The Grumpy Player Next Door: Copper Valley Fireballs #3

by Grant, Pippa

  So. Fucking. Gorgeous.

  Just like that.

  I grunt and walk around my SUV on the side where I won’t have to look at her.

  “Max,” she calls.

  The problem with being six-four is that you’re taller than everything, even when you slouch, and I can still see her over the roof of my damn car.

  And she’s charging barefoot across the frosted grass in twenty-five degree weather like the glitter coating her feet counts as shoes.

  I want to sweep her off her feet and carry her back inside her house and warm her up.

  But I can’t. “Go away, Tillie Jean.”

  “No.”

  Okay, yeah, that was dumb. Of course I knew that wouldn’t work.

  I glare at her. “We’re done. Post-season’s over. I’m gone. Go. Away.”

  She freezes on a gasp, hurt streaking so hard and fast over her face that my junk punches itself for me being such a dick.

  But I can’t do this.

  I’m fucking broken.

  “No,” she says again.

  It’s not a gaspy, desperate, broken-hearted no.

  It’s a don’t be a damn fool no.

  An I know that’s not what you want no.

  An I refuse to accept that you’re being this stupid no.

  “Your rules, remember?” Yeah. I’m an ass.

  But she deserves better. All that love shit Henri spouted about me knowing what it was worth for having been denied it for so long?

  Total, complete, romance-writer bullshit.

  “What are you afraid of?” Tillie Jean demands.

  That you won’t want me if you know who I really am. “Fucking up my game.”

  Her eyes narrow and steam slips out her nostrils. “What are you really afraid of?”

  “I’m asking management to trade me. Can’t play with your brother. It’s over. Sorry if you can’t accept that. Don’t come to Copper Valley. I don’t want to see you.”

  Jesus, I’m an ass.

  “You don’t mean that.”

  I don’t.

  Fuck me, I don’t.

  But I can’t be the man she deserves if I’m having panic attacks over worrying more that I’ll upset her brother than I am at the idea that I’ll never see her again. I can’t be the man she deserves if I can’t promise her that I won’t fall apart over other stupid shit later, leaving her to pick up my pieces. And I can’t be the man she deserves if I can’t pull my own shit together enough to tell her that I love her.

  She deserves someone who’s already whole.

  Not someone who didn’t know what whole was until I let her in.

  She’s whole.

  She’s always been whole.

  And she might be standing there with her hands fisted at her sides, sending daggers my way, but she’s also visibly ordering herself to look past the anger.

  I can see her doing it.

  “You can try to be a dick to push me away all you want, but I know this isn’t you. And you know this isn’t you.”

  “See what you want to. I can’t fix that.”

  I don’t wait for her to answer. If I do, she’ll talk me into staying. She’ll talk me into spilling my guts. Every fear. Every dream. Every worry. Every truth.

  And then she’ll hate me for real.

  I crank my engine, make sure she’s not doing anything stupid like leaping behind my car to keep me from leaving, and then I back out of the driveway of my winter house for the very last time.

  Shipwreck isn’t the real world.

  And it’s time for me to get back to where I need to be, to do what I need to do, and to live the life I’m supposed to live.

  Not this dream.

  The thing about dreams?

  You wake up.

  And last night was definitely a wake-up.

  It’s time to go.

  34

  Max

  Time doesn’t fly when you’re miserable.

  It fucking crawls.

  And no amount of video games, extra workouts, visits with Fireballs management where I chicken out every time on threatening to throw like shit until they trade me makes it go faster.

  Movies don’t help. Mindlessly scrolling TikTok doesn’t help. Sleeping doesn’t help. Besides, I can’t sleep.

  Not even getting to Florida helps.

  Like last year, management’s rented out an entire complex for us to stay at. Together. As a team.

  I’m in the pitchers’ wing, which is good.

  More space between me and anyone who knows firsthand what happened in Shipwreck.

  But there are only three other guys with me. Most of our pitching staff are married and staying in the family suites across the complex. Two of the guys are new, and the third has a girlfriend that he’s on the phone with all day long when we’re not at the ball field practicing.

  The team’s new catcher is nineteen.

  Nineteen.

  A fucking baby who needs to be broken in, which seems to be amusing the coaching staff to no end.

  “No,” I yell from the mound on our second day of warm-ups, “if I shake my head on the fastball, I’m not throwing a fucking fastball.”

  He squats, drops a hand between his thighs, and signals for a fastball again.

  I throw my whole glove instead of just the ball.

  Fucking catchers.

  He pops up from his squat, shoves his mask back, grabs my glove, and runs it out to me, dark eyes shining like a puppy dog’s, giant grin spread across his brown face. He was born in the Dominican Republic, moved to Oklahoma sometime in his childhood, spent the past two seasons working his way up the minors with the Fireballs’ affiliate teams—yeah, he started when he was seventeen—and I swear when God made Cooper Rock, he saved part of the dude’s personality to infuse into Diego Estevez.

  “Feels good to work out all our issues now,” he says. “So we’ll rock it in the real season. High five, Fast Max!”

  I leave him hanging. “I’m not throwing a goddamn fastball.”

  He grins bigger. “Why not? Fastballs are fun. You need the practice. And to work out all that anger. Find the zen. Be happy. Throw a curve ball. Hit me in the face. All the pitchers want to. You can be the first. I’ll forgive you.”

  I slide a look at the coaches gathered along the third baseline, all of them sporting massive grins.

  “He’s great, isn’t he, Max?” Tripp Wilson, the team’s co-owner, calls, while his wife, Lila, co-owner with the greater power here, hides her mouth behind her hand.

  “He’s not old enough to drink and he has as much energy as a squirrel.”

  “My brother has a pet squirrel. For the record, Diego has more energy than Skippy does.”

  Diego grins and taps the bill of my hat. “Slider. Curve ball. Knuckleball. Fastball. All the balls. All the strikes. You’ll give up a run or two. I’ll miss a catch or two. But we’re still gonna be fucking winners. Yeah, Fast Max? Yeah!”

  He trots back to home plate, kicking his feet up—kicking his fucking feet up—on the way. “Think I got through, coach?” he calls.

  “You nailed it, big D,” our catching coach calls back.

  “Yeah! I fucking love this game!”

  I’m being punked. That’s the only explanation.

  Diego squats.

  Signals a fastball.

  I throw a fastball and take his fucking glove off. “That’s what I’m talking about!” Diego yells. He pumps a fist in the air while he throws off his helmet. “You show that glove, Fast Max! You show it!”

  “Lay off the Red Bull, Estevez.”

  “No Red Bull, Fast Max. I’m just living the dream. Hey! Can you wave at my mom? She’s taking pictures.” He points to the stands. “Hey, Mom!”

  I’m twitching by the time I hit the showers after practice.

  “Dude’s hilarious,” someone mutters.

  “Fans are gonna love him.”

  “I got a grand on him having a dance-off with Ash between innings before the
end of the first regular-season game.”

  “And winning.”

  “No fucking way. You’re on.”

  I strip and stick my head under the shower until they’re gone. I don’t want to hear it.

  I don’t want to be here.

  I don’t want to fucking be here.

  And that doesn’t get better when I leave the shower and find Cooper leaning next to my locker. “Fuck off, Rock.”

  “I’m not mad at you.”

  I give him a side eye while I rub my hair dry.

  “Okay, I’m mad at you, but I’m not mad at you.” He punches me in the arm. “If you’d just fucking believe in yourself—”

  “I believe in myself, asshole.”

  “If you believed in yourself, you’d be calling my sister right the fuck now.”

  “Or maybe I don’t like your sister that much.”

  He glares at me.

  Dude’s totally fucking pissed at me, and he’s lying to himself if he thinks he’s not.

  “Is that really the problem?” Cooper Rock doesn’t do deadly calm. Cooper does happy as a golden retriever. He does arrogant as a lion. He does zen as a goddamn monk, but he doesn’t do deadly calm.

  Until now.

  “Yeah,” I lie. “That’s the problem.”

  “Or is the problem that you’re afraid if you commit to someone as awesome as Tillie Jean for real, you’ll have to face that you can be better than what your old man made you think you could?”

  Rossi leaps between us. No idea where he came from too—they don’t start practice for another two days—but there he is. “Enough, Cooper. Back the fuck up.”

  “No. No. I’m right, and he knows it. He hides behind thinking he’s worthless so he doesn’t have to be good at anything except baseball. You’re gonna be Trevor Stafford one day, dude. And what the hell are you gonna do then?”

  “I said back up,” Rossi growls.

  “Let him talk,” I tell Rossi. “I’d have to care for it to hurt.”

  Luca gives me the don’t be a dick glare. “So if Tillie Jean said the same thing, you wouldn’t care either?”

  I flinch.

  “Thought so.” He shoves Cooper. “Let’s go.”

  “Friends don’t abandon friends, Max,” Cooper mutters. “I’m still here, even if you’re being an asshole.”

  Fuck. “I’m not your friend.”

  “You’ve always been my friend, idiot.”

  Rossi doesn’t tell him to leave again.

  Doesn’t have to.

  Cooper’s already gone.

  “So why the fuck wasn’t I good enough for his sister?” I mutter.

  Rossi gives me another look, this one a classic duh number. “You told him you weren’t enough times that he believed you.”

  Jesus.

  Fuck.

  I did, didn’t I?

  And I was right.

  I pack up and head back to the complex, declining six dinner invitations along the way, and hole up in my room.

  Music doesn’t help.

  The email from my therapist asking if I’d like to talk again tomorrow doesn’t help either.

  Nor does one more damn knock on my door.

  “Go away. I’m jacking off,” I yell.

  “Not very well if you can still talk while you do it,” Tripp Wilson replies.

  Fuck.

  I’m gonna get myself fired.

  Maybe that’d be a good thing.

  I could just disappear.

  Head off to Tahiti.

  Make a living setting up umbrellas on the beach.

  Be fucking lonely, RAWK! a parrot voice replies inside my own head.

  I yank the door open. Fully clothed, for the record.

  “Bad time,” I tell the Fireballs’ co-owner.

  “You’re not regretting this, are you?” He lifts a copy of Arena Insider with my bare ass on the cover.

  Fuck. Fuck. My fingers start tingling.

  I forgot that was coming out today, and I’ve been ignoring the calls from my agent.

  He tucks the magazine under his arm and leans in the doorway. “Good article. Read it yet?”

  I shake my head.

  “Made me realize I’m being an ass in pretending I’m not a recovering hypochondriac.”

  My shoulders are getting tense. So are my lats. My pecs. My quads. Not about to tell my boss I don’t want to be the guy everyone talks to about their own mental health issues.

  Not when I’m cracking myself.

  Should’ve had my agent pull the article. I am not in for this.

  Tripp hands me the magazine. “You should read it.”

  He doesn’t say anything else.

  Not about his own issues. Not about mine.

  Just hands me the magazine and walks away.

  I toss it on my chair and fling myself onto my bed, right under the ceiling fan. Florida’s fucking hot.

  That article isn’t about me.

  It’s about a guy I thought I was for a month or two this winter.

  A guy you wish you still were, RAWK! the damn parrot says in my head.

  I snort back at it.

  When the parrot’s in my head, reading a damn article won’t help.

  Will it?

  35

  Tillie Jean

  “Great job, ladies,” I say on a gasp as I fall back onto my exercise mat. “Way to kick booty.”

  “I hate you,” Aunt Bea gasps.

  “I didn’t know I still had muscles there,” Mom says between pants.

  “Isn’t this supposed to get easier?” Aunt Glory demands.

  “Wimps,” Nana says.

  Mom lifts up on her elbows and glares at Nana, who pulled something in her groin—do not ask—and came to supervise instead of participate today. “Go walk the plank, Nana.”

  It’s so normal.

  Except nothing’s normal anymore.

  Everything’s a little hollow. It’s harder to make myself come to senior aerobics. It’s harder to smile at customers at Crusty Nut. I don’t want to paint.

  Even coffee is dull.

  This is nothing like breaking up with Ben.

  That was my injured pride and my fear that I’d be alone.

  Being without Max?

  It’s like someone borrowed part of my soul and is holding it for a ransom I can’t pay.

  I can’t make Max love me.

  And I can’t pretend I didn’t fall in love with him.

  “Same time next week?” I push myself up onto my hands and knees, then onto my rubbery legs while the class around me does the same.

  “Tillie Jean, I need to talk to you about the twins,” Dita says. She’s still bent over huffing and puffing. “Can you paint them for their birthday?”

  “Like face painting, or like paint their portraits?” Mom asks.

  “You should do both,” Nana declares. “Portraits of kids with their faces painted.”

  “Talk later,” I tell Dita with a nod. “Alone. No help. Peanut gallery.”

  She gives me a thumbs up.

  I head home to shower, ignoring the empty house next door. Max sent someone to pack up the rest of his stuff, and according to Uncle Homer’s daughter, the house is rented out off-and-on to vacationers starting in mid-March, and then she’s thinking of selling it permanently.

  And then there’s no chance Max will ever come back to that little house.

  I press through one more quick shower that doesn’t get the lingering glitter out of my hair or off my eyelids.

  My bedroom is back to normal. Mostly. True to his word, Cooper had a replacement bed delivered the next day and brought in a forensic clean-up crew to tackle the glitter.

  But it’s still glitter.

  And I still catch glimpses of it in the cracks between the slats of the wood floor, or on the blinds, or twinkling in the curtains around my bed.

  And every time, all I can see is Max’s face.

  Horrified.

  Angry.

 
; Ready to slay dragons.

  And then Max ready to slay me the next day.

  I rush through getting dressed and head to Crusty Nut. It needs a makeover—brighter colors, happier music, mood-boosting anything—but I want someone else to do the work.

  Not me.

  “Morning, hon.” Dad waves at me with a spatula when I slip in the back door. “Your mom says I should put pickle juice in your coffee this morning. Made ’em all work hard at aerobics, eh?”

  I lift my glittery coffee tumbler that doesn’t make me smile like it used to. “Nice try. Already brought my own.”

  “I figured. But maybe don’t get a refill from Muted Parrot today if you want it to be drinkable? And maybe go lighter on the Zumba next week?”

  I put on my apron and head for the bar. “Only until Nana’s fully back. Then it’s game on.”

  “Good plan.”

  I start to head to the bar, but pause. “Dad?”

  “Yeah, hon?”

  I start to open my mouth, to put voice to the words that have been tumbling in the back of my head, but it’s terrifying.

  I thought I was ready. I thought I’d be brave when the time came. I thought I could do this.

  So why do half a dozen little words feel so heavy?

  “Tillie Jean?”

  “I think it’s time I quit,” I whisper.

  Rip off the bandaid, right?

  He blinks slowly, then nods even slower. “You know what you want to do?”

  What I want to do?

  Yes.

  Yes, I know exactly what I want to do. It came to me in a blinding flash that felt so undeniably right that there was no question this is the direction I’m supposed to go.

  But only half of it is in my control. “Yes.”

  I don’t elaborate.

  He doesn’t ask.

  “Okay.” He wipes his hands on his apron, a familiar gesture that makes my chest ache for knowing it’s not a sight I’ll have dozens of times a day every day for the rest of my life, but I’m not going far.

  And possibly not for a while.