Breakout Play

by Rebel Hart

  Of her bare skin against mine, of the sound her breath made when it whispered between her lips in the softest sigh of pleasure. Of how her body had sucked me in, as desperate and needy as my own. Of her lips against mine.

  We passed side streets lined with houses with big front yards and driveways packed with cars. Kim gazed out her window and sat low in her seat, seemingly content for the time being as she peered through open windows into living rooms and dining rooms.

  I remembered this about her from when we were kids. Keith used to drive us around all the time. He was the first one with his license for a good year. Had I not failed my test two times in a row and then refused to go back out of sheer stubbornness until Roger convinced me to get my head out of my ass, I might have been there to do some of the driving. But Keith liked being the chauffer. Anytime we’d run out together to go to the movie store to rent a VHS or hit the ice cream parlor on Eighth Street, Kim would tag along. Keith would put up a stink but I never minded her company. She was always content to sit in the back seat with her chin in her hand gazing out at all the houses we passed.

  She said she liked to see how other people lived and there was no better time than at night when people’s lights were on and their blinds were still open. She used to say it was like looking into a sliver of their life.

  Over the years I’d caught myself doing that anytime I went for a stroll or a drive at night.

  Rain pattered against the windshield and only came down harder as the minutes passed. I flicked on the windshield wipers. They squeaked across the glass for the first couple of swipes before going quiet.

  Kim rolled her head to the side to look at me. “So are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “Well. Yes. That’s why I’m asking.”

  “Patience. You’ll see in a minute.”

  She rolled her eyes and turned her attention to the road as we came to a stop at a red light. I could tell by the hardness of her jaw and the tension in her shoulders that she was deep in thought, and whatever it was she was thinking about was bothering her. I wanted to ask. But now wasn’t the time. She was still pissed at me and therefore very unlikely to open up about whatever was weighing on her.

  Hopefully by the end of the night that would change. If I could get her laughing I knew we could come back together. That’s all it ever took with Kim. Laughter.

  I loved that about her.

  She sat up a little straighter when I turned onto Dunlap Avenue. Then she shot me a suspicious look. “Are we going to Archie’s?”

  “Maybe.”

  Her smile brightened and chased away the lingering heaviness I sensed from her. She gripped the handle in the door panel and leaned forward as the old school theater sign for the only arcade in Long Grove lit up the raindrops on the windshield.

  When I slowed down and turned into the parking lot, she slapped the dashboard victoriously. “I knew it! I haven’t been to Archie’s in… wow, I don’t even know. Years.”

  “Me neither.” I pulled into a space and killed the ignition. Kim fumbled with her seatbelt, suddenly in a hurry to get a move on with this date night, and I chuckled as she cursed the contraption. I reached over and helped her out. “Calm down, Kimwick. They’re open until midnight. We have time.”

  She opened her door and stepped out, shielding her face and neck with a lifted collar of her jacket. “Hurry up, Hughes. It’s cold as balls out here.”

  “Balls aren’t cold.”

  “Shut up.”

  “You’d know.” I winked as I locked the car with the remote.

  She fell into step beside me and threw her head back in mock laughter. “Very funny.”

  “I thought so.”

  To my surprise she moved in close as we approached the front doors of the arcade and wrapped her hands around my upper arm. She slid one hand down the inside of my forearm, where she slipped her fingers between mine and squeezed.

  “Thanks for taking me out tonight,” she said softly. “I needed it.”

  “My pleasure.”

  She walked with only a slight limp. We reached the doors and I tugged them open for her, letting her go inside first. We were hit with the sounds of children laughing and parents shouting out orders as they tried to wrangle their children to bring them home. Kim grinned from ear to ear as we passed old games we used to spend hours on when we were teenagers. As we passed the concession, where we could buy tokens to play and purchase prizes with won tickets, she took a deep breath.

  “It still smells like popcorn and old carpet in here,” she said.

  It most certainly did. I gave her hand a squeeze. “Let’s go get some tokens so I can kick your ass.”

  She pushed away from me and hurried to get into line, only favoring her left leg a little bit. I wasn’t going to tell her to take it easy. She’d tell me to take a hike and stick my advice where the sun don’t shine. She was a big girl. She knew what she could and couldn’t handle.

  Besides, games were a safe choice. She wouldn’t have to run or crouch or do any of that nonsense.

  I stood behind her in line. “I think it’s hilarious that you think you’ll be able to beat me. You couldn’t beat me when we were kids. Why would any of that have changed?”

  She flashed me a wicked smile before rolling up her jacket sleeves. “You wanna know how a girl copes with losing her chance at playing her sport for a living?”

  I frowned. “How?”

  “She plays video games. All the time. Better get ready for me to wipe the floors with you, champ. Don’t worry. I’ll try not to embarrass you too badly.”

  I chuckled. “Bring it on, Kimwick.”

  27

  Kimberly

  Archie’s was somehow exactly the same as I remembered and yet completely different all at the same time.

  It smelled the same; old and musky and buttery. Every now and then I was struck with the overwhelming smell of corndogs and cotton candy when people passed by with trays, searching for tables in the sitting area near the concession. Games rattled and banged and beeped all around us as we moved through the arcade, soaking in the sight and feel of the place before we actually committed to playing anything.

  They still had the old classics I used to come for as a kid: skeet ball, racing, DDR, hoops, and a single bowling lane. About seventy-five percent of the games were the same ones we used to play, and the other twenty-five were new games like Deal or No Deal and a massive life-sized version of Connect Four. There was also a life-sized chess board that took up a lot of space in one of the sections.

  It was loudest near the air hockey tables, where William and I were heading first.

  Back when we were teenagers, he and Keith used to have vicious air hockey competitions that always ended with bloody knuckles and bruised egos. I used to sit on the ‘sidelines’ with Jade while she gushed over how hot William was. I was too busy itching for my turn against one of them to care about that. Whenever I got one of said chances I always got my ass kicked but I didn’t care. I just wanted to play.

  “Are you sure you want to start our first date off with me humiliating you?” William asked as he swiped his playing card in the slot on the side of the air hockey table. Apparently Archie’s no longer used tokens to purchase game play. They’d switched to a much more modern system of having their guests load their playing cards with money and then using that to pay for each individual game. A round of air hockey was seventy-five cents.

  “You might want to save that cocky attitude, buddy,” I teased, taking my position at one end of the table and bracing myself with my hands planted on the frame. “You have no clue how much air hockey I played after I injured my knee. If this was a competitive sport you bet your ass I’d be NHL level.”

  He laughed. The sound drowned out the racket of the surrounding games and I couldn’t help myself. I grinned and laughed too.

  “From where I’m standing you’re the cocky one,” William said.
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  I shrugged one shoulder. “You say cocky. I say confident. There’s a difference.”

  “But that difference doesn’t apply to me?”

  “Nope. You’re an—”

  “Ass?”

  “Yep,” I said.

  He plucked the flat puck from the tray on his side of the table and slapped it down beneath his palm. He wielded his blue paddle in one hand, taunting me before slamming it down beside the puck. His eyebrow arched and his mouth twitched in a devil-may-care smile that made my knees weak—and my injured one doubly so. “Ready?” he asked.

  “Let’s see what you’ve got, Hughes.”

  He sent the puck careening to my end of the table. I shot it back. The hard slaps of the puck echoed through the arcade. William’s laugh was wild and carefree, and I couldn’t help but give in to the giggles that bubbled up out of me. Every time his shot came close to going through the slot that was my net, he’d cry out in bitter disappointment.

  I hadn’t been lying. I was fucking good at air hockey.

  I earned the first goal. And the second and third.

  William cursed his inability to get anything past me, and I had to gently remind him not to swear so loudly. We were in an arcade and there were dozens of kids around.

  “Shouldn’t they be going home soon?” William asked bitterly as he slid my score keeping tile from left to right, marking my fourth goal. He was still at zero. Zilch. Nadda. “I mean, don’t they have school in the morning?”

  “Who cares? From where I’m standing you should be worried about losing to your best friend’s little sister, not about the curfew of strangers’ kids.”

  He rubbed at his chest. “I don’t think I can handle how mean you’re going to get when you win.”

  “So you accept that you’re going to lose?”

  “Based on how this is going, I think it would be unwise to assume anything different.”

  “You’re learning, Hughes. I respect that.”

  He rolled his eyes and set the puck up once more. “I’ll be damned if I let you get a shutout, though.”

  “How cute. You’d be happy with one little goal, then?”

  “Yes,” he said shamelessly. “A lot happier than with zero.”

  “Let’s go then.”

  He fired another shot across the table. It careened toward me and I deflected it back, sending it into the corner, where it got caught up between the frame and his paddle. He got it out and smoothly countered it back to my end, bouncing it off the wall in the middle of the table. It came right to my net. William tensed. His eyes went wide. He thought he had it.

  I trapped the puck under my paddle and looked up from beneath my brows.

  William threw his hands in the air. “Oh, come on!”

  I fired the puck back across the table.

  He frantically tried to get his paddle down in time but I was too quick. The puck slammed through the flat net and clinked down into the tray on his end of the table.

  William hung his head and let out a defeated sigh. “Damn it.”

  I leaned up against the table. “Wanna go to ten, then?”

  “And suffer more of this? No. Thanks. I’m good.”

  “You sure? I could play left handed.”

  “Don’t patronize me,” he muttered as he slid my score tile. The table lit up. My side flashed and chimed that I was the victor. William brooded at his end of the table while I tossed my paddle down, clasped my hands together, and shook them over each shoulder in victory. William came to my side of the table and wrapped an arm around my shoulders to steer me away from it. “Come on, Little Miss Humble. Let’s try something else.”

  “Racing?”

  He flexed his fingers. “Sure.”

  I kicked his ass at that, too.

  With a wounded ego, William accepted my offer to take a break after another half hour of me lighting him up in front of some hockey fans who’d gathered around to watch our ice hockey rematch. After I slaughtered him he signed autographs and suffered some light teasing from some fathers, who cracked some jokes at William’s expense.

  Good thing there’s real hockey for guys like you, huh?

  You’d kick her ass if you had your skates on, man.

  We stood in line to get a late night snack. It was nearly eleven o’clock. We still had plenty of time to kill and both of us were feeling peckish.

  I pointed up at the menu board. “Blue raspberry slushies. Damn. Do you remember those things? They were so good. We used to come here just for those in the summer.”

  “Share?” William asked.

  I nodded. We moved up to the front of the line and ordered one blue slushie, a bottle of water, and two corn dogs. Once our order came up, William took the tray and we found a table away from the other people who sat at their tables on their phones with their heads down. Not many kids were left in the place and those that did linger were older and likely had their own cars out in the parking lot.

  “This was a good idea,” I said after my first bite of my corn dog. I plunged the end into my ketchup and mustard.

  “You’re only saying that because you won every game we played. I have deep regrets about bringing you here. Consider this our first and last date at Archie’s.”

  “That implies there will be a second date somewhere else?” I asked.

  He paused with the slushie halfway to his mouth. “Erm. Yes. Yes it does.”

  I smiled down at my plate. “I’m glad me kicking your ass didn’t shatter your confidence too much.”

  He sucked the blue raspberry slushie up the straw. As soon as it touched his tongue, his cheeks puckered and he squeezed his eyes closed. A strange, guttural sound came out of him as he shoved the slushie away and forced himself to swallow. When he opened his eyes they were watering. “Holy hell that’s awful.”

  “What?” I laughed, reaching for the drink. “There’s no way! These things were so good—” I sucked it back. My eyes widened as my taste buds tried to figure out if the drink was too sweet or too sour or a horrible combination of both. I forced it down my throat. “Oh. That is bad.”

  William tore a bite of his corndog off to chase away the lingering puckering feeling I imagined he was feeling. My whole mouth felt like it was trying to cave in on itself. I took a bite of my food too. It helped. Then we passed the water back and forth.

  I licked my lips. “That was awful.”

  “Offensive, really.”

  I laughed.

  William leaned forward and rested on his forearms when he finished eating. I was still working through the last couple bites of my corn dog when he nodded at me. “Do you think your dad is unimpressed that I took you out tonight?”

  “What? No,” I said honestly. “Why would you think that?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. I know he and I are close, but I worry that might change now. You’re his little girl.”

  “Not likely. My dad loves you. Probably more than he loves me and Keith,” I joked.

  “I love him too,” William said simply.

  I nodded. “I know you do.”

  He fell back against his seat. I wiped my lips with my napkin and sat back, too.

  “Should we get out of here?” he asked. “I can take you home.”

  I didn’t want to go home. I didn't want the night to end. But I could tell William’s brain was suddenly turning with thoughts about my father and what dating me might mean for their relationship. Apparently he hadn’t considered this before he asked me out.

  “Sure.” I stood up and picked up our tray. He followed me as I carried it to the closest garbage bin. “Let’s go.”

  28

  William

  What was Roger going to think about me dating his daughter?

  About me falling for her?

  And why hadn’t I thought about this before?

  I didn’t want things to change. Not for me and Kim’s parents, anyway. I still wanted—and needed—the relationship I had with them and I hoped they wanted it to
o. But what if I could only have one and not the other?

  What if it was Kim or her parents?

  That thought didn’t sit well with me as we pulled out of the Archie’s parking lot. Kim was quiet in the passenger seat and seemed content. If her mind was spinning with the same thoughts as mine it didn’t show. Then again, it probably wouldn’t. She’d always been a quiet contemplator.

  Suddenly she broke the quiet. “You’ll have to have me over to see your new place one of these days. Or nights.”

  “Yeah?”

  Kim smiled at me as she rested comfortably against the headrest of the seat. “Yeah. I’d love to see the digs of a pro NHL player.”

  All thoughts of Roger and whether or not he would approve went out the window. “Why not tonight?”

  “You don’t need warning so you can frantically clean the place up before having a girl over?”

  “Do you think so little of me?” I asked.

  Kim nodded. “Yes. I do.”

  I laughed. “No. I don’t need time to power clean.”

  “I’m impressed.”

  “Don’t be. I have a cleaning service.”

  “Naturally.” She snickered.

  I turned the car around and made for downtown Chicago. It was thirty-five miles from Long Grove, but the drive was pleasant at this hour on a weeknight. Not many people were out on the roads and we stayed off the highway, opting instead for winding back roads through municipalities. I was forced to endure Kim’s endless teasing about how easily she’d beaten me at nearly every single game we played back at Archie’s.

  Her smartass comments fell silent when I pulled up to my apartment building and turned into the underground parking. She was probably struck by how impressive the building was, all sleek lines and modern design.