His laugh booms through the receiver. “You want me to coddle you? Sorry, Linc. I draw the line at giving you the warm and fuzzies.”
“I don’t want the warm and fuzzies,” I huff. “Just tell me pragmatically how this is going to end well.”
I roll my eyes at his sigh, feeling like a needy asshole. Finally, after a long enough pause that I really start to consider he might’ve hung up on me, he speaks.
“How’s therapy been going? How do you feel?
” he asks.
“Good.”
“This is going to be fine. You’re an athlete so you know injuries happen. Management knows that too. Just keep rehabbing it and see what happens.”
“What if they don’t sign me?”
“There is a chance, as there always is, that you will move cities. You know that.”
My head hangs. “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
“But you’re going to have a job. And, even if you don’t, you have me managing your money. You’re not going to have to worry about it.”
He’s right, but that’s not the problem. It’s not that I’m afraid I won’t be able to eat or buy a house. It’s more like—what am I if I don’t play ball? I can’t announce. I don’t have a business or marketing degree. I’ll just be another has-been before age thirty and the biggest letdown to my family.
“Okay, enough of that,” I say, flopping on the sofa, shoving baseball out of my brain. “Next topic: I need a plan.”
“For post-baseball?”
“No,” I gulp. “Don’t laugh.”
“If it’s coming from your mouth, I reserve the right to laugh.”
This is going to be a tough one to live down, the fact that I, the best-looking out of the family, is having a struggle getting the girl I want. If I tell G, he’ll tell Barrett and probably Ford, and then I’m fucked. Holidays at home will never be the same. Knowing I’m fucking up my reputation with Graham, I still need him.
“Fine,” I mutter. “I met this girl. The one I was telling you about the other day, remember?”
“Yeah,” he says, sounding entirely too amused for my own good.
“She doesn’t want to see me.”
Grimacing, I wait for the chuckle at my expense. It doesn’t take long before Graham is snickering on the other end. Tossing the baseball onto the sofa, I wait him out.
“Sorry. I thought I just heard you say she won’t see you,” he says finally.
“I did. I don’t mean it like she won’t see me at all, because I fucked her three times last night and she slept in my bed. But unlike most women that won’t leave the next day, she won’t stay.” My voice drifts off as my mind goes to more sinister places. “Is this what my life will be like if I don’t get re-signed? Will I become a loser?”
“You’ll get re-signed.”
“But if I don’t, is this what I can look forward to? Is this how you live?”
“Fuck off,” Graham snorts. “I’ll have you know I have no problem getting a woman. I’ve never called you for advice, have I?”
“That’s because you have a plan for fucking everything,” I laugh. “You give your own advice.”
“True. Now what kind of advice are you after with Miss I-Don’t-Want-You?”
“You don’t have to say it like that, asshole,” I buzz. “I need a plan to win her over. I think what I need to do is convince her I’m more than an athlete. She’s all anti-baseball-god. Weird, right?”
The line stills as my brother formulates his proposal. “Okay, so tell me about her. Besides her physical attributes, please.”