“Yeah, turns out that he’s got some personal things going on and needs to take an early retirement.”
“Oh my God, Rush. This is so much better than player gossip.”
“Don’t count all your chickens just yet. You have to interview just like everyone else, and there are a couple of rounds of interviews from what I heard. This is not a done deal just because you’re my friend.”
“Of course!” she says, totally blowing off my words of caution. “But I’m a believer of visualization, and I already see us riding to work together in the green goblin. It’s going to be awesome!”
“I can’t even fit in your car, Mia, so get that visual out of your head right now. And we won’t have the same schedule anyway, so we won’t be riding together.”
“Aww,” she says, disappointed. “We don’t get to see each other that much as it is.”
“You know how it is. It’s training camp. But we’re here right now, aren’t we?”
“That’s true, but I had to get fired to make it happen.”
“That’s not fucking true.”
“Okay, okay. I guess I should just be with happy with the fact that the great Rush Bacchetti is in my presence tonight,” she mocks.
“Settle down.”
Mia and I started on an equal playing field as student athletes in college, but now things are not so equal. It bothers me I’m the semi-famous one in this friendship with millions of dollars in the bank and Mia is a struggling physical therapist. Sometimes I even feel guilty about it.
I’m not saying that she would have ever had the same type of notoriety or income as a volleyball player, but she would have been an Olympic athlete. Her wish come true. And of course I can never forget or forgive myself that the one night she needed me, I wasn’t there. By the time I found out what happened to her knee and arrived at the hospital, she was already under anesthesia and headed into exploratory surgery. She didn’t even know I was there.
“Your modesty annoys me, Rush Bacchetti.”
“Stop saying both of my names like that.”
“Why?” She smiles a goofy grin. “That’s your name, isn’t it, Rush Bacchetti?”
“When will you get that I’m just a cog in the machine? The quarterback’s ugly stepsister. I’m no Jett Caraway or Saint Stevenson.”
“The quarterback position is overrated. It’s all about the tight end. A very skilled position. You don’t give yourself enough credit, best friend. Remember, no one thinks about Tom Brady without thinking about Gronkowski.”
I smile reservedly and take a huge gulp of my cranberry juice. Mia is the only person besides my parents who can pay me a compliment, and I know there’s no ulterior motive behind it. It’s how she really sees me and that feels good, really good.
“I think you might just be my biggest fan, Bird.”
“Always.”
“Same.”
My phone buzzes again, and I see it’s Miranda. I respond to her text quickly, then copy and paste the information she’s passed along to give to Mia.
“I’m sending you the info now,” I tell her.
“For the job?”
“For theinterview,” I stress. Mia has an excitability about her and a way of jumping the gun on things. I, on the other hand, am a little more cautious. “The first one will be a phone interview.”
“With the HR girl?”
“She’s not a HR girl, she’s a manager of the department, and her name is Miranda. Miranda Green. Don’t embarrass me and call her HR girl, okay?”
“Ohhh, Miranda, is it?” She says in a terrible Irish accent. Why she’s picked, this accent is beyond me. Miranda is from the Bronx. “Do you have a thing going on with this Miranda woman?”
“No, Mia.” I shake my head. “And why are you using that accent?”
