Page 102 of Hard to Lose

I close my eyes and lean my head back on my chair. “I’m so sick of thinking about this. Of second-guessing myself. Of missing her and hating her at the same time.”

“As one does with heartbreak.”

“It never would have worked anyway. She’s from New York, and I’m from here. She has her big-city life and I have the bar and this town, The Center—”

“And you keep on talking yourself out of every coherent reason why it might be feasible.” My loud exhale is the only response I give. “People change, Gun. And to use your words, she came looking for the old you. What if the woman who showed up here originally was the old her? A different version of herself from before she met you that she’s not one hundred percent proud of anymore? What if meeting you made her look through a different lens? A lens that changed how she viewed things. Viewed Ryan Camden?”

I hate that I want to hold on to Ellie’s words and take them as truth, but more than anything, I want to stop talking about this. About her.

As it is, Chase owns my thoughts more than I want her to.

“Yeah. Sure. Perhaps,” I say and head out the door toward the parking lot where a big moving truck has just blocked the entrance to the gym area.

“Hey!” I say, waving my hands to catch the attention of the driver. “I can’t have you parking here. If you have a delivery, go to the main office on the other side.” I point.

The burly-looking guy looks at the top page on his clipboard. “I’m looking for Gunner Camden or uh, a Chase Kincade with The Center. You one of them?”

Jesus. Can I not talk to anyone without the mention of her name?

“Uh—yeah. I wasn’t expecting any deliveries though.”

“Well, I have a big one for you.”

Have I been so distracted with everything with Chase that I missed something?

“It says here the delivery is from Major League Baseball care of Easton Wylder.”

“Easton Wylder?” I ask, the name of the former MLB catcher and now sports announcer taking me by surprise.

But it shouldn’t now that I know who Chase is. Now that I know athletes like him are just a phone call away for her.

“I think you have that wrong.”

I war with indecision. With accepting something from the woman who currently crushed me and thinking this is something for The Center and the kids here.

Me or them.

“Here. The list is too long to read.” I shove my pride aside as he hands the clipboard to me. My own hurt doesn’t matter in the moment. Only the kids. Only fixing their hurt.

The two delivery guys start rolling up the back door of the truck while I look at the contents list. My jaw drops. There’s a detailed inventory of new uniforms, cleats, bats, gloves, baseballs, practice equipment like tees and fungo bats—more than I could ever imagine. And the quantities and the sizes provided are so vast that we’ll be able to outfit kids and those without for years and years.

I open my mouth to speak and then close it, overwhelmed by it all.

“See? I told you it was a lot of shit.” The driver points to the clipboard again. “Pages two and three have even more.”

“Pages two and three?”

When I lift the top sheet, I’m greeted with specifics on more ridiculous quantities of sports equipment—and not just baseball gear. There’s basketball and soccer equipment, cones and goal nets, field hockey sticks . . . and the list goes on and on.

“What in the—” Ellie asks as she walks outside. When she sees the first pallet of gear being offloaded from the truck on a pallet jack, her smile is slow and steady. “She wasn’t lying about this, now was she?”

My sigh is heavy. “No. No, she wasn’t.”

“Uh-uh. Don’t you get that look on your face, Gunner. Don’t you start wondering if she did all of this to get back in your good graces.” She grabs the clipboard from me and starts searching for something. “Aha. Right there.” She points. “This has been in shipment since last week. There is no way she could have coordinated all of this just to win you back.”

“I never thought that.” But I did.

And now I feel like shit for it.