25. Bad Hats & Folding Chairs
BAD HATS & FOLDING CHAIRS
Connor bounced on the balls of his feet, rocked back to his heels, and then forward again.
Ribby snoozed at his usual spot tied in the shade under the bleachers. Any minute now, Jonathan should be at the softball field. Despite the demands of the new kitten, he’d insisted he would come to the game and keep the book, which had become a routine after four previous occasions.
Connor had already extracted a promise from Trixie that he could have the book at the end of the season, because Jonathan’s doodles were too funny to throw away. He might even become a tiny bit competent now that he actually knew what an RBI was.
If Connor’s phone weren’t in his gear bag, he’d pull it out to re-read that exchange, which had become one of his favorites. From Real Blond Idiot they’d barreled quickly to I miss you, which made him pretty certain that he’d landed himself a boyfriend.
It wasn’t the dick-touching parts that gave him that feeling, it was the missing-each-other texts that he’d never had before. And he was pretty hungry for them.
There he was, strolling in from the parking lot, even more loaded down than usual.
He had his folding camp chair slung over one shoulder, he’d added a backpack in addition to the cross-body bag he held close to his chest, and he carried an iced coffee. Despite the gear, or maybe because of it, he looked adorable.
Today he wore pale blue jeans rolled above his ankles, his white teddy bear sneakers, his usual patchwork bucket hat, and the team T-shirt knotted at his waist. Its logo, a beer mug overflowing with rainbow-colored foam, undoubtedly made Jonathan avoid mirrors like a vampire, but Connor liked it on him.
A lot. He hadn’t had a spectator in a bad hat and folding chair in so long, not since his mother came to games while his father ran the ranch.
Watching Jonathan meander toward the bleachers greeting people catapulted him a decade into the past, and he could see his mother trotting in from the parking lot of one or another of his tournaments from her coffee run, cutting it part-your-hair close to the start of his game.
He remembered how the folding chair system slung across her back would bobble with each step she took. If his team was in the field first, she’d pick up the pace so she didn’t miss a play, but if they were the away team, she’d slow down since Connor usually batted fourth.
He’d teased her about always almost missing the start, even once asked her if she’d been on time to see the double-play he’d made off the lead-off batter, and waited for her brain to catch up with her guilt.
He hadn’t planned to shut his mom out of his life here in Eugene. He shared funny stories about teaching, he sent photos of Ribby, they exchanged recipes, and of course they kept up-to-date on Hank and the college friends she’d met.
But he’d never mentioned Jonathan or this team, and those were both pretty important.
He needed to give her the chance. He’d tell her, and his father, when he was at the ranch in two weeks. Jonathan was worth it.
Honestly, being truthful about his own life was worth it, and he didn’t know why it took wanting to have his parents meet Jonathan to give him the push.
Having them come cheer at a game again sometime, when the pandemic had robbed them of his senior season, that by itself would be worth it.
He needed them to really know him, all of him.
The voice in his head that might sound an awful lot like Jonathan said, “Breathe.”
As Jonathan arrived at the dugout, Connor saw a head emerge from the opening of the bag. “You brought the Duke of Pawsley!”
Having three spectators, because he counted Ribby who was tied up sleeping in the shade cast by the bleachers, and now Jonathan and the kitten, might put him in the lead for most fans in the stands.
“I brought the kitten, yes.”
“Pawsley.”
“Kitten, unnamed.”
“Oh, he’s named. He’s named Duke of Pawsley because he’s dope. D-O-P.”
By this point, the entire team had clustered at the fencing and was oohing over the tiny black and white head, which promptly disappeared.
“Shhh, they’re all very nice. You don’t need to be scared.” Jonathan murmured to the space where the kitten had retreated into his bag. “I promise they’re good.”
“No, we’re not! Most of us suck!” Danny yelled from where he was doing hamstring stretches, like voice volume alone could make him bat Connor’s average. “But we love you, Jonathan!”
Connor flipped off Danny and trotted out of the dugout and through the gate. “Is Pawsley going to be okay here?”
Jonathan lowered his sunglasses to the tip of his nose and looked up at him. Connor could swear his eyes looked like starlight, glimmering in the shadow of his hat brim. The jokes and banter backed up inside his throat like a clogged drain.
He lacked the words to tell Jonathan how much seeing him meant. He’d gone three days without Jonathan, woken up alone three times in a row, and he didn’t know if he could do it again. Pawsley got Jonathan’s fingertips on his head, but Connor needed reassuring words or a soothing touch, too.
He turned away to hide his face from Jonathan, but he forgot that meant Trixie and the rest of the lurking smirkers could see him. Shit. “We’re too loud.”
“I brought you something. Well, it’s for Ribby.” Jonathan set the chair on the pavement and opened his bag.
“Let me get that.” He was glad unbagging and unfolding the spectator chair gave his hands a task.
“It’s a towel with Kitten’s scent all over it, so you can train Ribby to sit calmly when he smells Kitten. That’s what the videos said.”
He opened his mouth to ask Jonathan to keep it until after the game, but nothing came out. Well, a croak came out. A fucking croak.
He cleared his throat and tried again. “Can I kiss you? In front of Pawsley?”
Jonathan dropped his glasses onto the seat of the chair and rolled his eyes.
“May I, you fucker?”
Jonathan huffed air so loudly out his nose, Connor wanted to grab him and mash their faces together right here, but he hadn’t answered yet.
“For the record, that wasn’t why I rolled my eyes. I’m not that much of an asshole.”
Connor raised his eyebrows and fought to contain his laughter. Jonathan looked so cranky.
“Fine. I am.” Jonathan sighed. “But also for the record—and you may as well engrave this on a bronze plaque—when I’m standing here wanting to be in your arms, saying kiss me with my eyes, just kiss me. Do I need a fan to send covert messages with like this is a ballroom? Get on with it.”
After that speech, he needed to do this right.
He removed Jonathan’s bucket hat, folded it in half, and tucked it between his thighs. Then he lightly placed his hands, which hopefully weren’t noticeably dirty, on both sides of Jonathan’s head and tipped his face at the perfect angle.
They looked at each other for a moment. Jonathan licked his lips. His nose was so cute, scrunched just like Pawsley’s, and his eyes glistened with something Connor wanted to see all the time, even if neither of them could give it a name.
He lowered his mouth to Jonathan’s. Closed lips at first, that was enough.
The feel of soft lips under his, the yielding and the presence, that was enough.
They only touched with Connor’s hands and their lips, that was all, but it was so much.
Connor let his mouth gently bracket Jonathan’s top lip. The tiniest touch of his tongue.
Under his palm, he felt the hinges of Jonathan’s jaw loosen, inviting him to take this deeper, and he wanted so much more. But they couldn’t, not here, not now, not with a game to play. He pulled away.
Jonathan sank back onto his feet with a little oomph.
“Let me help you with your things?” He was quiet. He didn’t want to broadcast this moment to the rest of the world.
Jonathan nodded. “I should sit where’s it’s quieter for Kitten.”
Connor picked the chair up from the pavement and walked fifteen feet past the dugout entrance. He didn’t want to talk, but he needed to get back into his game headspace, and out of the zone where nothing but Jonathan’s lips mattered. “I can’t believe you came and you brought Pawsley.”
“I missed—"
Jonathan had spoken quietly, but somehow every person on the team had hearing like a kid at nap-time, because half of them were heckling, and the other half were trying to stop the hecklers, and that left Jonathan mute and Connor definitely in the throw balls hard at people headspace.
“Them.” Jonathan raised his voice. “I missed all of them.”
Connor narrowed his eyes. “You were going to say it. You were.”
Jonathan stared back, one eyebrow in an architecturally perfect curve.
His hair had fallen smoothly into place after their kiss.
His white shirts stayed white, even after a day of work.
His shoes didn’t get black scuffs across the toes, as if he floated above the ground. His hair stayed the way he wanted it.
The need to mess him up, to make Jonathan dirty, drove Connor wild.
He heard Trixie call his name in the batting order.
“I have to take the field.” He didn’t want to.
“I’ll be watching.”
The innings passed more slowly than Connor wanted.
Every time he glanced over, someone was showering Jonathan with attention.
Or rather, begging to see Pawsley and cajoling Jonathan, who was letting them touch the kitten’s head with soft fingers, but keeping Pawsley protectively against his own chest.
It meant that Jonathan was letting people into his space, and he could see the tell-tale signs of exhaustion and over-stimulation. He was personally acquainted with the feelings, but even more of an expert in recognizing them in small children, and now, apparently, Jonathan.
Hopefully Jonathan was more self-aware than a second-grader, but the real kicker about exhaustion and over-stimulation was the difficulty with self-diagnosis. Sort of like being hangry, which, come to think of it, Jonathan probably teetered on the edge of too.