Chapter 8
Phaser: A miss-hit that has no spin or finesse whatsoever, just goes flying out of bounds in an embarrassing and cannonball–like failure.
Still no reply from Skye.
“Okay, that’s weird, right?” Jess said to Tania the next morning at the gym. “To say nothing at all?”
Tania breathed through her chest presses. “It is a bit weird. But maybe it’s like that thing where you get a text and you’re in the middle of something, so you can’t reply, then it just slips your mind?”
“Yeah, but…” Jess chewed her lip. “You wouldn’t do that for a text you were really excited about … would you?”
Tania shrugged as she exhaled. “Maybe.”
“Ugh.” Jess did another halfhearted bicep curl.
“Give it a day and then maybe try once more.”
“And say what? ‘Hey, it’s me, the woman you just hooked up with, sad and desperate, hoping you’re not ghosting me?’”
“Maybe not … exactly that?”
Jess kicked at a rubber mat. “This is what I get for talking to cool women. Rejection.”
“You have not been rejected!”
Jess raised her eyebrow at her.
“Yet.”
“Ugggh.”
“Listen, we play Sonja and Jonesy tomorrow. Let’s focus on that. We’ve got to build off our Horny Beach win.”
“Right.” Jess nodded, stuffing down the thought of rejection … for now. “Right. What’s our game plan?”
Saturday morning, there was still nothing from Skye. Jess knew she would never be able to focus on the match with the festering wound of the unanswered text.
Time to pull off the Band-Aid.
She sat at her small kitchen table with a bowl of oatmeal.
Hey, I don’t want to bother you, but … No, delete.
Hi Skye! I just wanted to make sure you got my message.
… Nooooo. Delete. Hey, how’s your weekend going?
… Maybe? Neutral. A tad boring perhaps, but …
neutral. Neutral was good. Here she was, casual, expecting nothing beyond relaxed chitchat.
She hit send.
Jess’s leg jittered under the table as she ate her oatmeal on autopilot. No response.
She brushed her teeth, packed her bag, including the two foil-wrapped loaves she had made for Vivienne the night before, and walked to the pavilion. No response.
Jess got changed, then found Tania in the stands watching the match ahead of them, already in her uniform. Jess sat next to her, chewing her nails. No response.
“You okay, Button?” Tania asked when she saw Jess’s face. “You look … extra white.”
“I texted her.”
“What?” Tania gasped. “When?”
Jess checked the time. “Forty-seven minutes ago.”
Tania scrubbed her face. “Shit.”
“I shouldn’t have texted before our game.”
“Well, since you said it first … yeah, you shouldn’t have texted before our game.”
“Fuck.”
“Listen. Do you think you can do me a favor and not check your phone at all until after?”
Jess scrunched her face up. “Ummm…”
“You can do it.” Tania scooted closer and took her hand. “Look, Viv and Lee are losing.”
That was, admittedly, rather interesting. Jess turned her attention to the court. The fact that the match was still going on meant it had gone to a third and deciding set. Vivienne was scowling, her face a dark cloud.
Very interesting.
They were down 13–14. The match was on the line.
Their opponents, from North Bay and not far ahead of Jess and Tania in the rankings, were clearly playing an incredible game.
They sent over a tough float serve. Vivienne made a shaky pass, then waited for Lee’s set, the tension in her limbs visible.
Her approach was strange, sluggish, like she was underwater.
Vivienne hit a phaser out the back line. Way out.
Game over.
They lost.
Jess wanted to celebrate, but … she couldn’t. Vivienne just looked so sad. Utter devastation, like her favorite person had died. But only for a second, then her face switched back to pissed off.
“Let’s go.” Tania stood and hauled Jess to her feet.
“Yeah,” Jess said, trying to read Vivienne’s lips, but having no luck.
They reached the sand and hovered by the players’ bench, waiting for Vivienne and Lee to vacate it. Vivienne’s face was warped in a scowl.
Jess slipped the banana bread out of her bag. “Hi,” she said, tentative.
After a pause long enough to suggest she had no desire to respond, Vivienne growled, “Hey.”
Jess searched for what to say. “Tough game” or “good try” would be awkward. Actually, maybe it was best to avoid mentioning the game at all. “Um, this is for you.” She held out the foil bundles.
Vivienne’s face didn’t move a hair from her scowl. “Oh. Thanks.” She took them and stuffed them into her duffel. “Why two?”
“Oh, um, remember I said I’d bake you banana bread for every win?” Jess’s face flushed. Their friendly bet in the car seemed a million miles away, and Vivienne could not be less interested in banana bread at the moment.
“Right.”
Jess shifted in the silence, wondering how to end this conversation. Vivienne was clearly taking losing hard. “Well … at least you’re still first in the league.” Then she cursed herself internally. The plan was not to mention the game, Jess. God.
Vivienne looked at her like she was stupid. “What’s with you?”
Jess folded her arms awkwardly across her middle. “What do you mean?”
“Why are you so obsessed with winning and losing?”
The question nearly knocked Jess over. “What are you talking about? I’m n—”
“You are.”
Jess sputtered. “You’re the one who made the bet with me.”
Vivienne rolled her eyes and shouldered her bag. “I don’t care if I win or lose, Jess. I care how I play. And I played like shit.”
“You didn’t … I don’t…” Jess trailed off, words suffocated by the injustice of Vivienne telling her she was obsessed.
Vivienne waited for her to finish, then, when it was apparent she wasn’t going to, huffed and stormed away.
Jess dropped her duffel on the bench, irritation squeezing her throat. “Easy for someone to say winning and losing doesn’t matter when they almost always win,” she muttered to herself as Vivienne’s angry form disappeared into the locker room. “And, please, as if she doesn’t care about her record.”
“What’s that?” Tania, who had been chatting with the scorekeeper and missed the exchange, asked.
“Nothing, I—” Jess’s phone buzzed in her hand, right as she was about to tuck it into her bag.
They were due to start their warm-up.… She shouldn’t even look at it.… But …
It was a message.
From Skye.
Jess read it, heart in her throat.
“No, don’t—!” Tania cried when she saw Jess on her phone, but it was too late.
Hey Jess. It was really nice hanging out with you, but I’ve realized that I’m not in a place where I can be in a relationship right now. I need to focus on myself. All the best!
Jess sank onto the bench and read the words again, pulse racing. She read them one more time.
Tania tucked a ball under her arm with a grimace. “What’d she say?”
Wordless, she handed her phone to Tania.
Tania was silent for a moment, then … “Oh … Jess.”
“Yeah.”
“‘Focus on myself’? That is some bullshit. Also … ‘hang out with you’?… To be clear, you guys…?”
“We did.”
“Fuck. I’m so sorry.”
Jess shook her head. “My text literally just asked how it was going. I got dumped without even being in a relationship.”
Tania made a dismissive gesture. “Fuck her, Jess. Seriously. She obviously has her own issues to deal with. You don’t want any of that anyway.”
Jess nodded, blinking fiercely against the tears threatening to fall.
The ref blew his whistle to start their official warm-up time.
“Okay.” Tania took Jess’s hands to pull her to her feet. “I know you feel like shit right now, but we’re not going to let an asshole like Skye get in our heads. Okay? We’re not going to let her affect this match.”
Jess’s legs felt hollow. “Right.” What had she done to repel Skye?
Their night together had been so good.… Everything went perfect, really.
Although … Skye had asked her to leave.…
Was that an obvious sign she was getting rejected that she’d been too stupid to see?
She realized Tania was staring at her expectantly.
“Right,” Jess said again, hoping to convince herself and Tania in equal measure. “I’m fine. I’ve got this.”
She did not have it.
They lost. Badly.
Tania didn’t even try to talk about the game when they sat on the bench after. “Are you going to reply to her at all?”
Jess wiped her forehead with a towel. “I don’t know … I don’t think so? I mean, what could I say?”
“The middle finger emoji is nice.”
Jess let out a half-amused huff. “Maybe…”
“Seriously, you should tell her to fuck off. Such a dick move.”
A thought hit Jess like a truck, flattening her lungs. “Oh my God.… Oh my God. Horn Beach is coming here in a couple weeks. I’m going to have to see her!… Fucking hell, do we play her?”
Tania’s jaw dropped. “Shit. I think maybe we do.”
“Oh God,” Jess groaned. “Just end me now.” She pressed her palm over her eyes. “You think there’s any chance I could bribe Winston to change the schedule?” As nice as Winston was, she already knew there was no chance.
The team that was playing next hovered nearby, waiting for Jess’s crisis to pass so they could sit on the bench. Jess stood and chucked her stuff into her bag, then followed Tania toward the locker room.
“It’ll be fine,” Tania assured her. “We’ll just … beat her.”
“Oh, is that all?”
“We will. We have to.”
“Hey…” Jess ran her fingers through her sweaty hair. “Thanks for not being mad about the game.”
“It’s fine.” Tania waved the apology away. “It’s just volleyball.”
Jess had to laugh, or else she’d cry.
Not that she was excited to put on her neon-green shirt and go to work, but the last few days had been occupied with either volleyball or staring at her phone, and maybe a few hours of ring toss was exactly what she needed to clear her head.
It helped that it was a busy day on the midway, a steady stream of customers to manage, prizes to hand out, and rings to collect. But as her shift wound down, a sense of dread built in her gut, knowing that she would soon have to face the real world again.