Chapter 62 Call Fail
-Annie-
Two weeks after my birthday, the pattern is more or less the same, but Drew and I have started missing calls because of our schedules.
We still text each day, but I’m at the Reporter when he is open to talk, and he’s at practice or games when I’m free.
I’ve tried to get out with friends, and it never fails that I’m at a movie or something when he calls.
Tonight, I’m out with Craig and Luke at the local minor league game.
I watch the game and imagine the shortstop is Drew and not the guy in front of me.
As if I’d manifested it, my phone starts to buzz, and a picture of Drew in his Arizona jersey pops up.
I swipe and open the video chat. “Angel, can you hear me?” I can see Drew, but my box is all blank.
“I can hear you, but I’m at the ballpark with Craig and Luke, and I have crap signal—I don’t think my video will work. ” I reply.
“I can call you back later?” Drew asks. “No, I can see you, stay,” I say.
“Man, great game today, saw the stats,” Craig pipes in next to me, and then Luke directs my hand to pull the mic closer to him, “I told you you’d kick ass: you’ll be moved up next season no problem with plays like that.
” “Thanks, guys, I appreciate it.” He is smiling with the praise from his friends.
“Angel, really, you can call me back after the game, it isn’t a problem.
Perez and a few guys are hanging, I can ju—” He gets cut off by a girl’s voice.
“Davis, baby, come back to the party. I thought you were going to teach me more about baseball, and I was going to show you my appreciation for the lessons.” I can’t help but think who the fuck is calling Drew baby and what does she mean by appreciation?
Drew’s face on the screen freezes with a girl’s hand on his chest, and the call gives me the pop-up of “call failed.”
What the hell just happened? I try to call him back, but my phone's signal sucks, and I keep getting a “call failed” message. I look up from my phone, and Luke and Craig are staring at me. “Annie, I don’t think that is what it sounded like,” Luke says, and he sounds serious, which makes me more worried.
Luke is never serious: he’s always the comic relief.
“Really, Annie, he’d said Perez had people over,” chimes in Craig.
I put up my hand for them both to stop. “He said Perez had GUYS over, but I don’t want to get into this with you both,” I tell them.
They both return their attention to the game, but I can feel them checking on me through side eyes.
My phone buzzes with a text notification.
Drew Davis
Annie, the call failed
I tried to call you back and it won’t connect probably because of your signal at the ballpark
I’m not sure where you got cut off but please don’t panic that is Jackson’s friend Danielle, I’ll explain PROMISE
Annie
What did she mean “her Appreciation” Drew?
Drew Davis
I’ll explain-it’s a misunderstanding
Annie
Then explain it Drew
Drew Davis
Call me when you’re home Annie
Annie
While you appreciate Danielle?
Drew Davis
It’s not like that Annie, I’m not my brother I love you and an easy hookup isn’t what I’m looking for and you know it.
I don’t answer because the few times I’ve tried to type something, it is all angry replies like, “Well enjoy teaching her BASEBALL” or “Why was she in your room Drew?” because he’d been in his room, that much was clear from the call.
At one point, I even type and then delete another message saying, “could have fooled me.” I know this is jealousy and anger, and I shouldn’t say anything over text when I feel like this, so I put my phone away and sit in the stadium until the game ends, because I’m not watching the game after what just happened.
***
The guys continue in Drew’s defense on the drive home, and I feel like I’m going to throw up the hot dog and crackerjacks that I had at the ballpark the whole way to my house.
“Annie, I swear if I’m wrong, I’ll go to Arizona myself and kick his ass,” Craig says, and Luke’s “Ditto” at least makes me less mad at my friends for their defense of Drew.
On the rational side of my brain, I know that Drew loves me and he isn’t the kind of guy that would cheat, but what I’d heard and seen had been real: I didn’t make it up.
***
When I get home, I do my best not to rush to my room, but I can’t help taking the stairs two at a time to get to my room.
The video call is already ringing when I shut the door to my bedroom, and I take a seat at my desk.
Drew’s face appears on the screen and a feeling of relief passes through my body, because he is alone.
My mind had imagined he’d answer with that girl next to him.
“Angel.” He says it so tentative, like he doesn’t want to set me off, which does set me off a little.
He doesn’t get to call me Angel right now.
“Don’t Angel me right now, Drew. Explain.
” “Annie, please, I promise it looked worse than it was,” he says, and before he can finish, I cut in, “Drew, just so we are on the same page here, let me tell you what it LOOKED like and what it SOUNDED like before the call ended, why don’t I?
I hear, and I quote, ‘Davis, baby, come back to the party. I thought you were going to teach me more about baseball, and I was going to show you my appreciation for the lessons.’” “Annie,” he interjects with a look of pain on his face, but I don’t let him interrupt me.
“Then, Drew, you want to know what I SAW? I saw her hand on your chest in your room, and then the call failed.” I take a deep breath, the jealousy and anger back in full force in my bloodstream.
“Can I explain?” Drew says, before I give him my one word reply.
“YES.” “Annie, Perez had people over after the game, and at first it was just a couple of the other guys from the team, but it evolved, and a few of the local baseball groupies tagged along with Jackson.”
He takes a deep breath before continuing, “I did talk with her, and she’d asked a lot of questions about baseball.
I was just being nice, but then she hinted that she wanted to see my room, and I told her no, Annie, I swear.
I told her I had a girlfriend, and I made a point to get up and get something to drink.
She kept trying to restart the conversation, and I’d come into my room, and I thought I locked the door when I called you because I wanted to talk to you, not her.
But I must not have locked the door. I don’t know how I missed the door opening and closing—I was talking with you and the guys, and she appeared behind me.
After the call failed, I removed her from my room and told Jackson he needed to take her out of my apartment.
” He takes a deep breath and runs his hand through his hair, looking exhausted.
I take in a deep breath and try to push the anger and jealousy from my body to digest what he’s told me about the events before and after what I saw.
“Drew, before you got interrupted, you told me Perez had some guys over: why say it like that?” Because after all he’d said, this point still bothered me.
I needed to understand. “I don’t know, I didn’t do it on purpose.
Maybe I felt guilty that she’d thought I was flirting when I’d just been talking about baseball, maybe I didn’t want you to think I’m partying in Arizona with all these girls in my apartment, because I’m not.
Annie, I will never do that to us. I know what I have, and no easy offer of sex is going to make me forget that you're it, that we are it, that I love you.” When he finishes, he looks so sincere, and my last feelings of anger and jealousy disappear.
“Can we not lie to save the other the heartache or worry again, please? I would rather have all the details, because what I just did tonight was spiral, Drew, I...” I pause because even the thought hurts.
“I thought this ‘us’ wasn’t enough, that the distance has already gotten to us, and it’s only been a little over a month.
” “Angel, I’m sorry, I promise,” he says.
We talk for a while longer, but I can’t kick the pressure in my chest, the feeling that I need to be sick.