by Anne Key
“Sure. I started in Denver, then Albuquerque, then San Antonio, and now Plano.”
“No shit?” I’m not sure whether that’s cool or horrifying. Maybe both.
“No shit. My dad retired from the Air Force. He was deployed a lot and finally it was over.”
“That sucks.”
“Yeah, but what are you going to do? I like it here and I can’t wait to get out. Austin’s cool, you know? Lots of music and some kick-ass places, like Barton Springs.”
“I haven’t had the chance to explore much.”
“I used to live forty-five minutes away. You’ve done a lot, seen a lot. How many games have you pitched?”
“I don’t know. Ten seasons?”
She nods. “I’ve only been playing for three and I’ve never been to state, you know?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I hear you.”
“Good, because you’re something else. Special. It’s not cool to put yourself down.” Meaghan pointed to the lights of the restaurant. “Exit now?”
“Yeah. Just go down. You cross under the Interstate.”
“’Kay. So, tell me a secret.”
“What?” I don’t have secrets.
“Tell me something you’ve never told anyone else.”
“I….” I have no idea. None. I’ve told Kaylee almost everything. I mean….
“Don’t think. Just say it.”
“I hate the way makeup feels.”
Meaghan nods, pulls into the Huddle House. “See? That wasn’t too hard, right?”
“Right. Your turn.”
“I cheated on my Algebra 2 final because I couldn’t afford to fail and not play.”
“Ouch.” I wince, because OMG, really? I mean, I’m not a saint. I get help with stuff, but a test?
A final?
Wow.
“Yeah. I panicked, like whoa. I just freaked.”
“My bestie writes my research papers for me and I do all her math homework.”
I can see Meaghan relaxing, breathing. “Dude. So you totally get it.”
“Totes.”
Not really, but yeah. You do what you gotta to play the game.
We head in and the skankiest waitress alive seats us. Okay, way to impress. Christ. At least we’re sitting in the back, right? No scary old dudes to bother us.
I was going to get grits, but who wants to eat slimy stuff in front of someone that wants to kiss you again? “So, pancakes?”
“God, yes. I love the whole butter-syrup deal, you know? The way it mixes up and then sinks in?” She blinks at me, and then turns a bright red. “Okay, so that was the stupidest thing to say ever, huh?”
“No! No, it was cool.” Hot. It makes my heart pound a little harder than before. “I like to pour syrup into each little square of my waffles, one at a time.”
“OMG! I do too!”
Suddenly we’re giggling, cackling at each other.
“I like ketchup on my burgers,” she offers.
“I’m a mustard girl all the way. My sister, she eats saltines with mustard on them—that’s all.”
“Ew. I don’t think I could do that.” I love how her nose wrinkles up, how it makes the little freckles scattered across her face stand out.
“When I was little, I used to eat cold hot dogs. I gave that up.” It feels so wicked, to say things like that where they are like secrets. Little private jokes, and we’ve only known each other a whole day.
It’s like having a best friend that makes you tingle.
“Cold hot dogs?” she squeals, then lowers her voice to a whisper. “Man, I kissed you on the lips! Betrayed.”
“Not! I’ve brushed my teeth, like, ten thousand times since then.”
The waitress comes up and I order a cup of coffee and pancakes. Meaghan orders milk and pancakes with bacon and extra butter.
“Oh, can I have extra butter too?” I ask.
“Sure girls, whatever.” The waitress is missing all of her teeth on the bottom, all of them, and it’s not like she’s old or nothing. How on earth does she eat chips? I mean, seriously.
When she walks away, Meaghan whispers, “How does she eat popcorn?”
“I know, right? I was just thinking that, I mean, just now for reals. How scary!”
“I can’t… I mean, I like playing ball too much to try anything… icky, but… I don’t get it.”
I shrug. “My mom says it’s built into some people—like having blue eyes or dark hair or whatever. Like Native Americans, they can’t help it. One time and it’s all over. You’re hooked.”
“Do you think so?” she asks, and I have to shrug again.
“I have no idea.”
I don’t want to get in trouble with school and stuff, so I’m scared to try.
“Yeah, me neither. I’m like totally clean, completely.”
“You have to be, if you want to play.” Even in high school, it’s like this big-assed deal. “My mom’s a bartender, though. So she knows all types.”
Meaghan laughs and thanks the waitress for our coffee. “Well, except nondrinkers, right?”
“You’d think so, right, but there are a ton of folks that go to the club that don’t drink.”
“No way.”
“Swear to God.” It’s neat, to know something someone else doesn’t. I put a good amount of sugar in my coffee, then the cream. I love the way coffee smells, but I have to doctor it a lot to like how it tastes. “Like there’s the ones that like to dance. Where else can you go? There’s the ones that are trying to save someone from the evils of drinking. There’s underage ones dating older guys. Mom’s like a psycho about ID-ing you and, man, she can spot a fake from like Collin County. And there’s designated drivers—that’s actually a thing.”
“Wow. Wow, I never thought about that.”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t either, but I spent a lot of my childhood in a club. I used to love to count the change out, and sometimes Mom would let me put the cherry or orange or lime whatever in the drinks. I felt like I was working.”
“Oh my God, that is the cutest thing ever!” Meaghan grins, shakes her head. “I can just see little you!”
“I looked a lot like big me, ’cause you know, I’m not so terribly big….”
“Have you always had short hair?” she asks.
“Yep. It’s not nappy, really, but it’s a tight-tight curl and I’m tender headed. It’s so much easier to cope with short.”
“I think it’s cute. I mean, for reals. I want to touch it!”
Monsters University! God, I love that movie.
“You don’t want to touch it.”
“I have to touch it!”
“My homework ate my dog.” Is that right? It doesn’t matter, right? It’s funny and it’s ours and I can’t stop smiling. I swear, it’s like my cheeks are cramping from it.
By the time the pancakes come, we’ve moved through family: she had a twin that died in a car crash three years ago—and music: we both have a huge thing for Ed Sheeran and wish Taylor Swift would get herself laid so she can stop whining; and movies: she’s picky, I’m totally not—and headed into which ball is harder to hit: a two- or four-seam fastball.
“Two-seam is slower.”
I nod. “Sure it is, but there’s a shit-load more movement.”
“For a ref to call it a ball, maybe.”
“Only if your pitcher sucks.” I don’t.
“Oh!” Meaghan snorts. “Don’t go dissing my pitcher now.”
“I didn’t. You’re the one that said she couldn’t make it work, not me.”
“What’s your best speed?” she asks.
“Close to eighty. Right now, zero. I’m still working on the windmill.” That motion, the one with your arm up in the air? God, that still hurts like a stone-cold bitch.
“Yeah. You said they had you going to rehab?”
“Yeah, my coach is taking care of it. He rocks and I haven’t missed a single day. I go five days a week.”
“Good for you! I know it’s
a pain, but….” She shrugs and grins. “Pancakes are here!”
“Yay!” I’m more than willing to not talk about the idea that maybe my arm won’t get better, because I don’t know what I’ll do then. Die. I’ll just die.
“Oh, these are big, huh! Too cool.” Meaghan bounces a little, and I have to admit, that makes me want to bounce too, clap, because she’s just so pretty.
We get the butter-to-syrup ratio right, and she takes a picture with her phone. I start to, but I know Kaylee’s watching Tumblr. I know it.
Of course, if she tags me, Kaylee will see it, huh? I only have a few friends, like three hundred, not like Kaylee. She’s got like two thousand, so maybe she’ll miss it.
“Hey, what’s wrong?”
“Kaylee.” I just blurt it out. “I don’t want to make her mad.”
“You didn’t say you were seeing someone else.” Meaghan’s lips purse, get real tight. “That’s totally not cool, Charley.”
“No. No! Kaylee’s just my best friend but… she doesn’t know.”
“About me? You didn’t tell her about meeting me?”
I shake my head. That would be too fucking easy. “About everything. Like everything.” I’m trying to talk to her with my eyes, because you know, what if someone overhears? I know about half the guys in this place, and the other half are like truckers or something. I mean, I don’t know them well enough to, like, call them or anything, but I bet my mom does and…. Come on. Get it.
“Oh.” She blinks a little, then nods. “That’s why you and Brant came together, huh? They think you’re….”
“Yeah. Everybody does.”
“Are you? I mean, do y’all….” She waves her head and I shake my head.
“He’s not that way.” Brant is as queer as a three-dollar bill.
“Neither are you, Charley.”
I look at my pancakes, at the butter. “It’s all… I didn’t even know.”
“How could you not know?”
“I don’t know. Maybe there’s something wrong with me. Maybe I’m just stunted.” Maybe I’m never going to be the person anyone wants me to be. It could happen.
“Maybe you hadn’t found the right person.”
I like how she says that. “Hadn’t found.” Not haven’t, hadn’t. Because I have.
“That makes sense.” I reach out under the table, touch her knee, and her fingers grab mine, squeeze.
“It’s okay. It’s kinda cool, being a secret. For now, at least.”
“I just… I don’t know how to say it, and if I do, I’m sorta saying it for you, for me, for Brant, you know?”
“Totally. Especially Brant, huh? You said they were whoa-churchy?” She’s not letting go of my hand. Not even a little.
“Like his dad’s a minister of one of those ‘you’re fixin’ to go to hell’ snake-handling type churches.” I don’t know if the snake part is true, but it sounds good, so I go with it.
“That is made of suck.”
“I know, right? Because, I mean, my mom… I don’t know, but she’s cool. She didn’t bitch when my older brother got picked up for shoplifting nutmeg when he was a sophomore.”
“Nutmeg? Like nutmeg-nutmeg?”
I have to grin, because everyone says the same thing. Everyone. “Yeah. Someone told him and his best friend Jake that if you smoked it you could get high. So there he goes, stealing three- dollar’s worth of nutmeg from the store. He’s still banned from the Brookshire’s on Wesley.”
“Smoked…. Wait, how do you smoke nutmeg?”
“Hell if I know.” All I know is that he smelled like pumpkin pie after and Mom laughed her ass off and told him that the least he could do was get arrested for something respectable.
If I remember right, she suggested illegal fireworks.
“Lord. How old is he now?”
“Ben’s fixin’ to be twenty. He works at the Chili’s; he’s cool, as far as big brothers go. I like him.” I know it’s, like, the least cool thing ever, but it’s true. He’s neat as hell. He doesn’t holler at me.
“Yeah? Does he like it? Waiting tables?”
“I think so, yeah. I mean, my mom’s in the same type of business, so it’s sort of like a family deal. We’re all customer service-y.” I frown, all of the sudden. “Did you tell me where you work?”
“I file papers for my dad. I mean, yeah, super lame, but he pays me and I do it for all his partners and everything. I scan all the stuff, organize it, file it.”
“That’s like techy and stuff.” Sounds boring as hell, really.
“Boring, but easy, and it’s a job at an architect’s, so that’s cool. I also volunteer at the pit-bull rescue, so that looks good for college.”
“Oh yeah? Puppies?” I haven’t ever had a dog, but I’ve always wanted one. Mom just says it’s hard enough to feed human kids.
“Yeah. I wash the kennels, I get to help with feeding, socializing, walking.”
“That’s cool. I mean, for real.”
Meaghan nods. “I sort of want to be a vet, but my dad says that’s harder than becoming a doctor, so we’ll have to see.”
“You’re plenty smart.”
One of Meaghan’s eyebrows lifts. “How do you know? I mean, really, I may be the dumbest girl on earth. All you know about me is that I play softball and I like you.”
“I know ‘Say Something’ is your favorite song and you love the Harry Potter books, but you weren’t into Divergent.” I’m trying not to be hurt, because she’s right, but you’re supposed to defend the people you’re going with, right?
“Yeah, I guess. I just, I want it, you know, but when your own dad says he doesn’t think you can, it stings. You know what I mean?”
I nod, even though I don’t. My mom’s a “you can be whatever you want to be, just so long as you want to be something you’re capable of being” type of woman.
I’m pretty sure I can be a ballplayer and if I can’t, I’m pretty sure I’m screwed.
I just don’t know what I’ll do.
“Still, I’m going to try, maybe. I have my applications in at UT and A&M and OU.”
“OU?” That’s almost as bad as A&M. Of course, I have my letter from UT, so long as I can play.
“I know, right? Dad went there, so I applied. I’m hoping for Austin. Texas State is right there too, and it’s okay.”
“Cool. I mean, really, college is supposed to like, rock and stuff, right? That’s why it’s the glory days and all?”
“I don’t know,” she answers. “You ever notice it’s always boys saying that? Like always. You never hear songs about that for girls. With girls it’s always about getting boys or getting knocked up.”
“You think you’ll want babies one day?” I don’t. I totally think it’s a giant pain in the ass. All that money you spend and no one cares. I mean, your kids care, but only if you’re poor. I’ve seen Kaylee. Rich kids don’t ever care.
“God, no. No way. I mean, I want to work and travel. I want to go see everything.”
“You’ll change your minds.” This oldest-lady-on-earth leans over the back of the booth. “You’ll see. You’ll meet the right man and your biological clock will start ticking and you’ll have some and never be able to imagine your lives without them.”
I give her a wow-go-away grin and then face Meaghan, ignoring her.
“I’m serious. You girls believe that money and travel are everything, but you’re nothing without your children.”
“Not everyone’s meant to breed, ma’am, but thanks.” Meaghan’s voice is dripping with sarcasm and, God, she’s brave. These types, they never know when to shut up.
“You wait and see. God will put his hand on you.”
Meaghan’s head tilts. “You ever think about how that sounds an awful lot like rape?”
My eyes go so wide that they pull at the corners, burn, both because Meaghan said that out loud to someone and also because…. Meaghan said that. Out loud. And it’s true.
“Well, I’ll b
e!” The woman flips around, and I just stare for a second. Then Meaghan winks, and I swear to God, I just crack up. Like I can’t stop laughing and she’s laughing too and we’re on the same page.
Together.
“So, where is the one place, more than anywhere else you want to go?” I ask. I’ve been all over Texas for tourneys and once to Oklahoma City, but that’s it.
“Rome. I want to see the Coliseum.”
“Oh? Oh, wow. That would be so awesome.” Rome. Damn.
“What about you?”
I shrug like there isn’t somewhere and then I realize there is a place I want to go. “I want to play some of the teams from Japan. They rock like rocking things and they’re so fast. I mean, we hit harder, but those girls are quick.”
“It’s always a ball game with you, huh?”
“Yep.” Always. It’s my thing.
“Well, I guess I’ll have to just try harder to keep your attention….”
“Oh, I always know what my outfield’s up to.” Is this flirting? I think it is.
“Keeping your eye on me, are you?”
“You know it, yeah.”
“So, Charley….” Her smile’s as bright as noon sunshine. “I’m going to have to leave in a little less than an hour. You want to go get your car? Talk for a little while before I have to leave?”
“Yeah. Yeah, we totally can.” I dig in my purse for a couple of twenties and she grabs my hand.
“This one’s on me. You get the next one.”
The next one. God, yes. Please.
“Sounds like a plan.”
Chapter 13
“WHAT DO you want to do for your party, Charley?” Mom is sitting at the kitchen table, reading some romance novel, smoking a Virginia Slims 100 Light, and drinking coffee.
“You’re up early. Everything okay?”
She nods, grins at me, and wiggles her eyebrows. “Your sister has a dentist appointment this morning. All is well.”
“Ah. Ew.” I grab a cup of coffee and doctor it up, pop enough toast in the oven for all three of us, and grab three eggs. “You want eggs?”
“No, baby.” She hates eggs, but I never do know whether it’s meaner to ask or not.
“Didn’t think so.” I scramble them up, get them going.
“So?”
“So what?” I have to get my pre-calc homework done today at lunch and I promised Meaghan I’d text her at seven thirty to make sure she was awake. Her school starts later than mine. Lucky broad.
