Some things never change in this business, but other things change rapidly. Opening for Levi on my first tour was one of the best things that could’ve happened to me. He’s one of the good guys in the industry, and he taught me a lot.
And while I have a lot of great friends back home in LA, Levi is the closest thing to anormalfriend that I have.
He grew up here in Copper Valley as the younger of two sons of a single mom in a middle-class neighborhood, got famous by accident, and never really let it go to his head. Definitely falls into thatstays groundedcategory of people in my circles.
His fiancée is a single mom of three who runs an independent bookstore and still gawks anytime Levi brings her to a big Hollywood event.
I often tell him he’s half the reason I relate to my fans. He taught me how to maintain a sense ofnormal, which turned out to be easier than I was afraid it would. He says that means I’m actually normal myself, and also a natural people person.
I’m apparently afraid of a lot of things.
Maybe too many things.
Maybe if I wasn’t afraid all the time, I wouldn’t carry anxiety in my stomach and I’d take a chance and date again.
He arches a brow at me while I wiggle the bat the way I’ve seenbattersdo it on TV.
And then I swing.
His face contorts while Piper cracks up. She’s pretty funny herself, but not right now.
She’s really bad, she signs to Levi.
Zoe shoves her. “Knock it off, Piper. Waverly knows sign and can understand you.”
“Piper. First base,” Levi says. “Ingrid, wanna try third?”
Ingrid laughs. “Absolutely not.”
“What if we get you some help?” Stu nods to the dugout. “You promise not to hurt them, and they promise to not be assholes about signing NDAs and having cameos?”
What seems to be the entire Fireballs baseball team is waiting in the dugout. Half of them are wearing pink Waverly’s Braverlies jerseys. The other half are in black jerseys that match Levi’s, with TEAM WILSON printed across the front.
“No way,” Levi says. “Tripp’ll kill me.”
Tripp. His brother, who’s in his second season as co-owner of the Fireballs, and yes, I knowentirelytoo much about the team.
I blame Levi even when I shouldn’t. But he isn’t aware of my history with Cooper, and I intend to keep it that way.
“I’ll only kill you if you injure one of them,” Tripp himself says through a bullhorn from somewhere in the outfield. “Also, we get to use footage for promotional purposes once the video’s live.”
“Why’s he hiding back there to talk to you?” I ask Levi.
“Either his wife doesn’t know he approved this, or one of his kids is using the bathroom in the bullpen.”
“Absolutely not.” Aunt Zinnia charges out from the opposite dugout. “We arenotgiving free publicity to this baseball team.”
I glance at the dugout again.
Diego Estevez is there. The rookie catcher that Cooper asked me to sign a baseball for.
Luca Rossi. I know him from his shampoo commercials. My skincare line is produced by the same parent company. I’ve known who he is for years but didn’t realize he played baseball until he got traded to the Fireballs last year.
“Who’s the best hitter on the team?” I ask Levi.
“Toss-up,” he replies, which isn’t what I expected him to say. Everyone knows Brooks Elliott has the best batting average and the most runs batted in. “Stats say Brooks Elliott, but Cooper Rock led the team foryears. Still smacks the shit out of the ball even if he’s playing second fiddle to the newer guy.”
“You arenotbatting with professional baseball players,” Aunt Zinnia tells me.
