by Ginger Scott
“I don’t know, you’re pretty sweet—like a cherry,” he laughs.
“If you call me cherry again, I’ll punch you,” I say quickly. He shakes his head with a chuckle, holding up a hand to point at me.
“Okay, Joss. Joss the boss,” he winks.
I roll my eyes, but when I turn around, I smile because boss is a whole lot better than cherry.
“We’re just going to hit a few more. You girls okay sticking around?” Levi asks.
“Fine by us,” I say, rounding the fence and sitting on the bottom bleacher next to my friend. “We’ll just wait here so we can, you know, give you more pointers?”
“Ha…teach me anything you want, Boss,” TK says, stepping back into the box.
I stand to untie my flannel from around my waste, sliding my arms through again. I let the sleeves drape on me, though, letting one fall off my shoulder enough that it exposes my bare skin and the black strap of my tank top. Levi looks at it, and licks his lips before sliding his mask over his face and kneeling down next to TK. He’s so easy. He’s also not the reason I did it.
Wes is wearing his hat low again, and he reaches up to adjust it before digging his foot into the mound. He’s counting on the shadow of his brim to mask him, but it’s not dark enough. I can still see his eyes—and they’re on me. I let my lip curl on one side as I tug my hair loose from the ponytail before I sit down to watch, my blond strands twisting and knotting in the breeze. I sweep my hair over my other shoulder, happy that Wes is watching every movement. And between each pitch, those eyes…they always come back to me.
The boys hit for about half an hour while Taryn and I both smoke a cigarette. I’m stomping mine out when TK hops back over the fence from grabbing the ball I fouled off into the field. He steps up next to me, nudging me with the bucket of balls.
“That’s bad for you, ya know. You should quit,” he says, nodding toward the butt on the ground.
“Yeah, well…I’ve got a long list of shit I should quit, TK. Trust me when I say smoking every now and then is the least of my problems.” I smile at him after I talk. I think I’m clever, but he doesn’t look amused. It makes me a little uncomfortable; I look away quickly, bending down to pick up the smooshed cigarette end. I may have a laundry list of bad habits, but littering isn’t one of them. I carry it in my palm to the trash at the end of the dugout then fall into step alongside TK, Taryn on my other side. Levi and Wes walk several steps in front of us. Levi looks over his shoulder a few times; Wes only picks up his pace, like he can’t drop Taryn and me off fast enough.
“So, Boss,” TK says. I sigh, but I give in to the smile. I hate to admit it, but I kind of like this new nickname. I think I also like that he’s moved on from my smoking and other flaws. “That’s some swing,” he says, gesturing toward the field behind us with his neck. “You play, right?”
Before I can answer, Taryn snickers. I roll my eyes and push her off balance, making her stumble a few steps.
“Joss Winters is the best shortstop in California,” she blurts out, sticking her tongue out at me as she takes a step to the side so I can’t hit her again.
“Ah, I don’t know about that,” TK says. “I’m pretty sure I’m the best shortstop in California.”
I look down at my feet and let my smile crease my cheeks before I pull my phone from my pocket and pretend I’m getting a call.
“What? Who are you looking for? TK?” I say to my fake caller. I hold the device in my hand to face him, and he pinches his brow. “It’s the President. He wants you to know that you’re actually number two now.”
It takes a few seconds for TK to let his laughter break through, but when it does, it’s easy and comforting. I like that I can tease him.
“You all go to North?” Taryn asks. I can tell TK’s answer is the one she really cares about. She’s never been good at hiding her emotions, and she bites at her bottom lip now like a child asking Santa for the latest hot toy.
“We start at South on Monday. Just moved here,” TK answers. Taryn nods, her eyes flashing a hell yeah to mine in a split second. I think about his words for a few seconds, glancing up at the rest of the we walking in front of us.
“You all just moved here?” I let my question spill out slowly, noticing Wes doesn’t pause or even seem to acknowledge my question at all. I’m starting to get the sense that he’s not real thrilled about giving us a ride home.
“Yep,” Levi says, spinning around and walking backward for a few steps. “We’re brothers.”
I nod, sucking my lip tightly while I do my best to attempt to understand how they all fit together without asking.
“You’re…seniors?” I settle on nailing down their ages first.
“Close, Cher—” TK starts, stopping his slip up mid-word, shaking his head, and chuckling to himself. “Damn, that became habit fast. I meant Boss. And no…we’re juniors. You?”
“Me and Taryn are too,” I say, tugging my shirt snug to my body as the sun starts to set. The wind is picking up some.
We’re getting closer to the truck, and Wes hasn’t said a word. I’m not even sure he actually speaks. He reaches the locked gate first, stepping up easily and placing one foot on the chain while he swings his body over to the other side. He turns his hat backward before reaching to the top of the fence to take the bucket of balls from Levi, but just before the exchange, his eyes move to mine. It’s such a small glance, and I’m right in front of him; there really wasn’t anywhere else for his gaze to land. But somehow it also feels choreographed, as if he’d been working this trip out several steps ahead of the rest of us just so he’d have this chance to silently confront me, study me, and look at me like this through a thin layer of chain link, close enough to touch if it weren’t for the metal barrier between us. My stomach knots, and I feel uneasy under his scrutiny—it feels like a warning.
This is unfair coming from eyes like that.
“Hey, wait…” Levi says after passing the bucket over. Wes turns away the second Levi speaks, so I give him all of my attention, my eyes wide, and my lips sealed. “You’re not related to Eric Winters, are you?”
I squeeze at my sleeve, which is now bunched in my palm, and rap my knuckles against my thigh as my teeth clench and my lips force out a smile. It’s not Levi’s fault he’s so enthusiastic about my connection to Coach Winters. He plays baseball, and my father will love him. He’ll love all three of them, actually. And Eric Winters is a big deal when it comes to California baseball. Seven state titles, forty-plus college players, and a dozen drafted into the majors. Unfortunately, his statistics in the father department suck ass.
“That’s why you’re so good!” he says, taking a step back, as if he’s surprised. I try to remind myself that his reaction isn’t his fault. It’s normal, the same assumption everyone makes. It still irks me, and my mind still runs through the same sarcastic response I usually give. Yes—this is the secret to my success, Levi. You’ve pieced it together. I have spectacular genes when it comes to running bases and throwing a ball. No effort of my own went into my talent on my part whatsoever.
“Or maybe she just practices harder than you do,” Wes’s voice breaks through my inner dialogue. He rolls his eyes at Levi, taking the bats through the fence as he defends me without my asking, without knowing he should. His eyes graze over mine again as he turns, pausing for a beat—long enough that I feel it and blink.
He was giving his brother shit, mostly. But he was also saying what I wouldn’t. Thanks. The word passes through my head, through my chest, but then the second he turns and steps to the truck it’s gone.
“Right, no…I didn’t mean that. I only meant that’s cool and all—your dad,” Levi stutters, glancing to me before climbing over the fence, focusing on his hands and feet. I see him shake his head to admonish himself; he’s embarrassed.
“I know what you meant. Yeah, it’s…cool…I guess,” I say, looking to Taryn before fitting my shoes into the fence holes so I can climb. She holds her mouth in a tight line in res
ponse, because she’s been with me through it all, and she knows my father’s failures all too well. No sense in tearing him down in front of these three, though.
We all clear the fence, and Wes secures the equipment against the cab in the back of the truck. Levi and TK jump in the back, insisting Taryn and I sit up front. I climb in reluctantly, not really wanting to sit so close to Wes, but Taryn doesn’t follow. I should have known she’d want to ride in the back near TK. I’m going to be in here with him—Mr. Talkative—completely alone. I guess I can fill most of the time with directions to my house.
I scoot closer to the door and pull it shut before reaching for the seatbelt. I hear Wes’s door close, but I don’t look at him. On instinct, I start to hold my breath, like I’m in the middle of some dare, being trapped in a box—a box with a boy that I can’t deny is hot, if not for his personality shortcomings.
The seatbelt won’t click, and I feel my lungs starting to ache from the lack of breath, and the more I fumble with the metal clip and the buckle, the more panic seeps through my veins and starts to take over my muscle control.
Wes clears his throat before sliding his hand along the seat toward my failed attempts, and my eyes widen at the sight of his fingertips moving closer to mine. I let go of the belt completely, but before it has a chance to retract and slide back over my body, Wes catches it. My eyes dart to his, and he holds onto our stare while he easily clicks my buckle in place.
“You were putting it in the wrong side,” he says, the edge of his mouth lifting, briefly. It makes a temporary dimple on his cheek, and my eyes zero in on that while it’s there.
“Oh, thanks,” I say. My hands tingle with the shot of adrenaline I feel from talking with him, this close, alone. I curl my hands tightly and bring them in my lap to rid myself of the sensation. I don’t like it—it’s out of my control.
He pulls his own belt over his chest then turns the key, the truck shaking a little with its effort to start. That one small fraction of a smile and those few words are all I’m going to get—he’s focused completely on his mirrors and the dirt road ahead now.
I pull my sleeves over my hands again, looking at my short, ripped fingernails. I spare a glance to my left and notice Wes’s eyes on my hands, so I pull my sleeve ends completely over them before tucking my hands under my thighs. His eyes move back to the road when I do.
“So, you, TK and Levi…you’re…brothers?” My heart pounds a little harder in my chest. I’m not good with new people. I usually either avoid them or dominate them from the beginning, figuring they’ll either bow to my aggressive style or steer clear of me. But Wes intimidates me more than most. I don’t like that.
Wes doesn’t respond verbally, instead looking at me to make sure my eyes are on him when he nods.
“Cool,” I say, immediately feeling stupid for having asked the question. The quiet takes over quickly on our side of the glass, while the two boys in the back with Taryn are laughing loudly, talking happily—smiling. Nothing but serious tolerance going on in here.
“Which one of you…” I start, but stop, my mouth not sure of the right way to form the words dashing around my head. I don’t know why I’m compelled to talk to him—I don’t know why I really even care, other than the fact that I now know I’m going to see him at school, probably more, given his skill and my father’s love of pitchers just like him.
He’ll be my dad’s new favorite.
I pull the lighter from my shirt pocket and run my finger over the switch a few times, a nervous habit I’ve picked up. Sometimes I crave having something to hold and touch more than the actual drag of a cigarette. “Who’s adopted? Just TK? Or…you?” The three of them look nothing alike—TK’s skin a deep brown, Levi’s pale and freckled and Wes’s somewhere in between.
The truck stops slowly at the edge of the dirt road, and Wes leans forward, looking both ways and squinting into the setting sun. The light plays off the ends of the hair sticking out of the back and sides of his hat, turning the strands gold.
“We all are,” he says, his answer short. A semi passes in front of us and Wes turns left onto the highway. I open my mouth to start giving him directions, but he interrupts me, glancing down to my lap where my finger is still nervously clicking the lighter. “You smoke?” he asks.
He knows I do. This feels like a trick.
“Sometimes,” I answer, not wanting to give him any more or any less, but inside, my voice keeps going. Sometimes I do a lot of things, and nobody has given a shit for years, so don’t pretend you do.
Part of me is tempted to light a cigarette now, just to see how he’d react. I don’t, though. Instead, I slide the lighter back into my front pocket and push my hands back under my thighs, turning my attention to the rows of houses streaming by outside my window.
“I lived with a foster family when I was young—the mom smoked a lot. She died of a heart attack at, like…forty,” he says, his lips parting to say more. A breath escapes, the kind that someone takes before they speak—a courage kind of breath. But his lips close just as quickly, and he glances over his opposite shoulder, switching lanes.
“Yeah, well…like I said. I only smoke sometimes,” I say. He didn’t tell me to stop. He didn’t say it was bad for me. He just smacked me with a small dose of guilt.
Asshole.
We reach the light for our neighborhood street, and I sit up, readying myself to tell him where to turn, but he pushes the blinker and moves into the left lane on his own, so I stop myself. How the hell does he know where I live?
The laughter in the back of the truck kicks in again, and I let the sound fill the small void as he turns at the arrow and maneuvers through the narrow street and cars all parked along the curbs.
“So you’re all…Stokes?” I ask, my eyes keeping a suspicious hold on him as he glances up in the rearview mirror. The small dimple comes again before he speaks, and the sight of it makes my heart beat harder for that second.
“Yeah. Three mix-and-match triplets,” he says, making the slight turn toward my house.
I lower my eyes and twist my head forward to peer out the front window before looking back to him. Taryn’s voice is faint through the glass behind me, and I hear the two guys laugh along with her again. Maybe she gave him our address while I was busy untangling my hands from the seatbelt.
“I’m the third one on the left,” I say, my eyes not leaving his face. His jaw twitches, but he nods slowly at my direction.
Shit. Maybe he’s a creeper. He’s a hot creeper, but totally a creeper.
I move my hand to my seat buckle, and the second he pulls up to my house, I unfasten my belt, and flip open my door. Wes doesn’t leave the driver’s seat. Taryn and I say goodbye to Levi and TK and wait at the edge of my dirt front yard while they climb into the cab with Wes.
“Did you give him directions too?” I ask Taryn, for some reason not wanting to admit I didn’t tell him where to go. I don’t want my best friend freaking out over this. It’s probably nothing. But then, it also feels like something—at least something I should pay attention to.
“No, you know I suck at that. I figured you had it handled. Why, did he get lost?” she asks, glancing at me, but only for a second before smiling and waving to TK.
“A little,” I lie, pinning my lower lip in my teeth and holding my breath. My thoughts race in search of any reason Wes Stokes should know where I live, and just before he pulls away, he looks at me through his window, his blue eyes locking on mine, and there’s a flash of a much younger face behind them for the briefest moment when he blinks.
The familiar feeling is gone quickly, but it leaves a trace of something behind. A memory. Wes Stokes has been here before. My chest constricts as I glance to the place in my front lawn a few yards behind me, the place where a boy once saved my life, and I live in that memory for a few long seconds before shelving it again—burying it back under everything I’ve promised myself to forget.
Two
Christopher.
> It’s funny how that name has become such a part of my life. His face. His eyes. The way his rapid breath was synchronizing with my heartbeat pounding in my ear the day I should have died. Sometimes, I wake up from nightmares hearing that sound. Not that it’s a bad sound. It’s the opposite, really. The hum of his chest as he’s breathing hard, fighting to protect me, is the sound that wakes me—saves me from whatever bad thing is about to happen in my head.
When I was younger, I would fall asleep imagining him holding me, tugging my blanket tightly around my body to feel safe—the way I felt in his arms, in the only real hug I’d ever had. I haven’t done that in years…until last night. The blanket didn’t have the same effect as it did when I was a child. I know better now—I understand pretend and fantasy.
As much as I know I can’t conjure up that feeling from that moment in time, I still indulge in imagining his face. That is something I’ve done nightly since the day he disappeared. Sometimes the boy I’m looking at in my head is the one from that day—like I’m trying to hold on to his memory, not forget his details. Other times, though, I lie awake and imagine what he looks like now. The one happy constant in my crap life is my thoughts of him.
It’s a secret I keep for so many reasons. I asked about him before I was shipped off to Fresno for the summer. I had heard he got hurt saving me, that my dad’s car hit him just as he grabbed me. The neighborhood kids were talking about it. There was blood, but when people tried to help him, he just waved them away, instead tightening his hold on me. They all called him a freak. But he didn’t seem so freaky to me anymore. That happens when someone saves you, I suppose.
After my mom left us, my dad wrecked his car a few more times—driving drunk, and by the time I got back from Fresno, that’s all the neighborhood kids were talking about—my fucked up family and how my dad was going to lose custody of me if he kept acting like this. That wasn’t the threat that got him to stop drinking, though. It was baseball—the risk of losing his position. When that hung in the balance, my dad learned to keep his drinking to the bar down the road, the one within walking distance, and he saved his drunken rants and outbursts for our home.
