Chapter 4
Brooks
The green-eyed girl reminded me of the time I’d caught a bluegill while spin-fishing with my grandpa on Casper Lake.
After I’d taken the hook out of its mouth, the fish had flipped to the bottom of the boat.
Instead of flopping like most fish would, it just laid there, eyes like large marbles just staring at me, and its mouth hanging open like it had accepted the fact it was going to die.
It didn’t die. I threw it back in the water.
Did I mention I’m a closet bleeding-heart sort of a guy?
Anyway, that’s what this girl standing by Reece Walters reminded me of.
That fish. Unblinking, mouth gaping, and a look that knew it was dead. Why she felt that way, I had no idea.
“Hey,” I said again. I mean, I was just trying to be nice and make a few friends. Nothing more.
“H-hi.” Her voice was so quiet I could hardly hear her.
“Meet my sister.” Reece shoved the girl with his shoulder. “Brielle. Brielle, this is Brooks Mason.”
“I’m the new kid,” I added with a half-smile. I was trying to make her feel more comfortable. Apparently, that didn’t work.
Brielle Walters didn’t even blush. She just went pale. Like, snow was darker than she was.
“Are you okay?” I couldn’t help but ask.
This time, Reece threw his arm over his sister’s shoulders. “She’s fine. She’s just shy.”
Something sparked in her eyes then as she diverted her attention to Reece.
Irritation?
Annoyance?
Desperation?
All three?
I wasn’t sure. All I knew was I was already getting bored trying to figure her out, not to mention I was going to be late for class. “Guess I’ll see you both around.” I gave them a wave and moved down the hall.
“Yo, Brooks!” Reece’s voice caught me and I spun on my heel to give him my attention.
He was still half-draped over his sister, and she was still staring at me like that bluegill.
Gilly.
Dang it.
Now I’d nicknamed her. Fish Girl Gilly. That could never get out. My mom would throw a fit.
How disrespectful to a young woman, Brooks Michael Mason.
But was it? I mean, if she looks like a fish and acts like a fish . . .
“Brooks?” Reece snapped his fingers in the air, then shifted his attention from me to Brielle and then back to me.
“There’s an open gym tomorrow after school.
Coach is going to run us through some throwing drills and stuff.
Nothing formal. Anyone can come, but if you’re planning to try out next month, you’ll want to show up. ”
“Nice.” I nodded. Now I was getting somewhere. “When’s try-outs here?”
“Probably the same as what you’re used to in Minnesota.
” Reece had removed his arm from his sister’s shoulders, but she had yet to close her mouth, and I thought—at least I could pretty much swear—she hadn’t blinked yet.
Reece continued. “We focus on conditioning and prep this month, and then late spring there’s tryouts.
You’ll want to be ready if you want to make the team. ”
“I’ll be ready.” I was already ready. I was itching for the season to start, and I didn’t doubt I’d make the team, so much as I was worried I wouldn’t be a starting catcher. That would suck. I’d always been in the starting line-up, but who knew who typically held that position here.
With a wave at Reece and at “Fish Girl Gilly”—I’d already forgotten her real name—I headed to class.
Well, really, it was just a study hall, and I was glad for that.
I wanted to get some work done, so when I got home, I didn’t have to think about homework and could focus on my throwing program that my old coach in Minnesota and I had come up with.
I needed to stay sharp in the off-season, and it wasn’t easy when the world was insulated with twenty-some inches of snow.
The teacher overseeing the study hall had her face buried in a novel. I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt and assume it was prep work for Lit class. But considering the book had a spaceship and an alien lady on the cover, I doubted it was.
I had just sat down when I caught a whiff of oranges. Or lemons. Or both? I also heard a muffled oh crap before a pile of textbooks slid to the floor at my feet. One of them landed on my toe. I bent to pick it up and collided with something solid.
I bit my tongue so I didn’t say anything worthy of dishwashing and ignored the sharp pain of cracking my head against hers.
Hers.
Fish Girl Gilly.
There she was. Next to me in study hall, with all her books laying on the floor, her mouth wide open—again—and green eyes that actually gave me the feeling she was a little bit terrified.
Of me?
Hey. That was better than that other girl—what was her name?—in physics who had the puke pink lip gloss and looked at me like I was a box of chocolate.
I could help the terrified, but I ran from the boy-crazies.
“Your head okay?” I asked her.
She nodded. Wordless. Maybe she couldn’t talk well? Like for real.
“Let me help.” I tried to remember what her real name was as I scooped up her books. I handed them to her, and her fingers brushed mine.
She snatched her hands back, and the books fell to the floor again.
“Are you okay?” I eyed her.
Now she was red. Full-on blushing, but not in a way that made me think she was crushing on me. It was total mortification.
“I-I’m fine.” She bent—slower this time around—and once she was sure she was clear of my head, she retrieved her books. “I’m just—klutzy.”
I brushed my hand on my jeans. For whatever reason, I could still feel her fingers where they’d touched mine.
Weird.
“So you’re Reece’s sister?” I tried to make small talk, but I kept my voice low. The teacher wasn’t paying attention now, but I didn’t know her well enough to know what she’d tolerate in a study hall.
“Mm-hmm.” Fish Girl Gilly—yeah, I need a new nickname for her. She was too cute. She stacked her books on her desk and made a huge effort not to look at me, but I noticed a sticker on the side of her water bottle and couldn’t help but point it out.
“So you like One Direction, huh?” The boy band was on to its next decade and going strong even though they hadn’t put an album out in like . . . I didn’t even know.
She shot me a glance. Nodded. Looked back at the notebook she was opening.
“Believe it or not, I’m actually a Timberlake fan. You know, NSYNC. The original boy band.” Sure, I was only quoting something my mom always said. She was actually the NSYNC fan, not me, but it gave me something to talk to this girl about.
Her head shot up, and for the first time, she looked at me. I mean, really looked at me. She had cat-eye sharpness to her expression now, and I felt like I’d made a major mistake.
“We can not be friends.”
Those four words were totally unexpected. I’m not sure I’d ever had a girl decline my entire existence because of music choice. I had to challenge her. I mean. Come on. I leaned toward her, keeping my voice low.
“I’ve heard of the rift between NSYNC and Backstreet Boys fans, but One Direction? I mean, they’re second gen. NSYNC is the G.O.A.T.”
It was a challenge.
She lifted her chin and glared at me. All awkwardness had melted entirely off the girl, and whatever she’d been afraid of didn’t seem to matter in this moment. “They are not ‘second gen.’ One Direction is their own entity entirely.”
“C’mon. Bye-bye-byeeeeeuh,” I mocked with what I hoped was a goofy enough grin to show her I was teasing. I moved my hands like puppets to go with the words.
Her eyebrow raised. “That’s two strikes.”
Oh. So that’s how she was going to play this? Baseball terminology to shut down my teasing? “What if I told you Niall Horan was a Chicago Cubs fan?”
“You’re out!” She declared with a whispered hiss and a quick glance at the teacher, who was still more interested in fictional aliens than her students. “Besides, anyone who knows Niall knows he’s a Red Sox fan.” Then she muttered under her breath, “Which is unfortunate. Go Brewers.”
“Brewers?” I retorted in surprise. That was my go-to team since my dad was born and raised in Milwaukee.
She cocked her head to the side and she must have taken my comment as a dig. “If you’re a Cubs fan I’ll . . . ” She just shook her head in disgust.
“Cubs fan?” I reared back in my seat, and the words came out in an unexpectedly higher pitch than I’d planned. The idea was—well, no one should ever joke about Brewers and Cubs fans. They just shouldn’t.
She leaned forward, and for a moment, I caught a whiff of that citrus smell again mixed with her spearmint gum, which she popped in my face. “You’ve already lost with me, Brooks Mason. There is no win in your future here.”
“Really?” I eyed her. She was . . . fascinating.
She sat back and picked up a pencil, ready to ignore me. “Besides,” she muttered. “NSYNC is for old people.”