I eyed her sideways.
“Fine, but don’t you want to know if he got the job?”
“I already know he got the job or you wouldn’t be smiling.”
She stopped immediately, though that might have been because we’d reached the front of the line and the cheese had visibly started to de-melt on the pizza. She pointed two fingers at her eyes, then at the pizza-cart guy, and kept repeating the gesture until I pulled her away.
We took our slices of slightly warm pizza and made our way to the grass knoll by the far end of the auditorium. Some of the other girls from our team were already there—Ainsley, Ivy, Monica and Sadie, along with a couple boyfriends and guys who fell into the want-to-be-boyfriends category. Nick was there too, having very obviously saved me a spot on the ground beside him. My steps slowed, but Jessalyn came right behind me, urging me ahead.
“If you like him, don’t stop now.”
I sat next to Nick, tugging Jessalyn down with me. Nick glanced at me, then looked away. I bumped his shoulder with mine. “Hey. You don’t have to sit on the grass,” I told him. There was a bench right next us, and though most of our group preferred the grass, I knew Nick didn’t. He’d risk being late to his next class because he’d need to pick off every stray blade of grass from his jeans. “Come on.” I started to stand to move to the bench with him, but he shook his head.
“I’m fine. You like the grass.”
I did, but I liked it even more that Nick said so outright instead of shrugging and looking away. He did look away, but the words still counted. I smiled at his profile. “Thanks, Nick.”
Beside me, Jessalyn was mopping grease from her pizza with a napkin, almost like she was angry at it for not being steaming hot. I bit into my own slice—lukewarm, but pizza was pizza.
When she got to the crust, Jessalyn dropped it and leaned around me. “So, Nick, you’ve been to all our games this season. Are you really into softball or are you just really into Da—”
I tackled her to the grass. She laughed around the hand I used to smother her mouth. “What is wrong with you?” I hissed in her ear. “You can’t corner him like that!”
One of the guys asked Nick a nonmortifying question, distracting him enough for me to let Jessalyn up.
“Why not?” she said, savagely tearing off a chunk of pizza crust and chewing it. She gestured with the remains at Nick’s back, then at me. “He says how he feels, then you’re forced to face how you feel. Rip-the-Band-Aid-off relationship advice—it’s the only way to go.”
“Thanks but no thanks.” I returned to my own pizza, which had gone completely cold. We both knew Nick wasn’t a rip-anything-off kind of guy. After yesterday with Brandon, I wasn’t either. Slow and steady was the way to go, especially when there weren’t any other options.
“Fine,” Jessalyn said in my ear, then louder, “By the way, Nick, you got the job.”
CHAPTER 11
Iwas used to seeing my coach and not my dad when we were on the field, which was the only thing that got me through practice that day—that, and he kept us so busy that there was rarely time to think about anything besides how exhausted we were.
Coach was big on conditioning drills during practice. Beyond baserunning, hitting, bunting and rundowns, that day we did running lap tosses, where we paired off and ran while throwing a ball back and forth. Next was Z drills, where we lined up in two facing rows and threw one ball as fast as possible, zigzagging down the line until it ended with me. And we finished with dirty drills, which again paired us off to throw ground balls that forced the other player to drop down or even dive to catch.
Normally, practice ran only a little longer than sixth hour for the rest of the school, but we had a game the next day against a team that had solidly beat us the year before. No one wanted a repeat performance, so it was after four when I waved bye to the other girls and lowered my exhausted body into my car in the school parking lot. I was glad for the physical weariness, because it helped distract me from how weary my heart felt.
It had been barely twenty-four hours since my world imploded. I checked the website on my phone, but I wasn’t expecting Brandon’s account and results to be back. They weren’t. There also weren’t any messages from him. I did have a text from Selena, though.
Selena: What time will you be home? I can’t wait to tell you what’s going on!!!!!
I rocked my head back against my headrest. Five exclamations points was excessive, even for Selena. If she was already trying that hard, it couldn’t be good.
Me: Dad thinks your big news is joining the softball team.
Selena: Did he say that?
Me: He didn’t have to. So?
Selena: So…what?
Me: What is it?
Selena: I’ll tell you at dinner.
Me: That bad?
