Chapter 19 #3
The girl from earlier was sitting next to the desk with him, no baby seat in sight, but there was a baby monitor on the desk. “I don’t usually act like a fanboy,” the man said, his voice a whisper, “but… is that Kulti?” His face was really hopeful.
I set my phone on my lap and watched as he leaned forward for my reply. “Yes.”
The guy pumped his fist in the air and turned back to the girl. “I told you so!” he whisper-hissed at her, which only made me smile.
“His hair is different,” she responded to him in a low voice, looking back to make sure she wasn’t being overheard.
“He does look different with his hair short,” I agreed, stretching my neck up but only able to catch a glimpse of the guy they’d called Dex hunched over.
“Do you think he’d give me an autograph?” the redhead asked.
I nodded.
The guy grinned at the girl, who smiled at me.
“He’s the most famous person we’ve had in here, at least since I started.
There was that boxer guy that was a friggin’ jerk, but no one was impressed,” she explained shyly.
She turned back around before adding, looking at the ginger, “I used to have a big crush on him. He was so cute.”
“Don’t let the boss hear you.” The redhead laughed. Or he’d get jealous? How adorable was that?
So sweet it made me feel a little weird. With how busy I was, I didn’t spend much time around couples. Even when my friends had significant others, I still didn’t do a whole bunch of stuff with them.
Oh hell. I had almost exactly what I’d always wanted. I had nothing to complain about.
“Are you dating?” the guy blurted out a second later. The girl hit him in the arm.
I felt my neck get hot, and though I realized I didn’t have to answer, I did anyway. “No.”
“Oh.”
“We’re just best friends.”
“LOOK, I need to warn you: I think my dad’s going to lose his shit,” I said as we pulled into my parents’ neighborhood. “I already warned him that I had a big surprise while I was waiting for you at the tattoo place, but I really think he’s going to lose it.”
I could feel the weight of his gaze from the other side of the car, even though it was almost eight o’clock at night. “I’m not worried.”
Of course he wasn’t worried. But I was.
My dad was going to crap his pants. I hadn’t found the balls to even warn my mom because I wasn’t sure how she’d handle it either. There was a chance she’d freak out and say she needed a warning beforehand.
“Rey, you don’t understand how big of a fan of yours he is.”
“Schnecke, I’m not worried. I’ve seen it all.”
Not that I didn’t doubt it, but it still didn’t help my nerves as we got closer and closer to the house my parents had lived in for as long as I could remember. The fear that one of them would spill the beans on my childhood crush had been nagging at me for hours.
What was I going to say, though? That he wasn’t welcome?
That wasn’t very nice, and that wasn’t the way my parents had raised me.
Plus, I’d brought Jenny home with me a few times during breaks.
That wasn’t counting the other teammates and friends who had been in and out of my life over the years who had come by for holidays.
The small three-bedroom house was right at the end of the cul-de-sac. My mom’s new-ish car and my dad’s work truck were in the driveway as I parked on the street. The house wasn’t new in any way, but my dad took care of it.
I shot him a smile as Kulti grabbed our bags from the trunk, holding my hand out. “I can take that.”
He gave me a single look before he kept walking right up the stones my dad had laid as a path to the doorway. The German didn’t even bother waiting for me to catch up before he was knocking on the door, a little more subdued than the way he banged on mine every time he came over.
I shoved him to the side as the locks began turning. “?Quién es?” Of course it would be my dad.
“Sal!” I called back, putting my index finger up to my mouth when Kulti looked at me.
“Sal? You lost your key?” The bottom lock turned, and a moment later, my dad’s face appeared in the crack of the door.
“No.” I grinned, happy to see him. “Happy early birthday. Don’t freak out.”
His forehead scrunched up as he swung the door wide. “Don’t freak—” He stopped. His gaze swung from me to Kulti, then back to me and finally back to Kulti. The weirdest breath escaped his mouth.
Then, he shut the door in our faces.
Kulti and I looked at each other, and a second later, I started laughing as a big grin that caught me totally off guard cracked across his lightly bearded face.
“Dad,” I cried out.
There was no reply, which only made me laugh even harder.
“Papi, come on.” I pressed my forehead against the door, my shoulders shaking as I replayed the look on his face when he spotted the German next to me. “Oh God.”
Twisting my head to look at Kulti again, I saw he was still smiling.
“Salomé? ?Que paso?” My mom’s voice came from inside the house a second before she opened the door, her forehead scrunched up in confusion already.
“Porque—?ay, carajo!” she said, immediately spotting the much taller man standing next to me.
Her face went a little pale. Her mouth gaped in surprise for all of three seconds before she cleared her throat, looked back at me, and cleared her throat again.
“Okay. Okay.” Her eyes swung back over to the German before she smiled warily.
“Come in, come in.” She spoke in Spanish, ushering us inside.
“Hey, Mom,” I said, giving her a hug before stepping aside as she closed the door behind us.
“I brought my friend with me.” I gave her a look with wide eyes that said please don’t bring anything up.
“Mom, Rey… Reiner...? Kulti...?” I looked at him for a clue as to what I should have my family call him.
He just casually shrugged in response, extending a proper hand out to my mom. “Rey, this is my mom.”
My mom was too busy looking him up and down like she couldn’t believe he was real, and honestly a small part of me couldn’t believe it either.
Reiner Kulti was standing in my house. I’d watched hundreds of his games in the living room.
I’d sworn to my dad I was going to be as good as The King in this exact place more times than I could count.
He was here. Here. As my friend, spending the next few days because he had nothing else to do.
Jesus Christ.
“Hola, Senora Casillas,” Kulti said in his perfect Spanish, before continuing on. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Thank you for having me.”
Who was this man with manners? I watched him, not really surprised at how polite he was but… a little bit caught off guard.
A small, slow smile crossed my mom’s face, pleased with his introduction.
“It’s nice to meet you too,” she said, thankfully avoiding anything like I’ve heard so much about you or something really incriminating.
Mom finally looked over at me, not switching back to English.
“I was wondering why your dad shut the door and walked into the bedroom. He’s in there now.
Go find him while I get Reiner a drink.”
So she decided to go with Reiner. How about that.
I gave him a small smile as he stood there with our bags in hand. “I’ll be right back. You can leave the bags there. I’ll move them later.”
He gave me what I was starting to call his “shut up, Sal” look. I smiled at my mom and gave her another hug despite the fact she was more focused on the man next to me. “I’ll get him out of there.”
Sure enough, the bedroom door was closed when I came up to my parents’ room. I knocked on it twice before saying, “Dad? I’m coming in. Don’t scar me for life.”
Sitting on the edge of his bed, with his head between his knees, was the man who had raised me.
His rough, dark hands were gripping the back of his head, and it took everything inside of me not to start laughing at his mini panic attack.
Choking it all back, I took a seat beside him and put my hand on his back.
“Surprise,” I whispered with only the slightest hint of laughter in my voice.
Slowly, his head turned, and I caught one light-green eye staring back at me. “I don’t know whether I want to hug you or beat you,” he said in Spanish.
“You’ve never even spanked me,” I reminded him with a big smile.
Dad managed to scowl with only the small part of his face visible. “No la chingues, hija de tu madre. Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”
It should be said that my dad was the second most dramatic person in the family, only outranked by my little sister. Eric, our mom, and I were the sane, stable ones.
So yeah, I shook my head at him, knowing he was full of crap. “With the way you drive, it’s going to be another car that—”I dragged my thumb across my neck “—gets you, not a heart attack, all right?”
Dad tilted his head so that both of his green eyes were visible. I’d always wished I’d inherited his mom’s gene, but I hadn’t. None of his kids had. With his super tan skin, the color always seemed to pop. Lucky dog. Mom had told me once it was the first thing she noticed about him.
“With the way you’re treating me, I’m going to end up on blood pressure medicine soon.
” He sat up and continued to give me an impertinent look.
“You brought him to our house, and you didn’t warn me?
You didn’t even tell me you were on speaking terms the last time we talked.
” He shook his head. “I thought you were my best friend.”