“Eh, I’m not too picky.”
He laughed while I tried to rein in my facial expression. My cheeks hurt from smiling.
“Go ahead and switch it up. It will be more poetic to crush you with your dominant hand.”
He only smiled before pounding me with an ace serve. Meaning the serve was so fast it glanced off the farthest corner possible on the table, gaining him a quick and decisive point. I could only gape at the ball and then at him.
He grinned. “Eighteen to twenty.”
I scooted back a foot as he served again. This time I returned the ball, but straight into the net.
My eyes narrowed. “What kind of spin are you putting on that ball?”
He gave me a mock confused look. “Spin? Nineteen to twenty. Worried yet?”
“Serve the ball.”
Another point in his favor tied us up at twenty. The game was played until the first person reached the score of twenty-one points, but the winner had to win by two points. Which meant it was time for me to put an end to this madness.
“Have you ever seen that movie, The Princess Bride?”
He had been about ready to serve again, before he stopped himself, meeting my eyes, instantly wary.
“What?”
“Remember that partafterInigo switched hands with his sword?”
A disbelieving smile stretched out across his face as he shook his head. “Don’t say it.”
“Imagine me like the man in black, switchingmysword hand.” I dramatically threw my paddle up in the air catching it with my left. Emphasis on the words ‘catching it.’ It was a beautiful, triumphant moment.
“You’re a leftie.”
“Game on, cowboy.”
Our eyes were locked in a battle of wills, both of us grinning like idiots, trying to rein in our smiles but unsuccessful at doing so.
“My serve,” I said. He tossed me the ball and scooted back from the table a couple of feet, body stilled and ready, obviously waiting for me to pound it across his table. Well, I had seen enough of his forearm work that I knew I couldn’t win by my offensive skills. Good defense was my only chance. I brought my serve back and made it seem like I was going to slam it across the table when instead I hit the ball so soft it barely tipped over the net. Dusty scrambled forward as fast as he could but ultimately hit only air.
I sighed triumphantly. “Twenty-one to twenty.”
“That’s how you want to play, huh?”
“You mean, like winning? Generally.”
He shook his head slowly, a dangerous smile forming across his lips. “Buckle up, girl. My serve.”
His next serve seemed like an easy return, but the second my paddle touched it, the ball bounced off somewhere behind me. I turned back to glare at Dusty. “You and your dang spins.”
“No idea what you’re talking about. I’m trying to go easy on you.”
“Shut up.”
We went back and forth like that, each of us trying our biggest and grandest tricks, gaining a point, only to have the other person do the same on the next serve. We were tied thirty to thirty when we stopped for a group meeting.
“Alright,” I began. “We obviously could do this all night.”
“If you want to just admit defeat and get started baking that pie, I’d be fine with that.”
