The Fill-In Boyfriend

by Kasie West

  Spending time with her brother. I could feel the tug in my heart at the thought and knew that any more time spent with her brother might lead to a lot of harm on my side. I was starting to like him. Too much. And I usually didn’t let myself do that with so little assurance that the feeling was mutual. But I found myself saying, “Okay.”

  We had driven a good twenty minutes and had reached a country neighborhood where every house looked in need of a face-lift. Hayden pulled up a long dirt drive. The property was lined with large trees and even more junk. Rusted-out old cars, broken appliances, large pieces of farm equipment.

  Dogs, several of them, ran up to the car as we drove, barking and chasing us.

  “Where are we? This looks like the setting for a mass murder.”

  Hayden smiled at me. “This is Will’s house. He’s a member of our church, and for twenty bucks, he lets us throw baseballs in his yard.”

  “Couldn’t we have thrown baseballs in your yard for free?”

  “Yes, but he lets us throw baseballs at his stuff.” Bec pointed to an old car we were passing with a large hole in its windshield. “It’s very satisfying.”

  Hayden honked the horn and an old man came out of the dilapidated house and called to the dogs. They all barreled toward him. He locked them behind a gate and then went back in the house with a grumpy face that seemed to say he really didn’t want us here.

  “He’s in a good mood today,” Bec said.

  “That was his good mood?”

  “Normally he makes us lock up the dogs and it’s not as easy as he made it look.”

  “If he doesn’t like you coming here, why does he let you?”

  Hayden turned off the car and grabbed the bucket of baseballs from the backseat. “He loves us.”

  “He loves our money,” Bec said, holding up a twenty. “I’ll go pay him.”

  “That was the saddest attempt to throw a baseball that I’ve ever seen,” Hayden said after my . . . sad attempt to throw a baseball. It didn’t even shake the windshield let alone put a crack in it.

  “Just picture your brother’s face behind that windshield,” Bec said, tossing a ball and catching it over and over.

  “Imagine him holding up his video camera,” Hayden added.

  “Do you guys keep this bucket of baseballs just to use over here?” I asked.

  “No, we have it because Hayden tried to play once in high school like all his friends. But not all the baseballs in all the world could make him athletic.”

  “Thanks, Bec.”

  “What? It’s true.”

  “You didn’t make the team?”

  “My heart wasn’t into it.”

  “He’s been friends with the same group since elementary school. They all got athletic. He got . . .”

  “Don’t say it,” he said to her.

  “Geeky.”

  “She said it.”

  I laughed.

  “He felt left out and lonely. That’s why he tried out for the team. Not because he liked it.”

  Lonely. Hayden felt lonely with his group of friends. Was that why he thought I was when he first met me? He seemed to sense what I was thinking because he squeezed my arm and said, “I’m not lonely. Now, throw the ball.”

  I got ready to throw again and he said, “Okay, come here. You need direction.” He pulled me closer then positioned himself behind me.

  Bec groaned. “Are you really using the ‘let me help you learn something’ move?”

  I couldn’t see Hayden’s face so I wasn’t sure if he was blushing as much as I was.

  “This isn’t a move, Bec. She really needs help.”

  “Hey.” I elbowed him in the stomach and he laughed.

  “If I wanted to make a move, I’d do something like this.” He put his hands on my waist, pulled me back against his chest, then leaned in close to my ear. “Hey, baby, you need help learning how to throw a baseball?” He said it in his low, husky voice.

  I froze, the entire back of my neck and right ear tingling to life. Bec must’ve seen my face because she started laughing. Hard.

  He stepped back. “What? Was that not very good?”

  “Oh no, I think that would’ve worked if you were trying to pick up Gia,” Bec said through her laugh.

  “Whatever. It wasn’t that good,” I said.

  “Okay, so now the real lesson.” His hands were on my waist again positioning me. “You want to angle your body slightly. Then you’ll step with this foot and then throw. Use the step to add energy to the throw.” He backed away completely now and I was tempted to tell him I didn’t quite understand so he would show me again.

  “I don’t know if I should be taking advice from someone who didn’t make the baseball team.”

  “Throw the ball,” he said in an even voice.

  I smiled and threw the ball.

  “Better.”

  “Except you need to scream something at it while you throw.” Bec picked up a baseball and yelled, “Wake up and see what you’re missing!” as she threw the ball.

  Hayden raised his eyebrows. “Who was that directed at?”

  “Stupid boys.”

  “Got it.” He passed me another ball.

  “Don’t forget to yell,” Bec said.

  It was more embarrassing with Hayden here but I tried anyway. “How hard is it to ask?” The ball bounced off the windshield.

  Hayden twisted a ball between his palms. “Would you have said yes if he asked your permission to use the footage?”

  “I’m not sure. Probably not.”

  He nodded.

  “Hayden?” Bec said, pointing at the ball. “Have any demons to exorcise?”

  Hayden stared at the windshield for a long moment. Several balls littered the tall yellow grass around the rusted car. Unlike Bec and I, Hayden didn’t yell anything angry, but the speed at which his ball hit the glass made me think that maybe he did have a few demons. The glass let out a loud pop and several spiderweb cracks formed from the point of impact all the way across the windshield.

  It was my turn to raise my eyebrows at him. “What was that about?”

  “It’s fun to break things” was his answer but I wasn’t sure it was the real one.

  We all threw several more, and after a few minutes, Hayden held up his hands. “Okay, stop.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “It’s going to shatter,” Bec said.

  Hayden grabbed a ball out of the bucket and tossed it in the air. When he caught it he held it out to me with a wicked little smile. “It’s all you.”

  I took the ball from his hand. “If I don’t break it, I’m going to be really embarrassed.”

  “You’ll break it.”

  I angled my body slightly, stepped, then threw. The windshield shattered with a satisfying crack. I smiled. “That was awesome!”

  “So cathartic, right?” Bec asked.

  “Yes.” I let out a happy sigh.

  Bec picked up a few balls from the ground. “I’ll go play fetch with the dogs for a little bit. Be right back.”

  Hayden started picking up the balls, throwing them back into the bucket. I helped him. “You guys do this a lot?”

  “Not really.” The amount of broken or cracked windows on the surrounding cars seemed to say the opposite.

  “Did he recently bring that car in?” I asked, pointing to an equally rusty but completely free-of-damage car that sat by a tree across the yard.

  “No. We don’t touch that one. It’s a ’68 Camaro. I’ve been trying to convince Will to sell it to me since we started coming here, but as you saw, he’s kind of a grumpy old man set in his ways.”

  “But I thought Bec said he liked money.”

  “She was kidding. I think what he really likes is visitors. Come on, you should see this car.”

  CHAPTER 29

  Hayden headed toward the car and I followed. “This car is pretty far gone. It would take a lot to restore it anyway.”

  One side window was rolled down
and the interior was filled with dried leaves, the seats were ripped, their rusty springs visible. It didn’t stop Hayden from grabbing hold of the roof and swinging himself in, feetfirst, through the window. He rested his wrist on top of the steering wheel and put on a model-like expression: squinty eyes, slightly parted lips. “What do you think?”

  I laughed. “It looks good on you.”

  “I agree. Care to join me?”

  The passenger seat seemed even dirtier than the one he sat on. He must’ve seen my hesitation because he reached out and grabbed for me. I jumped back with a squeal. He dropped his hand, patting the outside of the door like it was a beloved pet. I surprised myself by walking forward, and climbing in through the window, headfirst, right over the top of him. He let out a laugh and helped me through. It was a tight squeeze with him sitting in my way, and my hips brushed against his chest and the steering wheel. My pants snagged on something and I was jerked to a halt, my hands on the passenger seat, my feet still out the window.

  “I’m stuck,” I said.

  “Yeah, you are.” His voice contained a smile.

  “Help me.”

  He laughed. “But I’m kind of enjoying this.”

  “If I weren’t using my hands, I’d beat you right now.” I tried to pull my leg forward again and was greeted with a ripping sound.

  Hayden laughed but then I felt him reaching for my ankle, where it seemed the problem was. “It’s stuck on the lock. Let me try to unhook it.”

  My arms were starting to shake from holding myself up.

  “Got it,” Hayden said, and tugged my leg free, sending me jolting forward and face-planting into the seat.

  “Ouch.”

  “Oh no. I’m so sorry.”

  My legs were draped across his lap, my arms stuck beneath me. The stick shift had bruised my side for sure. I carefully rolled to my right, toward the seat, and he helped me sit up.

  “You okay?” He took in my face.

  “I’m fine.” I rubbed my hands over my face, sure it was covered in dirt. He picked a leaf out of my hair. “I’m good,” I assured him with an embarrassed laugh.

  “That was really graceful.”

  I hit his arm and he pretended it hurt.

  “Well, I hope this was worth all that,” he said, a smile on his face.

  I glanced around at the dirty interior that looked even worse up close. “Yeah, not really,” I said with my own smirk.

  He leaned back against his seat then reached over and took my hand in his. Okay, so maybe it was worth it.

  “How did your Odd Couple scene go today in class?”

  “Really good. Thanks for your help yesterday.”

  “You didn’t need my help.”

  “I need your help.” The way he said it made it sound like we were no longer talking about practicing lines for a play.

  Maybe he wasn’t. “What demons were you working out today?” I nodded my head toward the car we had battered.

  “Ones that should already be worked out,” he said vaguely.

  I wondered if he was referring to Eve, but there was no way I was going to bring up her name just in case he wasn’t. Not when he was holding my hand of his own free will and not because we were pretending for anyone.

  “Do you ever wonder if who you pick as friends says something about who you are?”

  So he wasn’t referring to Eve. He was referring to Ryan, who had betrayed him with her. Or maybe he was referring to the fact that he was lonely in his group, an outsider. I thought about his question, thought about my friends and what that might say about me. I even thought about how Bec’s friend had accused me of being mean because of something Jules had said. “Are you talking about Ryan?”

  “I’m talking about a lot of things, but yes, he was my friend.”

  “It was his choice. You can’t control what he does. His choice says nothing about you.”

  “But doesn’t it? He was willing to turn his back on a lifelong friendship for a girl. Shouldn’t I have seen that coming?”

  “You couldn’t have predicted that. It doesn’t mean you’d do the same thing just because you chose him as your friend.”

  “I know. I just feel like I should be over it already.”

  I squeezed his hand. “He hurt you. That’s not easy to get over.”

  He sighed.

  “What Bec said, about you being different from your friends . . .”

  “I’m not lonely,” he answered almost too quickly.

  “But you don’t really relate to them like you want to?”

  “I like sports and sometimes they come to plays. It works out.”

  “But you feel left out?”

  I waited for him to tell me that Bec was wrong again but instead he said, “So did the baseball-throwing experiment help? How are you feeling?”

  “I had a fun day, and considering everything that happened the last few days, I think that’s a good thing. Thank you for making me laugh.”

  He studied my face and I smiled to reassure him. He said, “I don’t want to be thanked for that. You don’t seem to have a problem laughing. You’re good at putting on that face. It’s what’s behind the smile that I wonder about. You don’t have to be perfect all the time.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m not, believe me.”

  He brushed at something on my face, probably some dirt from the seat. “I like it when you’re not perfect.”

  I felt my cheeks get hot again and this time I couldn’t hide it.

  “What about you, Gia? Do you ever feel lonely in your group of friends?”

  I found myself automatically wanting to say no. But he was right. I did always put on a happy face. This whole day was supposed to be about letting go. Letting my feelings out. It wasn’t something that came easily to me but Hayden made me want to try. “I never used to.”

  “But now?”

  “I don’t know. I love my friends, but yes, I’m discovering that they don’t know me very well. It’s not their fault, though. I’ve never let them. I’ve never really known myself.”

  “Isn’t that part of being a teenager? Discovering who we are? Who we want to be?”

  “I hope so because otherwise I’m really far behind.”

  “I think you know yourself better than you think.”

  From across the yard Bec yelled out, “Where are you guys?”

  Hayden backed up and I realized how close we had gotten. “Guess we’d better get going.”

  It took me several deep breaths to even out my breathing. Hayden climbed out the window and then turned back toward me.

  “Can’t I use the door?” I asked, scooting over to the open window.

  “It’s rusted shut.” He reached out his hands. “I won’t let you fall this time. Promise.” His eyes twinkled as if remembering my not-so-graceful entry.

  I moved to my knees, trying to avoid the exposed springs, and put my head and shoulders out the window. I used the doorframe to push myself up and twisted so I was now sitting on the frame, my upper body facing the car, my legs still inside. That’s when Hayden scooped me up, putting one arm beneath my legs and the other around my back, and lifted me out of the car. I let out a surprised yelp and threw my arms around his neck for support.

  Even when I had cleared the window he held on to me for several breaths. Finally I looked up, wondering why he wasn’t putting me down.

  He met my eyes. “I had fun today too.”

  “Good,” I said, more breathy than I intended.

  Bec appeared behind him. “Did you use the ‘climb over me into the car’ move on her? I swear, you’re pulling out all the stops today.”

  My previously fast-beating heart seemed to drop, and as if to emphasize the feeling, he put me down.

  “It wasn’t a move, Bec,” he said, steadying me while I took a few wobbly steps.

  She shrugged. “I’m pretty sure you don’t have to put on the moves to ask her to the play on Friday.”

  Hayden narrowed his eyes at her
.

  She offered him an innocent smile. “I’m going to get the baseballs. Meet you at the car.”

  And then Hayden and I were alone again. He ran a hand through his hair. “She’s really subtle, yes?”

  “You don’t have to,” I said at the same exact time he said, “Would you want to?”

  “I know,” he said at the same time as I said, “Sure.”

  We both laughed. “Okay, let’s try talking one at a time,” he said. “You first.”

  “I was saying, don’t feel like you have to ask me just because your sister told you to.”

  “I don’t. In fact, I was going to tell you that you had to go to the play because I can’t be friends with someone who’s never seen a live play before.”

  “Well, in that case . . .”

  He looked to where Bec was throwing balls into the bucket. “I don’t know how you won her over, but you have.”

  “Just ten minutes of screaming out our problems seemed to work.”

  He smiled. “She wouldn’t have let you in her bedroom in the first place if she didn’t like you.”

  “I don’t think I earned it in any way.” I wondered if she really liked me or if I was just the lesser of two evils in her mind. “But I like her.”

  “So, Friday? Six.”

  “Sounds good.”

  CHAPTER 30

  I sat at the head of the table, the other members of the student council staring at me, waiting for me to say something. I usually enjoyed leading discussions, but so far I had been useless in this meeting.

  “Gia,” Daniel, the vice president, said, “I think we’re ready to move on to item number two.”

  “Right.” I looked down at the paper in front of me. Item number two was one I had fought for, an all-night graduation party on the beach. “Did everyone complete their assignments?”

  “We’re good on permits,” Daniel said.

  “I haven’t been able to get a band,” Ashley said. “Were there any bands that tried out for prom that would work for this?”

  “No . . .” I paused, thinking about Nate’s band. “I don’t know, maybe.” The day we had auditioned bands had been a long one. Maybe we weren’t hearing clearly for the last ones. “I’ll find out and let you know. What about the food? Is that taken care of?”