Full Count (The Catcher Series Book 1)

by Bri Izzo

  Twenty minutes later everything is set up to conduct the interviews on the softball diamond. To prevent another upchuck, Erin makes sure Buzz is comfortable before running through a list of questions with us prior to the cameras rolling. She is very professional about everything, so together Buzz and I give the go-ahead to start filming.

  Partway through the interview, the questions become more personal compared to the beginning ones that focus more on Buzz’s game, which would be fine if Buzz wasn't such a fucking goof ball.

  “So, rumor has it that you two are dating?” Erin chuckles, slightly more personal like we are becoming her friends.

  “Yes,” Buzz firmly answers. She’s so damn happy and proud to finally say yes to someone asking us that. I get caught up in her giddiness - not the two sets of fatherly eyes coming from behind the crew. When I don’t say anything, she turns her attention to me instead of Erin and the cameras. “What? Should I not have said anything? McCallum knows, so I figured…”

  “It’s fine,” I assure her with a minuscule raise of my eyebrows.

  “Bianca, what’s your favorite part of Skyler?” Erin questions her playfully. Too playfully.

  Buzz immediately bulges her eyes out at me as a defense mechanism for trying to contain her excitement in public. She always fails. Always. This is no different. I sit in my chair and just watch her giggle and cross her legs to keep from peeing herself. It’s uplifting to see my girl this happy again and laughing this hard, but I sort of wish it isn’t in front of an entire fucking crew of ESPN people. I know her answer is something sexual, and that’s why she can’t control herself. Her brain has no filter, and I adore her for it.

  Erin is smiling as a result of Buzz’s laughter, but everyone else in the crew is completely clueless as to why she’s having a giggle attack.

  In the midst of her giggle-fest, Buzz manages to get out, “He’s always there for me.”

  Erin and I deadpan. Clearly that isn’t what is making Buzz laugh her ass off. Erin wants more detail.

  “How?” she vaguely asks, not wanting to skew Buzz’s answer in any way.

  Finally Buzz catches her breath enough to give a real answer. “Last night in the hospital I asked him to get me a popsicle, so he got me one.” She continues laughing a little bit more. I know that this moment is fresh in her mind, and I can’t help but let out a small chuckle. She’s so damn cute, but this story is better saved for another time off camera.

  Erin looks at me in question of whether or not she should take it as perverted or not, so I confirm, “She’s serious. She’s the least high maintenance girl I’ve ever met.”

  “Is that what you like most about her?” she questions me.

  “No,” I remain expressionless.

  “Then what do you like most?” she asks.

  “Yeah, Sky, what do you like most?” Buzz chipperly repeats. She’s bouncing in her chair, and I know the interview is going to have to be over soon because she has math in ten minutes. Also, she can’t sit still much longer. After lunch they’re going to do the sappy part of the story that deals with the accident and recovery.

  I think for a moment on how to phrase it. I don’t want to fuck up my declaration of what I love most about my girl on ESPN of all places. Finally, I answer, “I like her happiness. When she tries to hide her smile after she strikes someone out, when she actually smiles after winning a game. I like when she’s doing what she wants to be doing because there’s nothing better than seeing this girl happy.”

  After school Alex, Tiffany, and Cara have their turns in the spotlight. Everyone is really supportive and excited despite not being excused from classes like Buzz, Benny, and me. I’m standing on the opposite side of the camera crew from Buzz, completely out of the way. Buzz is on standby in case they want her to join in on Alex’s interview. The crowd around us seems to be thickening, and I’m beginning to wonder if we have any security for ESPN being on the patio.

  As I’m looking around for either one of our dads, the head ESPN guy, or anyone from the crew, so many other students are surrounding me, and I can’t find anyone of authority. To my left, I hear Erin and Alex’s conversation with the cameras rolling.

  “What do you think of Skyler and Bianca dating?” Erin asks.

  Fuck.

  “That’s disgusting. They can flirt all they want, but they’re not dating,” Alex confirms.

  Shit.

  I can’t hear the rest of it to listen if Erin completely outs us. I look to my right, where Buzz is standing next to one of the crew members. She’s huddling up on his far side away from the rowdy audience. Someone accidentally pushes me from behind trying to make his or her way into the camera frame, but luckily they push me in the direction towards Buzz.

  “Move! Back the fuck up!” I demand, holding my arm out to create a barrier.

  “Dude, it’s Erin Andrews!” I hear a guy yell, and then that someone appears to be thrown at me. I stumble backwards and then push him off me.

  “I don’t fucking care. Back up,” I yell.

  “Whatever, man,” he snarls at me.

  “Fuck you!” I continue. I make my way through the crowd to get to Buzz who is huddled up in a circle with the crew members. “Hey,” I greet her, slinging my arm around her neck and shoulders. “Let’s get out of here.” She silently nods in agreement, so I pick her up and carry her like a toddler through our crazy classmates who have nothing better to do than to fucking stalk Erin Andrews.

  “Did you hear what Rex said?” she asks me once I get her away from the crowd and set her down in the parking lot near my Jeep.

  “Yeah. I’ll deal with it,” I promise her.

  “Hey,” she calls for my attention. She stops walking and waits firmly for me to look at her, so when I notice her motive, I play along and pay her my attention. “It’s us against them. Who wins?”

  Sighing, I’m comforted with the idea that she wants to back me up against her brother, but I also can’t ask her to do that: choose sides. “Us, sweetheart,” I assure her, reaching for her hand and magnetizing our lips together in broad daylight at school. God damn it feels good. But I know this moment may not last. We have one more pitch and our count is full. Next pitch makes or breaks it.

  39 Bianca Ferrari

  Skyler and I wait in the living room on my couch for Rex and our dads to come home from the ESPN interviews at school. After hearing Erin ask Rex about me and Skyler dating, I have snakes in my stomach. I’m so freaking nervous he’s going to kill us.

  Full count. This next pitch can be a home run or a strikeout. I’ll probably foul tip a few times in trying to convince Rex to be okay with this. Ultimately I’m hoping for a game winning home run, just like I hope for every time I’m up to bat.

  When the front door squeaks open, Skyler grabs my hand and gives me a stern look: he will handle this. That’s what scares me. I don’t want them to fight about me. If I go down, I want it to be swinging, not looking.

  Rex walks into the room alone; our dads must know what’s coming and want to stay far away. The clunk of my brother’s heavy backpack hitting the the kitchen floor makes me jump.

  “Rex,” I whimper.

  “I need to talk to you two,” Rex declares. His eyes are like burnt coals, sizzling all the way down to his core. I have never seen him this mad before, and I’m a little intimidated.

  “Alex!” we hear from the hallway. The front door slams again, and Benny, Tiffany, Baylee, and Sam appear behind him all looking like they want to stop two trains - Rex and Skyler- from slamming into each other on the same tracks.

  Baylee must’ve heard Rex slam the door first and came downstairs to see what is going on, but the others come right from the field where they were watching or participating in the ESPN interviews.

  “B, go to Benny,” Skyler orders me as he stands up, still holding my hand.

  “No,” I argue. I’m prepared to swing at this pitch; I won’t chance it by looking and hoping for the best.

  “Buzz
,” he states firmly.

  “It’s my fight, too, and he’s my brother. The three of us are best friends,” I remind both of them. I hate seeing the two of them on opposite teams. They’re two of the most important people in my life; I can’t choose between them. “What’s he going to do, hit you?”

  Rex looks about ready to do just that, but I step in front of Skyler. He won’t do it with me in his line. “Move, B,” Rex demands.

  “Stop,” I sigh out of disgust. “Can we just talk about this like humans? You’re not an animal.”

  “You told me this wouldn’t happen,” he rehashes our conversation from almost a year ago. I remember it because I regret it. I regret pretending I didn’t have a crush on Skyler. I regret not trusting him. “Last summer, remember? After your accident?”

  “Yes, I remember,” I confess, and I feel the strength of Skyler’s hand on my shoulder.

  “You lied,” Rex announces to the group, but no one looks surprised. I can’t see if Skyler is or not since he’s still standing behind me. I wonder if the snakes in my stomach are poisonous because I have never felt so sick in my life. What if I lose Skyler after this fight? He’s probably pissed or hurt or both that I told Rex him and I couldn’t happen. I can’t lose him. I won’t.

  “I didn’t mean to,” I promise him.

  “My ass, you didn’t mean to. You’ve liked him for years. Don’t act all innocent,” he snaps, taking a step closer to me.

  Feeling Skyler pull me back makes me unsteady, but I’m grateful he’s still in protection mode. He guides me to a sitting position on the ground when my feet get tangled with each other. How Rex can’t see that Sky just wants the best for me is unreal. He’s supposed to be the smart one.

  “Hey, back off,” Skyler warns Rex.

  Rex looks even more pissed, if possible, so I decide to blurt out my explanation for everything that’s happened in under ten seconds in hopes of preventing an actual fist fight between the three of us, or even just the two of them.

  “Just listen,” I beg as I sit on the ground in between them at Skyler’s feet. For a moment everyone in the room washes away their anger and focuses on me. Whether or not they are worried about me now sitting on the ground, I don’t care; at least they are all listening. “When I told you it couldn’t happen, I really didn’t think that it could. I didn’t think that Sky and I were capable of moving past the accident and being with each other because we liked the other person and not just because they were alive or doing everything in their power to make the other one comfortable. I also thought he just saw me as a best friend and little sister for a while. But things changed.”

  “Did you fuck him?” Rex interrupts my speech.

  Rolling my eyes, I answer him in a roundabout way. “Is that really all you’re concerned about?”

  “No, but it still matters,” he argues. “You’ve been sleeping at his house almost every God damn night for the last year.”

  “It’s not about that. And you’ve been with Leah since your freshman year, so stop being a hypocrite. You should be happy your sister is with someone who you consider to be your best friend and not some random asshole at a party.” Yeah, I purposely avoided directly answering his question. I figuratively stand up for myself as I sit on lower ground compared to everyone else. Tiffany is in the background giving me encouraging sign language which actually boosts my confidence. However I’m getting weaker by the second having to fight like this, and I don’t want Rex to concede just because I’m going to pass out; that isn’t really winning.

  “You should’ve told me… us,” Rex complains, gesturing that the entire group didn’t know about this secret. In reality, they probably all assumed and just left it alone.

  “We couldn’t tell McCallum either,” Skyler finally speaks. “He asked us on the first day of school if we were dating, and we told him no because we weren’t. But then we started to, so we had to keep it a secret so he wouldn’t find out so I could still be her coach. Turns out there’s nothing he can do anyways since I don’t get paid and we’re both students.”

  “He knows now?” Rex wonders.

  “As of today, yes,” Skyler tells him.

  “Great. So even he found out before me. That’s nice,” Rex whines, throwing his arms dramatically up into the air.

  “He approached us first,” I inform him. I hate this situation. We should’ve just told our friends and siblings and had them keep the secret. At the time, Rex wasn’t totally against me and Skyler; he let us go to homecoming together after all. Regardless of when we told him, Skyler and I knew we were going to have this fight someday.

  “You should’ve been professional like he wanted,” Rex glares at Skyler.

  “I tried. On the field I was, but off, I fucking couldn’t,” Skyler argues firmly.

  “Why couldn’t you? Huh?” Rex pushes him over the edge, and I can feel his deep breaths from beneath him. I’m honestly scared they’re going to conduct a fist fight right over me.

  “Because I fell in love with her, you idiot!” Skyler declares. The tension in the room grows so thick that I swear I’m in quicksand mixed with honey as I slowly drown in between them. I love hearing him fight for me and for us. It's almost as good as his answer earlier about what he likes most about me. It means a lot that he’s willing to do anything to keep us together, even fight my brother. “Last year it almost literally fucking killed me when she was so mad at me that she decided to be with Chase. Seeing her get fucked over was the last thing I wanted. I couldn’t let anyone else do that to her ever again. And then the accident happened, and I blamed myself, but I was determined to take care of her and do whatever I fucking could to help her. It became unbearable to see her unhappy and in pain, but in the midst of helping her fight back, I truly fell in love with her. The nights she didn’t sleep at my house all I did was worry about her. Being with her makes everything better. I’m not sorry that I fell in love with her, but I am sorry that we hid it from you.”

  “And what happens when you break up?” Rex taunts. How dare he say that! That pisses me off! He’s giving us no chance at all.

  “If…” I interrupt him, and I think I’ve done me and Skyler justice until Skyler alerts me that I have, in fact, not done so.

  “Excuse me?” Skyler raises his voice at me for the first time in a long time.

  “What?” Rex and I chorus. I’m royally confused. I just stuck up for us, didn’t I?

  “There is no ‘when’ or ‘if’. We talked about this, B,” Skyler clarifies. He’s never been more passionate or serious about anything in his life. I can see it in his eyes and hear it in his voice. I lose my breath for a second, taken aback by his statement. Rex looks floored, like he can’t believe someone can honestly care about his sister this much, which hurts me a little.

  A weird silence blankets the room for a solid minute as Rex and Skyler stare each other down. Rex is figuring out his decision on whether or not to continue the fight, and Sky is trying to determine if he needs to add more to his argument. I think he did pretty good.

  “I can’t lose one or both of you to a break up,” Rex calmly says, his eyes moving back and forth between us. I completely sympathize with his statement; I can’t lose Skyler to a break up either. It’s unfathomable.

  “You don’t have to worry about it,” Skyler promises, which floods my chest and my mind. Most people in my situation would have to think about possibly losing their lifelong best friend, but mine just confirmed that I can rest assured. “I can’t lose her or you to a break up either. I told her in September it was all or nothing. I couldn’t stand seeing her with anyone before me and I certainly wouldn’t be able to fucking stand seeing her with anyone after me.”

  I’m trying to make sense of everything that’s occurred today. The entire school wore colorful t-shirts to support me; ESPN did a feature story on me; Skyler and I outed our relationship to the world. Now I’m listening to my boyfriend tell my brother he doesn’t have to worry about a breakup between us.
Overall this is awesome; however, it’s a little overwhelming, too. I close my eyes and let my back gently fall to the ground. Of course this sends everyone into a panic, which is just getting so fucking annoying that I’m treated like such a baby.

  “B!” Rex yells as Skyler shouts, “Buzz!”

  “I’m fine! Stop yelling!” I interrupt both of them. “Would the two of you just make up already? This is exhausting.”

  “Are you going to be with him no matter what I say?” Rex asks, sounding more like my dad than ever before.

  “Yes,” I immediately answer. “But it would be nice if you were okay with it. I think he's gonna want you to be his Best Man."

  “It’s just weird to think you guys are serious about this. I know flirting is in both of your natures, but it’s more than that?” his voice inflicts at the end, indicating he needs confirmation on the last part of his statement. I don’t question his (lack of) taste in Leah; he needs to accept that Skyler and I tastefully like each other.

  “Yes,” I whimper, reaching my arm up so Skyler will take my hand in his.

  “Sky?” he questions, needing one more piece to fully comprehend this puzzle.

  “I told you I love her,” he calmly states.

  Sighing deeply, I hear Rex concede. “Then I guess I’ll have to get used to it.”

  The ESPN crew hangs around for the rest of the week to capture more footage of me and Skyler in our games and at home. Luckily they don’t catch our fight with Rex on camera, although it would make for a great reality show on MTV. He asked if he could redo the segment when Erin asked him what he thought of Skyluzz, but he wouldn’t let me watch it. He said we’ll see it when the whole feature airs.

  On Friday morning I wake up in Skyler’s bed after having showered at my house the night before. Graciously he lets me sleep in while he gets ready for school. I groggily roll over as he steps outside of his closet in his varsity baseball jersey and khaki shorts.