Total pages in book: 32
Estimated words: 30889 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 154(@200wpm)___ 124(@250wpm)___ 103(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 30889 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 154(@200wpm)___ 124(@250wpm)___ 103(@300wpm)
I have the rest of the plane ride to think about the situation with Derek. I’m sure we’ll return to being real friends, instead of two guys making small talk. For now everything between us feels too recent, too fresh.
Like when we land and go our separate ways at the airport. I wish I were hopping into his car to head to his place. Instead, I go to mine.
Eventually, once I have furniture and my apartment looks like a human being—or at least a ballplayer—lives in it, my parents demand a tour.
“So, let us see the place,” my mother says, when I FaceTime them one morning in August.
I point my phone camera at the sparkling clean countertops in the kitchen. They’re pristine because I’ve mostly been eating team-provided food and I haven’t been making late-night sandwiches.
Then I show them the couch where I’ve been occupying the middle cushion because there’s no one else to sit on it. The windows admitting the late morning Seattle light.
“It has a pretty good view,” I say, and hold up the camera so they can see the city—or possibly just the glare off the windows. Maybe Derek’s looking at the same view. Which is too melodramatic a thought for eleven in the morning, when we’ll see each other in a few short hours.
“Not too much light?” my dad asks. Because they know I usually sleep until midmorning.
“No,” I say, “the lighting’s perfect.” My throat goes faintly scratchy. I know why and there’s nothing I can do about it.
“And you’re liking Seattle?” my mom asks.
My throat goes even tighter. “Seattle’s great. Really. Everything’s going better than I expected.”
When I put it that way, it doesn’t even sound like a lie.
A few days later, my mattress situation shifts from an inconvenience to an actual problem when I wake up with a twinge in my back. The discomfort lasts through a shower, my drive to the ballpark on my truck’s heated seat, and through a trainer’s rubdown. There’s no way I’ll sit out a game with a mattress-related injury, so I ask the trainer to slap a lidocaine patch on it, then go out to the field.
Derek’s running fielding drills with Travis and Angelides, who’s practicing recovering balls out of the dirt and winging them to second base. For a while, I just watch. There’s a harmony to the game that makes it peaceful, especially on a day like today, the stadium roof open but the weather otherwise cool.
Derek looks good at second base. Even among guys who are natural athletes, he’s particularly willing to try stuff again and again until he gets it right.
Except…
But no, it’s not fair to blame him for us not being together. It’s a decision I made and he agreed with. A mature one. The right one, except it twinges the way my back does—a pang that’s becoming increasingly impossible to ignore.
At the end of the day, we still play on the same team. We still need to work together, to be friends and teammates.
“Hey, Chason,” Derek yells from the field, “you gonna come out here or are you gonna stand on the sidelines?” A cheerful ask, punctuated by the bright flash of his smile.
I gesture to my back, which feels better but not completely relaxed. “Just got worked on.”
Derek’s demeanor immediately goes from playful to clubhouse leader. He waves to Angelides, then comes over to me. “You okay?” Derek asks, looking a little over-concerned given that I only have a sore back.
“Just slept on it funny.”
Travis cracks up from where he’s standing on first base. “How do you get hurt sleeping?”
Derek’s eyes narrow skeptically. “You sure?” he asks with such legitimate concern that my heart squeezes.
“For real,” I say, reassuring him, “I got this mattress from some place online and it turns out I probably should have gone shopping at an actual store. There’s a lump or something.”
A totally normal ballpark conversation. Except that I know Derek’s bed is ridiculously comfortable because I’ve slept in it. “You should get a better bed,” he says.
Don’t I know it.
He’s about to say something more, but I keep going. “Don’t worry. I’m working on it.” And don’t say that I’m also working on a lot of stuff.
Like how to get over him.
15
Derek
I can’t stop thinking about Adam’s bed as I get ready for our game that night.
Or my own for that matter.
How I haven’t replaced the damaged one in my spare room, even though I need to. I’ve been researching mattresses in my spare time. Who knew there were so many options? There’s organic, cotton, latex foam and on and on.
I never planned to devote so much attention to bedding, but I’m in the market too.
That’s what I wanted to say when he cut me off.
But I can read between the lines. Adam needs to concentrate on himself, his new home, his family, baseball.