SWAY (Part 1)

by Jennifer Davis

  I chose the park and should have known that meant going to the batting cages. I didn’t mind it , I didn’t have my bat. I tried to use his, but it was too heavy for me and I didn’t hit very well with it, so I insisted on just watching him. That was all I wanted to do anyway.

  Once we left the batting cages, we ran a few errands. He stopped at one of those brushless places to have his car washed so the paint didn’t get scratched, which was understandable, I guess. It was expensive paint.

  We went to Ronnie’s Sporting Goods store and picked up an old glove he’d had re-stitched, along with a few other mundane things, but I didn’t mind. I didn’t care what we did as long as I got to be with him.

  When we stopped to grab lunch, I noticed him checking his phone as we sat down. I had seen him take it out a few times earlier. He hadn’t answered it then, either. I watched it constantly shake and whine in place on the table. He would look at the call screen and lay it back down without a word.

  After the sixth time it happened, I finally spoke up. I was curious who was calling so much, and why he wouldn’t answer.

  “You can get that,” I told him.

  “I don’t want to. We’re eating.”

  I waited for him to tell me who it was. He didn’t. “Is it really because we’re eating, or because of who it is? I asked, feeling ridiculously possessive of him.

  Ryan paused, smiling wider. “It’s because we’re eating.”

  I figured he’d caught on to my insecurity and would continue to answer my questions vaguely for his own entertainment.

  We’d been together every free moment we’d had since prom, but suddenly I wondered if he was still talking to other girls or worse, seeing other girls when I wasn’t with him. I didn’t want him speaking to another girl, much less—ugh. The mere thought caused a wave of nausea to roll through my guts. I had to know.

  “Is it another girl?” I asked quietly, not looking at him.

  “It’s not another girl. It’s baseball stuff. They’ve been wearing me out lately. I’ve got a dozen schools calling, wanting to woo me, offering me anything I want in exchange for a verbal commitment. I don’t want to answer a call like that while we’re eating. It would be rude of me to have you sit here for an hour while I talked on the phone.” He paused, “Okay?”

  “Okay,” I mumbled, feeling a little silly at first, then not so much. “You can’t blame me for thinking it was another girl.”

  Ryan smiled again, remaining silent. I was getting angry, my tone reflected my mood. “Is there even a girl in this city or maybe I should say in the whole state who doesn’t have your phone number?”

  “Actually,” Ryan said before taking a big bite of his food, making me wait until he’d swallowed it before he could continue. “I can positively say that at this moment there is not a single girl anywhere in the world that has this number, with the exception of my mother, and she shouldn’t count.”

  Ryan leaned back in his seat and smiled widely at me. My eyes flaunted my dissatisfaction with his story. I was not in the mood for his games. Everybody on the planet had access to that number. I narrowed my eyes, frowning at him, positive he was lying to me.

  “I got a new number,” he laughed, his face beaming with excitement at the news. I continued to stare at him, waiting for him to retract his statement or clarify it, but he didn’t say anything else. He just kept that grin on his face, taking in my annoyance, and enjoying it.

  “You got a new number?” I folded my arms across my chest.

  “Yes. I did.”

  “You didn’t tell me.”

  “You didn’t need to know. You don’t call boys, remember?” Ryan reminded me, grateful for the opportunity to use it against me.

  “You are seriously getting on my nerves,” I griped, strictly because he was right. I didn’t need it. I never called him for anything. I didn’t have to. He always called me.

  Ryan smiled again. I rolled my eyes, shifting back in my seat, away from the table. Once I was situated, I glared at him, waiting for him to say something else. He didn’t. He only smiled, turning my frustration into infuriation.

  “So do you have two phones? Because you said a new number. Does that mean you have one for when you’re with me and one for when you’re not?” I huffed.

  “No. But I wish I’d thought of that.” He winked. I was not amused by that statement. Ryan leaned across the table toward me. “Seriously, Annie I had no idea you were such a conspiracy theorist. It’s kind of cute, seeing you like this, all huffy and defensive over me.”

  My jaw unhinged, falling open with surprise. He laughed at my expression, which I quickly changed to show him my discontent.

  “Okay.” He held his hands up as if he were surrendering to me. He smiled sweetly for a moment before he explained. “I got rid of the old number because I’m not interested in anyone but you. I don’t want to talk to other girls. I don’t want to date other girls. I just want to be with you.”

  It was embarrassing how quickly my attitude shifted. I had a gleaming smile on my face, gushing happiness.

  “So there are no other girls?”

  “Only you.”

  I felt my guard lifting. Maybe trusting Ryan wouldn’t be as difficult as I had originally thought.

  ***

  When we got back to his house, we decided to go swimming. I thought lying by the pool would be a good way to spend the rest of the day.

  I changed and went to meet Ryan. He was waiting for me by the edge, his feet already in the water. He had an open ended pool. The kind you could just walk in and out of. It looked sort of like a wave pool, only smaller and without waves.

  Ryan smiled when he saw me, but didn’t say anything. “You ready to go in?” About my bathing suit, that is. I was a little let down. I was expecting something. I already knew he liked it, but we were alone. He was free to say whatever he wanted.

  Ryan took my hand and we walked into the warm water, drenching ourselves. He swam to the deep end and I went back to the shallow end and lay so my bottom half was in the water. The sun was hot and felt good against my skin. I closed my eyes and drifted a little, until I heard Ryan sloshing toward me. He lay next to me on his side. Feeling his eyes on me, I kept mine closed. His hand brushed over my cheek. I smiled a little and then I felt his fingers on my mouth, tracing my lips, skimming past my chin, down my neck, and then sweeping along my shoulder and away from my skin.

  I opened my eyes; his hand went back to my cheek. He paused to look at me before he kissed me. I slid one of my hands into his hair and moved the other softly down his arm.

  His eyes rested on mine when we stopped to breathe. He kissed me again, deeper, moving his hand over my stomach, allowing his body to lean partly against mine. As good as it felt it; we were acting inappropriately. I already had one strike with his mother for not being a society girl, and if she saw us like this, she would probably have me removed from the grounds. I envisioned an angry old woman ordering me away while sitting on a tufted chair suspended in the air by shirtless, gold-skinned men.

  I put off stopping it as long as I could. “Maybe we shouldn’t be doing this out here,” I suggested.

  “Sorry,” he groaned. “I guess I got a little carried away.”

  “I don’t want to give your mother another reason not to like me.” I shrugged, looking pitiful.

  “Don’t worry about my mother. She can’t force me to stay away from you.” He pushed my hair away from my face and kissed my forehead. “I want you. No matter what she thinks, it won’t change the way I feel.”

  Ryan moved his fingers down the strings of my bathing suit top. I didn’t think I would ever get used to how I felt when he touched me. Ryan kissed me and we wound ourselves around each other again. Breaking away was getting harder to do.

  19

  Ryan and I changed back into our clothes and sat tensely at opposite ends of the sectional, unsure what to do with ourselves. I began to wonder how long he would allow this to go on—this sort
of seventh grade level making out. He wasn’t used to having to wait and I didn’t want him to be with someone else, but I also didn’t want to give it up before I was ready in order to keep him. I decided he needed a distraction.

  “Hey, you got an extra glove?”

  “Yeah—Why?”

  “Come throw with me.”

  “Can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “I might hurt your hand,” he sniffed, exhaling hard.

  My eyes narrowed. “I don’t think you could hurt my hand if you tried,” I challenged.

  “Oh, it’s like that now.”

  I shrugged, cutting my eyes away.

  “You’re on, Reynolds,” Ryan proclaimed.

  He grabbed the gloves, a baseball and my hand and led me into the backyard.

  “Do you need to warm up that arm before we get started?” I chattered.

  “No. I can still set you on fire throwing cold,” he smiled, displaying his sparkling teeth for me.

  “Well let’s do this thing, Blondie,” I hollered, and then spit on the ground, pounding my closed fist into the center of my glove. I squatted into position. Ryan laughed riotously at my dramatization.

  I let my glove hang low while I looked to my right and nodded as if I had just received a signal from the pitching coach in the dugout, like a real college baseball catcher would do, and then relayed the senseless signal to Ryan with my fingers as I lifted my glove for him to throw to me.

  He shook his head, still laughing at my display, and then threw to me, but nowhere near as hard as he could have. I imagined he was throwing mid sixties—my speed. A whole thirty plus miles slower than what he was capable of, but I didn’t complain.

  I loved getting to see him throw from this angle. I had only seen him pitch once before, from the side, unable to see the concentration on his face, or his windup and release. It was perfect, and he was seriously hot when doing it.

  “Are you giving him some pointers?” John winked at me as he approached.

  “No. He won’t let me show him anything, thinks he already knows it all.” I winked back.

  “Funny.” Ryan nodded at us. John slid his hands into his pant pockets, rattling loose change. “What are you two doing tonight?”

  “Not sure.”

  “Bart Sanders from Blackman wants to stop by. I invited him to join us for dinner.”

  “Why? I don’t want to go to Blackman.”

  “I know son, but it would be a good idea to entertain all offers.”

  “Even if I know I’m wasting the guy’s time?”

  “Annie can stay, too. And the two of you can duck out early. Just give him a minute to present the offer.” Ryan didn’t look happy at all. “Does mom know?” he asked quietly.

  “About Annie?” John questioned in the same tone.

  “Yes, about Annie.”

  “Not yet.”

  “Then we’re not staying.” Ryan turned his back to John.

  “I’ll talk to her,” he said.

  “What’s going on?” I asked. I was seriously confused.

  “It’s nothing.” Ryan looked back at his father. “I’m going to be with Annie tonight and I don’t want her to have to deal with mom.” Oh. The horrible mother, I thought, but I couldn’t let her scare me off without even meeting me first.

  “I’ll stay,” I offered lightly. “Thank you, John for asking.”

  “Annie,” Ryan retorted.

  “What?” I smiled at him. “She can’t be that bad, can she?”

  “Yes—she can.”

  “I’m a big girl, Ryan. It’ll be fine,” I assured him. I wanted to know just how nasty she was going to be to me. But you never know, John liked me plenty. Maybe she would, too, once she got to know me.

  Ryan tried to talk me out of staying several times, but I wouldn’t let him. I had a sundress in my bag and was able to make myself look nice for a casual dinner, I thought. Ryan thought so, and that was really all that mattered to me.

  He held my hand as we climbed the stairs to the main floor of the house. “You can still change your mind if you want,” he mumbled, his hand motionless as he held the door knob.

  “No. I’m not changing my mind,” I answered. “Just go.” He exhaled hard, reluctantly opening the door, leading me to the kitchen where a woman stood with her back to us. Her long dark hair rested in firm waves against the back of her dress, which was short and sleeveless; cream colored wool. She was wearing black and cream stilettos and was holding a glass of red wine in one hand, flipping through a magazine with the other.

  “Mom,” Ryan said. When she turned toward us I was startled. She looked too young to be Ryan’s mother. She looked too young to be anybody’s mother. She was stunning. Beautiful and obviously took very good care of herself. I already knew she was daring because one drop of that wine would have ruined her designer dress.

  “This is Annie.”

  “Hello, Annie. I’m Valerie,” she said politely, smiling warmly, which confused me. I’d expected an old, hateful shrew.

  “That is the cutest little dress you’re wearing,” she complimented, her voice syrupy sweet.

  “Thanks, it’s nice to meet you.” I smiled back.

  “You too, dear.”

  I wondered what Ryan had been so worried about. She seemed fine to me, but he was still uneasy.

  “Ryan, honey, would you get the door, please?” she asked, hearing the chimes. He hesitated, not wanting to move.

  “Please.” She smiled persuasively at him. He looked at me then gave Valerie a look warning her to behave while he was gone.

  “So, Annie,” Valerie said as she sat down, sipping her wine, her eyes raking over me. “What is it that is so special about you?” she asked, peculiar tone in her voice.

  “I’m sorry?” I didn’t understand what she was asking.

  “There must be something.” Her lip curled slightly, her tone darkened. “Although, truthfully,” she sighed, “I’m having trouble seeing it.”

  I really didn’t know how to respond to that.

  “What is it about you that had my son so anxious to bring you home?”

  “You’ll have to ask him, I guess.” I had to force my mouth open to spit out the words.

  “You are the first of his flings that he’s brought here, which tells me he may be more serious about you than the others.” Her eyes cut to mine. “I’m not terribly worried though. From what I know of my son’s exploits he bores quite easily and I imagine it won’t be long before he tires of you as well.”

  She swirled her wine in her glass, her eyes stabbing through me. “You don’t seem interesting enough to keep him satisfied. Besides, my son was meant for greater things than…well, you frankly,” she said, loathing in her voice. “He will never settle down with a baseball groupie, so if I were you I wouldn’t get too comfortable around here, sweetie.”

  Valerie got up, sat her glass of wine down and straightened her dress, readying herself for her company, who appeared as if on cue. Ryan returned with Bart Sanders and his father in tow. I quickly composed myself.

  “Bart,” Valerie lit up, holding her arms out for him. “Thank you for joining us tonight. We appreciate you making the trip,” she said, holding his hands, appearing genuinely gracious.

  I smiled at Ryan, hoping not to alert him to his mother’s behavior. I was still shaking off how quickly she’d turned from polite and happy to meet me to an anaconda threatening to squish me right out of Ryan’s life. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Ryan tried to warn me.

  Bart turned to me. “And who is this lovely young lady?” Valerie quickly answered before Ryan had the chance to introduce me. “This is Annie, Ryan’s little friend from school.” Like we were second graders on a play date. “She’s one of the transfers from Wilson,” she added, a hint of disgust in her tone as if that was something I should have been ashamed of.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Annie.”

  I smiled. “You too.”

  “How about
we sit down for dinner and talk shop?” John suggested. I was sure he was just as anxious as Ryan to get me out of there.

  Dinner was good. I imagined that Valerie hadn’t cooked any of it, but she accepted the compliments just the same. I assumed she didn’t do any household chores.

  “Well, I know all about Ryan, here.” Bart looked at me. “What about you, Annie? Do you play any sports?”

  “I play softball.”

  “Annie’s a pitcher, too,” Ryan stated. “She’s good—throws a changeup I’d never be able to hit.”

  I flushed, embarrassed by his lie.

  “Annie Reynolds!” Bart declared, pointing at me, shaking his finger in recognition. Valerie appeared to have a mild stroke when Bart announced my name. “You hit the home run into the street on Thursday.”

  “How did you know that?” I asked as politely as I could, although I was rightly surprised that a college baseball coach knew who I was. Something I knew wouldn’t help my case for not being a baseball groupie in Valerie’s eyes.

  “My son was at the game,” he chuckled. “His girlfriend pitches for Hoover.”

  “Really? Small world. Huh?” John threw out, glancing at Valerie, who was visibly fuming. “It was all he talked about when he got home. Never seen a softball hit that far before.”

  “Honestly, it was a fluke. I was lucky to get a hold of that fastball she kept throwing me.”

  “You struck her out with that changeup.” Bart rested his fork against his plate and chuckled with his mouth open. “She was furious.” Which seemed to make him happy. It’s hard on your ego; getting struck out when you’re a pitcher.

  “Sorry,” I said quietly.

  “Don’t be. She’s one who needed to be taken down a couple notches. Believe me,” he chuckled again. Then leaned toward me from across the table. “It’s a competition. The whole point is to be better than the other team.” Bart sat back in his chair. “I bet you’ve had a few of these scholarship offers yourself?”

  “I’ve gotten a couple letters, but I don’t plan to play in college.”