First Place: Twenty-Five Yards to Life

Twenty-Five Yards to Life

by Deidra Whitt Lovegren

First Place

That’s my name and my number, but it’s not me.

With a flick of my thumb, I pop open a black umbrella and square up behind a rusty chain-link fence. Fresh cut grass takes me back to the start of my own NFL career—before the chronic pain, relentless lawsuits, and crazy carousel of ex-wives ruined my life. 

Did it always rain like hell during training camp? The players don’t seem to notice the wet jerseys sticking to their backs. A coach's whistle sounds three sharp blasts. Instinctively, I look up in time to see number twenty-five get flattened. Spelled out in bright red across his shoulders, the name J-A-N-K-O-W-S-K-I carries the weight of family pride.

My grandson, Sammy “the Calf,” claws his way from beneath a scrum of Richmond Rebels. He’s been grinding through the July heat, running sprint intervals and smashing tackling dummies, hoping luck shows up in pads and a helmet. But Sammy’s always been fortunate—same as me. And I’m old enough to know luck tends to skip a generation.

Sammy pushes himself upright, his game pants smeared with red Virginian clay, dark and thick like dried blood. When he spots me standing underneath the umbrella, he waves with both hands like a child on Christmas morning.

Others notice my presence. Spectators point. I hear their whispers.

That’s Leo Jankowski! 

The Cow looks terrible. 

I didn’t know he was still alive. 

The Rebels’ head coach jogs over.

“Good to see you, Leo.” I shake his hand. I’ve known the man since he was an equipment boy back in the day. He’s always been a straight shooter.

“I gotta say, Coach, this squad’s looking sharp.” I cough into a handkerchief, but recover quickly. “The guys are hitting their marks. You’re building something solid.”

“That means a lot coming from you.” The coach puts his hands on his hips. We both watch the next snap. “The Calf’s doing great. Guess the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”

I eye him. We both know Sammy is good, but he isn’t me. 

“There’s always room for improvement,” I reply. 

The coach leans in. “Patricia and I have been meaning to have you over—”

I wave him off, avoiding eye contact. I wonder how much he knows. 

We chat about nothing for a few minutes, but my eyes never leave the field. I note every one of Sammy’s mistakes. 

After the coach returns to the huddle, a sports reporter sidles up to me. 

“You’re Leonard ‘the Cow’ Jankowski!” The young man holds up his fist with thumb and pinky extended like cow horns. He moos. He’s starstruck. He should be. After all, I’m the second longest-playing running back in NFL history—right after Frank Gore.  “Yep, I’m the Cow,” I reply, adjusting my umbrella to my better shoulder. I halfheartedly return the fist gesture without the moo. The low barometric pressure makes my new knee hurt, and I thank God for the two tramadol I took before coming.  The reporter shoves a mic in my face. “What do you think about Sammy the Calf playing on your old team?”

“Continuing the Jankowski legacy with the Rebels means everything to me,” I say, surprised by the sincerity in my voice.

“Your son’s career ended after just one year in the European League. What does Danny the Bull think about his son playing in the NFL?”

My lips press into a thin line. I clear my throat. “The Richmond Rebels run the finest organization in the league. I was lucky to play a small part in its history, and I’m proud to see my grandson wearing number twenty-five.”

The reporter hesitates, obviously itching to ask about Danny’s latest arrest. I shoot him a look that dares him to try. He shifts gears.  “Would you have spent thirteen years as a running back on the Rebels if there’d been free agency—” I audibly exhale. “Look, I know you have a job to do, but let me be a grandfather today. It’s Sammy’s first season. Give me your card, and I’ll give you an exclusive another time.”

“Oh my god. Th-that’d be great. Would you?” The reporter’s eyes shine. 

I nod, pull out my handkerchief, and cough again—this time, deeply. I frown at the splotches of red on the white linen.

The reporter hands me his card and disappears into the drizzle.

My glasses fog up watching Sammy the Calf execute the same play over and over. I crumple the reporter’s business card in my stiff hands and shove it into my pants pocket along with the handkerchief.

Bu-bum ba, bu-bum ba… 

My phone lights up, playing the first few bars of Barry White’s “You’re the First, the Last, My Everything.” 

Bu-bum ba, bu-bum ba… 

I glance down at my phone. Her pixelated face smiles up at me from the screen.

“Linda, will you marry me?”

The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Linda sipped instant coffee from a mug, wearing only a pair of bikini underwear in the crisp spring air. She had ditched bras during our sophomore year in college, shortly after Congress passed the ERA.

Taking a big bite of a toaster pastry, she replied with her mouth full. 

“Are you cracked, Leo?” 

I wrapped myself in her afghan and flopped onto her dorm room bed. My bed was much bigger, but Linda swore there were too many jocks in my apartment, drifting through the cluttered kitchen or crashing in the bathroom. It wasn’t her scene. She couldn’t stand the weed haze hanging in the air like some ratty velvet curtain, or the giggling floozies spaced out on acid tabs.

Linda pushed her aviators higher up the bridge of her nose, set down her mug, and straddled me, her legs splayed wide.

“Marry you for real, Leo? Are you serious?”

“I am.”

She bent to kiss me. I pulled her closer, nuzzling into her neck, my hands tugging at her panties. 

I first met Linda at a freshman mixer. My teammates had spiked the punchbowl with cheap booze—the kind that could strip paint. Linda drank cup after cup, jabbering about lowering the voting age, getting out of Vietnam, and returning to the gold standard. As we both got plastered, I watched her mouth—rich and full, like Carly Simon’s. She worked herself into a political tizzy while I said nothing. What could I say? I disagreed with her on every point.

But after four years together, my breath still caught whenever her sharp hazel eyes locked onto mine, waiting for me to say something far-out so she could pounce.

“Marry me,” I asked again. 

She responded by making love the way she always did—like it was the end of the world. 

Afterwards, she nestled beneath my arm, tracing the curve of my collarbone, drifting her fingers softly down my chest.

“I’ll marry you, Leo,” she agreed. “But we’re not going to last.”

I tucked one of her errant curls behind a bobby pin. “Not everything’s a bummer, Linda. We’re not Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford.”

“Hah! You’re way too green for politics.” She slipped out of bed and pulled on her bell bottoms. “Remember what Atkinson told Joanna in The Stepford Wives? ‘Lovely is better than good.’ Fuck that, Leo. I don’t want to be either.”

“You can’t help being both.” I untangled myself from the afghan and stood, facing her. “You’re already foxy.” My hands unzipped her jeans. “And you’re good. Very good.” 

We returned to her narrow bed. 

For hours, we lay side by side, companionable in the silence. I pulled a pack of Marlboro Reds from my duffel bag, lit two, and handed Linda one. She preferred menthols, but no self-respecting man carried Virginia Slims.

“I’m not Polish, Leo. Your parents’ll hate that.” She exhaled a long, gray plume of smoke. “Besides, I start law school in the fall. Only one of the few women. Makes you wonder how far the revolution’s really gotten us.” She flicked cigarette ash into her empty mug. “Maybe I should just skip it. Who’s gonna hire a chick lawyer anyway?”

She launched into a rant against male chauvinism while I got up to stir myself a glass of Tang. Nodding at the right moments to placate her, I thought about how I was drinking the same stuff as the astronauts.

“You don’t gotta sweat makin’ dough,” she said, trailing off. “Big NFL bucks comin’ your way.”

“Rookies get like fifteen grand. Nothing to write home about.”

Her brow furrowed. There was something else.

“You okay, babe?” I asked. 

She turned away and looked out the window. “I need to borrow some money.”

“Sure,” I said soberly. “How much?”

“About three hundred bucks. I’ll know more after my next appointment.” She looked at me, her expression pained.

“What’s going on, Linda?”

She didn’t speak for an eternity. I waited her out.

“Remember when we went to Philly over break?”

“Yeah.”

“I didn’t pack my pills.” She wrung her hands. “I’m only a month late, but my doctor said—”

My teeth clenched so hard my jaw ached. 

“Is it mine?”

“Of course it’s yours, you bastard.” Her eyes narrowed to slits as her hands slid to cover her belly. “What kind of freak do you think I am?”

“You want money for an abortion, right?” I coughed, choking on her betrayal. “The woman I love is pregnant with my child. And you want to get rid of it?” 

“It’s a minor medical procedure. Minimally invasive.”

“It’s my child—” I gasped. 

“It’s not even a baby at this point,” she shouted back, her face flushed. “Just a cluster of cells. It’s my choice, Leo!”

“What about my choice?” I knelt by her, placing my hands over hers. “This is our son or daughter. Killing a baby is a mortal sin.”

She jabbed an accusing finger in my face. “Cool it with your Catholic mumbo jumbo! You’re playing football. I’m going to law school. We don’t have time for a baby!”

I gathered her up in my arms and kissed her belly until she quit protesting.

“Leo—”

“We’ll make our own baby food,” I said, cutting in. “I’ll be the taste-tester.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Please, Linda.” 

Another eternity passed while we considered each other. 

“Fine.” She exhaled heavily. “But we’re going to name her Gloria or Betty. She’s going to be a cool little feminist.”

I kissed her again until we were both breathless. 

“If it’s a boy,” I said, pulling back. “I’ve already picked out a name.”

She smiled wider than I’d ever seen.

“You do?” She crushed her cigarette into an aluminum ashtray. “What is it?”

“Daniel. Edward. Jankowski.” 

The judge’s voice echoes through the crowded courtroom, heavy and solemn as a graveyard. Outside, the press gathers like vultures circling roadkill. I spy the reporter who approached me at the Richmond Rebels training camp. He nods at me like we’re old friends. 

Linda is sitting across the aisle in the gallery. 

Our son stands in front of the judge, his head low. 

“Mr. Jankowski, you’ve been convicted of aggravated involuntary manslaughter while driving under the influence. By fleeing the scene, you have shown a troubling disregard for others. The court has considered your lengthy record of DUIs, the facts of this case, and the lasting harm caused. Accordingly, I sentence you to twenty-five years in the custody of the Virginia Department of Corrections. This court is adjourned.”

Danny the Bull looks every one of his fifty years, each one of them unlucky. Dark circles shadow his eyes. His bald scalp shows through a patchy comb-over. Heavy jowls swallow his weak chin. 

My stomach sours in disgust. 

As the paperwork from the bench is sorted, Danny turns to find his mother. 

Linda mouths I love you as tears stream down her face, still as lovely at seventy-five as when she was in college. 

My heart crumbles to dust as the bailiff leads Danny away—behind glass, behind walls, behind chain-link fences.

“I could never get him to sleep as a baby,” Linda says over lunch afterward, her voice thick with emotion. “The colic—my God, Leo. Do you remember those nights, walking the floor with Danny?”

I say nothing and push pasta around my plate with a fork.

“I don’t know how you did it back then. Training camp all day, baby duty all night…” Linda’s voice trails off. 

The memory of that bone-deep exhaustion makes my old shoulders ache.

“I remember crying in relief when you drove home in your Chevy Vega, carrying a bucket of KFC.” She reaches out and pats my hand. Hers is soft and warm. “You were a thoughtful husband.”

“Maybe in the beginning.”

She gives me a knowing look. “We raised Danny right. Our daughters turned out great, all things considered…”

“I love you,” I mumble. 

Her hazel eyes flash briefly before an old pain dims their light. 

It’s been decades since our divorce, but it would take an eternity for her to forgive me for the fights, the drugs, the stewardesses, the parties, the groupies. The lies.

“Will you do something for me, Leo?” she asks cautiously. 

“Try and stop me.”

“Visit Danny whenever you can.” She runs a distracted hand through her hair, much shorter than it was when we married. It’s regal, a silvery gray that suits her. “In-person visitation is on weekends and holidays. You can schedule a time online.”

“Online,” I laugh. “I’ll have to get Sammy to show me how to do that. I can barely read the damn numbers on my phone.”

We drink black coffee and order chocolate cake to share. Our fingers twitch, craving cigarettes. She gave them up during Danny’s pregnancy. I gave them up far too late. 

“You were a good father, Leo.”

I love her all the more for knowing that I need to hear that.

Another coughing fit comes. She reaches for me, concern clouding her face, a flicker of pity behind it. I feel foolish. 

“We’ll see you at Thanksgiving, won’t we? Max is deep frying a turkey this year.” She picks up her purse, a sign that our lunch is over. “The girls are planning to stay the week with their families—and bringing the dogs! Having a houseful isn’t for the faint of heart.”

“I’ll come and play grandpa. Maybe give Max a break.” I glance at the diamond on Linda’s ring finger—five times the size of the one I gave her fifty years ago. 

“Next June, Max and I will celebrate our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.” She arches an eyebrow, her hazel eyes piercing my heart of hearts.

I lean back in my chair, the chocolate cake forgotten. “We were married twenty-five years, too.”

“Almost twenty-six,” she says quietly. “I was hoping we’d make it for life.”

The prison smells of disinfectant and bad breath. Limp Christmas decorations hang about the room, adding to the dispirited atmosphere.

An officer escorts Danny to the visitation room. He’s unshackled, a low risk prisoner. 

“I thought we’d be behind plexiglass,” I say.

“You’ve watched too many cop shows.” Danny gives me an awkward handshake. He needs a shave and looks thinner than he did in court.

We sit at a table that would be more at home in a middle school cafeteria.

“How’s Linda?”

“Your mother is well. I saw your sisters at Thanksgiving—”

“Yeah, they came by a few times.”

We sit in silence, overhearing bits of muffled conversation from other pairings. 

“Have you seen Sammy?” I finally ask. 

Danny shakes his head. “December is his busiest month.”

“True, true. I remember that.” My hands fidget. “Rebels might make it to the Super Bowl this season.”

Danny sighs. “Then Sammy will be busy through February. Or March.”

“Hey, there’s something I have to tell you.” I steel myself. It never gets any easier, no matter how many times I say it aloud.

Danny sits up straight, politely waiting for me to find the words. “Bad break for me. I’ve got stage four lung cancer. They’re going to try immunotherapy—whatever the hell that is.” 

My son drops his head, his eyes heavy-lidded. “I’m sorry, Dad. Linda said you were having health problems. But I never thought...”

“Yeah.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Not too much,” I lie. “But I wanted to come by in person and tell you that I’m sorry for how things turned out.”

“You mean my being locked up?” 

“About a lot of things.” I blink hard. “It seems these days I’m chock-full of cancer and regret.” I grasp his arm. “I wasn’t around much when you were young. I wish we’d spent more time together. Camping or something.”

“You hate camping.”

“Maybe fishing or something,” I mutter, my throat tightening, eyes brimming. “I could’ve thrown you more balls in the yard…”

“Dad,” Danny says, clasping my hand. “You were my hero. You were on TV. I was the only kindergartener who could spot a power sweep right, trap play, and quick hitter through the three-hole. You sacrificed everything for us. You said that’s what fathers do.” He holds up his fist with thumb and pinky extended. He offers a weak moo. 

I return the gesture and the moo. 

We both smile, and it feels good.

I wipe my eyes. “Sammy has a bright future in the NFL. He’s a great kid.”

“He is,” Danny pauses, swallowing hard, “but unfortunately, he inherited the Jankowski drinking problem.”

I stare at him. It’s clear Danny has more to say. 

“What is it? Tell me.”

He begins slowly. 

“Sammy was driving that night.” Danny puts his head in his hands. “He hit a pedestrian, then panicked and drove home. I drove back.”

“My God, son.” My heart jackhammers in my chest. “You took the fall for Sammy.”

Danny shrugs and gives me a weary smile. “It’s only twenty-five years for me…”

“But Sammy’s entire life.” I finish his sentence and pull him into my arms. 

“Will you come back to see me next week?” Danny whispers into my neck. I pull him closer.

“Try and stop me.”

Winning pieces are published as received.

---

Fiction Potluck

January 2026

First Place Winner:

Deidra Whitt Lovegren

Deidra Whitt Lovegren frequently competes in international writing contests and often loses.

Her published works include The Medicine Girl, The Medicine Woman, and 21 Conversations—a collection of dialogue-only short stories. The Lady of the Match, an anthology of her work translated into Arabic, debuted at the 2024 Cairo International Book Fair.

Throughout her career, Deidra has taught English and composition at every level, from preschool to college. She currently lives in Virginia with her husband of 30 years, their three sons, and two rescue cats.