“We’ve both got our own pints of Ben & Jerry’s. I got my period and needed chocolate.”
“Sorry, Kels.”
“It’s okay. I’m not worried; it’s only been a couple of months. It will happen. The timing might be less than ideal.”
Kelsey and Sam were trying to time their second baby’s arrival around the off-season. If it took much longer, the baby might arrive during spring training. The MLB provided paternity leave for only five days, which wasn’t much when there were so many road games.
“I ran into Tucker on my run today.” I shouldn’t havedropped that on my sister while she was trying to get my nephew to fall asleep.
“What?” The alarm on her face matched the feelings of disgust still running through my veins. “My God, let me get him settled. Shit.”
“Sh-it.” Crew’s voice repeated Kelsey’s swear.
“Oh, fuck!” Kelsey fumbled as she tried to cover up her swearing, only making it worse.
“Truck!” Crew yelled out, eager to join in the fun. He hadn’t yet perfected the f-sound, thankfully.
“Why don’t I go wait downstairs while you finish?”
“Please. I chilled a bottle of wine. Why don’t you get it ready? It sounds like we’ll need it.”
I made myself at home in Kelsey’s kitchen and had two bottles of wine poured and ready when she came down the stairs after putting Crew to bed.
“Okay. Dish.”
“Today was my fourteen-mile long-run. He popped up next to me while I was struggling through it. It was already one of those days where I couldn’t get my body and my brain to sync.”
“What happened?”
“He basically threatened me.”
“How the hell does he think he can threaten you? Don’t you have a rape kit sitting in New Hampshire?”
“Yeah, but Kelsey, he’s got videos of us…”
“Videos?” Her eyes widened as she understood what I was saying. “What did he say he would do with the videos?”
“He said they would be used as evidence to support that what happened was consensual. And, he threatened to send them to Jonathan.”
She swallowed a huge gulp of wine and looked down at her hands. “Fuck.”
“You didn’t tell Sam, did you?”
“No. But I need to.”
“Kelsey, you don’t. What is it going to help? Tucker is his teammate. He won’t be able to do anything and keep the peace on the team. And it’s not like I’m going to press charges. I don’t want any of that splashed all over the news.”
“What do you think Jonathan would do if he found out?”
“I don’t want to find out.”
“Why? Because you don’t trust him to support you? Or because you don’t think you deserve the support.”
Fuck me, my youngest sister had always been the most perceptive. I brushed away the tears that had welled up and fell into her open arms.
“I ended up pushing through and finishing my run.”
“Why?”
