure I can do it."
"And why do you think you're going to be able to swoop in and magically fix my reputation?"
I walk around to the chair sitting beside the couch and drop down into it.
"Make yourself at home," she says sarcastically, then turns back at her computer. "I know I'm the one who is going to be able to fix your reputation because I am going into this with a unique perspective."
"What do you mean?"
"I've had the unique opportunity to hate you personally before hating you professionally. That offers me some additional layers to work with. The people who used to be your fans only know the things about you that are in the public eye, but I know more. I know all the things my brother and I can't stand about you. That means I can approach each of the issues, and deal with them one-by-one."
"How uplifting," I say. "Good to know I've got you in my corner."
She shrugs.
"It's the reality of the situation, Shane. I'm not representing you because I care about you or how anyone sees you. I'm worried about myself. Frankly, I think you should get what's coming to you."
"I should get what's coming to me?" I ask incredulously.
She looks at me again. Her soft lips are pressed together into a tight smile as she seems to try to come up with what she wants to say next.
"I'm not a fan of men who make asses out of themselves in public because they think they are entitled to more in life than others. But that's a matter of personal preference. If it's only you who's getting messed up in the situation, then whatever. I don't care. In fact, I'm sure there are plenty of fans who act exactly like that, and who don't understand why people are being so hard on you. I don't have any sympathy, though, for people who use their power to hurt others. You can have an attitude, sure. You can get pissed off as much as you want, in fact. But keep your hands off other people, especially a woman who loved you, and probably thought you'd take care of her. Protect her."
Anger and frustration blur my vision, and I have to focus on forcing myself to stay calm. If I didn't already know how blunt and straightforward Julie is, I would think she’s trying to bait me in an effort to teach me better self-control. Instead, I know she's expressing exactly what she thinks and feels.
"I didn't do anything to Vanessa," I say. "Nothing she’s said to the media is true. She’s a liar."
"It doesn't really matter if I believe that," Julie says.
"Yes, it does," I shout, then take a breath. "It does matter if you believe me, because it's the truth. And if I'm going to trust you to get me back on track, and to stop people from looking at me the way they do, then I need to know you understand what's happening. You need to know I'm not that type of man. I might not be a great person. I might not be nice, or generous. I might not be the smiling face on a Wheaties box encouraging young children to spread their wings and reach for their dreams, or whatever shit sports heroes are supposed to do. I might never have been great at relationships, of any kind. I'm not saying Vanessa and I had the perfect fairytale, but I was never abusive. We were together for years. Sure, we had our fair share of difficulties. Every relationship goes through rough patches, and maybe some of our patches were rougher than others, but it never got physical between us. Ever. Even when she would go into her little fits and start throwing shoes around the house, or threatening to key my car, I never laid a finger on her. I would just let her wind herself up until she burned out, then wait for it to be over. I was always good to her."
"Then why would she lie? Why would she go to all the effort of coming forward and telling this story?"
"I don't know," I say. "You said she is a woman who was abused by the man she thought would protect and take care of her? Here's the thing. I don't think that woman ever really loved me. I don't know if she has the capacity to love another person as much as she loves herself – and the attention she gets from dating football players. As for being taken care of and protected, she was. Up until a few weeks before we broke up for good, I treated her like a princess."
"That doesn’t answer my question," Julie says. "If you were so good to her, why would she lie about the abuse?"
I feel my lips curving into a snarl. I don't want to have this conversation. This situation never should have happened in the first place. I didn't want to talk about this with Mr. Slidell, or with the coach or ownership, and I sure as hell don't want to talk about it with Julie. I'm at the point, though, where it's obvious I don't have much choice in the matter. As much as I don't like it, Julie seems to be my only chance.
"Do you know who Bobby Kilmer is?"
"Is he an actor?" she asks.
"No, he's not an actor."
"Then, no, I don't know who Bobby Kilmer is."
"He's my teammate," I say. “He's the grandson of Robert Kilmer, a Hall of Fame player. He didn't want to go as Junior or The Second."
“Anyway, Bobby used to be a good friend of mine. He spent a lot of time with Vanessa and me. Then I realized he was spending a lot of time with just Vanessa, and not me."
"Oh," Julie says.
"Yeah," I say. "And it just so happens he wants to take over my position. So, we broke up. Apparently, I haven't been upset enough about it."
"What do you mean?" she asks.
"I think Vanessa flattered herself into believing that she was far more important to me than she actually was, and expected it to crush me when we broke up and she left me for Bobby. It didn't, and I didn't leave the team, so he didn't get my position. Maybe this is her way of getting back at me for embarrassing her and pissing him off."
"Your relationship wasn’t important to you?" she asks. "I heard you were shopping for engagement rings for her at one point."
"Well," I reply with a shrug, "yeah. I guess. I was planning to eventually propose to her."
"That seems pretty important to me," she says. "Not that I really have a personal reference point for that."
I sigh.
"Look, I've been with her for a lot of years. Everybody was used to seeing us together, and thought we were good together. It was good for my image to have a pretty girlfriend who hung off my arm at events. But the thing about pretty girlfriends and athletes is eventually fans expect you to do the wholesome family thing and get married. "
"So, you were willing to marry a woman you weren't in love with, and let her devote her life to you, just so you could look good?"
I can hear the disgust in Julie's voice, but I don't need to justify my relationship to her.
"It's not like I was going to spring it on her. She had been hinting around for months. I just didn't realize she was playing me and Kilmer off each other. Whichever one of us seemed to have better prospects, and a more appealing future ahead of us, was who she wanted."
"Why would she think he had a more appealing future than you?"
"He convinced her he was going to get my spot and the franchise tag. I'd already started having some... issues with public relations and had a few rough games at the end of the season. Kilmer told her I wasn't going to last on the team, and that he was going to step into my place with the favor of ownership, and the fans, and all the endorsements... everything. That would put him on a trajectory of major success and leave me stranded."
"So, it doesn't bother you that the two of you aren't together anymore?"
"I'm not going to lie and say I wasn't angry when we broke up. But I really don't care anymore. I wouldn't want to be with her even if she changed her mind. I think that offends her. She wants me to be upset, and angry, and send me spiraling out of control."
"That's not too far off from what happened," Julie pointed out. "I wouldn't necessarily say you are completely out of control, but you're definitely teetering on the edge."
I lean slightly toward her, meeting her eyes so I know she's hearing every word I say to her.
"I didn't do anything to her," I say. "I never hurt her. She's doing everything she can to manipulate people, and it could destroy my career and my future."
"I believe you, Shane," she says.
I'm surprised by the comment.
"You do?"
She nods.
"I do. I'm not sure why exactly, but I do. It’s more likely I'm just projecting my own experience on to you, and I don't want her to get away with it."
"Your experience?" I ask. "Did some guy do that to you?"
I feel unexpectedly defensive for some reason, and I'm relieved when she shakes her head.
"No," Julie says. "I've never actually had the opportunity for a man I'm in a relationship with to treat me like that. What I'm talking about is the man I came here to Pennsylvania for."
"Online dating?" I ask. "You came here to meet a guy who doesn't exist?"
Julie grimaces.
"I might be stupid, but I’m not that stupid. No, I thought he was going to give me a chance at my dream job. I came all the way up here after meeting him once because he promised me a position. When I showed up for what I thought was going to be my first day, though, he looked at me like I was crazy. It took that confusion, which rapidly turned into pity, for me to understand that he had been hitting on me when we met. He essentially told me he dangles jobs in front of women like carrots to get them in bed. I didn't go along with it, so he didn't actually think I was going to show up for the job."
"Wow. Harsh," I say. “What an asshole.”
"To say the least.”
"Not that what you went through doesn't completely suck," I say, "but what does it have to do with Vanessa?"
"It was complete manipulation," she says. "They both set out to control us, and it changed the way people look at us. It might not be exactly the same thing, but I can commiserate with you a little. Just like it's completely unfair for him to manipulate me as a really twisted way of trying to seduce me, it's beyond disgusting for her to lie and try to get sympathy and ruin your reputation with false accusations. I don't think she should get away with it."
"What did you do to stop that guy from getting away with it?"
Her cheeks flush briefly, and she looks back down at her computer. She seems to have picked up that particular diversionary technique from Mr. Slidell.
"Nothing," she admits. "But that's completely different. He humiliated me, but it didn't impact anybody else. It was a one-time thing. What he did was shady as hell, but there's no way I could prove what happened. I'd rather just put it behind me and move on. Your situation with Vanessa, however, is completely different. Her lies could cost you your job, but if it escalates, it could even land you in legal trouble. I will try to prove she's lying about you. I'm not sure how, but I'll figure something out. "
I move from the chair to the seat beside her and look at her screen.
"What are you doing?"
She slides her eyes sideways at me, letting out a slow breath that seems to be her way of keeping herself level.
"I'm trying to find out as much as I can about what people are saying about you. On news articles, blogs, Twitter – anything I can use to help me devise my approach."