“Well, I just—”
“You guys ready to eat?” Dawn asked, appearing in the doorway.
“Uh, sure,” I answered. “But aren’t you waiting for more people?”
“They’re already here,” she said with a questioning look. “You two been, uh, too wrapped up in other things to notice?” she smiled. Without waiting for my reply she added, “We’re waitin’ for ya,” and headed down the hall.
“Since we’re not going out, I’m going to change my clothes,” I said to Gage. “You guys can start without me.”
“Okay,” he replied, kissing me before he stood.
When he left, I grabbed the bag I had with me and quickly changed. I wasn’t surprised when I stepped into the kitchen/family room area and found everyone watching a baseball game on ESPN. The first thing that popped into my head was that Wyatt had subtly mentioned some game he might want to watch that night, and it was all it took for Dawn to say, “Oh okay, let’s do that; I can make you dinner if you want.” And then Wyatt probably mentioned something about Mike and Sean watching the same game and Dawn said, “Oh, just invite them over; I can make dinner for everyone.”
I sighed to myself. I didn’t like being so pessimistic about my sister’s relationship with her boyfriend, but I couldn’t help it. And Wyatt had always been pretty pleasant toward me, so it wasn’t like he was a major jackass or anything. I decided I should probably be fair and stop being so critical about their relationship.
Gage handed me a plate of food that he’d prepared for me and said, “I’ll eat what you can’t.”
I thought it was very thoughtful of him to serve me food, but with a smile I said, “Sure, and you’re just betting that I can’t eat four enchiladas, aren’t you?”
“Surely am,” he grinned.
“Well I gift you two of them already,” I replied, putting my arm around him to kiss his cheek. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. But it was purely a savage instinct. Those guys wouldn’t have left you an olive.”
He motioned to Wyatt and his friends with a nod of his head. All three of them were positioned on the couch next to each other, facing the TV. Dawn was sitting at the table by herself, so I decided to sit across from her, and Gage sat next to me.
“This looks really good, Dawn.”
“Oh, thank you,” she smiled. “Thanks for showing me how to make it. Oh, and I want to try a lasagna next. I think Wyatt would really like that. Can we try that sometime?”
“Yeah, sure. Hey, maybe on Sunday. Gage is coming over if you want to invite Wyatt.”
“Um, probably not,” she replied. “I’m sure he’s got something else going on since it’s his day off.”
No, he just didn’t like spending time with “the parents,” I wanted to say. Dawn knew that too, which is why my family usually only saw Dawn when she was without Wyatt. But I kept my thoughts to myself and enjoyed the evening with Gage and my sister. We ended up joining the others in the family room to watch the Braves battle the Cardinals.
I hardly ever cared where I was with Gage. I’ll admit that it kind of surprised me that the ease we’d had with one another when we used to talk on the phone had remained the same. I felt like I’d known him for a long time, and I had to feel thankful that he’d called me up that one Friday night. I guess maybe I had my sister to thank for that, and I told myself that it was important for me to do so.
I liked watching baseball with Gage. I didn’t even care that the other guys were in the room because Gage and I tended to have our own little side conversations about the game anyway. I figured I’d get made fun of if I asked any questions out loud, so I made sure only Gage could hear me. But it was hard for him to explain something to me when there was always something in the explanation that he’d also have to explain as well. I felt bad that I was so clueless about the game, but Gage was patient with me. I don’t know, maybe he even liked teaching me.
“So you guys still didn’t get your schedule yet?” I asked him when the game was over. I hadn’t even seen him play before and I was looking forward to it.
“Oh, we got it today,” he replied, realizing he’d forgotten to tell me. Everyone was in the kitchen eating the brownies that I’d made during the third inning, but Gage took my hand and led me to the hallway. “I grabbed an extra copy just for you, but they’ve also finally fixed it on the website.” When we made it to his room, he grabbed a sheet of paper from the dresser and handed it to me.
“Oh good,” I said, glancing over the times. “Most of them are after six.”
“Yeah, except for the Saturday and Sunday games.”
“But I can make those no matter what time they’re at,” I smiled. “But for the away games I’ll have to see when they’re during the week.”
“I don’t expect you to make those. Some of them are a couple of hours away.”
I shrugged. “I’ll just have to see, I guess.” I dropped onto his bed stomach first and began entering his schedule on my phone. “Your first game is on Monday?”
He dropped onto the bed right next to me. “Yeah. I thought I told you that.”
With a chuckle I said, “I thought you meant the next Monday. Sorry, I guess now I know what you meant about meshing in just a week. You literally meant one week before games started.”
“Yep,” he replied, turning onto his side to face me. He ran a hand through my hair and then gathered it into a loose ponytail. “And all these guys range from ages eighteen to twenty-two, they’ve all had different high school and college experiences… It’ll be interesting,” he concluded with a smile.
“Did everyone end up getting housed? You said the league relies on host families, right?”
“Yeah, everyone has somewhere to stay for now. There are two guys that are stuffed in with another pair of guys for the time being until they can find another host family, but I think they’ve got it figured out.”
“Or you can stuff ‘em in here,” I joked, glancing around the bedroom. “Wyatt can adopt a couple more ball players.”
“He actually said he didn’t care,” he shrugged. “I know they haven’t found a host family for the two guys coming up from California yet, and they might have to take up a couch here for the time being.”
“Have Wyatt clear out that office by the family room.”
“Yeah I mentioned that. Right now it just stores his junk. He said it could be used as an extra bedroom if they needed it, but I doubt he’ll ever get to clearing it out.”
“Hmm, I can help do it if that’s what it takes.”
“We’d need to fit two beds to go in there, too.”
“No problem. My parents have a set of bunk beds that they’re saving for ‘grandkids,’ ” I said with a smile. “But the beds come apart and make two separate twin beds if those would fit in there. Well, unless the guys prefer to have them as bunk beds…”
Gage chuckled. “It’s not that they’re stacked as bunk beds. It’s the fact that because they’re bunk beds, they have both a headboard and a footboard. Not too comfortable when you’re over six-foot.”
“Well it’s either that or they can sleep on the floor.”
“Yep, beggars can’t be choosers. I kind of got lucky because I got the guestroom in my cousin’s house. None of the other guys have both a big bed and a room to themselves.”
“This is a double-sized bed. You don’t want to snuggle up to another player on your team?”
He scowled. “No way. Maybe if it were you,” he added, raising a brow.
“Oh but I’m sure there would definitely be a ‘no co-ed’ rule enforced,” I teased.
“Ah, very true, so I’m glad you’re not on my team then.”
He was still playing with my hair, but he stopped when I turned to face him. I scooted myself closer to him until we were only inches apart. “So what determines which games you pitch and which games you don’t?” I asked against his lips.
He smiled as he kissed me back and replied, “Um, the starting rota
tion and…yeah.”
I smiled at his lost train of thought. “I don’t know what that means.”
“I can’t think straight when you’re this close to me with your mouth on mine.”
“Do you want me to move?”
“No.”
He put his hand behind my head and laid me onto my back, and while he was still leaning on his elbow, continued to kiss me. I slid my hands to his back and ended up pulling him a little closer—
“I’m telling mom.”
Gage immediately pulled himself away from me and Dawn laughed from the doorway.
“Jeez Gage, I’m not your mom,” she told him. She looked at me and said, “Just thought I’d tell you that I’m heading home.”
I sat up and asked, “Is everything okay?”
“Oh, yeah. The guys are just going to play cards, and you know what a great poker face I have,” she rolled her eyes. “Oh and Gage, they wanted me to ask you if you’d play.”
“Uh, no thanks.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. I’d rather make out with Ellie if I were you, too. Have a good night kiddies,” she waved over her shoulder.
Gage looked at me and said, “That means pick up where we left off.”
I laughed and had to agree.
Chapter Five
I planned on going to Gage’s first game that Monday, whether he pitched or not, but it just so happened to be that he was pitching. I got off work at three that day, headed home, ate, changed, and made it to the ballpark by six. I kind of got a taste of why Dawn was always excited to watch Wyatt’s games because I felt really giddy to be there.
Most of the team was out in the grass, stretching and warming up, and Gage pretty much saw me right away. At first I just kind of stood where I was because I didn’t know where to sit, but then I saw a few of the guys from his team in the dugout to my left, so I decided that was the side to sit on. Gage made his way over, just as I was sitting down.
“Hey, beautiful.”
“Hey.” I left my things on the bleachers and joined him by the railing. “My first sighting of you in a baseball uniform,” I observed. “Very nice.”
He smiled and said, “Nice sweatshirt.”
“Yeah, you like that?” I chuckled. “It was on the seat of my car. Some random person must have left me a Bears sweatshirt while I was at work.”
Most of his team began heading our way for the dugout, and I noticed several eyes looking us over.
“Well some random sister of yours gave me a key to your car.”
“If you were at the radio station, how come you didn’t come see me?”
“Am I allowed to?”
“Sure. Just ask for me at the front desk and they’ll call me.”
“Hmm, I’ll keep that in mind. Oh and by the way,” he smiled, “You sounded great this morning.”
“Did you listen?”
“Mmhmm. How could I not?”
I laughed and said, “I don’t know. So it sounded okay?”
“Yeah, it was really good, Ellie. I think you’ll get a good response. But I think if the listeners knew what you looked like, they’d enjoy picturing your beautiful face right along with listening to your beautiful voice. Just like I did.”
“Hmm, I think you’re just biased.”
“Oh, no,” he insisted with a shake of his head. “This entire city would agree with me. And I think my teammates are also having a good time looking you over right now.”
He wasn’t even looking at any of them, but I glanced over to the dugout and several of them were standing there staring at us and having little conversations with each other. I wished he hadn’t brought it to my attention because it made me feel really insecure.
“Well you’d better go set things straight and inform them that staring is rude.”
“Is it? Then I apologize because I can’t ever stop staring at you.”
“Pssh, get out of here,” I told him, playfully shoving him away. “You’d better focus on that catcher’s glove. Mitt?”
He chuckled. “Kiss me so I can start focusing.”
I did kiss him, but I couldn’t help but wonder how many people were actually watching. “Do your best,” I told him.
With a smile he nodded, and then joined his team in the dugout.
I sat down by myself, except for the other people that were scattered along the bleachers around me. My sister and Wyatt sat down next to me just as the game was about to start, and I was glad they were there. For one, I just liked having my sister with me, and another, they answered any questions I had about the game.
Gage was doing really well through the third inning. The other team hadn’t even gotten a hit off of him, and he’d struck out four batters already. I was returning his smile when he came back to the dugout before the bottom of the third, but just as he disappeared to his bench, another face appeared in my line of sight. It was Dr. Farrell, and I was scared that he thought I was smiling at him when he saw me.
With his own smile, he made his way up the three rows of bleachers and actually sat down right next to me. I was all by myself at the moment because Wyatt and Dawn had left for a trip to the concession stand.
“Hello, Ellie. It’s a small world, eh? My little brother is on the opposing team.”
“Hmm, really? Don’t Europeans play cricket or something? Not baseball?”
He laughed. “Are you really going to stereotype us?” When I didn’t respond he asked, “So I see the boyfriend’s arm is doing okay. It doesn’t seem to be giving him any trouble.”
“Yeah, it’s doing fine.”
“His doctor’s clearance was sufficient?” he asked with a tiny smile. I barely smiled as a reply and he added, “Ah, so he didn’t really need it.”
“No, he did. His coach kind of had a cow when he saw Gage’s arm. He’s a real hot-tempered sort of guy and was going to make him see another doctor.”
“They were stitches, for bloody sake,” he chuckled.
“It looked disgusting,” I scowled.
“Well, I was almost disappointed that you held yourself together so well in the ER. I was hoping to tend you as a patient as well.”
“And how old are you?” I had to know. “Because aren’t most doctors—when they have that ‘doctor’ title—in their thirties or something?”
He chuckled. “Possibly. But when you start your schooling early enough, you find yourself getting your feet wet soon enough as well. I finished university and began in the ER right away. I’ve only lived in the states for about a year. Brought my little brother with me so he could play the manly American version of cricket.”
“I’m amused, but you still didn’t answer my question.”
“Oh, my age. I’m somewhere between twenty and thirty.”
“Thanks for narrowing that down.”
He smiled and said, “Okay, I’m exactly between twenty and thirty.”
I didn’t respond as I considered the piece of information. I watched the game for a minute before I turned to him and asked, “Did you really tell Gage that you thought I wasn’t that into him?”
He lightly laughed. “I suppose in a way I did.”
“What do you mean ‘in a way’? You either did or didn’t, right?”
“Well, here is what I said… After you left I just sort of said something like, ‘Oh, I guess I read your relationship wrong,’ and I apologized. I told him that I just assumed you were his girlfriend—you know, good-looking fellow and a beautiful woman. He said you ‘kind of’ were. So…we began speaking about that. I prefer patients to be busy with other thoughts than of what I’m actually doing to their flesh.”
He smiled when I involuntarily shivered with disgust.
“I could tell he really liked you, though,” he continued. “But he seemed kind of unsure about your take on him. I only mentioned a way to find out for sure, and that was to see how you reacted if I asked you out.”
“Ah, I see. So instead of being the conceited, egotistical jerk I though
t you were, you were only trying to help a fellow mate?”
“Well, yes and no. Sure I wanted to help him out, but I was secretly hoping to acquire your phone number instead. So yes, I really am the egotistical jerk you thought I was.”
That did make me laugh.
“I was a little wounded to see you attached to his arm, though. I rebuked myself for letting my hopes get in the way of reality.”
I was thoroughly amused, but I also felt a little insecure if he was actually telling the truth. I was glad for the game in front of me to view when I didn’t know what to say.
“So I take it things are going well with Gage? You’re here, so I suppose that answers my question affirmatively.”
I finally glanced at him, because while I was busy watching the game, he had been watching me.
“Yes, things are going well. Gage is a great guy.”
He sighed and shook his head playfully. “Not what I wanted to hear. I was hoping that the two of you just realized the need for friendship instead of courtship.”
I smiled.
“I had hope when I saw you here. I was sitting over there—” he pointed to the other side of the stands, “—and I thought, ‘Oh! It’s a sign.’ ” He smiled and then shrugged. “I was wrong again. I’m not doing so well with this.”
“I guess it’s not meant to be.”
“Ouch,” he slightly cringed. “Don’t burst my bubble.”
“My sister is here. Why don’t you rescue her from her boyfriend?”
“Is she a twin?”
“No,” I chuckled. “But we do look a little bit alike—same brown hair and green eyes. And she’s two years older than me.”
“I won’t lie to you and say I’m not interested, but it would feel awkward to pursue her as a second choice.”
“I won’t tell her.”
It was his turn to chuckle. “Where is she?”
“She and her boyfriend went to the concession stand. They should be back soon.”
“So what’s the issue with the boyfriend?”
Summer Swing Page 5
