R.E.M. Part 9

Of course he didn’t listen to Blair. Of course he listened to Peter Manning. And of course he found himself stuck spending his days in a sweaty mess with men who were bigger and stronger and stupider and crazier than he was.

He laughed at Blair’s thought that he should throw his tryout. Football was the one thing he’d ever done well and he didn’t know how to pretend otherwise. To his shock, he made the roster.

He didn’t play except when there was a disaster leaving the coach with no other option, but that was all right. He was in the NFL. He hadn’t planned for this, exactly, but any man who said he’d never dreamed about playing pro football was either lying or really really gay. The food the team brought into the locker room was good and the cheerleaders were easy. Peter was pleased with him most of the time, even if he sometimes asked Todd how he could live with himself knowing he was so useless that he never got off the bench. It was an okay limbo in which to spend a few years.

Llanview and L.U. and KAD faded away from his consciousness.

When the team went to Philadelphia to play the Eagles, the Banner dutifully sent a reporter to ask “the former L.U. standout” how it felt “not to be a star in the pros.” Todd dutifully spit out the correct answers about caring more for the team than himself—he’d known enough to say that since Sam Rappaport had been his coach, after all—and waited for it to be over.

Then, when it was over, Kevin Buchanan joined the sports reporter.

A strange sensation coursed through Todd. It was almost as if he was glad to see Kevin. Todd decided that it was probably just jetlag.

“My mom and Jessica wanted to be sure I invited you to dinner,” Kevin said when they’d shaken hands. “They reminded me three or four times.”

“I wish I could,” said Todd. “The team has to leave right after the game.”

“I figured,” said Kevin.

“Tell your mom and Jessie I’m sorry.”

“Sure.”

“How are they doing?”

“Good,” said Kevin in the polite way people did when they didn’t feel like a real answer was required.

“How about Powell?” Todd pushed. He hadn’t even thought of Powell since graduation. As intense as Powell had been about the bonds of their ersatz brotherhood, it was a little odd that he hadn’t made any effort to stay in touch with Todd. (Todd was the football star; football stars never had to make efforts to maintain personal relationships because other people always made the effort for them.)

Kevin’s lips tightened.

“What happened to Powell?” Todd repeated. He put on his best ‘concerned’ face. He might even have been concerned. Sometimes it was hard for him to tell. It was obviously hard for Kevin to tell, too, because Kevin took a moment too long to answer.

“He had a hard time,” Kevin said at last. “He’s sensitive,” he added, using the term his mother had always used to excuse Powell’s brand of crazy.

“He really freaked out when Marty ended up in the hospital right before graduation.”

“He never quite came back from that,” Kevin admitted, and Todd took that to mean that Powell had gone from hysterical fearful outbursts over Marty’s well-being to out-and-out obsession with Marty. Powell had been headed that way when Todd had picked up for Cincinnati. “His parents decided to get him some help.”

“They put him in a loony bin?”

Kevin scowled, not caring for Todd’s word choice. “It was a wakeup call for Marty, though. She straightened out and went right into med school. She’s doing great.”

“Good for her,” Todd lied, because maybe if he sounded pleasant and nice and decent Kevin would tell him about Blair. Then he remembered that he wouldn’t give Kevin that satisfaction of knowing he wondered about Blair and he didn’t ask. But by then it was too late to tell Kevin to remind Marty that it was bad form to try to cure all her patients with sexual healing, so he let Kevin go.

Another year passed. For the second time, Todd almost inexplicably made the team, with the help of a few freak injuries to would-be teammates who really and truly were better than he was.

It happened to be a rule on the team that second year players invited the rookies to their homes for a welcome to the team dinner. Except everyone knew that instead of “dinner,” it was a party, and instead of “the rookies,” the whole team crashed. It took about a quarter of a minimum-salary player’s yearly earnings to throw the damn party.

Todd was less of a party animal when he had to spend his own money and let his own house get destroyed.

Halfway through the party, he was wondering if he should just burn the place down and move. One of the running backs, more drunk than high, was standing on the couch with his dick in his hand, pretending to masturbate while half a dozen women ducked out of the way of the imaginary spray. The team’s kicker, more high than drunk, was giving wet willies wherever he could get close to an ear with a spit-soaked finger. Sex, in twosomes and threesomes and foursomes, was happening in every bedroom and bathroom and closet and corner. Only Todd’s own bedroom was spared because he’d locked it and claimed to have lost the key. Everyone realized he was lying and he didn’t fucking care.

He took another drink and let one of the cheerleaders writhe around him in time to the music.

And if you follow

There may be a tomorrow

But if the offer's shunned

You might as well be walkin' on the sun

If it hadn’t been his own house, he wouldn’t have been half-sober and paying enough attention to see her as soon as she walked in.

But if it hadn’t been his own house, she probably wouldn’t have walked in, anyway.

He pushed the cheerleader into the accepting arms of one of his teammates and forced his way through the party to Blair.

“What are you doing here?” he asked as soon as he was close enough for his shout to be heard.

“I told you I’d come visit you,” she said, like over a year hadn’t gone by since she’d made that particular declaration. She had a little travel bag on wheels with her.

“You planning on staying?” he asked.

“Well, I was going to ask you if I could,” she said, lowering her eyes artfully. “There’s some convention in town and all the hotels are booked. But when I saw you were having a party, I thought I should at least say hi before I started driving back to Llanview.”

He knew he’d been right to lock his room.

He took Blair by the hand and led her through the chaos of the party. There were whistles and questions about where Todd had been hiding this, as well as the occasional comment that teammates were teammates and needed to share that made Todd want to take somebody’s head off even though he’d said the exact same thing more than once.

In the comparative quiet of his room, Todd handed Blair the key.

“You can come back to the party if you want, but you lock the door behind you and you keep the key with you,” he warned. “If you stay in here, you don’t open the door unless you’re positive, and I mean positive, that it’s to me. Every guy down there thinks he’s entitled to have sex with every woman he looks at, and they all looked at you. These guys are local heroes. They can do no wrong. They get away with everything. You have to take that seriously.”

Blair cocked her head in pretended curiosity. “I have the strangest sense of deja vu. I seem to recall that about two years ago I went to a party and Kevin Buchanan was appalled when I wanted to go for a walk with the biggest partier in all of Kappa Alpha Delta. Who was that guy?” She snapped her fingers. “I just can’t remember his name.”

Todd didn’t appreciate the irony. “I need you to stay safe. And I need my bedroom to stay safe,” he added, because he didn’t want her to get any crazy and possibly realistic ideas about how he’d been pining for her since he’d left Llanview. “Nobody has sex in my bedroom but me.”

“That happen a lot?” she asked.

“That’s not your business,” he told her.

“What I meant was, do you have a girlfriend who wouldn’t like it if I slept in your bed?”

“Oh.” Todd shook his head. “No. You should get into bed. Right now.”

Blair laughed. “You really don’t want me to go to that party, do you?”

“I really don’t,” he admitted. He’d always been honest with her about most things.

“Okay,” she agreed. “I won’t.” She handed the key back to him and batted her eyes. “I’ll stay locked in your tower until you come to free me, Sir Todd.”

“Come out if the house burns down,” he said, mindful of the story she’d told about her crazy relatives the last time they’d spoken. “Knowing some of these guys, it’s a possibility.”

“I’ll remember.”

“I’d like to kick them out now, but I can’t. It’ll be most of the night.”

“Okay,” she said again. She kissed his cheek and he wondered what the hell was going on. “Enjoy your party.”

There wasn’t much chance of that.

He did what he could to speed the party along to a premature end. He bribed some of the girls to lure their targets elsewhere. He started a rumor that there was a better time to be had elsewhere. He surreptitiously called in noise complaints to the police. He had his hand on the circuit breaker to cut the power before it occurred to him that as long as the supply of booze and women held out, no one would care if the lights went off. They would probably even prefer it.

It was the early hours of the morning before he’d successfully sent his guests out into the world and unlocked the door to his own bedroom.

He found Blair asleep in his bed.

The sight pleased him. Rather than take a shower and lie down himself, as he’d intended, he fell into a chair and stared at her. He actually had her in his bed; why miss a minute of it and take the chance that she’d vanish if he looked away?

He wasn’t sure how long he stared at her, but eventually her cat-green eyes blinked open and she rolled over, languidly stretching out in his bed, caressing it like she should have been caressing him.

Blair focused her gaze on Todd, completely unashamed to have put on a show for him in her sleep, completely unbothered to have found him there. It was an unconscious confidence and trust that was sexy as hell. “Todd?” she asked. “What are you doing?”

He shrugged. “Just thinking,” he said, because that was technically true.

“Party over?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Want your bed back?” she asked, making no move to get up.

“I think my bed likes you better than it likes me,” he told her.

“I know that’s not true.” She stroked a pillow invitingly with her hand. “I think this bed just loves you.”

If Todd hadn’t known better, he would have thought it was an invitation. He stared numbly at her.

“We could always share,” she suggested. She scooted over, leaving open the place still arm from her body.

“What are you doing, Blair?” he tried.

She swung her long legs over the edge of the bed and stood up. He choked back a gasp; she was wearing a scrap of black lace that left almost nothing to his imagination. “You didn’t want me at your other party,” she said. “I thought we could have our own party.” She pulled him to his feet; he followed her direction, mesmerized, as she began to dance with him.

When she kissed him, he kissed back. Wildly, he wondered if it was actually happening after so many near misses. Had Blair really just shown up out of the blue and planted herself all but naked in his bed? Did he really care why, as long as it was happening?

Before he lost his nerve, he pushed her hard onto the bed and climbed on top of her. The kissing got harder and faster; after a moment he pulled back to look at her, to convince himself once again that she was really there.

She ran her hand gently down the side of his face, playing with his hair, which had grown long enough for a ponytail over the past year. She looked into his eyes and a wave of fear overwhelmed him. This was the woman who had looked at him and talked to him when he’d been the loser expelled from L.U. for being too stupid to pass a test. This was the woman who made it plain that she didn’t care whether he had the play of the day on ESPN or not. This was the woman who snuck into his bedroom with beer and made him laugh at the stupid portrait of Kevin Buchanan’s grandfather. This was the woman who peeled him off the floor of a bar when he needed it and told him her darkest secrets.

He’d never done anything like this with anyone like her in his life.

He grabbed her hand and pinned it over her head  so that she wouldn’t touch him like that again. He was going to get through this; Blair wasn’t going to get a chance to run away and call him a freak like those other women-- those other women--

Blair pushed him hard in the chest. “Todd, let’s just, let’s just, Sweetie, let’s just slow down.”

It was the ‘Sweetie’ that undid him more than anything that had happened so far. He decided to cut the humiliation short, put Blair in his past where she belonged, and never mention this to anyone.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” he muttered. “Look, I have to go to practice--”

“You do not have practice at 4:00 in the morning,” she said. She reached again for his hair, which seemed to fascinate her. He leaned back, but she was persistent. “I’m not staying stop, Todd,” she murmured. “I’m saying, let’s go slow. If you try it, you might like it.”

“If you want me to stop, you just let me know,” he blurted out. He was pretty sure that no woman, ever, had really enjoyed having sex with him. It hadn’t mattered in the past; he hadn’t cared about them, and he’d kept in mind Peter’s warnings about the nature of women. But with Blair, it mattered. He’d never had sex with a woman he liked before. Hell, the only other woman he liked with Kevin’s mother, and the thought of that almost made him run screaming from the room.

She didn’t answer. Instead, she drew him into another deep kiss. “Slow,” she whispered into his ear. “Slow.”

She unbuttoned his shirt, kissing down his chest as she went. She stayed in charge up through the moment of entry; by then, Todd’s nerves had vanished and he couldn’t think of anything but Blair’s skin and Blair’s curves and Blair’s mouth and Blair’s hot, wet, insides.

His mind didn’t reconnect with his body until sometime later when he had Blair’s naked body draped over his own like the best blanket ever. “What are you doing here, Blair?” he asked.

She laughed. “If you don’t know, I could do it again and see if you figure it out that time.”

“No!” He reconsidered. “Well, maybe. Definitely. But why are you in Cincinatti and not Llanview?”

“I came to see you.”

“Just like that,” he said flatly.

“I did tell you I would visit you when you left.”

“You didn’t call,” he pointed out.

“I’m so sorry for the breach of social etiquette. What would your friend Viki say?”

“You know what I’m asking. How about you answer for real? I thought we had this thing where we told each other the truth.”

“Okay,” she whispered. “Truth. There was no convention. I could have gotten a hotel room. I came here to see what would happen. If I could make this happen.” She gestured aimlessly at their entangled, naked bodies. “I almost turned around when I saw that you were having a party, but then it seemed like a sign. The first time I met you it was at a party a lot like that one.”

“Why now? Why not when I was hitting on you every time we had a drink? You just want what you can’t have?”

“Maybe. A little.” She sighed and rolled off of him, but snuggled close to his side like she had the night she’d told him about her family. “I was attracted to this man. I crossed paths with him doing things with Melador because he owned a spa. Him and his wife.”

“Ouch,” said Todd, because even he knew better than to fly into a jealous rage at the thought that Blair had been after someone else.

“He seemed like the kind of man I was supposed to be with. Older and sophisticated and a big deal with the main line upper crust. So I decided that I should go get him, like I went and got Melador.”

“It didn’t work?”

“It did, for a while. He never quite told me he was going to leave his wife, but… Well, even when I had him it wasn’t as much fun as it was supposed to be. It wasn’t as much fun as I used to have with you. And there was this whole thing where I accidentally ran over his wife.”

Todd’s laughter shook the bed. “Accidentally?”

She slapped him lightly with her manicured hand. “It was an accident! And after that, it was like, what am I doing? How am I finding it inside me to do that when I couldn’t even find the courage to figure out what was going on with us because you were younger and a football player and Dorian doesn’t like you? It’s why I didn’t call ahead. I was afraid I’d lose my nerve. I wanted to see in person if you were interested for real. A lot of times, men, they’ll hit on you over and over like you used to and the prize is getting your number or getting you to say yes. It’s all about the pursuit. They don’t really want you if they can get you.”

“Did Dorian tell you that?”

“It’s true!”

Todd shrugged. He wasn’t going to acknowledge that Blair’s witch of an aunt had a point, not when it didn’t apply to him, not with Blair. “I really want you,” he said, flipping himself on top of her and kissing her neck until she moaned. This time, there were no false starts.

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