“Could have fooled me.” I point between her and the glove before muttering, “Doubt you had a very good teacher.”
She angles her head, and her braid slips along her collarbone again, catching the rays of setting sun, turning the whole thing to copper. “You’re a good teacher.”
“Yeah?” I swallow. “So are you, and we’re a team, so, you know ... you can practice here before you, uh, get that job and move all the way out east without anyone to make sure you aren’t eating shitty Chinese takeout every night.”
Even though she smiles, Ren in full bloom again, those words take the place of old memories of Matty, and they shred the back of my throat with each step towards the stupid barbecue, and I think, somehow, the absence of her in my chest and in my life feels worse than the echoing emptiness of him.
Ren
If someone was healed enough and whole enough and had all the pieces of themselves in order, they’d be really lucky to fall in love with Miller Colson-Burke.
He makes a great teacher, and an even better teammate.
It’s probably not hard to teach someone to barbecue properly—but he makes it look easyanyway.
Standing behind me, not quite touching, but close enough I can feel the stacks of muscle brushing against my back and my waist when either of us moves, he reaches around, almost caging me in, showing me the right level for all the knobs and dials.
His chin even drops to my shoulder for a brief moment when he watches me flip burgers.
He’s there to turn the heat down when I do accidentally let something catch fire.
He tells me more about his childhood. More about Matthew. More about the things he likes and doesn’t like. He loves spring training because it’s warm, but he hates Florida even though he lived there for a few years. He doesn’t read a lot, but he thinks hemight try if he found the right books. He watches a lot of hockey, and the only sports podcast he’s ever done an appearance on is hosted by three guys who played professionally. He uses the calculator on his phone for anything to do with numbers, except for numbers relating to baseball.
They’re funny details he shares—like he’s trying to paint this picture of who he really is with his interests.
But I already know who Miller is. I like the little pieces he gives me, but I don’t need them to understand he’s so much more—bigger and brighter and better—than people think.
We trade more bits and pieces in stories over dinner—he had another fit of chivalry and took the burger I burnt—and I think, as one bottle of beer turns into two, droplets perspiring in the warm evening air, that I feel more of those fragments of me stirring around my feet.
He leans back in his chair, stretching, and I try not to look at the strip of bronzed abdominal muscle and faint dusting of dark hair when his T-shirt lifts above the waist of his shorts.
“I’ll try to catch better next time, so you aren’t subjected to my poor grilling.” I frown, poking at my empty plate.
“Wasn’t that bad,” he says with a sideways grin, rocking back on his chair before he sits forward, elbows coming down to his knees with a wave of hair curling over his forehead.
I purse my lips. “High praise, seeing as the burger you ate might have actually been able to pass for a hockey puck.”
“Protein is protein.” He shrugs as his phone, upside down on the table, starts vibrating.
A crease digs between his brows, and a muscle twitches in his cheek when he flips it over. Scrubbing a hand across his jaw, he groans into his palm. “It’s my aunt and uncle. They’re Facetiming me. I’ve texted a bit more but ... I haven’t ... called them back yet.”
“Answer it, if you want.” I hold a hand towards his phone, smiling encouragingly. “I’m here. It won’t be that bad. I’m a good distraction.”
“Yeah.” His eyes are on mine before the corners crease with a wince, and he turns to his phone, still ringing on the table. His tongue prods his cheek, and some sort of internal war wages before his thumb swipes across the screen and two faces come into view.
“Hey—uh, hi.” Miller smiles into the phone, strained.
Even with the screen angled away from me, I can see his aunt’s face light up.
“Miller,” she breathes, relieved. “How are you?”
He runs a hand across the back of his neck. “I’m good. Busy. Sorry, I’ve—”
“It’s fine, son.” Another voice cuts in, deep, a bit like Miller’s, actually. “You’re having a great season.”
I see his eyes flash, something a bit like a cut of pain when he hears the word, but his smile looks fond. His grip tightens on his phone, and he nods. “Yeah, thanks. Been a lot of work. Had a couple bumps trying to figure things out. Pascale has been great. Whole team, really. Joel ... the new starting ... pitcher—” He chokes on the word, but he keeps going. “He’s, uh, great. Good guy.”
His aunt takes a deep inhale, lines digging in at the corners of her eyes, readying herself to say something, but she frowns. “Where are you? You aren’t on the road this week. Are you—” Silence falls and I think she realizes. “Oh. Miller, you didn’t have to go there alone. We’d have—”
