A/N: "This is a part of a series of stories, but you can read it as a stand-alone. Each of these stories is meant to be readable in isolation, but, if you want to read them in the chronological order of events, they go like this:

Tami Taylor Is Always Right (between Season 1 and Season 2)
Back in the Saddle (Season 2)
How Did I Get Here (Season 2)
The Best Man Wins (Season 2)

Please leave comments! It's encouraging to know people are reading.

[December]

"TMU, huh?" Eric's father asked. "That's a somewhat decent team. And quarterback coach is one of the better paid assistant coaching positions."

This was as close to praise as his father ever got. Eric hadn't told him TMU was looking at him for the QB coaching position until he already had the contract in his hand. He'd long ago learned only to share his successes with his father.

"Yep," Eric said. He was talking on his cell phone as he cleaned out his desk at Dillon High. He'd had to break his contract early, since it was for the academic year, and they wanted him at TMU starting January 1st.

"Tell me again why Tami isn't just moving to Austin with you?"

"I told you. She loves her job here. She loves these kids."

"Are you having problems in your marriage, son? Is this some kind of trial separation?"

"No! We're fine!"

"You damn well better not have cheated on her."

Eric slammed a drawer shut. "I didn't cheat on her! Christ, Dad! There's nothing wrong. We just have different career directions right now."

"First of all, son, don't use the Lord's name in vain. Second of all, you said she's pregnant! How can you even think of living over three hundred miles away from your pregnant wife? And Julie needs you too. A teenage girl needs her father."

Eric leaned back in the chair and put an arm behind his head. "Look, I offered to stay in Dillon and keep coaching the Panthers. Tami said no. She insisted on this. Not me. Her."

"And she's not looking for space to get over something you did?"

"No."

"Son, that doesn't make any sense at all."

It didn't make any sense to Eric either, but damn if he was going to agree with his father. "Well, she's not going to bend on this."

"Who's wearing the pants in that family?"

Eric clenched his teeth together. He should just hang up. You couldn't slam a cell phone down, though. There was no satisfaction in it. "It's not 1950 anymore, Dad, like when you and Mom got married."

"We got married in the 1960s, son, at the start of the sexual revolution. And I still managed not only to wear the pants, but to keep them on."

"I didn't cheat on her."

"I believe you, because you'd probably be missing an appendage if you had. But this plan of Tami's doesn't make sense, son. You have to know it's bad for your marriage. A man should not be working a job over three hundred miles from his wife when she's having his baby."

Eric's father hadn't left the AFL until after Eric's little sister was born. There had been a lot of travel involved in playing professional football. "Yeah? Where were you when Mom was pregnant with me?"

"Not where I should have been."

Eric bit his bottom lip. He didn't have a come back to that. "I have to go." When he clicked off the cell phone, Eric sat and stared at the words above the door frame: "Clear eyes, full hearts." He took a deep breath. "Can't lose," he muttered to himself.

That night, as Tami came out of the master bathroom dressed in a robe, her hair still damp from the shower, he offered to stay in Dillon again.

"You've already broken your contract, sugar," Tami said. "You've already signed the new one. We have a strong marriage. We can do this."

"I don't know if I can, Tami."

She untied her robe and let it fall to the ground. He couldn't tell she was pregnant, though he imagined her breasts were slightly fuller.

"Do you like what you see?" she asked.

Of course he did. "Tami –"

"- Come to bed." She turned down the sheets. "Make love to me."

His eyes roamed her body as she slid on top of the bed.

She smiled and patted the sheets beside her.

He supposed they could argue about this later.