by Sarina Bowen
“You better look for that underwear!” Anton calls after me. “Don’t jinx us, y’all!”
I take a long, long shower in the hotel’s luxurious locker room. But when I come out, there aren’t any towels. I could swear I grabbed one off a stack on the counter, hanging it on the hook before I got into the shower. But now I’m dripping on the floor and there’s not a towel in sight. “What the hell?”
The only towel in the room is slung around Castro’s hips. He’s standing by a locker, shaking out his shirt. “You know he’s kidding, right?”
“What? Who?” I’m distracted because I’m still trying to solve the towel mystery.
“Anton. He’s a music hound. He plays the guitar and goes to every concert he can find. He was just putting you on with that Texas thing.”
“Oh.” For a split second I feel only annoyance. I fell for that shit? But then I realize something important. If Anton and Castro are pranking me, that’s a good sign. You don’t prank a teammate that you hate. “Wait. Did you take all the towels?”
“Towels?” Castro says innocently. “There are some paper towels in there, I think.” He points to a wall-mounted dispenser.
Because I’m a little slow, I actually walk over to the dispenser, if only to mop up the water I’ve dripped on the floor.
It’s empty.
“Fuck you,” I grumble, and Castro laughs. So I do the only reasonable thing, which is to stalk over to him, grip the edge of the towel he’s wearing, and yank it off his body.
Castro, bare-assed now, just snorts. “I was done with that anyway.”
“Good thing.” I dry myself off as best I can with his wet towel. “Did you really take the paper towels out of the dispenser? That’s pro-level. I hope you’ll put ’em back, though, so that some underpaid hotel worker isn’t cleaning up after your little prank.”
“Don’t you worry.” Castro opens his locker and shows me a tower of towels—cotton on the bottom, paper on top. “I left the toilet paper in the stalls. Once I watched a player try to dry himself off with TP. It disintegrates, you know? He was picking little pieces out of his underwear for days.”
I shake my head. The prank could have been worse, I guess. If I wasn’t willing to grab his towel, I probably would have walked back into the weight room buck-ass naked for a workout towel.
We get dressed in silence for a few minutes. Right until Castro opens his yawp and says, “So. You and Bess, huh? What exactly are your intentions?”
“My—” I let out a chuckle. “What are you, her dad? And is this 1955? Where do you get off asking me that?”
It comes out sounding snippy, and I fully expect Castro to get mad. But he just sits down on the bench and calmly levels me with a brown-eyed stare “You got to stop thinking of me as a young punk who doesn’t know things. And you really shouldn’t blow off my question. Bess doesn’t date players.”
“Yeah, except for this one. And I bet she wouldn’t be super-excited about you discussing it behind her back.”
He doesn’t even flinch. “But she really doesn’t date players. She says she needs to be able to go anywhere with us in any situation and never have to wonder if people will whisper about her. She says that’s the only way she can do her job.”
“I get that,” I say testily. “Except she’s not my agent. And obviously she’s made a different choice this time. So maybe you shouldn’t question it.”
“But that’s just the thing,” Castro presses. “She did make a different choice. She broke her own rule for you. And that means something. Something big.”
There’s a bad joke in there somewhere about something big. But I let it go. I would never embarrass Bess. And she wouldn’t like this conversation at all.
“She likes you,” Castro says. “She really likes you. That’s what I’m saying. So I hope you’re worth it. Are you gonna treat her right?”
The question makes me bristle, but I won’t give him the satisfaction of letting it show. “Aw.” I chuckle. “Thanks so much for asking. I’m glad you guys are so loyal to Bess. But, yeah. Bess is special to me.” It’s a hundred percent true, too. I’m startled by how I feel about her. Lately I’m wearing a silly grin half the time, because she put it there. It’s not just the sex, either. She’s made me feel like my fun self again. Like everything in the world isn’t so fucking complicated.
“She doesn’t need anyone fucking around on her,” Castro says.
“Oh man. I thought we were having a moment, and you had to go and ruin it. Not that it’s any of your business, but I never cheated on anybody. Don’t believe everything you read. I’m good to Bess, and I was good to her way back when flip phones were still popular.”
He frowns. “I know the bloggers don’t care about a little thing like the truth. I’m not an idiot. But I do know this—Bess wouldn’t take a chance on you if it didn’t matter to her. But you’re this bitter guy who just got divorced. Last night you told Jimbo never to get married.”
“Yeah, and I was kidding. That kid is twenty, and I’m sure he’s smart enough not to marry someone who will divorce his ass and then still text seven times during dinner to ask him how to flip a circuit breaker in the garage of the home you bought in the neighborhood she chose even though it gave you a shitty commute.”
And now I’m in a piss-poor mood again. Thanks, kid.
Castro shrugs. “I don’t begrudge you the pain. I’ve known loss, and it isn’t pretty. But please don’t make it Bess’s problem. I’m very protective of her. We all are.”
“Because she’s your teammate’s sister.” That’s why I’m getting the extended remix version of this speech.
“It’s more than that. She’s been through a lot.”
“Uh-huh,” I agree, even if I don’t know exactly what he’s referring to. “Dave is her only family, right?”
“Maybe.” He scratches his chin. “Their dad might still be alive somewhere. But he wouldn’t dare enter a room if Dave is around. Or me, for that matter. Bess used to be his punching bag. Even when she was only yay high.” He holds his hand down by the floor.
I do a poor job of keeping the surprise off my face, because Bess never mentioned her father to me. “She grew up with her grandparents.”
“Eventually,” he corrects me. “Not until Dave was fourteen. He realized he couldn’t always be there to step in front of his father’s fist. And he was sick of watching his little sister get bruised. And burned, too. There’s a scar on her arm.” He touches the inside of his elbow. “Cigarette burn. That’s one of the ways her dad kept her in line.”
Something goes wrong in my stomach. I know that scar. I’ve kissed that scar. But I never asked Bess where it came from.
“Eventually, Dave landed on a strategy—he breaks his own face with a wrench.” Castro taps his cheek. “Two bones. Just so someone would report their dad to social services.”
I honestly might vomit if he says anything more. I’ve spent the last couple of months whining about my trade, and my divorce. Then turning to Bess to cheer my sorry ass up. Meanwhile, she’s cheerfully putting up with my bullshit after barely surviving childhood? I kind of want to punch myself right now.
“Anyway…” Castro shrugs as he pulls on his socks. “Bess has already had her fair share of difficulty. If you bring her any more, I will end you. And so will Dave.”
“Yeah,” I grit out. “Message received.”
But he’s not even done. “Dave had it worse, I guess. Their mom died of a drug overdose when Bess was still little. Dave found their mom on the living room floor after he got home from kindergarten. Bess was screaming her head off in her crib for hours.”
I’m all out of words. I just stare at him, trying to picture Dave Beringer at five, standing next to his mother’s dead body.
Castro stands up and zips his jeans. “I said my piece. Just don’t let her down. She deserves the world.”
“I know.” Of course she does. And I’m suddenly craving her so bad. I wonder how many hours are left in this day befo
re I can sneak off to my hotel room and call her, just to hear her voice. She’s on her way to Vermont, though. She said the phone service is spotty up there. So we might not connect.
But I hope we do. Missing Bess on the road is a familiar feeling. Back when I was twenty-three and watching my teammates hook up, I’d been so lonely for her.
I never told her, though. I still haven’t.
Castro leaves, and I stay there for a while, sitting on the fancy spa bench. It’s dawning on me that Bess must not have wanted me to know about her childhood. It’s the only explanation for why she’s never said a word about it.
And I don’t know what to do with this realization. Was it pride that kept her from telling me? Or did she think I wouldn’t care? The truth is that I’ve never given her the chance to confide in me. We were so young the first time we met. I remember wanting to impress her. I was trying to impress the whole world.
It worked, I guess. We impressed the hell out of each other on a regular basis. But I’m not that kid anymore. I’ve figured out that impressing people only goes so far. Now I need more.
I’ve seen that scar on Bess’s arm so many times. Yet I never asked how she got it. Maybe I didn’t want to ruin the fun. But now we’re past that, aren’t we? Bess means a lot to me. If she’ll talk to me about her past, I’m ready to listen.
I told Bess that being together didn’t have to be a “life-changing thing.” But somehow it already is.
Can a jaded divorcé fall in love again? Maybe this one already did.
Twenty-Three
That’s Not an Ax
Bess
“And then Cinderella accidentally turned into a mouse. The end.”
My niece looks up at me with her little pink mouth open in surprise. “No, Aunt Best! Read it for real.”
“I did, you stinker.” I close the book. “Three times. We’re both going to get in big trouble if you don’t go to bed soon. Your daddy is going to give us both a spanking.”
“No. Daddy not do that.” Nicole grins at me, showing off a perfect set of tiny teeth.
“Of course not,” I whisper. Spankings are just a fiction to Nicole. “But it’s still bedtime.” Not that I’m much of a disciplinarian, either. My niece is wearing pink, striped pajamas that make her short legs look like sausages. She’s so cute and cuddly that I would honestly sit in this rocking chair all night and hold her. And this adorable little scamp is dragging out her bedtime to epic proportions because she knows I’m a huge softie.
But Zara is making dinner downstairs. So I rise from the rocking chair, hugging Nicole tightly. She wraps her arms around me, too. It will be a struggle to let go of her. “Sleep with the angels, baby.”
“Night, Best.”
And now I have actual tears in my eyes. I hope she never stops calling me that. I’m so smitten it’s ridiculous. I have to force myself to set her down in the crib. One of the sides is removed, because at two and a half, my baby is not so much of a baby anymore.
I cover her with the blanket and ruffle the coppery curls near her face. “Night, angel. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“I climb on your bed?”
“Of course.” And lord help me, that will probably happen at six thirty. But that’s why I’m here. I moved eight hundred miles just to be more available for six thirty wakeups with this child, in this house. I give her one more kiss on her satin cheek, and then make myself leave the room.
Slowly I descend the stairs, taking a moment to put on my game face. I’ve decided that I need to tell my brother about Tank, because I don’t want him to hear it as gossip.
Honestly, it’s not a big deal. Dave is vaguely aware that there are occasionally men in my life. And I’m thirty freaking years old. Although he does have a classic “nobody is good enough for my baby sister” complex. So that’ll be fun.
I dread talking about Tank, though. Because Dave will ask me if it’s serious, and I’ll have to say no. And if he asks me whether I want something serious with Tank, I don’t know what I’ll say. Because I do want more. But you can’t always have the things you want.
In the kitchen, I find Zara but not Dave. She’s adding cream to a pan full of crumbled…
“Is that sausage?” I ask. “It smells good.”
“Sure is. We buy it from a farmer in Tuxbury.”
“And what do you use it for?”
“This is going over pasta, with some garlic, peas, and chives in a white sauce.”
My stomach rumbles. “Can I help with dinner?”
Zara gives me a smile. “Probably not. No offense.” My lack of cooking skills is widely known. “How about you pour a couple mugs of that hot cider and take one out to the lumberjack outside?”
“Sure. But you could put me to work setting the table or something.”
“It’s handled, Bess. You did the hard work of putting that kid to bed. Have some cider and make sure Dave doesn’t remove any important body parts while he’s splitting wood.”
“Okay. I won’t spike his, then.”
“Good idea.” She picks up a ramekin full of chopped herbs and adds them to the pan with the sausage. Her cooking smells wonderful, and I’ll bet it’s something I could learn to do if I just put in the time.
The other morning when Tank asked me why I don’t cook, I flat out lied. It’s not that I don’t have any interest. It’s just that putting food on the table was always a fraught issue when I was young. There was never enough of it. My father couldn’t be bothered. And then my grandmother complained about how much we ate.
Dave used to heat up cans of soup and stew for me. I think he mastered Kraft dinners at some point, because I remember watching him sprinkle packets of powdered cheese over pasta.
“Hey, Zara?” I ask spontaneously.
“Hmm?” my sister-in-law asks as she pours the pasta into boiling water.
“Someday will you teach me to cook a few things? Just to get me started.”
“Sure!” She throws a smile over her shoulder. “That would be fun.”
“Thanks,” I say gruffly. And then I reheat the cider for Dave and myself. Because even a dummy like me can use the microwave.
Outside, the evening is cool, and the light is gone. Dave is splitting wood in the glow of the porch light. It gets dark early in Vermont in November. But I love the cool, crisp air and the scent of pine on the breeze.
While my brother does hard physical labor, I’m sipping a mug of cider and thinking deep thoughts about what I might want to learn how to cook.
Life is good.
Dave stands another log on a wide, flat stump. Then he lifts the ax high and splits it with one sharp blow.
I cackle. “I swear this is better entertainment than a playoffs game. Who knew you’d turn into a lumberjack with an ax?”
“Not an ax. A maul.”
“What’s the difference?”
“A maul is heavier and duller than an ax. It splits the wood by force, not blade sharpness.”
I crack up again. “Who knew, big brother? Who knew.”
“You go ahead and have your fun.” He flashes me a smile. The stupid man doesn’t even care that I’m teasing him. That’s how much he loves Vermont. “Want to try it?”
“Are you kidding? I’d probably lose a limb.”
“Nah. Come here. Quick, before we have to go in for dinner.”
Reluctantly, I set down the mug of cider and stand next to Dave.
He hands me the maul with a grin that says he knows I’m nervous but also too stubborn to say so. “Let gravity do all the work. So long as you keep your eye on the log, and your body out of the way, there’s nothing to it.”
I lift the maul overhead. It’s kind of heavy, but I don’t complain. Then—taking care with my aim—I let it fall to the cut end of the log.
I’m too tentative. Instead of splitting the log neatly in two, the maul just sticks into the log’s top. When I tug on the handle, the log lifts with the maul’s blade.
Now it’s Da
ve’s turn to laugh. He takes the maul from my hand, aims, and brings the whole mess down onto the stump with a bang. The log splits neatly away from the maul. “Try again.”
“No. My drink is getting cold.”
“Dare you.”
“Asshole!”
He cracks up again. Neither of us will ever refuse a dare. Bravery was our sibling code. Because it took an act of bravery just to walk through the door every night. We had the kind of childhood that people don’t talk about in polite company.
When I watch my brother stacking all those wedges of wood he’s just split, I feel like I can see two different people. There’s the happy father splitting wood for his new wife and their three fireplaces. And there’s the frightened boy who’s desperate enough to break his own face to save us both.
The back door opens. “Dinner in five minutes!” Zara calls out before disappearing inside again.
I stand up quickly, because when someone calls you to dinner, you go.
“Hang on,” he says. “There’s something I have to tell you.”
My stomach dips, and I don’t even know why.
Dave turns to me with a smile. “We’re having another baby in May.”
Oh.
“A baby,” I echo. “Oh, wow.” It takes a second for the news to sink in. I don’t know why I hadn’t seen it coming.
“Yeah, my teammates were right on target with their teasing.” He chuckles. “This time it’s a little boy.”
“Oh! Congratulations!” The guys in Brooklyn had some kind of pool going to bet on how soon after Dave’s retirement he and Zara would have a second child. It’s funny when a cliché comes true.
But my insides are swimming in turmoil.
The existence of my brother’s first child had been a huge shock. For two years after his first tryst with Zara, Dave hadn’t known he had a child with her. That drama is over now, and I’m happy for them.
So why do I feel so gutted right now? “Congratulations,” I choke out.
“Thank you,” he says quietly.
“In May,” I say slowly, turning it over in my mind. While I’m watching the playoffs, my brother will be welcoming his baby son into the world. This time he’ll be there at the hospital, encouraging Zara to push.
