Maggie: He’s refusing to let me wash the jersey you gave him. He’s afraid your signature will wash out. It smells like sweat and Old Spice. And I can hardly go into his bedroom.
Sweat? It doesn’t smell like sweat. It was clean. That kid is smart not to wash that jersey. It’s more valuable that way.
Me: I don’t use Old Spice. It simply smells like me.
Maggie: You really love yourself. Don’t you?
Me: Don’t you love yourself? Maggie with the secret soccer-playing past and the sprinkle of freckles on her nose.
Maggie: Are you flirting with me?
Me: No. I’m being nice. And friendly. My motives are pure.
Does it make motives less pure if you call them pure? I’m pondering that thought when my phone pings with another text. I take another bite of my alfredo and peer down to see what Maggie’s written back.
Maggie: I doubt that.
Me: What is it you think I want from you, McCrae?
Maggie: Something. No idea what. But you’ve done me this huge favor of coming to Wyatt’s party and giving him a jersey, and now you think I owe you.
Maggie: You’re going to do something unsportsman on the field, aren’t you? You’re going to behave badly, and you’re going to want me to turn my head like nothing happened.
Me: No.
Maggie: No? That’s it?
Me: That’s it.
Me: Like I said at Wyatt’s party, I think we could be friends. I’d like to try.
My phone sits silent. My pure motives and sincere kindness are sinking in and wearing her down. I can feel it. Maggie’s going to love me.
I smile to myself.
I mean, why wouldn’t she?
My phone pings, and I peer down at her message.
Maggie: I highly doubt that.
Twenty
I textedMaggie two days ago.
See you in Denver?
I added that question mark just so she’d write back. I saw the referee listing. I know she’ll be there. Still, I asked.
What kind of woman ignores a solid question mark?
I thought about texting again. I thought about telling her to tell Wyatt that I’d wave to him. I thought he’d like that. I also thought that sounded like a desperate man begging a woman to write him back.
I’ve never been desperate in my entire twenty-six years of life. Not the first seventeen years in Brazil and not the last nine in the States.
If I text a woman, she wastes no time writing me back.
Until now.
