Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Mac gave herself a couple of hours.
Not as a rule. Just as a boundary.
David would need to know soon. She understood that. The vintage game wasn’t casual, even if it was presented as such. People practiced. They showed up. They committed. She respected that enough not to stall indefinitely.
But she didn’t answer right away.
Instead, she rinsed the berries again, laid them out on a towel to dry and went about the rest of her morning. Laundry folded. Emails skimmed but not answered. Shoes lined up by the door.
Every so often, the thought of David’s invitation surfaced.
Vintage baseball.
Fourth of July.
Good Hope watching.
She noticed what happened next.
Her mind didn’t drift toward the field or the crowd or the novelty of it. It went straight to logistics.
How many practices would there be? What kind of conditioning would she need to feel ready? How much work would it take not to embarrass herself?
She caught herself standing in the living room, mentally rearranging her week.
That was when she stopped.
The pickup game had felt nothing like this.
That had been grass under her feet and a borrowed glove that hadn’t quite fit. Laughter. No warm-up. No one watching to measure her.
This felt different.
Not bad. Not wrong.
Just…familiar.
Hoping to sort things out in her head, Mac went for a walk. The neighborhood was quiet, the air warm but moving, cicadas starting up in the trees. She tried, honestly, to picture herself saying yes.
To see if something inside her leaned forward.
It didn’t.
There was no spark of curiosity. No flutter of excitement. Just a tightening sense of responsibility settling into place like it always had.
She was back at her house when her phone buzzed.
Paula.
She stared at the screen for a moment before opening the message.
Call me when you can. I’ve got something exciting to talk through. This could be a great summer for you.
Mac closed her eyes.
There it was.
Not the offer itself, but the shape of it. The pressure dressed up as possibility. The subtle slide from invitation to expectation.
She could already feel the way yes would pull at her. How it would start as one thing and become another. How committing to the game wouldn’t stay contained to the game.
She wouldn’t just play.
She’d train.
She’d prepare.
She’d push.
That was who she was.
And the realization came quietly, without drama: She didn’t want that right now.
Not the grind. Not the proving. Not the feeling that she owed something just because she could do it well.
Mac went inside, set her phone on the counter and stood there until her breathing evened out.
She knew which message she needed to answer first. She picked up the phone and typed.
David, thank you so much for thinking of me. It really means a lot. But after giving it some thought, I’m going to pass this year. I hope the game is a great one.
She read it once.
Sent it.
She didn’t feel a rush of relief, no surge of emotion.
Just a soft loosening in her chest, like something unlatched.
She stood there for another beat, noticing how her shoulders felt. How her jaw unclenched. How her mind, finally, stopped racing ahead to the next obligation.
The phone buzzed again.
Paula again.
She didn’t respond.
Instead, she poured herself a glass of water, took a long drink and felt something unfamiliar settle into place.
Space.
Mac leaned against the counter and let herself stay there, content in the knowledge that saying no hadn’t closed a door.
It had opened one.
Friday afternoon had begun to feel like an exhale.
The beach was quieter than it would be later—late afternoon stretching long, the sun already angling low enough to soften everything it touched.
Connor walked beside Mac at an easy pace, their shoes in hand, sand warm and shifting underfoot.
Kids were scattered along the shoreline, buckets tipped over, castles half built and already surrendering to the lake.
A group farther down was stacking driftwood near one of the fire rings, someone arguing cheerfully about whether they had enough for a bonfire.
Mac bent to scoop up a flat stone and sent it skipping across the water. It hopped twice, then disappeared.
“Good throw,” Connor said.
She shrugged. “Lucky angle.”
They walked a few more steps before she spoke again, casual enough that he almost missed the weight of her words.
“I told David I’m not going to play.”
Connor blinked. “The vintage game?”
“Yeah.” She nodded, eyes still on the water. “I texted him this morning.”
His first reaction came fast. “Oh.” Then, because it felt like the thing you said when someone made a choice for themselves, he said, “Okay.”
He meant it. Mostly.
“I gave myself a day,” she went on. “I kept thinking about it, and it didn’t feel…exciting. It felt heavy. Like a commitment I’d already started bracing for.”
Connor nodded as if that made perfect sense, because on the surface, it did. He told himself that. He told himself it was good she’d figured that out before saying yes.
“Good,” he said. “Then you did the right thing.”
She smiled, quick and relieved, like she’d been hoping he’d say that. “That’s how it felt when I sent it. Like something let go.”
They walked on. Connor let the sound of the water fill the space where his other thoughts wanted to crowd in.
He hadn’t realized how much he’d been picturing her out there until just now—wool uniform, the whole town watching, her name called like it meant something again. He hadn’t pictured it as pressure. To him, it had seemed like it’d be a celebration. Like a door swinging open.
But celebration for him wasn’t always celebration for someone else.
He shoved his hands into his pockets and kept his gaze forward.
Down the beach, a volleyball net came into view.
Nothing official, just rope tied between two poles, sand already scuffed from movement.
A loose cluster of people stood around it.
A couple of locals he recognized, a few tourists by the look of them, a teenager bouncing on the balls of his feet like he couldn’t wait to start.
Mac slowed.
Connor felt it before she said anything, the shift in her posture, the way her attention sharpened instead of pulling back.
“Looks like a game,” he said unnecessarily.
She was already smiling. “Yeah.”
One of the players spotted them and waved. “Hey! You want in? We’re short one.”
Mac didn’t look at Connor. She didn’t ask. She just stepped closer to the net, brushing sand from her palms.
“Sure,” she said. “Why not?”
And just like that, she was moving—sliding her sunglasses up into her hair, tossing her sandals aside, rolling her shoulders once like her body knew exactly what to do.
Connor stopped walking.
He leaned against one of the weathered posts near the dunes and watched.
At first, the game was loose and playful. Missed serves, laughter when someone tripped in the sand. Mac laughed, too, loud and unguarded, calling out encouragement to a kid who couldn’t have been older than sixteen. She clapped when a point went the other way.
Then the rhythm changed.
She dropped into a ready stance without thinking, knees bent, weight forward. When the ball came her way, she reacted on instinct—quick feet, clean pass, a spike that landed exactly where it needed to be.
Someone whooped. Someone else shouted her name.
Connor felt his mouth curve, slow and involuntary.
This was different.
Not the controlled intensity he’d seen in her televised games. Not the braced-for-impact focus he’d glimpsed earlier in the week. This was lighter. Freer. She dived for a ball and came up laughing, sand streaked across her calf. She didn’t check herself afterward. Didn’t pause to assess.
She just played.
The game tightened, cheers rising from both sides. When Mac landed a solid spike, the group erupted, high fives all around. She grinned, breathless.
Connor folded his arms, something warm and unsettled moving through his chest.
This was what she’d meant about pressure.
Right now, there was no crowd watching and reacting. She hadn’t stepped into a role that had expectations. This was simply movement and sun and the simple joy of being in her body without consequences.
When the game broke up, Mac jogged over, flushed and smiling, sand clinging everywhere.
“That was fun,” she said, like that surprised her.
Connor nodded. “Yeah.” He hesitated, then added honestly, “It really was.”
She glanced back at the net, then at him. “See? Low stakes.”
He smiled, a little crooked. “I stand corrected.”
As they started walking again, the bonfire crackled to life down the beach, smoke curling into the cooling air. Connor matched her pace, quieter now, letting the moment settle.
The bonfire flared as someone added another log, sparks lifting into the dusk.
Mac angled toward it without hesitation, her energy loose and bright.
Connor smiled to himself and followed her.
Whatever came next, he knew one thing for sure—he didn’t want to rush her past moments like this.