By the time summer rolled around, I was regularly playing golf with a few teammates-turned-friends and was getting surprisingly good at it. Life wasn't perfect, but it was no longer bewildering and lonely - as it had been when I first arrived in Dallas. It was at one of those friend's houses that I found myself one night, drinking beer and sitting around his tastefully-lit pool.
"You boys need any more beers?" A female voice called out. "Snacks?"
"Nah, we're good," Jimmy - one of the linebackers for the Cowboys - called back.
"Damn," Adam - another teammate - chuckled. "Where'd you find her? I've never met a chick who knows how to leave me alone."
"Oh, she knows how to leave me alone. And I know how to leave her alone when she's got all her girlfriends over and they're getting their white wine on, you know?"
I knew where the conversation was headed. I knew what I was going to be asked before it was asked. And when it was I did what I always do and deflected.
"Concentrating on my game. Nothing against women or anything, they're just not what I'm focused on right now."
"Bullshit." Jimmy replied good-naturedly, echoed soon after by the rest of the guys.
"Concentrating on your game?" Adam asked. "That may fly with the media, man, but look around you. It's off-season and your pansy-ass has been playing just as much golf as the rest of us. 'Concentrating on your game' my ass."
"Leave him alone." That was Brandon, one of the physical therapy crew and, by that point, someone I considered a friend. "He's still holding out for some little chickie back in his hometown. Got it bad, too, I've seen him reject smoking hot women multiple times."
Ugh. I'd barely even mentioned Tasha to Brandon. But I guess once - or twice - had been enough. I sat back in my chair, preparing for the onslaught.
"Really?" Jimmy asked, looking at me. "Why not just fly her out here? Small town girls love living in the city."
"Yeah, uh," I started, knowing I had to pick my words carefully or be torn to shreds. "She's got a job. And family issues - her mother is pretty sick and they're kind of a tight unit."
"Bummer," Adam offered.
The roasting I was ready for didn't actually come. It was the first time I'd talked about Tasha for a long time but most of the guys seemed surprisingly sympathetic.
"So you weren't into the long-distance thing?"
"Actually, she wasn't into it."
There were noises of general disbelief all around me. It was Rob Jabowsky, another huge linebacker and not a guy I knew very well, who spoke up first.
"Really? She wasn't into it? You're one of the most famous guys in America, Kaden. You know how many chicks would claw each other's eyes out to get ten minutes with you?"
"Tasha's, uh, she's not like that. She's kind of a hard-ass, actually. Always has been, even back in high school."
"Ha, yeah, I hear that," Adam said. "There aren't many hard-assed women out there but those that are, man you cannot make them do shit they do not wanna do. I feel you, man."
There was general agreement that women like Tasha did exist, that they were rare, and that attempting to convince them to do things they weren't into was an exercise in futility. It was an odd feeling, talking about it - about her. I'd taken so much shit over my relationships with her, stretching all the way back to high school, really, that it surprised me to be shown so much understanding from a group of huge, overpaid, over-privileged jocks, just like me.
"Does she know how you feel?" Someone asked.
"I - I don't know. I think so. I mean, I told her a few times that I wanted her to come live with me but she always shot it down right away. Her family and everything."
"Yeah," Jimmy replied. "But does she know how you feel?"
That question took me back a little. "Well, I assume she does. I mean, you don't just invite someone to come live with you, or offer to pay off her family's debts, if you don't feel strongly about them, right?"
"I don't know, man. That's the thing about those hard-ass women. They're hardasses for a reason. They're covering something up, you know? They're scared of letting anyone in. I used to know a girl like that - pretty similar situation, actually. Most of the time it seemed like she didn't give a shit about me, but she admitted it to me once that she only acted like that because she was actually totally in love with me and it scared the shit out of her. And believe me, I went above and beyond for this girl. Bought her a car, took her on vacations, even offered to set her up in her own place when she said she didn't want to live with anyone. Turns out she never even realized how I felt. Not until it was too late, anyway."