by Alexis Anne
We slept back to back all night long. I made her breakfast and we wound up using the kitchen counter for another round of fast, intense love making. Then Beau texted to let her know they were on the way.
“I have nothing better to do until February. I’m here to help whether it’s picking Linc up from school or taking you out fishing to get away from everything.” I kissed her one last deep time, knowing it might be weeks or even months before we could really move forward. “I’m going to be the best next door neighbor you’ve ever met and Linc is going to get so used to having me in his life he won’t ever worry about me leaving you—or him—lonely.”
She smiled up at me sadly. “You really think everything will work out?”
I gave her chin a shake. “I know it will.” Then I hopped down her front steps, waving goodbye before Beau pulled into the drive.
Yes, I was a man well pleasured and satisfied, but I was also a man who had full confidence the world was at his feet. Liv and I were solid and once we navigated these murky waters we’d be together, once and for all.
But in the meantime I had someone else to win over.
As soon as I got home I pulled out my phone, hitting the speed dial. “Hey Trent. How do I become a baseball coach?”
Part II
15
Friend Zoned
9 Months Later…
* * *
Chris
To say things didn’t go quite as planned would be an understatement. I’m still not quite sure how I wound up so firmly in the friend zone, but here I was. Linc and I were thick as thieves though. And I was so close to Summer I was dangerously close to calling her my best friend.
And that pissed me off because my best friend was Liv and just two hours ago she called me “buddy.” Like buddy old pal. It was as if she were deliberately pushing me further into the friend zone and I didn’t know why.
“Has she met someone else?”
Summer frowned. “No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. My sister is the definition of monogamy. If she were moving on she would tell you.”
“I feel like she is telling me,” I grumbled, catching the baseball Linc rocketed my way and threw it back. He’d turned into a pretty good ballplayer. I helped coach his fall ball team and between me, Summer, Trent, and occasionally, Beau, Linc’s home life had barely registered his mother’s new schedule.
That’s right, I was friends with Beau. We were one big modern family, minus the actual relationship-with-Olivia part of the equation.
“She’s...I don’t even know,” Summer sighed. Linc threw another ball that made my glove pop. “Dang, kid. Take it easy on the old man. He’s got to pitch tomorrow.”
Linc snickered. “I don’t throw half as hard as Wes does.”
Wes being Linc’s new favorite player. Linc had become friends with a lot of the guys this season. Getting to know Beau I also got to understand how very different we were. Not just the whole city nightlife part, but professionally as well. He almost never took Linc to games and rarely introduced him to his teammates. It was as if Beau’s football life was on another planet.
Whereas I wanted Linc there all the time. Every game he could come to, he was there. Over the summer break Summer traveled with Linc to my away games, Liv meeting up with us when she could. He came to dinners with my teammates and spent real time with them away from the field. He even helped me teach Erik and Wes how to fish. I suspected he’d have a full bleacher section at his fall ball classic this year.
If only I could figure out where I went wrong with Olivia.
Working with Carmen was a raving success for Liv. I was so fucking proud of her and excited for everything happening. After Olivia was done with her part of the baseball documentary, Carmen asked her to take on an oral history project she’d had back burnered for years. It was now Liv’s baby and it consumed her. So even though the six months of travel had come and gone, she was still working long hours and taking the occasional trip for her new project.
“It’s like,” Summer suddenly said, “like she’s burying herself in her work. I’ve never seen her like this.”
I caught the ball, sent it back, and took the opportunity to glance at Summer. She stood a couple feet away chewing on her lower lip the same way Liv did. It was easy to fall into friendship with Summer. She and Liv were tight like I was with my brothers—both of whom were currently living with me. Ben because we’d (we being me, Paris, Berlin, their mom, and Grams before she passed) tricked London into coming home and Ben into renovating Grams old house. We basically shoved the two of them together and, I’m proud to say, it was working. I liked to think I was fully entrenched in Calusa Key society, just like I promised. Oh, and Scott decided to abandon his Hollywood life, his girlfriend, and all of reality to live in a hammock. Pretty sure he was having a full blown life crisis, but aside from the moping and meditation, he was generally in good spirits.
So I had my brothers, my friends, and Linc, but I only had a shred of Olivia. We needed a shove back in the romantic direction. “I could ask her out.”
“No. Don’t do that. She’s like a mouse. She’ll get one look at you and run back to her hidey hole.”
“One look at me?”
Summer sighed. “I think she’s put up a mental block. You are her friend. Just a friend. You are not the sexy ballplayer who swept her off her feet. If you give her that hungry you are my woman look, she’ll have to take the block down and remember what it’s like to feel.”
So I needed to get past the block. Or, to put it in baseball terms, I needed to start tipping my pitches. No more laying back, no more playing her game. I was going to remind her I wanted her, that my feelings were physical and intense, and that I would accept nothing less than everything.
I spent my next off day helping Ben track down supplies. I wound up at the hardware store, the grocery store, and finally, the outdoor rec shop to pick up a fake alligator. No, I didn’t know why and also no, I didn’t want to know why. It was Ben. There was a one hundred and seventy five percent chance it was a prank. My big brother loved pranks. It was how the whole sunflower seed war began.
And on that note, I grabbed a few bags of sunflower seeds at checkout. I wasn’t sure what my next prank would be, but I needed supplies to pull it off.
“Chris,” Paris Anderson hissed from the sunglasses rack twenty feet away.
I dropped the seeds into my basket and moved her way. “What’s up?”
She waved her hands to indicate I needed to keep my voice down. “Shhh! There are ears everywhere.”
So this was about Ben and London. “As far as I know Ben is head over heels. I think we’re in good shape.”
Paris beamed. “London is so completely frazzled. I know I shouldn’t enjoy this so much but...well I am. It’s nice to see her foundation shaken.”
“I’m just glad Ben’s smiling again. He can be a grumpy bastard.” Says the man who was a grumpy bastard. Maybe it ran in our blood because Scott was full blown grumpy bastard at levels that put Ben and I to shame.
“So do you think we need to do anything else? Trap them in a room together? Accidentally make them reservations at Moonlight Tides?”
“I don’t think we need to send in reinforcements just yet. Let Ben work his magic first.”
“Okay.” Paris frowned, finally standing upright again and returning her voice to normal. “How are you, by the way?”
“I’m good.”
Then she arched her eyebrow and zeroed her gaze in on me in a way that made me feel like someone had just turned on a spotlight. “Do I need to lock you and Olivia Saldana in a room together?”
“Shhh!” I glared at her. “There are ears everywhere!”
She giggled. “Like the whole island doesn’t know.”
Great. Just...great. “Again, no meddling needed. Let me work my magic.”
She pursed her lips. “There’s no magic happening, Christopher Robin.”
I glared at he
r. “There will be very soon.”
“I’ll get the popcorn ready.”
“Smart ass.”
She grinned, clearly proud of her meddling ways. “Oh hey Mr. and Mrs. Rossi. Getting a new kayak?”
A man and a woman about my parents age, maybe a little younger, had an orange tandem kayak in their hands. “The old one finally cracked,” the woman said. “Hopefully this one lasts ten years as well.”
“Wow! My kids destroyed one in under a year. I’m impressed. How’s Sam? I haven’t seen her in a while.”
“Oh she’s well. She was just here for the weekend. You know how she likes to lay low. I’m Jean, by the way. And this is my husband Cal.”
I shook each of their hands. “Chris.”
The husband grinned. “I’m a huge fan, Chris. Will you sign our kayak?”
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how I signed my first and only kayak with a Sharpie from aisle four at the Calusa Key rec shop. “Now it has to last ten years,” I said as I added the marker to my basket.
Jean shook her head, pushing her husband toward the end of the registers. “It was nice of you to indulge him, Chris. See you around!”
“Don’t blame me if they charge you double for the kayak now that it’s a collector’s item,” I joked.
“You should have had him sign it after we paid for it!” Jean sighed.
“That was really nice of you,” Paris said quietly.
I shrugged, feeling a little embarrassed for some reason. “They were really nice people.”
“Their daughter Samantha is really nice, too. She’s a researcher in Gainesville, but she comes home all the time to see her parents. You might meet her one day. She was tight with Summer growing up.”
Well, if they were friends with Summer then I’d sign anything for them. Maybe I’d make it a joke and secretly sign random things for her to pass on to Sam. That could be pretty funny.
I dropped Ben’s stuff off at Gram’s house, stopped by Trent’s to fix a leaky pipe he couldn’t reach, and got home in time to see Summer driving off with Linc for his afternoon adventure club meeting.
My eyes tangled with Liv’s as she finished waving goodbye. I saw them flare in panic but instead of backing off like I’d done every time for months, I found myself propelled forward, my feet eating up the ground between us. I swear she looked around for a way to escape and realized there was no possible way she could, so instead she stood frozen, eyes wide, like a deer trapped by oncoming headlights.
“Hey there, Liv.”
“Hi Chris.” Her voice was steady but remarkably quiet.
“I was thinking of taking the boat out for an evening run. Does my fishing buddy want to tag along?” I intentionally used the word buddy since she’d just used it on me, and because I hoped I could convince her my intentions were friendly.
When they were, in fact, not friendly at all.
“I…” her eyes darted around as she tried to come up with an excuse.
“You?”
“Uh.”
“Linc’s at his meeting for the next two hours. They’re learning about the lifecycle of sand dollars tonight. Come on. You’ve been working nonstop. We haven’t hung out in at least a week.”
She swallowed and stared at my chest. “Yeah. Okay. It would be nice to feel the wind in my hair. Let me text Summer and change.”
“I’ll meet you at the boat.”
I waited until she slipped past her front door before I walked back to my house with a spring in my step. I was going on a date with Olivia Saldana. She just didn’t know it yet.
16
Smile and relax
Chris
Even with the roar of the engine and the sound of the wind racing past my ears, I could hear Liv’s sigh as that same wind washed over her face and danced through her hair.
It made me sigh to see her shoulders relax and a smile curve her lips.
It had been too damn long since I touched those lips. I remembered every second of what it felt like, tasted like, to have her lips on mine. Every morning and every night I remembered with excruciating detail the heaven that was her body moving with mine.
The water was smooth today, like glass in some places, a slight ripple in others. The sunlight reflected off it almost painfully as we headed west, and then eased as I turned the boat south.
“Where are we headed?” she yelled.
“It’s a surprise!” As much as anything could be a surprise. She knew the area better than I ever would. She’d probably guess my intentions pretty quickly.
A large boat crossed ahead of us and I adjusted course slightly to take his wake a little less brutally. Liv braced her hands on either side of the windshield, bent her knees, and absorbed the impact as we passed over the waves. As soon as we were clear and back onto smooth waters she moved to the bow, looking over the side.
She paid almost no attention at all to where we were going and instead seemed to make the most of her opportunity to relax. To breathe in the salty air, feel the sun on her skin. She smiled the whole way there.
“Are we headed to Cabbage Key?” She finally asked with a confused look on her face.
I shrugged. “Want to get a beer with me?”
I couldn’t see her eyes, but I could feel her looking at me. “Yeah. Sounds great.”
Since it was weekday afternoon it wasn’t busy and I was able to pull right up to the dock. I fell in love with this place the first time Liv took me here. It was a small island with a historic house that was now a lodge. There were several cottages on the island you could rent for a few nights. It was also easy to wander the island or eat at the one and only restaurant. There was no way to reach the island except by boat. It was the kind of place that had dollar bills stapled up everywhere and surprisingly delicious food.
We snagged a table that looked out over the water and ordered two beers. She still had that blissed out look on her face, but her hands had begun to fidget with the paper napkin in her hands.
“Maybe we’ll have time to walk around before we head back.”
Her eyes drifted to the grass and then down to the rocks and sand. “You know it’s weird. This is the same water outside our houses, same sand, same everything, but it feels different.”
I could say the same about us. We were the same people who were on a collision course last year, but we didn’t feel the same anymore. “The wind is different. The shade. The island isn’t like Calusa Key at all.”
“That’s true. It’s a nice day.”
It was warm but not oppressively hot. I wanted to make small talk but every topic that jumped to mind was work related—hers or mine—and that felt like a huge part of what was holding us permanently in the friend zone. There had to be more to Olivia and Chris than baseball and photography. That was part of why I wanted to get in the boat and just go. “I found a new—well new to me—band that I can’t stop listening to. They’re super popular so you probably know them already. The Brothers Osborne.”
Her eyes unfocused. “I’ve heard of them but I don’t know that I can say I’ve heard their music before. What do you like about them?”
Aha! We could talk about something other than work. I felt like I’d just struck someone out and was doing a victory lap around the mound. “They're a little bit country, a lot southern rock. All their music makes me smile and want to relax. It reminds me of you.”
She blushed. “I make you smile and relax?”
“You know you do.” I didn’t push the topic. Instead I sipped my beer and enjoyed the view of the water, hearing “Pushing Up Daisies” in my head.
“How’s the commute?” She didn’t look at me.
“Not bad at all. Every so often I wish I could just crash after a late game, but then I think about waking up anywhere but my beach and it makes the drive seem like nothing at all.”
She studied me for a minute, looking like she was wrestling with something. “You know in all the time we’ve spent together I’ve never asked you wh
at you want out of life. You’ve already got a World Series under your belt and more awards than most ballplayers dream of, a beach house...what else is there for Chris Kaine to conquer?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” I said quietly. “But since you asked first I’ll answer first.” I stared at my half empty mug, the condensation making rivers down the glass and soaking the cardboard coaster underneath it. “I want a home. A family. Something permanent. I’ve never had it and I’ve always wanted it. I’ve lived on my own since I was fifteen, Liv. Fifteen. I’m tired of being alone.”
Her eyes widened in surprise. “I knew you mentioned residency in high school baseball, but it didn’t sink in…” I knew she was calculating Linc being gone in six years instead of ten.
“Yeah,” I laughed and sighed at the same time. “I was an ambitious kid. I knew what I wanted and my parents weren’t going to settle down for three or four years while I finished high school. It was a solution that let everyone keep on living their dreams. But ten years later...I’m so fucking tired. I travel for work and I love it, but at the end of the day I want to come home, and when baseball is over, home is the only place I want to be.”
She sat quietly. I knew she was staring at me because the hair on my arm kept pricking. “My parents were never going to last. Like Beau and me. I think that’s why I’m so attached to this house. I always wished we could just be happy. First with my parents and then with Beau. I think I’ve started to believe it’s impossible.”
“It’s not,” I blurted. “The island is seductive. The sunsets, the beaches, it’s like a trophy. But that doesn’t mean it’s for everyone.” Liv’s parents weren’t the first artists who wanted an exclusive beach getaway where they produced their art, and they wouldn’t be the last. Just like Beau wasn’t the first or last athlete to mark a stretch of beach as his own.
