“I’m worried about you. It seems like you never go out,” his dad said. “Every time I call, you’re at home.”
“You’re just calling at a good time. And um, we went out twice, the last couple weeks, as a team. Remember that bar I told you about?” Cam wasn’t going to mention that the first time his teammates had dragged him to Vault, he’d nearly had a heart attack.
“You go out by yourself?”
“Uh,” Cam hesitated. He didn’t want to lie, but he also didn’t want to make his dad worry, the way he was worrying now.
“Kid, you can’t hide away in that little box.”
“It’s notthatlittle,” Cam argued. But it was. It was a tiny-ass apartment, and he probablyshouldn’tbe so happy here. When he’d first walked in, before he’d signed on the dotted line, he’d actually worried that living here would feel confining. He remembered asking the sales manager showing him the place where the nearest green spaces and parks were, because he’d been sure that he’d not justwantto see a tree, butneedto see a tree.
But then he’d moved here for camp, and the thing hadalmosthappened, and suddenly the four walls of this apartment had started to look really good. Not right away, but more and more each day, then each week.
“It’s fucking tiny,” Shane griped. “I hate the thought of you cramped in there.”
“Dad, it’s really not that bad. I like it.” That wasn’t a lie at all. He did like it, but what he wasn’t going to share was that he probably liked it more because of what it wasn’t.
“I’m just worried about you. And then yesterday—Hall looked pretty pissed on the sideline.”
Cam winced, glad that Dawson hadn’t overheard that comment. He’d have believed no matter what that Dawson wouldn’t have liked everyone to know how much he hated missing the kick. But with how well Cam knew Dawson now, he was becoming so much more familiar with how deep that frustration would go.
He’d tried so hard to hide it on the sideline during the game. Cam had watched him school his expression like somehow not showing the wound of the missed field goal might change the ball’s final trajectory.
“Yeah, it just . . .it was just one of those things. He’s solid.” Cam hesitated. Unsure of how much he should say. He’d never worried about sharing with his dad before, but ever since coming to Toronto and starting his professional football career for real, it was tougher. “I think I probably fucked up the hold.”
“You got the ball down in time.”
“Barely,” Cam said heavily. He’d been thinking about that two seconds for the last twenty-four hours and now even if he looked at the tape and it proved it wasn’t his fault, it still wouldn’t matter.
“Kid, you need to take it easy on yourself. You’ve only been holding for him for what . . .a few weeks?”
Cam didn’t need to tell his dad that it wouldn’t matter if he’d never held for Dawson before last week’s game, that it didn’t matter if he was unpracticed and unprepared, that mistakes—even slight, barely even mistakes like yesterday’s—weren’t something he could get away with. Especially now that he was in the NFL.
If he couldn’t do it, there’d be a hundred guys behind him, aching for the chance.
But he didn’t say any of that. There wasn’t any point in rehashing it. Maybe his dad had lived in the middle of nowhere, Montana, for practically his whole life, but he still was a lifelong football fan. He understood.
“We’re going to get it figured out,” Cam said optimistically. More optimistically than he currently felt, anyway.
“If this whole thing doesn’t work out—” his dad started to say, but Cam cut him off.
“Dad,” Cam said in a hard voice. “No.”
Shane gave an embarrassed laugh. “God, I sound like one ofthosefathers now, don’t I?”
Cam rolled his eyes. “You wouldn’t be any good as an over-involved sports dad, anyway. You’re too emotionally healthy for that shit.”
“Yeah, probably. Doesn’t mean I’m not tempted into it, once in a while. Having you so far away sucks. I trust you can take care of yourself—you’ve got a good head on your shoulders, kid—but doesn’t mean I don’t worry sometimes. On days like yesterday. Days like today, when I think you’re just gonna hide in that apartment forever.”
Ugh.Ugh. Cam hated the guilt that swamped him.
“Sorry, Dad. I wish—” Cam cut off. Unsure what else he could say. Unsure what else heshouldsay.
He’d felt okay leaving his dad to his busy, fulfilled life in Montana. But every once in a while it hit him how much he just plain missed having him around.
Other dads cared more if their sons succeeded in making it to the NFL or the NHL or to MLB or whatever overachieving goal they’d set for them than they did their actualsons. But Shane had never been like that. He’d wanted Cam to have goals and aspirations, sure, but Cam had never felt like achieving those was a requirement for his dad’s love. He’d have it, regardless.
He’d have it even if he didn’t make it with the Thunder, or with any other team that tried him. Even if he went back to Montana and picked up the threads of a life he’d put together as a backup plan: managing his dad’s veterinary business with the business degree he’d gotten in college.
