He hands it back to Nolan, who instantly shows me.
“Look!” he exclaims.
“I see.” Then turn back to Evan. “That’s really cool. Thank you.”
Other people noticed he was signing autographs, so now everyone is trying to hand him something to sign.
I pull our kids out of the way even though he keeps glancing back up at me to see if I’m still here. “Let everyone else get a turn,” I say.
Evan and I lock eyes.
“I’ll see you in two weeks.”
I nod and grin, not able to say anything else since the crowd around us has grown even more, so I step back and turn to climb up the stairs.
“I saw that.” Sasha nudges me.
“Saw what?” I question, not sure what she means.
“The way he looked at you. He’s into you.”
“Stop. No, he’s not. He was just being polite.”
She smirks. “Uh-huh. We’ll see.”
“I don’t date my clients,” I state firmly, knowing all too well what happened the last time I did.
She stops to eye me, then Nolan, and blows my statement off. “Your clients have never been extremely hot baseball players. I think you may need to break your own rules for that one. Just sayin’ …”
I shake my head as I grab the rest of our things and make our way to another part of the stadium that has activities going on.
Evan
Of course the girl I’ve been thinking about all day shows up tonight.
While I sat in her chair today, I was trying my hardest not to think about how beautiful she was. The last thing I need in my life right now is a girl taking my thoughts away from the game. I was able to tuck any attractions I had of her away—until mysister’s phone call. Knowing she was purposely trying to set me up put so many what-if questions in my mind.
Since it was going to be two weeks until I saw her again, I was able to push it away completely.
And then she shows up here.
When I noticed the kid standing at the railing, wearing the same Little League hat I had seen in the picture sitting at her station today, I had to go over to see if it was him.
I finish signing all the autographs that I’m asked for, not caring how long it takes. I’ve seen guys annoyed by this part of the game, but I love it. I used to think it would be so cool to get a player’s autograph. I still can’t believe I made it this far, so really, this is me as my five-year-old self, still wanting that autograph, even though I’m the one writing on the ball now.
Once everyone is gone, I grab my things and head back to the locker room.
“Did you sign every ball that was handed to you?” Murph asks.
Max Murphy—who everyone calls Murph—is an older pitcher on the team and can be a little on the grumpy side, so I’m not surprised he’d ask something like this.
“Yeah. Why not?” I respond with a shrug. “Not like I have something pressing to get to.”
“Rookie,” he taunts as he grabs his stuff and walks by me, heading out of the locker room.
Chase Thorne, our third baseman and who’s the same age as me, places his hand on my shoulder. “Don’t let him bother you. He can be a bump on a log sometimes. Talk to the fans or don’t. You be you, bro.”
I nod my thanks to him as I get back to gathering my things to head home for the night.
