More recently, Patrick had resorted to shitty barbs about me taking a dick up my ass. I ground my teeth every time, reminding myself it was the injury and nothing personal. His brains had been scrambled by repeated hits on the field, and he’d come away from the NAFL with a death sentence.
The scariest part was none of us were guaranteed to avoid his fate; every day we were healthy was a blessing.
“Hon, you know I won’t care who it is,” Angie said sweetly. She took the seat next to me and placed her hand over mine. “I worry about you, Lincoln. You’ve been roaming around that house for years now, chasing ghosts of the life that never fit you. And if it’s Pat you’re worried about, don’t be. I won’t tell him anything you’re not ready to tell him yourself.”
She broke down sobbing and I scooted close enough to wrap my arms around her. It was oddly refreshing to see her break down about the hand life had dealt her.
Them.
She hadn’t signed up for any of this, but she wasn’t about to leave her husband’s side.
“In sickness and health, Lincoln,”she’d once told me when I asked how she put up with his mood swings and aggression.“When we stood up in front of God and our family, I promised that man I would love him in the good times and the bad. Even knowing how bad those bad days would be, I wouldn’t trade him for anything. He’s not abusive, not physically anyway, and I know him lashing out isn’t about me. He’s sick, Lincoln. And if he truly understood what Tanner and I go through every day, he’d hate himself.”
“It’s okay, Angie,” I whispered, pressing my lips to the side of her head. As she cried, my own thoughts drifted to Nixon. How would he react if I woke up one day and couldn’t remember how to do the simplest of tasks? If I stared out the window, lost in my own head? I swallowed hard, thinking about the game of Russian Roulette every former player was caught up in. None of us knew if the damage had been done long ago and we were going to die for the sport we loved. “It’s okay. Shhh.”
She regained her composure before long, wiping away the tears with the back of her hand. “I’m sorry, Lincoln. You were trying to tell me about this new guy you’ve finally found and I’m a dang wreck.”
“It’s fine, Angie. If anything, it’s good to see that you’re not trying to be stoic all the damn time,” I admitted.
“We’re not talking about me, Lincoln Sims,” she warned, smoothing her hands down her front. “Tell me about him. Who is it? Where did you meet? Is it serious?”
I sucked in a deep breath, steeling myself for even more questions once I told her. “It’s Nixon Cross.”
Angie slapped her hands down on the table in a very out of character display of excitement. For the first time in longer than I could remember, there was a glimpse of the brilliant smile Patrick used to call her secret weapon.
“Obviously, you know where we met, but we reconnected when I spoke to the Breakers during training camp. He’d actually reached out to me before I flew up, hoping I could help convince Zach Kendricks to come out before he was outed by that show they did this summer. It hasn’t been easy, but that’s probably not a surprise. You know how Nixon can be.”
“Stubborn as a mule, that one is,” she responded, slipping into the deep Southern drawl she hid most of the time, not wanting people to infer anything about her intelligence because she came from rural Southern roots. “I’m happy that the two of you stopped ignoring one another. I’m not sure if you felt it, but there was always electricity between the two of you.”
“We felt it,” I admitted. “And we spent a whole lot of time trying to convince ourselves of all the reasons it’d never work.”
“Is that Lincoln I hear out there?” Patrick yelled from the den. I shook my head, reminding myself again that this wasn’t him, it was the illness.
While there was no way to confirm a diagnosis, the doctors were fairly certain he had CTE, not any of the other diseases they’d commonly diagnosed in the past. The man who used to bound into the room, threatening to tackle me to the ground like we were our sons’ ages, had been replaced by someone who couldn’t trust his body to move the way that used to be automatic. He spent most of his days in that chair, safe from showing his weakness to anyone.
“Get your ass in here, Sims. Game’s about to start.”
“That’s the happiest I’ve heard him in a while,” Angie said, standing to get back to preparing snacks to get us through until it was time for me to head out. If that was jovial Patrick, I didn’t want to know what she put up with on a daily basis. “Go, sit with him. Maybe it’ll snap him out of the funk he’s been in.”
“Okay, Angie. I’ll go see what I can do to lift his spirits.” I crossed the kitchen to give her a quick hug. “Once that food’s done, I expect you to do as I told and get out of the house for the day. You need a break. Pamper yourself a bit. Buy a new outfit. Be selfish for a few hours.”
Her shoulders sagged and I worried she’d break into tears again. This was a woman at the end of her rope, but she’d continue stoically refusing any lifelines tossed her way unless pushed. Well, I was going to push. I couldn’t do much for her daily struggles, but I could give her a very temporary reprieve.
“I will, Lincoln. But please don’t tell him where I went,” she pleaded. “His latest obsession is money. He’s certain we’re going to lose the house and he’s going to leave Tanner and me with nothing because of the medical bills.”
The hitch in her voice told me how close to a possibility that was. I wished there was more I could do to help them, but Patrick would lose his damn mind if he thought anyone saw him as a charity case.
A lump formed in my throat at the thought; hewaslosing his mind. Literally. And there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.
I held her tighter, whispering against her hair so only she could hear me. “I won’t, sweetie. If things do get to that point, you call me, okay? I don’t care what Patrick says, you and Tanner shouldn’t have to worry about money on top of everything else.”
“You’re a wonderful man, Lincoln. Nixon’s lucky to have you in his life,” she responded, blatantly ignoring my offer. I hoped that, if it came down to it, she’d remember and call me. In the meantime, I’d do everything in my power to stop by whenever I was home just to make sure they were okay. Patrick yelled for me again and I tensed. Angie released me and patted my arm. “Go spend time with him. I know it didn’t sound like it when you walked in, but he’s been in a better mood since I told him you were coming over to watch the game.”
Guilt punched me in the stomach, nearly knocking the wind out of me when I entered the den. Patrick, the man who used to be unstoppable and always moving, was slumped into his leather chair, two empty beer bottles already littering the end table beside him and another in his hand.
It was barely noon and he was already on his third drink of the day. “You gonna stare at me like some sort of animal at the zoo or you gonna sit?”
“Good to see you, too, Patrick,” I said as I took a seat on the couch, trying to stop myself from staring to catalog the differences since the last time I was here. He’d lunge out of his seat to kick my ass if he thought I pitied him. I wanted to make a quip about how bad he looked, but couldn’t force the words past my lips.
