Chapter 16
SIXTEEN
ABBEY
I’ve never been one to drool over an athlete… until today. Wil just hit a home run. Sure, it was off an easy pitch from Sam, but give the people what they want, right? Too bad Wil didn’t give the people what they want in tight baseball pants.
“Um, are you for real?” Tamsa asks. “That’s your Golden boy? Cowabunga.”
“Shh.” I jerk a thumb in my parents’ direction. Mom’s telling Dad what she wants from the concession stand, but still, I don’t want them to overhear. “Keep your voice down. He’s not my anything, except my manager.”
She snorts. “You keep telling yourself that. I can tell from here that Golden boy’s got a thing for you. With a capital Th.”
I roll my eyes. “I’ve missed you so much, Tam.”
“I know you have.”
“But I kind of love working at Hometown. Is that weird?”
“Totally. How long is this game?” Tamsa picks at her nail. “You know I love you, but I don’t know how much of this I can sit through.”
“Don’t worry, the game is only three innings.”
“Great,” she says, “only two to go.”
Tamsa and I have gotten together a couple of times now since I emailed her—once for lunch and once to see That Thing You Do! Twice. We left the theater after the first screening and got back in line to buy tickets for the next one. Yes, it’s that good.
“It’s not the same without you,” she says when the inning ends and the teams switch sides. It’s not the first time I’ve heard it. “There’s something weird going on with Kim. She kind of shut down. I don’t like it.”
“Hmm.” I take a bite of the hot dog Dad brought back for me.
“Leng from accounting went to Medtronic, of all places. There’s a rumor that Slick Dick might sell to some conglomerate out of St. Louis. I’m so outta there if that happens.” She pauses. “And Sasheen is leaving music and entertainment. Another one bites the dust.”
Sasheen, Ryan’s admin. The pit monster in my belly—who’s been on sabbatical lately—roars to life and swipes its claws. I swallow hard. “Wow, that’s… surprising. Where’s she going?”
“Advertising. I still think there’s something fishy about what happened with you,” she says, quiet enough that my parents won’t hear.
“Layoffs happen,” I say.
“So does bullshit.” She sighs.
I’ve missed Tamsa and her no-nonsense approach to life… except when it applies to me. I want to tell her, I do, but I also don’t want to tell anyone, ever. I couldn’t even tell Glamma. And even if I did want to tell Tamsa, now is not the time.
“Do you think I’ll be able to catch Harmon Killebrew before he leaves?” Dad asks. “Maybe I should get in line now, just in case.”
After the game, and after Dad gets his autograph, we wander over to the concessions area where we find Wil surrounded by adoring fans—Hometown League athletes and a few players who look like they might do this for a living, in actual baseball uniforms.
Wil walks over with a gigantic smile on his face.
Gigantic! I’ve never seen a smile like that from him, big and broad and crinkly around the eyes.
And before I know what’s happening, he gives me a hug.
A hug! Not like the drawn-out, delicious hug from the warehouse the other night, but even this brief contact sets me off balance and swizzly and yearning for more.
“Mr. Rhodes,” Wil says as he shakes Dad’s hand, “good to meet you. I’m Wil. And Mrs. Rhodes.” He turns to Mom, who pulls him in for a hug, a real one, with a squeeze and rocking back and forth.
“Please, call us Jeannie and Tom,” she says as she steps back, her hands on his shoulders, and looks him over. “We’ve heard so much about you!”
I furrow my brow. “Have you, Mom?” I’ve only seen my parents a handful of times since I started at Hometown, and Mom speaks to the answering machine more than me.
“Well, yes, don’t you remember? At Scout’s birthday dinner? You told us all those funny stories about Cesar and Sam and Kevin. And Wil, of course.”
I turn to Wil. “One story. She heard one story about the guy who threw the VCR at you at customer service because you wouldn’t let him return it.”
“It was five years old!” he says. “And that’s the story you chose to tell? Wow. I can think of about thirty more interesting stories.” And it must be my imagination, or maybe a fleck of dust in his eye, but I swear, Wil winks at me.
“I hope we’ll get to hear work stories about our little apple someday!” Dad booms. “She’s so busy between the store and the magazine, we barely see her anymore!”
Oh, no. No, no, no. I meet Dad’s eyes, willing him to not say another word. Wil doesn’t know about the zine. Not that it’s a big deal, because what I do in my free time is my own business, but—
“The magazine?” Wil asks, and there’s something tight and pinched in his tone. “What magazine?”
My cheeks heat. “Not a magazine. This guy I went to college with, Hal—”
Mom cuts me off. “You don’t know about the magazine? Abbey, why doesn’t he know about the magazine? Here we go…” She reaches into her giant mahogany leather handbag and pulls out a sheath of bright lime-green papers.
Oh. No.
“Mom, really—”
“Take one of these. And let me see if I have any older issues.”
Wil takes the zine and peers at the cover, a collage of grainy images: voters at the polls, an I Voted sticker, and a hand-drawn graphic of suffragettes. Rhodes on the race, the headline reads, and in smaller print below: Will women voters give Clinton the edge?
“You write for a zine.” It’s not a question. “Huh.”
“It’s a side gig,” I cry, “helping out a friend from college, building up my portfolio…” Damn. I shouldn’t have said that.
Mom pulls another stack from her bag. “Here’s the one about the Ruh-Roh show, although I have to say, I wish you would be more careful, Abbey.”
“The Ruh-Roh show?” Wil echoes and takes the offered zine.
“Jesus, Mom, how many do you have in there?”
Dad puffs up his chest. “We bought every copy they had at Rooted Market last week.”
Tamsa snickers. “Oh, yes, that Ruh-Roh article is very good. And funny!”
I glare at her. “Not helping,” I hiss, then turn back to my parents.
“Look, I appreciate the support, but psycho logic has a very, very small print run. Like five hundred copies. You can’t buy every copy.
What do you do, carry around a roll of quarters?
And it’s not like selling out is going to make them print more.
It’s like… it’s like…” I turn to Wil. “What am I trying to say? False something?”
“Artificial demand,” he says dryly. “Sort of.”
“Yes! Artificial demand! You can’t create demand by buying every copy and carrying them around in your handbag! Hal’s barely making enough to cover printing costs!”
“But we’re so proud of you, Abbey,” Mom says, “even if you did lose your job at TC Weekly, and even if you’re writing these clever little articles for free. I hand them out to friends at church and Jazzercise!”
Wow. I think she just insulted me. Multiple times.
“I get paid ten dollars an article,” I remind her. “Please, buy one copy if you have to. That’s it. One. Save the rest for the people who really want to read it. Your Jazzercise friends are not the target readership.”
“Well, I’m looking forward to reading these, Rhodes,” Wil says. There’s something just below the surface in his tone, and I can’t quite tell if it’s pride or disappointment or a little of both.
“You see?” Mom says. “You should be proud that you’re at least using your college degree!”
Tamsa snorts. “And on that note,” she says, “I’ve got to go. I’ve got a date.”
“Not the guy from Williams Pub?” I ask.
“God, no. One and done, remember?” She gives me a hug. “Grant Lee Buffalo’s playing at Seventh Street Entry next week. Want to go?”
“I’ll have to check my schedule.” And my bank account.
“We need to go, too, apple,” Dad says. “Come over for supper tomorrow night if you can. Glamma misses you.”
Tomorrow’s Sunday, ad set, which wipes me out. I hug my parents and turn to Wil after they leave. “Are you mad? About the zine?”
His eyes narrow as he stares at me for long seconds. I hold my breath. Please, please don’t be mad at me about this.
“No. I think it’s great,” he says finally. “I’m glad you found a way to keep writing.”
I whoosh out the breath.
“Just don’t let it get in the way of work, especially now with the holidays around the corner.”
There’s the Wil we know and love. Time to change the subject. “Can I help clean up or anything?”
He shakes his head. “No, we’re good.”
“Maybe I could volunteer sometime,” I say. “The game was fun.”
“You could be a buddy next year. We can always use more women to buddy up with the girls.”
“Oh, I don’t know much about baseball.” And who knows where I’ll be next summer.
“I could help you,” he says. “Mostly we teach the kids about teamwork.”
“I’ll think about it.” I smile. I liked watching Wil engage with the kids, not to mention run around the bases. He looks happier and more relaxed than I’ve ever seen him.
“Why does your dad call you apple?” he asks.
I can feel my cheeks pink up. “Apple Records. Abbey Road.”
He smiles. “Of course. I should have guessed.”
“He’s called me that for as long as I can remember.”
“I like it. Your parents are great.”
I roll my eyes. “Greatly embarrassing.”
“I’m sorry you missed my grandparents and uncle,” Wil says. “They left right after the game.”
“Uncle Howie was here? I would have loved to have met him.”
“Someday,” Wil says. “You’ll meet him someday.”
It sounds like a promise.
Even with a raise for my promotion from ATC to team captain (by some miracle, Jeremy agreed to my salary demands, although I don’t actually know how much Aurora made, so he could be lying), I’m still not making anywhere close to my salary at TC Weekly.
Even with overtime, I’m having trouble paying all my bills.
After every long shift, I think about stopping by the night deposit box at Norwest Bank with the “severance benefit,” but three things always steer my car in a different direction: my integrity, my self-worth, and let’s face it, my sheer exhaustion.