CHAPTER 37
Ramirez is jumpy before they shut the cabin doors on the plane. She sits beside me on the private charter plane, but she’s fidgeting too much to enjoy the extra leg room or care about the view out my window as we begin to taxi. Dante sits on her other side, trying to make small-talk with her and getting little more than one-word answers.
“Nervous about flying?” Dante asks.
There’s a long pause before Ramirez sighs and answers, “I’m fine,” with a tight smile.
“Really? ‘Cause you’re giving me shorter answers than Reyes right now.”
Her laugh is strained and hollow, lacking all of its usual husky richness. She bounces her knee a mile a minute. Without thinking, I reach out and rest my hand on her leg. My fingers bracket her thigh and dig into her muscles. I squeeze until she goes still.
“Mhmm.” Dante sucks his teeth and turns in his seat. He sprawls his long body out to take advantage of the empty seat beside him. “I see you.”
He lets it go at that. We’ve just hit cruising altitude, and he’s more interested in pulling out his gaming system than interrogating Ramirez and me. Which is good, considering we still haven’t had any sort of talk.
I feel so childish even thinking that. The talk. Like I’m some nineteen-year-old boy who doesn’t have my life together. She’s been the only person on my mind for months. I gave the whole polyamory and ethical non-monogamy scenes a try back before Oliver. While I get the appeal, they never quite were for me. Bringing the same single-mindedness I have for baseball to my relationships makes me a one-partner man; I’m all in or completely casual and don’t know how to do anything in between. Regardless what Ramirez is feeling, and regardless of where we’re headed, this is exclusive from my end.
It doesn’t matter that we never got enough privacy with our families in town to discuss any of it.
“Better?” I ask, realizing we’ve been cruising for a few minutes and my hand is still on her leg.
“Little bit,” she says. But when I start to pull my hand away, she’s quick to drape her fingers over mine. “Don’t.”
She speaks quietly. Neither of us is trying to draw attention from our teammates or coaches. Other than Dante and his nosy ass, that is.
I sit and enjoy the warmth of her hand on mine and the firmness of her leg between my fingers a few minutes more. We sit in silence, but it’s not uncomfortable. Aside from those few times I hurt her feelings or pissed her off, our silence is never tense. When the flight attendant starts walking the aisle taking drink orders, I hook my bag with my foot, and rifle through it without letting her go.
“Put your tray table down,” I tell her once the bleached-blond man in airline uniform has passed us. I set a small wooden box on the table, hoping it will fit once I open it up for game play. Beside it, I set my phone and the aux splitter. “Your playlist or mine?”
“Mine,” she says.
“Alright, then. Set it up. Or are you going to make me do all the work?” I tease, happy to get a small smile in response.
She lets up on my hand, and I pull away while she gets the splitter hooked up to her phone along with both our headphones, already hanging from our necks, same as every other player on the team. She scrolls through, searching for the right playlist, but she doesn’t put her headphones on.
I open the small box and start setting up the miniature tiles on the green velvet.
“I thought you needed four players for mahjong,” she says once I’ve got all the tiles in place.
“You know how to play?” I try not to let my surprise show in my voice, but the way she laughs makes my failure clear.
“No.” She practically snorts, and her eyebrows shoot toward her hairline as she laughs. “I’m going to be a terrible person to play with.”
“Or I’m planning to take advantage of you while you don’t know the rules.” I blush when I play my own words back for review in my mind.
“Alright, viejito. What are you waiting for?” She leans in, under the guise of getting closer to the characters on the board, and lowers her voice. “Take advantage of me.”
I spend most of the flight explaining the rules of mahjong, modified to the Filipino style and to fit two players. It’s a bit clumsy; I’ve never really had any need or desire to play two-person mahjong. My mother taught me, but there was always my sister and usually some other East or Southeast Asian elder from the neighborhood. Not only did I not have any reason to learn the two-person version. I’d also never been the one to have to explain the rules.
The blond-haired, blue-eyed midwestern flight attendant with his slight frame and Germanic features makes some joke about placing his bet with us. I thank him for the drinks and collect our trash from the tray tables and seat-back pockets, but I ignore his comments. I’m not in the mood to hear all about custom, modernized mahjong sets from someone who views it as just a fun gambling game. Teaching Ramirez through her frustration and over-competitiveness has been a blast; I don’t want to taint that by hearing it described as quirky, unique, or–worst of all–exotic.
The man is a good sport and walks away without looking too put-out by my refusal to include him in this game that always reminds me of home and family.
“Is there anything you aren’t good at?” Ramirez asks as she wins her first game. “Or are you one of those annoying perfect people who can pick up anything?”
“If I were so good at everything, I’d have convinced you to tell me why you’re so nervous about facing your old team by now.”
“And here I thought you were just doing an excellent job distracting me.” Ramirez sighs and leans back in her seat.
“Is that what you want me to be? A distraction?” I ask, when what I meant to ask out loud was the simpler and far less charged, Is that what you want me to do? Distract you?
She stares at me from the corners of narrowed eyes. “Usually?” she reaches across the game to take a sip from my ginger ale, since her cup doesn’t even have ice left melting in the bottom. “No, I don’t want you to be a distraction. Most of the time, you’re almost too much of a distraction.”
She turns her attention to her phone, and I’m not sure if she’s merely changing the song or signaling that she’s finished with this conversation. A second later, my own phone buzzes in my lap. The notification makes me smile even before I open the message.
Ramirez:
Do you have any idea how distracting that tight, little ass is?
I grin at her and respond in kind.
Me:
There’s nothing ‘little’ about me, rookie
Ramirez:
That’s no lie
Ramirez:
Very. Fucking. Distracting.
Me:
Oh yeah? Have you been missing me, mami?
I didn’t mean to call her that. Definitely not for the first time in a text like this. As flustered as I am by my own slip, at least I’ll be able to play it off as a joke if she doesn’t respond well to it.
Trying not to be too obvious, I shift in my seat and watch her reaction. Her eyes go comically wide as she reads the message. She doesn’t laugh. She doesn’t tease me. Most importantly, she doesn’t look disgusted.
Ramirez:
Mmhmm the things I would have done to you in your pool if our families hadn’t been there
Ramirez:
… papi
Relieved, I can’t help laughing. Dante looks over at me with that knowing fucking grin, Ramirez leans back in her seat and pretends to be intent on her music.
Ramirez:
Lol so that’s what does it for you, huh, viejito?
Me:
I don’t seem to remember you calling me old when I was eating your pretty pussy in the locker room
It’s her turn to choke on the last of my ginger ale she’s polishing off at the worst possible moment. She holds herself together, and I can see Dante in my peripheral vision, squeezing his armrests and fighting the urge to turn and give us the look again.
Ramirez:
You had me struggling to say much of anything
Me:
Except my name. It sounds good when you scream for me like that. Think you’re my biggest fan now, rookie?
Ramirez rolls her eyes and gestures at the forgotten game of mahjong. I pack up the tiles in a hurry, and she takes advantage of the armrest that we’d lifted out of the way to play the game of strategy and chance. She leans in closer–hip against mine, knee nudging my thigh, tight black spandex pressed against my gray track pants.
The game is hardly tucked back in my bag when my phone buzzes again. A little too close to my semi for that vibration to be entirely comfortable. I leave the tables down, hoping they make what’s going on in my pants at least a little less noticeable to any passing eyes.
Ramirez:
Can’t wait to see how loud you’ll scream my name next time
Me:
Aren’t you cocky
Ramirez:
Cocky, huh?
She nudges me with her elbow to make sure I see the way she gives me the once over. Her gaze slides down my body so heavy, I can feel the heat blooming along the path from my throat to my growing bulge. She isn’t done when her gaze slips back up to capture mine. She licks her lips so fucking slowly, letting her tongue linger on that full bottom lip, leaving it wet, and soft, and begging me to think about how she’d feel wrapped around my dick.
Me:
Why are you so mean to me? You like torturing me like this, when you know I can’t do anything about it?
Ramirez:
Oh, cari?ito, I’m just getting started with you
Ramirez:
I think you like when I’m a little mean though
Ramirez:
And who says you can’t do anything about it?
Her next message is a gif that makes my dick jump. A man on his back with his wrists bound together. A woman on her knees but clearly in the position of control. She smiles against the tip of his dick, hooded eyes locked on his, and lets her spit drip down his cock before swallowing him one slow inch at a time.
If this weren’t a charter plane, I’d be down the aisle already, waiting in the bathroom for her to make me a member of the mile-high club. Instead, I’m shifting in my seat and trying to calm my dick, surrounded by a plane full of my teammates.
“You’re the worst,” I mumble for her ears only.
“Too bad it’s so very obvious you’re lying,” she whispers back. Just in case her meaning wasn’t crystal clear, her full eyelashes flutter and she looks down at the growing outline of my cock and back.
“Trash?” The flight attendant appears out of nowhere.
I lean forward in a hurry. I’m hunched over, curled in on my own body when Ramirez hands him the empty cup and watches the flight attendant move onto the next pair of seats. She turns to stare at the way I’m resting my elbows on my thighs and balling my hoodie up in my lap.
And she laughs. If the sound weren’t so perfectly her–encapsulating her in full tones the same way her scent cloaks her in sweet mystery–I might manage to be annoyed. All I actually manage is to laugh back and bump her knee with mine.
The plane begins its descent into Dallas, and all my distractions lose their efficacy. I’m oddly empty when her gaze leaves me to stare nervously out the window at the clouds flashing by and the city growing in the distance.
I still don’t know what happened in her brief time with the Scorpions to shake the confidence of the rookie I’d seen playing in the minors a few months before. All I know is the strength and softness of the hand that reaches for mine as the engines roar in our ears and the plane accelerates in its descent toward the city she calls home.