Colby pauses her hand over the tee as she grasps the next ball.
“Oh, yeah?” She doesn’t meet my eyes. I know what she’s wondering, though. Did I watch some stream, or?—
“It was game one. I made Adriel come with me. Of course, we had to bail after the fifth inning because he’s such an attention whore. He was making a scene.” I chuckle, but mostly because I’m nervous; not because my brother’s narcissism is funny. It’s not. It’s a flaw. One he got from Adriel Senior.
Colby swallows and glances up at me through her lashes. I try not to fall back a step when her deep brown eyes lock on mine. She’s like a walking truth serum. Every time she looks at me, I want to confess everything—my sins, my passions, my feelings.
My regrets.
“You were there.”
She blinks once.
I suck in air, holding it in my lungs for a beat before speaking. It’s a trick my mom taught me to keep my mouth from saying stupid shit. It only works about half the time.
“Wouldn’t have missed it for the world,” I admit.
Colby’s semis two years ago were in Missouri, not incredibly far from Sweetwater, Oklahoma, but definitely a plane trip away. One that required strategic coordination to make sure my brother and I didn’t miss any of our obligations for Texas or Sweetwater. Luckily, Adriel was on suspension, his first, and I was between series. It cost me twelve hundred bucks for our flights, and six hours of turnaround time. But I got to see my best friend hit a homer in the fourth inning to take the lead. They ended up losing that game, but I saw her at her best. Worth every penny, and the risk of pissing off Coach if I ended up returning late. Maybe I’ll get the chance to tell her all of that one day. For now, though, it’s enough to tell her I was there.
For her.
“Can we please talk about it, Colby?”
She blinks again, this time her gaze dropping away from mine.
“There’s nothing to talk about, Jay. We have work to do.”
I rest my hand over hers, which is still hovering above the tee, clutching a ball. Her fingers tighten around the ball under my touch, but she doesn’t immediately pull away. At least two full seconds pass before she drops the ball and jerks her hand into her body. She scans the facility around us, but we’re still the only ones here. Her eyes zoom back to mine.
“This is my job, Jay. This is my dream job; the oneIgot.” Her hand flattens against her chest with a thud. “My dad couldn’t get this job, but I did. Do you know how fucking impossible that is? That I’m the one here, and he’s not?”
“Yeah, I do,” I say, a light chuckle escaping my lips.
“Jesus, Jayden. This isn’t a joke.” She stands and kicks the tee before dropping the ball and walking away with her hands threaded together atop her head. She makes a wide circle while I stand still, dumbfounded. How could I have screwed this up already? I can’t even talk to her without making a mess out of things. Maybe her dad was right. I’m no good for her.
“I’m sorry I brought it up,” I mutter.
She waves a hand at me, pacing another wide circle before beelining toward the tee. She resets it and positions her stool a few inches farther back before taking a seat.
“Let’s get to work.”
She plops a ball on the tee, then folds her arms over her chest.
“Colby,” I utter her name with a tone soaked in regret. My volume bleeds with apology. Her gaze remains fixed on the pearl placed atop the black rubber tee, though, and it doesn’t veer anywhere else.
“Fine,” I say, setting my feet in place and lining my bat up to take another one-handed swing. She’s no longer taking notes. The iPad is on the ground behind her. We’re going through motions now. All of this . . . pointless.
I strike the ball. She places a second one on the tee. I slice through it, too. We repeat. Ball after ball, swing after swing. I’m so consistent that the final ball chips paint off the post I keep hitting.
“Well? What’s next, Coach?” My cynical tone hides very little, and Colby sighs in response.
I snag the handle of the ball bag and kick the few stray balls near her toward the back of the tunnel so I can pick them all up.
“And by the way . . . you were the one who kissed me, Jayden. You initiated things.You, not me. And then?—”
I glance over my shoulder in time to catch her hand gesturing an explosion at her side while she mouths, “Poof.”
My fingers tighten around the handle of the half-filled bag and let it dangle against my thigh. I flit my gaze to the ground, but the green turf is clear of balls, so I lift my attention back to the girl I let slip through my fingers. Her mouth is a hard line, and though there’s a slight glassiness to her eyes, she’s holding it together pretty well. That’s good. I don’t want to make her cry. That wasn’t the point of this. I’m not quite sure what the point was anymore. At the very least, though, some truth should come out.
