Exactly As You Are (Love in Louisville #1)

Chapter 37

37

J oan crouched at first base, ready to make a stop. The third week of September saw summer make one last muggy stand before hopefully fading into crisp autumn afternoons. She loved being at the ballpark despite the heat.

She glanced at Lucas, who waited on short. He caught her eye, grinning at her from under his baseball hat, offering a look that promised excitement later. Her heart skittered in her chest, an honest to God palpitation, and she didn’t have to strain to interpret that. Her intense infatuation with her best friend continued to grow. The thing she’d been trying to avoid stared her in the face, daring her to pretend she didn’t have it bad. She couldn’t rely on Lucas, either. If she told him how she felt, he would likely suggest they go to Vegas and get married or some wild thing like that. She had to be the levelheaded one, and she still wasn’t sure how she wanted to proceed.

The batter, a slight man with a beard, hit a ground ball to short. Lucas scooped it up and executed a perfect throw to her waiting glove.

Lucas put his fist in the air when she made the out. She heard Kendall whooping from the set of sparse spectators, along with Maria’s polite clapping, and then the top of the 8th was over. She got some claps on the back from her teammates in the dugout. Lucas snaked an arm around her waist, feigning a friendly side hug as he trailed his fingers along the waistband of her pants. Her thighs clenched.

“Is this how you celebrate with all your teammates?” she asked him.

He glanced around to make sure no one watched them, then he leaned over to whisper in her ear.

“This isn’t even close to how I want to celebrate right now.” He snuck a lightning quick kiss in next to her ear. She shivered. When she and Lucas had started this, she’d had no idea how frisky he could be, although it made sense. She loved seeing this side of him, the one she didn’t have access to when they were only friends.

He pulled away before the others started noticing them. Eric high fived her, and Gwen threw her arms around her neck.

“We’re going to win the whole thing, Jo!”

Joan laughed at her friend’s enthusiasm, feeling lighter than she had in weeks despite her concerns about her growing feelings. She would have to talk to Lucas at some point, but she needed time.

“We’ve got some news,” Joan announced. She clinked her spoon against her glass.

They were out to eat with the entire softball team. The air-conditioned bar provided welcome relief, even though it smelled faintly of stale beer and onions. They’d won their game, and the softball tournament, after an exciting last inning featuring a home run from Lucas and several stolen bases.

Gwen threw her a sharp glance. “You and Lucas have an announcement?”

Joan shook her head.

“Not like you’re thinking,” she murmured. A little louder, for the benefit of everyone else, she said, “we’ve decided to make this an annual event. So for any of you who decide you want to come back, we’ll do this again starting next July.” She raised her glass. “And cheers to our win!” The others clapped. They’d made casual friends with the strangers who’d been on their team from the beginning, and she hoped they could retain at least some of the same team members the next year.

Rowan’s wife, Annie, offered her a wide smile. She was heavily pregnant but had apparently been feeling better, so she’d been joining them for games and dinner after.

“Maybe I can join you next year.” She rested her hand on her stomach. “If someone can keep our girl, that is. Might be a nice way to get out for a bit.”

Rowan touched Annie’s shoulder. He’d been a bit more tolerable, though he still made unfunny jokes and off-color comments from time to time.

Lucas squeezed her thigh under the table. She started, then gave him a sly smile. Across the table, Christine furrowed her brow at the two of them. Shit. There was no way she was onto them, but she would be if they didn’t stop being so obvious. Joan was close to Christine, but she’d never talked about her diagnosis before—she wasn’t quite ready to explain it to her sister. Lucas moved his hand when she tensed.

Eric leaned in to ask Christine a question, so Joan nudged Lucas.

“Maybe we should be more careful,” she whispered.

He looked at her for a long moment.

“Sure, sure,” he said.

Christine followed them to her car, though. She leaned against it while Joan fiddled with her keys.

“So.” Christine looked between them. “You guys are being super weird.”

“How so?” Joan’s heart pounded. She was fine with her friends knowing, but one of her family members knowing about her arrangement with Lucas would lead to awkward questions.

“You’re hiding something.”

“Fancy yourself a detective, do you?”

“Joan.” She eyed Lucas, who rested an elbow on Joan’s car like a whistling cartoon version of someone who wasn’t up to anything.

She sighed. “I do need to talk to you at some point. It might take a bit, though. It’s kind of a long story.”

Christine continued to look at her. “Alright. Are you okay, though?”

“Yes. I swear.”

Christine surged forward to give Joan a hug, then did the same with Lucas.

“Have a good night, Cece.”

“Same to you guys.”

Lucas turned his head toward her on the drive back to his place.

“You don’t want her to know about us?”

Was that a hurt note in his voice? She hoped not. When they’d started this process, she knew it was possible one of them would disappoint the other. She’d been trying hard to juggle her own needs while being sensitive to Lucas, but she may have blundered.

“It’s not that, really. If I were going to tell one of my family members, it would be her. But she doesn’t know about the vaginismus. I have to cover that information first, I think, or else what we’re doing probably doesn’t make sense.”

“Ah. Yeah, I understand.”

The car fell quiet.

“Hey Lucas?”

He grunted in response.

“I’m really sorry. I know it seems like I’m trying to hide here, but I promise I’m not, like, ashamed of you or anything. I care about you.” In truth, her feelings for him alarmed her. She worried she’d botched her side of the deal by growing more and more attached to the idea of them together, despite the dubious wisdom of the notion. “But I’m not going to talk to my parents about my sex problems, either, and even though Christine wouldn’t tell them, I still feel a little squicked out by the idea of someone in my family knowing what we’re doing.”

“And what are we saying that we’re doing? Still sex therapy?”

She wrinkled her nose. “I honestly don’t love the sound of that. I don’t know how else to put it, but it feels more meaningful than that to me.”

He didn’t say anything, but he did reach over to brush a hand along her neck. She continued.

“I also wanted to talk to you about a timeline here.” Her heart punched against her ribcage again. “This has been going on for almost three months now, and I still feel like I’ll need some time before I’m ready to try, well, you know.”

“Fucking?”

Her face heated. Something about that word in his deep voice scrambled her brain.

“Yeah. That. I’m just not there. So if you want to stop, or pursue someone else, please tell me. I’ll understand.”

“Joan.”

“Hmm?” The trees blurred by. To her horror, a stray tear rolled down her cheek and caught in her hair.

“There’s a lot I could say to that, but I’ll start with this. I would never end this because you aren’t moving fast enough. I care about you, too, and it would be a real asshole move for me to leave you hanging just because you can’t have intercourse. And as I’ve said before, this isn’t some chore for me. I’ve never been so happy.”

Joan’s tears flowed a little more freely then. She sniffled. “Honestly?”

“Yes, Joan. Give me some credit. I’m not some asshole who’s going to drop you like that. Not like others have done, apparently.”

“Even though we aren’t together? I mean, together for real?”

“My relationship with you has always been the most real thing in my life,” he said.

“Luke.” She covered her eyes with her fists. It scratched something deep in her psyche, hearing Lucas say things like that. It made her feel like they belonged to one another somehow, like there was no one on earth who understood her the way he did. “That’s literally the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

He glanced at her. “Hey. Are you crying?”

“Sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Absolutely nothing, Joan. It’s okay. And you take all the time you need.”

“The witch is back.”

Martin typed something into his computer. It was time for the shift change, and he watched as Celeste stepped off the elevator. She’d been on vacation for a week, and it was the first day Martin was working with her again.

“Actually, she was strangely nice to me yesterday.” Joan didn’t know what to think of her. It made her suspicious. Hopefully, Celeste felt guilty for how she’d treated Joan.

Martin filled in Celeste and the other night shift nurses.

“Guy in room 303 is absolutely too sick to be here.” Frustration coated his voice. Hospitals were discharging patients earlier and earlier, so rehab centers, subacute facilities, and nursing homes were sometimes getting them before they were ready to do hours of therapy a day.

Joan helped a young CNA named Andi give someone a bed bath. Andi thanked her so profusely that Joan almost felt embarrassed. She’d always helped the CNAs when she could, and she hoped it wasn’t so unusual for them to receive assistance from the nursing staff.

As usual, she tried to avoid Celeste, but the woman tracked her down. She touched Joan’s sleeve when they crossed paths in the med room that afternoon. Joan turned to look at her.

Celeste’s face took on the expression of someone biting into a raw potato. She opened her mouth, then shut it again, then opened it once more.

“I’d like to apologize for my recent behavior,” she said brusquely. “It was uncalled for. I’m just very protective of this unit.”

Joan’s mouth dropped open. She felt like she’d stumbled onto some bizarro version of the real world, where bullies apologized spontaneously. She wondered if Jennifer had talked to her. Either way, she would take it.

“Thank you.”

She remained wary, but as she walked to her car that day, her mood lightened. Maybe this whole thing with Celeste had resolved.