About an hour later, my cell phone rings. It’s Daisy.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Colin. Sorry to bother you at home.”
“No worries, Daisy. How’s it going?”
“Well, practice got cut short, so I wanted to give you a call to check in on you.”
“I’m fine,” I lie. I’m actually in a pretty sorry state at the moment. I didn’t want to drink, given my run-in with the law last night, but I also didn’t want to be completely sober, so in an attempt to chase any kind of high, I bought myself a tin of Skoal chewing tobacco. The guys on the team at ASU used to say it relaxed them, but moments after I put the first pinch of it in my lower lip, I forgot to spit and instead followed my natural instinct to swallow. The choking that followed caused me no small amount of discomfort. I tried to spit out all of what was left andended up spending the next twenty minutes in the bathroom, wrestling tobacco particles out of my teeth with my Crest Spinbrush.
“Good,” she replies. “Glad to hear it. Listen, I just wanted to let you know, after you left, Gordon continued to stand up for you.”
“Huh?”
“To your father. He told John that you’re the best player on the team, the smartest attorney he’s ever known, and that John was wrong to verbally attack you like that.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously. He actually used the termunparalleled work ethic.”
Gordy thinks my dad walks on water; I have no idea why he would ever disrespect him like that in favor of standing up for me, especially when we so clearly dislike each other.
When I don’t respond, she asks, “You still there?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Sorry. I just don’t get why he would do that.”
“There’s more. He quit the team.”
“What?”
“Yup. He left right after you. He told John that he didn’t want to play for someone who mistreated his own son like that.”
“Holy shit. What did my dad do?”
“He told him to take his nut pillow and go.”
I laugh. “I can’t believe it.”
“Just thought you should know.”
“Thanks, Daisy.”
“Have a good night, Colin. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I hang up with her and call Gordy.
“Hello?” he says.
“Hey. It’s Colin.”
“I know who it is. I think this is the first time you’ve ever called my cell phone though.”
“Probably,” I say. “Yo, Daisy told me you quit the team.”
“Yeah. I mean, I’m not much good in my condition anyway,” he says.
“She made it sound like you…”
