“Kane!” he shouts. “You’re supposed to hit the pins, man!”
“Thanks, Torch. Super helpful.”
Chloe is trying not to laugh. Failing spectacularly.
“It’s not funny,” I mutter.
“It’s a little funny.”
Derek appears at our lane, arms crossed, that smug captain smile plastered on his face. “Thought athletes were supposed to be coordinated, Kane.”
“Different skill set,” I say through gritted teeth. “Very different.”
“Clearly.” He turns to Chloe. “You should probably teach him. Before he breaks something.”
Chloe picks up her ball—a sparkly purple thing that looks like it belongs in a kid’s party—and steps up to the lane.
She bowls a perfect strike.
The pins explode like she just fired a cannon at them. The crash echoes through the venue.
Everyone stops. Stares.
“Holy—” Tyler starts.
“That was incredible,” I finish.
Chloe turns around, grinning—a real grin, not the careful smile she’s been wearing all day. “I was in a league in college.”
“Of course you were.”
Derek’s smirking. “Looks like your girlfriend is carrying the team, Kane.”
“I’m aware.”
But watching Chloe light up like this—confident, happy, unselfconscious—is worth the humiliation.
She walks back to me, still smiling. “Want me to show you?”
“Please.”
She picks up my ball, demonstrates the approach, the release, the follow-through. Her hands move confidently, precisely. This is her element.
“Now you try,” she says.
I step up. The ball feels heavier than it should. I focus on the pins, visualize the path?—
Gutter ball.
Chloe’s laugh is pure and bright and completely unguarded. “Okay, we need to try something else.”
She steps up behind me, her hand on my arm, adjusting my stance. “Loosen your grip. You’re strangling it.”
“That’s what it feels like.”
“And follow through—like this.” Her hand guides mine through the motion.
We’re standing close. Too close for the performance. But it doesn’t feel like performance.
