There’s Got to Be a Morning After

TREY WASnot expecting the standing ovation from the players when he walked late into the locker room the next morning.

He’d been pleasantly preoccupied, actually, his mind on the warmth and joy of having a man in his arms over the course of the night, of Dewey’s pleasantly rumpled blond hair in the morning and the way he’d insisted on buying them coffee and a breakfast burrito since Trey offered to take him home.

He thought of all those hurried relationships when he’d been in sports, of the way he’d had to hide his dates—literally in the closet of his hotel room more than once—and the way, most of the time, the guys he’d been with hadn’t really been interested in a what-comes-next.

And how he and Dewey were looking forward to going out for dinner and a movie in ways that said they were way ready for more than dinner and a movie. It was like… like waiting made it sweeter. In a million years, Trey wouldn’t have believed he could talk so much about things that weren’t sports. But Dewey was funny and, well, blunt about pretty much anything. Comedy, television, art, music, movies, celebrity trends, even coffee and coffeehouses and recycling. Their opinions didn’t always match up—Trey still hadn’t found a way to tell Dewey that he thought all coffee was Satan’s piss in a paper cup, and he was never going to be as excited about American Impressionism as Dewey seemed to be. But they both liked Patton Oswalt and Chris Titus and Taylor Tomlinson, and Trey thought that he’d slept with enough guys who’d eaten, drunk, breathed, dreamed about sports but still hadn’t had anything to talk about outside the bedroom to build a relationship on that fact alone.

So Trey had been pondering the list of artists Dewey had told him to google so Dewey could go shopping for stuff for his freakishly boring walls when he’d walked into the locker room as the team kitted up for practice, and they’d all stopped what they were doing and applauded.

Trey almost ran the other way.

“Uhm…,” he said as the applause died down. “Thank you?”

One of the younger players, still in his street clothes, walked up to him and shook his hand. “My brother’s gay,” he said baldly. “And he always worried about coming to games: What’s the atmosphere going to be like. Does he have to worry? And he’ll still worry, but coaches like you mean things might get better. So thank you.”

There was more applause and hoots and hollers, and suddenly Trey felt like a huge fraud. Like he’d stood up for other people and hadn’t been that dedicated, that passionate, because he’d like to not worry.

“Thank you,” he said, his coming-out speech on the tip of his tongue. “That’s kind of you, but you should all know—”

“Oh my God, is he here yet?” Harold called from the coach’s office. “Why is everybody still in the locker room. People, do we or do we not start practice in T-minus two minutes!”

There was general laughter, and the players scattered, and Trey was left with the confession he hadn’t given yet.

He smiled and waved as the players finished their preparations and ventured into the coach’s office, where the staff had gathered, grateful for a reprieve from the smell of feet, balls, and armpits, because there was not enough sanitizer in the world.

“Well, thanks, Harold,” he said dryly as he locked his keys and his wallet in his desk drawer. “I was about to come out because the kids gave me the perfect opportunity, but now I’m stuck in the closet for the rest of my life. Well done.”

Harold snorted. “Don’t come out now, all quietly and shit. I’ve got sixty dozen reporters banging down my door after your second press conference in a day. I’m betting you’ve got your own masses of messages and emails and ‘please, please, please.’ If you feel like you need to hand the media its ass one more time, be bold. Clear it with your other coaching gig and let’s make some fucking magic.”

“No,” Trey whined. “I don’t want to be a poster boy. I just want the team to know because now that it’s a thing, it’s only right!”

Harold arched an eyebrow at him.

“Besides,” he confessed, “I’m sort of dating someone right now that I really like, and I don’t want to shove him in the closet. He’s, you know, awesome. And the closet smells like—”

“Balls,” said Russell Jeffries. “You can be honest. We work here. We know what a coach’s closet smells like.”

Trey stared at him and realized that, while he may be all mild-mannered and Mr. Maturity, he seemed to have a thing for the guy who spoke the truth with blunt words, and who made him laugh when he did it.

“I was going to be nice and say armpits,” Trey confessed. “And Icy Hot.”

Casey snorted. “I think my dog gets high off that smell, by the way. I caught her humping my duffel bag the other night—I’m pretty sure it’s armpits and Icy Hot that’s doing it for her.”

“With my cat, it’s feet.” Trey chuckled. “God, I had a friend over last night, and Beckham was all over his toes—”

“Wait,” Russell said. “Sort of dating? If he was over last night isn’t that actually dating?”

Trey shook his head. “No, last night was… well, it was a nice thing to do. He caught the press conference on the field last night and showed up for moral support and….” He shrugged.

“Your morals needed supporting,” Russell said. “Understood. I’m glad you had a woobie there to help.”

“A cute woobie,” Trey bragged a little. He got to hear all the time about wives and girlfriends. Just once, he wanted to talk about his green-eyed barista with the foul mouth who wanted to decorate his walls.

“Oh God,” Harold mock-moaned. “If we’re going through all this shit so you can date a teddy bear, I’m out of here!”

“Hey, don’t knock teddy bears,” Trey said, because he’d appreciated those that he had dated. “But no. He’s young and lithe—”

“Lithe?” Casey questioned.

Trey laughed, his face heating. “Quite fit,” he amended, and then he couldn’t tease anymore. “And quite cute, but he could look like a rock troll for all I care because he showed up last night when things sucked the most.”

There was a sudden quiet in the room, and Harold said, “You’re right. Come out to the team when you feel like it. But if we keep getting bombarded by the press and you feel up to being a poster boy for a while, it might be worth it, Trey. For the most part my feedback’s been positive. Wouldn’t it be great if, at some time in the future, this wasn’t even a thing?”

Trey had wished for that his entire life.

“I’d love that,” he said quietly. “But, you know, every time we think we’re getting close—”

“Someone moves the goal,” Harold agreed soberly. “Yeah. I get it. And I get that even if you go on the news and tell the whole world, you’re still going to be answering intrusive questions for maybe the rest of your life. At least for your time here, which, God willing, will be until the college rots into the ground and turns to dust. And none of it is fair. And I’m sorry. But I sure would love it if our kids, at some point, could not worry. If the locker room could be a safe place. I mean—” Harold shuddered. “—I don’t want to hear it be a safe place. That Kitson kid had a zit under his balls the other day and… bwah,I don’t even want to know how that was resolved.”

They all shuddered then. Young men, active bodies, zero boundaries, and piss-poor judgment—God knows what could have happened with that.

“So gross,” Russell muttered. “Casey, did he end up going to you with that?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Casey muttered. “It’s… eww… the human body can be so gross.”

Another collective shudder, and Harold cleared his throat and called them back to what needed to be done.

“Okay, then. Out on the field all reporters are banned. Let’s get the guys back to task. Trey, give me a heads-up if you’re going to do any of it—just so I know so when somebody comes to me and says, ‘Hey, did you know?’ I can say, ‘Absolutely, and he’s such a great guy, we’re so proud of him.’”

Trey laughed. “I’ll hold you to that, even if we lose tonight’s game.”

Suddenly Harold’s eyes got big. “Hey, this date of yours. Is he coming?” It wasn’t unusual for the coaches to bring their significant others to games. Often they sat together so they could commiserate if things went wrong or plan how to celebrate if they went right.

“I haven’t asked. We’re, uh, still new. I mean—”

Harold’s eyes lit up with unholy glee. “So, uhm, we’ve got most of the season left. Do you think maybe he’ll last that long?”

Trey stared at him, not sure where this was going. “Uhm, why?”

“Because,” Harold burst out, almost dancing in glee. “Because you come out to the team, bring your guy to the game, and suddenly—boom. There’s your approval. There’s your whole package. All the girls are there, your guy is there, the president of the college’s wife is there, and we’ve got ourselves visual support, and anybody who has something shitty to say can go suck eggs. It’s perfect.”

“Aw, Harold,” Trey mumbled. “It’s such a big thing to ask somebody.”

“Well, when’s it okay? A month? ’Cause we’ve got until December. It’s September now. November? We’ve got that multicollege tournament, and it’s here this year!”

Trey shook his head. “I don’t even believe this. What if it goes wrong? Do you know what I could be exposing him to? I mean….”

Harold blew out a breath. “Same shit you’re exposing yourself to, Trey. Yeah, I know. But think about it. Talk to your guy in a few weeks.”

“How do you even know he’ll still be my guy?” Trey asked, although, for the rest of his life, probably, he’d remember the way his heart had jumped in his chest when he’d seen Dewey standing next to his car that night.

“Because he’s the first guy you’ve dated since you came here to coach,” Russell said, and Trey shot him a glare of betrayal. He and Russell had played pro, although not on the same teams, and they’d been hired the same year. They’d spent their first month as assistant coaches bonding over beers while wondering what in the hell Harold had planned for them tomorrow. Russell had been newly married then and expecting his first kid, and Trey had confided in him how jealous he’d been. Russell had someone to go home to. A family. A life. Trey had been looking at the dating scene at the time and had seen nothing but loneliness ahead.

“Russ!” he protested now, and Russell waved him off.

“We gossip about each other all the time, T. Get over it. If this guy even gets mention, it’s serious. So keep it in mind. And with that let’s go coach the kids before Kitson decides to show off his pimple again.”

Casey shook his head. “I lanced it,” he confessed. “If there’s a zombie zit there, it’ll be even worse.”

“Ew….”

“Oh my God!”

“I hate myself for even knowing that!”

“And we all hate you for telling us,” Harold concluded, scowling at Casey. “Let’s move it!”

TREY WASrunning goalie drills when the text buzzed on his watch. Don’t answer any emails until you read mine. Trust me. It’s fine.

The text came from Mike, and Trey gave a huge sigh of relief. He hadn’t had time to address the email situation that morning, but knowing Mike had a boilerplate worked up for him was a huge relief.

His attention was pulled back to the drills when Ryan, the forward currently trying to kick the ball through their goalie by sheer force, called out, “Heads up, Coach! Are you still high on fame?”

He grimaced. “Still dealing with the PR nightmare,” he apologized. “Sorry!” Then, “Watch it, Keeler. You almost let that one through!”

“Sorry, Coach!”

He blew his whistle. “Ryan, give it a rest and go see Russell for your next drill. But water first.”

Ryan nodded and, to Trey’s surprise, trotted forward. “No, seriously. Is that what made you look so mad?”

Trey grimaced. Twenty-year-olds—their empathy was finally starting to emerge, but their vocabulary was for shit. “Not mad. Relieved, actually. I’m so glad I’m surrounded by grown-ups who aren’t throwing me under the bus, you know?”

“Yeah,” Ryan said. Then, almost under his breath, he added, “But maybe you should all talk about your love life in quieter voices.”

Trey blinked at him, and the kid grimaced. “I forgot my water bottle. I heard what Coach Frantz was saying. You know, about bringing your guy to a game? He’s right, you know.”

Trey took a moment to digest this. “Can I tell you how much I hate that a guy I’m barely dating is being used as a political prop?” he asked bitterly, and Ryan grimaced back.

“Yeah,” he said, and then he leaned a little closer. “But if you can help make it better, it won’t be so hard for me.”

He leaned back, and Trey stared at him in surprise.

Cliff Ryan was a good-looking kid. He had sharp cheekbones, brown hair, green eyes, and a square jaw, and at this moment, he harbored an expression that was both embarrassed and determined, and Trey sighed.

“I hear you,” he said with a little smile. “I’ll come out to the team today. I… you know. Let me date the guy first before I drag him into this, okay?”

Ryan nodded. “Yeah, that’s fair.” Then he gave a chuckle and leaned close again. “And by the way, good call on running away from Kitson’s ball zit. It was so gross.”

“Oh God,” Trey groaned. “Just—no. No. Things I never wanted to know about another person, ever. Not another word.”

Ryan cackled and ran off to get water, and Trey turned back to his job. He should have been mad, he thought, forced into this thing by one of his students, his public life on display. But the thing he liked—loved—about coaching was that he got to share his experience in the game with people coming up. He liked teaching. He liked being passionate about something and giving a whole new generation excitement and purpose about a thing that had mostly been constructive and, well, magical in his own life.

And making the game safe for everybody, particularly people like he had been, whose only emotional safety had been on the soccer field, that was sort of in his wheelhouse.

Looking into Ryan’s eyes, the hope there, the support, he’d realized how important his job was; not only to coach the game but to coach the players. Being bold, being brave, being confident—those were the marks of a good athlete.

But they were also signs of a good man.

Stepping up wasn’t just for sports.

He whistled shortly for the next forward to start running the drill and then called to his goalie. “Gotta go talk to Coach Frantz. Back in a sec.”

Harold, bless him, was fine with it.

And after they all got whistled in to a huddle before they broke for the showers, so was the team.

Some of them had known already. To some it was a complete surprise. Not a single one of them seemed to care.

“Gen Z,” Trey said softly to Russell as they filed in. “Who knew?”

“Gives me hope for Gen Alpha,” Russell agreed. “Me and the wife will keep raising them.”

Trey snorted and went to tackle his paperwork. Their game was that night, the big date was tomorrow night, and he had a rec-league game on Saturday over two hours of driving away. He didn’t want a single shitty email hanging over his head when he left campus that day.

With a happy sigh, he read Mike’s email, which said, in essence, that parents had signed on for inclusion when they’d enrolled their kid in the club, and that any complaints needed to be brought up with the board. Mike had provided a cut-and-paste script and had given the directive to cc the board on all emails regarding this matter.

Bless them. Bless them all.

The last of the previous night’s exhaustion fell away, and Trey got to work with a good heart.

YOUR CAR’S still broke? He hit Send unhappily, because dammit, he missed his meeting with his cousin, and he’d sort of wanted Pete to meet Dewey since they’d planned to have lunch at the coffeehouse again.

Well, Trey might eat here for lunch permanently, at least until Dewey found another job. He was finding that smile—the one that lit Dewey’s eyes and made his baby eye crinkles appear, showing that he wasn’t a teenager and all his sweetness and light didn’t come without reason and thought—that smile was becoming addictive.

He’d needed it today, enough to text Dewey an actual time he’d be in. Dewey had seen him, signaled five minutes, and said, “I’ll order.”

It was so cozy! Trey found a corner and wondered where they’d eat when Dewey became a gallery owner or an art buyer or any of the thousand-and-six things he’d rambled about that morning, because although he did like people, he was ready to move on with his degree.

Then he’d pulled out his phone and asked Pete if he was coming, and, well, here they were.

Sorry, T. Mom’s back in town for a few days tomorrow—we’re going car shopping. Until then, it’s Uber, and I gotta save that shit for work.

Do you need me to pick you up for the game? Pete loved sports as much as Trey. The fact that Trey had been in the pros for a while had apparently gotten Pete laid more than once, although Trey had no idea what the pickup line for that would be. Trey always reserved at least two tickets at the box office for him or Nan or Debra or friends.

I’ll Uber, Pete texted, and Trey blew out a breath.

I’ll get you,he said. Can you be ready at five? Game’s at seven.

Sure thing. Beer afterward?

Sure.

“Making dates without me?” Dewey said as he drew near with a tray.

“Sort of,” Trey admitted. “My cousin’s coming to the game tonight, and his car’s still not working. I told him I’d pick him up.”

“Wait,” Dewey said, setting the tray down and removing two coffees and a sandwich from it. “You’ve got a game tonight?”

“Yeah. JV plays Thursday, Varsity plays Saturday night. That’s why”—he shrugged—“movie on Friday.” He batted his eyes winningly, and Dewey slid the tray between the table and the wall and then sat in the chair across from him, inhaling his coffee with a reverence most people saved for church.

“I could come,” he said guilelessly. “Sit with your cousin. Can you get me a ticket?”

“You don’t have plans?” Trey asked, feeling a stupid jolt of excitement in his chest.

“Well, I was going to walk down to the bar where Ceej works and get a free beer,” Dewey said, his lips quirking, “but I do that four, five times a week.”

“Minus last night,” Trey murmured.

“Minus last night,” Dewey amended, smiling slightly. “Seriously, I mean, this sport means so much to you. I-I’d like to see it played.”

“JV games aren’t as much fun as varsity,” Trey cautioned. “And, uhm….” He couldn’t help the shy smile that started. “Uhm, I sort of, uhm, came out to the team today, and it was fine, and so, uhm, when we get to uhm, that, uhm….”

Dewey was actively staring at him now. “Uhm?”

Trey swallowed again, and his mouth was dry, so he took a hurried sip of coffee and tried not to make a face. Tea. Oh Lord, he needed to visit his aunt Nan for a single cup of tea.

“Look,” he said after a moment, remembering when he used to walk into a bar, peg one of four guys in there who’d be interested, find the cutest one, wink, and walk out to get laid. God, actual dating dating was hard. “There’s a family section for spouses, girlfriends, etc. I usually get tickets closer to the center of the field because it’s more fun up close, but, you know. In the future. When you don’t mind a little attention. Harold said I was welcome to bring someone. You. Someone. When you’re ready.” He grimaced apologetically. “It’s… it’ll make it sort of serious. But tonight, you and Pete sitting together—it’ll be good. Pete loves the game. He’ll walk you through it. And he’s a fun guy. Trust me.”

His smile was… well, probably weird. Hopeful and embarrassed and excited and….

And then he saw heat rising in Dewey’s cheeks for once.

“What?” he asked.

“I trust you,” Dewey said, gazing down at his coffee. “It’s…. God, I want to kiss you some more. It’s weird, us making plans for me sitting with the coaches’ wives when we need to….” Trey heard it. Have sex. Get busy. Get naked. Make love. “Kiss more,” Dewey finished weakly.

Trey’s eyes swept over him, all the things that had attracted him in the first place—pretty green eyes, faintly ironic smile, wide, full mouth.

“I’d love to… kiss you more,” he murmured.

“But tonight, we’ll go to a soccer game,” Dewey said with an exaggerated breath of patience.

“And tomorrow we’ll go to a movie,” Trey reinforced dutifully.

Dewey’s eyes went narrow and catlike, and his smile went feline. For a minute, he bore an uncanny resemblance to Beckham.

“Absolutely,” he said. “That’s what we’ll do tomorrow.”

Trey smiled sunnily, because after yesterday’s crapfest, things were finally starting to look up.