The Coach and Me

The lobby was more elegant than it should be for a team hotel. We were used to suburban Hampton Inns with lobbies designed by Hospital Waiting Rooms Inc. This one, while also suburban, had a upscale feel to it. The polished wood bar seemed more suited to the Campbell Bar at Grand Central, while the teardrop chandelier overhanging the lounge area had Tiffany aspirations.

While there were a handful of customers in business attire, studying P&Ls over cocktails, most of the people in the bar were soccer parents in windbreakers, jeans, and sweatshirts. Nothing was lost by the contrast, though.

As I exited the elevator, I could see my team's parents still gathered at the tables, still watching the same games on the flatscreen TVs--just more empty wine glasses, beer bottles, and crumpled napkins than there were when I'd walked by an hour earlier. By this time, the parents of the older team J. coached had arrived, and were sitting at adjacent tables. I could see J. was sitting with them. While he was friendly and personable, I did notice that although he socialized with the parents of the older team he coached, he seemed to be a little distant with the parents on our team.

I glanced in the mirrored surface between the elevators to check my lipstick. I was wearing a black tank top (no bleach stain this time) tucked into an ankle-length emerald-green sarong that tied at the waist; it was so long that it brushed the tops of my wedge sandals. I'd spent the last six weeks in heavy sweaters and a puffer coat. There was no way I was going to walk around Arizona in anything long-sleeved--I had a huge vitamin D deficit to make up here.

I texted Jackson to tell him that I ordered a pizza that would be delivered to Brad's room, and that he could share with the boys, and that I'd be down in the lobby with the other parents. He didn't respond.

As I approached the sunken lounge from the elevator bank, I could tell J. had already seen me. Of course, as always, as soon as my gaze rested on him, he looked away, returning to his conversation with two dads I didn't know. You could drive yourself crazy trying to figure out what was going through another person's mind--trying to parse that out was a fool's errand. But I couldn't help it. I felt myself wanting to play the game again.

Kayla saw me and waved me over. I made my way over to the table where our parents sat, exchanged greetings, and settled in for a replay of the same conversations we always had in hotel lobby bars on every single out-of-town trip: Remembrance of Games Past, Portrait of the Terrible Ref as a Young Man, Their Eyes Were Watching the Game Clock.

Kayla leaned in. "How's Jackson?"

"Still hates me."

She touched my hand. "I'm so sorry. Have you talked to J. about it yet?"

"Not yet. I'm not even sure how to start that conversation."

"Just pull him aside and ask if you can have a quick word with him," Kayla said, like it was the easiest thing in the world.

"I will," I promised.

Ellie, at least three glasses of Yellowtail in, leaned over. "You will what?" Kayla glanced at me to see if I'd told Ellie. "Jackson's dad and I are getting divorced," I said.

She reached over and gave me a fist bump. "Welcome to the club, honey. You gonna make a big announcement?"

"Ha ha."

Ellie shook her blonde curls. "No, get it out--catharsis time. Let the world know."

"Oh boy," Kayla said.

Ellie set her wine glass down and unsteadily hoisted herself up on the banquette where we were sitting. Kayla tried to coax Ellie down, but it was no use. Ellie wasn't going anywhere. She put both her pinky fingers in her mouth, and let loose with an ear-piercing whistle. I wanted to crawl under the table. "Listen up, I've got an announcement to make," she bellowed. Everyone turned to look at her.

I considered whether it would be more or less obvious if I did a cartoon slide down the banquette and onto the floor, then crawled out of the lounge toward the elevator bank. "This beautiful lady sitting next to me is officially single and ready to mingle. Her no-good husband is history and maybe one of you can be the future. Get in while the getting's good."

Good-natured laughter and applause followed Ellie's pronouncement. The only one who wasn't smiling was J., who studied the coaster under his beer like it was the most important thing in the world.

"How good's the getting?" Brad called over from his table. Mary chastised him in an undertone. "What? I'm asking for a friend!"

I wanted to disapear. One by one, the soccer moms made their way to our table like I was a bereaved widow at a wake, offering their condolences on the death of my marriage. I needed a drink.

I made my way to the bar and ordered a Scotch. I kept my eyes glued on a baseball game I didn't care about while the bartender made my drink. This wasn't going according to plan.

Sam approached the bar, turned around, and leaned on it with his elbows. I glanced over at him. He was wearing his trusty baseball cap, turned backwards. I felt a surge of embarrassment, before reminding myself that Sam didn't have mindreading powers and had no way of knowing I'd just made myself come thinking of him.

"Didn't know about you and Jackson's dad," he said. "Sorry." My cheeks went pink. The bartender handed me my drink and I quickly signed for it.

Sam leaned into me, thinking about saying something, then took a long swig of his beer instead. "What?" I asked.

"Nothing. I was just thinking that now that you're available--"

I willed him not to say anything weird. Although just an hour earlier I'd imagined sucking his cock and watching him jack off, this was also the same guy who told the boys that he only wore mesh ballcaps because he didn't want to go bald and that Bigfoot was real and had been spotted in a Wal-Mart outside of Winnipeg. Plus, he had a very nice girlfriend. He leaned into me again and I could see he was already sailing on three sheets, with a headwind. He inclined his head toward the lounge.

"Do you realize how many of them want to get with you?"

"Get with me?"

"Now that you're single, I mean. Not that they would've said no either way. But I feel like there's a lot of dudes who've been biding their time."

"Like who?"

He turned his eyes to a table full of dads, all of whom were watching an MLS game on one of the TVs.

I laughed. "I think your IPA has made you mistake me with someone more attractive."

"Come on, don't do that," he said. He inclined his beer bottle toward the table. "Just wait, let them get a few more drinks in them."

I wondered if this was Sam's clumsy and very young way of giving me a compliment. Maybe he thought I needed one after everything that had happened. But then he started pointing people out. "Brad, for one."

I almost choked on my drink. "Brad is married."

"What's your point?"

"Moving on."

"I've seen Cullen's dad checking you out."

"I've seen Cullen's dad checking every mom on this team out, too, not to mention the moms on rival teams. I think I saw him check out my mom once. It's not exactly a badge of honor."

"Fair enough."

With each swallow of my drink, my embarrassment started to fade. "Who else?"

He hesitated, then looked over my shoulder. "Follow my eyes." I followed his gaze to a large man in a Vikings sweatshirt. "I don't even know that guy."

"Not him. Two guys over." That was J.. "Just my observation. He's never said anything, but I think it's pretty obvious. He can't take his eyes off you. I'm surprised you haven't noticed." I felt something funny inside me--a weird stirring that I hadn't felt in years. I couldn't think of a thing to say.

Sam drained his beer and set it on the bar top. "Don't worry, though, you're safe."

"What do you mean?"

"He'll never do anything about it. Ever."

My phone buzzed--it was Jackson. He'd lost his card key and wanted to get into the room to get a new shirt after one of his teammates threw a slice of pizza at him. "I've gotta go."

"You should come back," Sam called after me. "You never know what might happen once someone has a few too many."

It seemed the elevator would never arrive. J. had ignored me as I spoke to Sam at the bar, and as I hurried out to the elevator bank, but now he was laser-focused on me as I waited awkwardly for an elevator that was sure to be full of dripping-wet kids coming up from the pool.

By the time it arrived, though, it was empty. I stepped in, and reached to press our floor button--but at the last moment, I saw J. approaching, with a few other parents involved in an intense conversation about tournament brackets. Though my nerves were on fire, and everything in my being urged me to hit the "door close" button, I did the opposite, as I'd do for any latecomer to a closing elevator door. The doors opened, but J. didn't move.

Our eyes locked. "Oh," he finally said. "That's okay--go on ahead." He didn't want to be anywhere near me. I withered a little inside.

Ellie stepped up behind him and interlocked her arm in his. She laughed her big laugh. "He's afraid of getting into the elevator with you alone." She certainly had a knack for saying the embarrassing parts out loud.

I forced a smile. "Well, after what I did to that other guy who rode alone in an elevator with me, I understand his hesitance." I just had enough time to get this sentence out before the elevator doors closed.

I leaned against the wall of the elevator. Maybe it was for the best. In fact, I had thought of what it would be like to fuck him in an elevator. I had done it once, long ago, when I was still living in New York. I had been dating a fireman, and though his general interests were limited to the Buffalo Bills, meals in Little Italy, and guessing women's cup sizes, he had all sorts of sexual tricks up his sleeve, including a fireman's key that could stop any elevator in New York.

He took me by surprise the first time he did this. We had been on our way to dinner when he told me he needed to pick up some paperwork from headquarters in downtown Brooklyn. It had been afterhours, and aside from the guys at the security desk, the place was almost deserted. Certainly, no one was at the elevator banks.

We were about seven stories up when he reached past me and stuck his key into the fireman's box--a double entendre that only had meaning to me later. A short alarm barked, then stopped. Startled, I looked over at him. He shook his sandy hair off his forehead and gave me a look that instantly got me wet. I knew I was going to get fucked, even before he started unzipping his khakis.

He pushed me against the wall. With his lips on my ear, he whispered, "I'm going to make you scream." He pinned my arm above my head with one hand, and with his other reached under my short skirt and tugged at my panties. Not even bothering to take them off, he pulled the crotch to the side and jammed two fingers into my pussy while, with his thumb, rubbed my clit. "You like that?" he breathed into my ear. "You like how I play with that stiff little clit--god, you want to get fucked so bad, don't you? You want me to fill you up until my cum is streaming down your thighs."

I reached down and took hold of his thick cock. As he finger-fucked me, I used his pre-cum to rub circles over the head of his cock with my thumb, working my way down slowly, my touch light as a feather, but enough to make him growl. "I'm gonna pound that pussy so hard. Does your little pussy want to get fucked right here?"

I ran my fingers through his hair and tugged, hard. "I need you to fuck me with that big cock."

"My cock is absolutely throbbing for you right now." He pulled my leg up and I hooked my high heel into the railing on the adjacent wall of the elevator, opening up my wet pussy for him.

He slid a hand under my ass and tilted my hips up before guiding his cock into my tight cunt. I groaned--the feeling of a man's cock sliding into me for the first time is so exquisite that I want it again and again, and he knew this about me. So as soon as he was balls-deep in me, he pulled out slowly, slowly, until the head of his cock was just touching my pussy. He circled my throbbing clit with the head of his cock until he couldn't wait anymore, and plunged it deep into my pussy again. He did this over and over again until my legs went weak.

I slid my hand down between us and rubbed my clit as he fucked me. This turned him on even more and his thrusts got harder and deeper. "That's it," he breathed, "play with your clit while I punish that cunt. Fuck, you are so tight and wet."

The elevator rocked a little as his thrusts sped up. I imagined this little box dangling ten stories above the ground, precariously hanging on wires. Was it possible for him to fuck me so hard that the wires snapped? Instead of terrifying me, the thought was intensely hot. "Tell me how much you want it," he growled. "Tell me how bad you need to be fucked right now."

"I want your thumb in my ass," I heard myself say. I didn't know where that come from, but didn't have time to think too much about it, because without being asked twice, he filled my little hole with his thumb as he continued to fuck me. "Holy shit, I'm gonna come so hard. Bounce that little pussy on my cock while I push my thumb up your ass, baby."

Hearing his moans was too much--knowing my body was getting him off was like flipping the switch and I felt my body starting to throb with a freight train of an orgasm. "I feel you coming," he groaned. "Come on that cock, come on that fucking cock."

I could barely breathe, the orgasm was so intense--there was just a moment left before it was going to swallow me up. I ground my hips onto his cock like I was trying to take him in completely. "Fuck, I'm coming, take it--take this fucking load." As he roared in my ear, I came hard, clamping down on his cock so hard that he could barely move, screaming his name. It was as if we were suspended not only above the ground, now, but also suspended in time and place.

I'd forgotten his face long ago, but not the power of that orgasm and the way the memory of getting fucked in that elevator still made me wet. When I thought about it now, it was J. who was fucking me in the elevator, J. who was using my body to get his cock off, J. who had the key that made the world stop for us.

As the elevator at the hotel slowly made its way up from where its doors had just closed on J., I wondered what he would say if he'd gotten into the car with me and the others who had been waiting, and I'd leaned over and whispered in his ear what I had been thinking from the moment I stepped into the lounge: "If these people weren't here, I'd be on my knees, with your cock in my mouth."