Chapter 6
Dear July,
I’d give anything to be there with you now. Last night was so special…
Joe
By practice Saturday afternoon, I’ve resigned myself to a world where July is in a relationship with somebody else. I can keep going, but it grinds away at me like having a thin layer of sharp gravel under my skin.
I’d driven over to Cullowhee Thursday morning. Got myself a hotel room with a real shower for a couple of nights. My new campus is beautiful, nestled in the Smokies, surrounded by as much nature as I could possibly want. Too late for skiing and too soon for rafting yet, but I hiked the university trail system a couple of times. Maybe one day I’ll do it on a mountain bike.
I wandered the campus, found the social work department, and introduced myself to the people there. Some of them gave me reading lists, so I went over to the campus bookstore and picked up everything I could find that might be useful. I explored the town, tried some interesting-looking restaurants, drove to Lake Glenville, and took a canoe out for a few hours.
I absolutely did not think about how much better it would all be with July. How we could paddle out to the middle of the lake and drift and talk and learn each other again. How I could hold her and lull her into getting some of the rest she seems to need so badly.
Didn’t think about her going home with that smirking asshole, holding him , rolling around in his bed, teasing and laughing with him the way she might’ve with me twenty years ago. About the warmth of her smooth skin and the light she casts everywhere she goes. Did not imagine her going quiet, looking into his eyes before tilting her head to kiss his mouth with the tenderness she showed me so many times.
I mean, I knew it would be a miracle if she was still single when I came back. The odds against it were astronomical. Tom may be a dick, but he’s not stupid, and if he didn’t want her, there’s probably a list as long as my leg of other Galway guys who would snatch her up in a heartbeat.
So I used my time in Cullowhee to calm my hopes the fuck down. I’ll just go ahead with my plans for school. Fix up my building so I have a decent place to live for the time being. Decide later whether to sell it or open some kind of youth organization there. Wait and see what happens between July and Tom.
She didn’t seem madly in love with him. Maybe they won’t last.
But I’m going to leave the ball in her court. Not going to hang around begging like a half-starved pup. She knows I’m here, knows I’m single, knows where I live. If she wants me, she can tell me.
And then she can have me, because goddammit, I’m still hers, under-skin gravel and all.
I beat her to practice Saturday. Andi waves me over to warm up with her and the left center fielder, a little speedball named Hiromi.
“So, Joe, what do you do for a living?” Hiromi asks right off. “Wait—let me guess…”
“I’m thinking career criminal,” Andi says beside me.
“Ooooh, like a cat burglar!” Hiromi looks me up and down. “Yeah, you’re built for stealth. And speed.”
She’s not, like, purring or anything, but I’m pretty sure I’m blushing.
“Yeah, like that guy in that old Ocean’s movie. The one who did that laser dance.” Andi sounds perfectly serious and is almost certainly being a smart-ass. She just has that look about her.
I snort. “I’m not much of a dancer. Besides, that guy had moves no normal human could do.”
“I’m a normal human,” Hiromi says, tossing the ball to Andi and then suddenly arcing backwards, glove and all, into a flip. She lands on her feet in plenty of time to catch the ball Andi throws back.
Dirk, the right center fielder, coming toward us with another ball, sees all that. His eyes go wide, and he trips over thin air.
“Damn, Hiromi, you are freakishly skilled.” Andi’s shaking her head in disbelief. “You guys got any hidden talents? We could be the Savannah Bananas of softball. I can twerk.”
Dirk turns his eyes to her, and I can see the heroic effort he makes to keep from looking down at her curvy ass. He’s blushing furiously. Pretty sure the women have rendered him speechless. He might’ve swallowed his tongue.
The three of them actually have me laughing when July drives up.
She climbs out of her Subaru and I’m shocked. She doesn’t look well rested or well loved or well sexed at all . Ima hafta kill Tom . She looks exhausted, the shadows under her eyes more like bruises now. When Tom calls her name and holds up a ball, she nods and hauls a bag out of her back seat and moves toward us like she aches all over.
“Dude, you okay?” Andi calls to her, and I know then that I’m right—this isn’t normal for July.
July waves her off. “Just stiff. I’ll work it out.”
She does seem better as practice gets going. Her fielding is almost as sharp as it was Wednesday, her throws from third to first right on the money. She covers a lot of ground, and her batting is strong. She talks to everybody, teasing and laughing the way I remember her always doing.
She jokes with me too. I’m part of everybody .
Tom and I pretty much ignore each other. Well, if you don’t count me carefully placing my own hits right up the middle, just out of his reach. Or to the left side. Just out of his reach.
July catches me grinning after the third one, so I hit the fourth right at him, so as not to be petty. He fumbles it. I have to fake a coughing fit to hide my laughter.
I’m not usually this much of an ass.
This is my dad coming out in me. Fuck.
I straighten up and try to act right. Swing for the fence, practice placing shots to the right side, down the lines. When it’s somebody else’s turn to bat, I take my position in left and concentrate on keeping my mouth shut and doing a solid job fielding.
At Lindon’s afterward, I choose a chair between Hiromi and Dirk. Tom sits next to July, of course, but he keeps his hands to himself. The only physical contact they have is when his shoulder brushes hers as he leans forward to say something to the catcher.
I can feel July’s eyes on me as I get to know my teammates, but I don’t know what it means. When I look at her, I can’t read her expression.
“So, Joe, what’s it like being back?” Andi leans across Dirk to ask. He doesn’t seem to mind a bit. Pretty sure he’s sniffing her hair, which is curling out of her thick braid.
I think about how to answer. “I still like Galway. Hasn’t changed as much as I thought it might’ve. Good people.”
That starts everybody talking about which teammates grew up here and which are transplants. Tom’s eyes move from me to July as if he’s just figuring out she knew me before. But she’s busy talking to other people. Seems she’s the link between most of the members of the team.
She’s a little more animated now. Doesn’t look so tired in the muted light of the bar. Maybe she really was just stiff earlier.
If I were Tom, I’d give her a long, slow massage to banish every bit of pain. Bad enough the asshole’s got my girl; it’s unforgiveable that he’s not doing his job properly.
***
July
Joe fits right in with this team in this bar, just like he did at the steakhouse when we were young. He told me once that his family always moved around a lot. I guess he’s learned to talk to pretty much anybody.
I was almost late to practice tonight, hoping he’d show up to ride with me, but that was silly because he knows the place, time, and team now. And he hasn’t been around at all since Wednesday, so why would he ride with me?
The last couple of days have been tough. I’ve had a hard time concentrating at work. Burned myself twice, messed up a couple of orders, and haven’t been able to focus on my paperwork. Still not sleeping much. I keep waking up from nightmares of trying to reach Joe as something carries him farther and farther away. Those are mixed in with dreams of being with him at the lake, of touching him as he looks at me with that light in his eyes. Having him whisper in my ear, his words delicious, his fingers finding and worshiping all my secret places, his warm breath stirring the fine hair at my neck.
It isn’t easy seeing him laughing and joking with Andi and Hiromi and the whole group, with zero need for me or my help or my input.
I don’t know why I’m feeling like this. I’m not a jealous person. God knows he’s had a rough enough time that he deserves this. And I mean, maybe he really just came back because he liked Galway before, and he explained his disappearance just because it was the right thing to do as long as he was here.
But I must’ve gotten my hopes up for something more. Must’ve thought he’d come back for me . Silly. I guess it’s good that I see otherwise now, before I set myself up for a bigger fall.
Because I’ve been messing things up. Important things. Responsibilities. And that’s got to stop. I’ve got too many people depending on me. And as of today, one more.
I’d forgotten Maisie was coming in for her first shift this morning, and when she turned up five minutes early, something must’ve shown on my face, because Donna and Tina sized up the situation and took her under their wings without me having to ask. Maisie will be trained right if they do it. Not so sure I can say the same if I train her.
I need to get myself under control and my ass in gear.
***
But over the next few days, my Joe obsession grows along with my mistakes. I accidentally leave lettuce and tomatoes off the produce order and have to make an emergency run to Ahmed’s Market and pay three times as much. I forget Sonya’s going on vacation and underschedule us for the whole week. I put salt instead of sugar in a giant batch of custard. I forget to buy my sister, Jen, a baby gift and only manage to show up at her shower because my brother comes to get me.
Every night I drop into bed more tired, have more dreams about Joe, and then I wake up too soon and go right back to making mistakes.
I’m letting people down right and left. This is no way to run a business. No way to treat my family or my employees, who are having to cover for me and redo my botched work. Wednesday morning, after an entire week of me being unreliable, Donna comes in with a daily to-do list on a giant chalkboard. “To help us train Maisie,” she says diplomatically as I watch her screw it to the wall next to the walk-in. But I know it’s for me and my no-longer-working mind.
At practice, I watch Joe’s lean body as he runs and fields and throws so easily. I listen to him tease back and forth with the team while I can’t think of a single thing to say. The breeze riffles his hair and the light flashes off his smile and his eyes, and I know it’s going to be another sleepless night.
I’m hoping his shirt will ride up again so I can see the thin trail of hair down his belly. His waist is way smaller than mine, dammit. His butt in those sweats looks so perfectly cuppable…and the flex of muscles and tendons in his arms makes my mouth water. I feel ravenous for him and heartbroken that he isn’t here for me .
I’m so tired my mental filters have taken a break. When he and I collide as we’re going for a pop fly, I land on top of him, my breast in his throwing hand. I don’t know if he realizes his thumb is moving on my nipple. His eyes are so intense, so close… Lust crashes over me like a giant wave. Fuck everything. I want him right now. A few minor adjustments and I could be riding him…
An actual growling sound comes from my throat. I’m a quarter inch from kissing him, forgetting where we are and that we’re surrounded by people, when Tom runs up yelling, “Don’t forget to call the ball, y’all! Somebody’s going to get hurt!”
Tom grabs my hand and pulls me to my feet, yanking me back to my senses before I can embarrass myself. I move back to third base, not looking at Joe, feeling weirdly like crying.
I haven’t cried since the year he left.
Haven’t felt so broken, so wrong in all ways since that time.
I can’t go through that again. I don’t know if I could survive it, and way more people are counting on me now. I can’t let myself get lost in this.
I was just a kid then. I’m an adult now. I’ll find an adult way to handle it this time. I’ll do better.
Nobody can be as good as my memories of him. I just need a reality check and some adequate sex, followed by a good night’s sleep, and I’ll be fine. Back to normal, problem solved.
Even if he didn’t come back for me, he’s single right now. Probably wouldn’t mind a night together, no strings, right?
So after practice, as we’re all leaving Lindon’s for home, I catch him and ask if he’s been to the roadhouse yet. If he’d want to go with me tomorrow night, if he doesn’t have plans.
His eyes widen a fraction and his gaze shoots to Tom, who’s on my other side, talking to Andi.
“We’re not a couple,” I grit out.
Joe’s smile, when it comes, is slow and warm and knee-weakening. “Okay then. I’d like that.”
We arrange to meet at my car in the alley at eight tomorrow night. I go home, pace for three hours, sleep for six, help open the restaurant, and right after breakfast rush, I sneak over to Naomi’s Lingerie across the square to do some shopping.