Page 8 of Curveball: The Baby and the Grump

With that, I grin hard at him, which only seems to increase his sourness. He turns his back on me and goes over to the fridge. “Look, what do you want? I’ve got a bunch of sandwiches and stuff. Just help yourself.”

“Thanks,” I say dubiously as he moves out of the way. He wasn’t joking; the fridge is huge and jam-packed with enough food to last any normal person weeks. I don’t want to look greedy, but I am hungry, and the wrapped sandwiches look like they could have come from a fancy deli. I pick a relatively small one, full of salad, not too messy-looking. I have to eat this in the car, after all.

I shut the fridge doors, and there’s a moment of hesitation, like neither of us quite know what to say next.

“Well… I guess I should get going,” I say. “I have to get some sleep in before tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” Jackson says absently, like he’s lost in a memory. “Bye, then.”

He doesn’t show me to the door, but as I leave I can feel his eyes on me, watching. I have a thousand more questions — about why he lives alone and why he seems so lonely — but now isn’t the place or time to ask.

As I shut the front door, I take one last look into the house, and it still looks like a hollow shell.

In the car on the way home, in between bites of sandwich — which is exactly as good as it looks — I think about what I’m going to tell Matt. He’ll be really excited to learn that I met one of his heroes today. And maybe a little jealous. And possibly mad that I injured him.

Well, it’s an excuse to see Jackson again. I’m not sure what he’s going to think of it, but as I drive through the night, I concoct a plan. Jackson Kerr has no friends and he needs help. So I’m going to be just that.

CHAPTER 7

JACKSON

The worst part about all of this is that my arm really does hurt. Doctor Brown sent me home with painkillers, but I try not to take too much medication because I’m terrified that I’ll fail a drug test some time. I don’t even eat poppy-seed bagels. It would be so embarrassing to get suspended for something like that.

Fortunately, I have one of the best chefs that money can buy, so I plan to eat the best food I can get my hands on for the next few weeks — and right now that means a load of carbs. It’s not something I usually do, but seeing as I’m not going to be able to use my arm for the next few days, I figure what’s one or two days of bad habits?

I wake up at my usual time, grab breakfast, take a pill and get mad about how much my arm hurts. Then I get mad at Freya for doing this to me, and then I get mad at myself for thinking about her at all. Once I finish my breakfast bowl, I decide to put all thoughts about her far from my mind forever. And to do that, I need a distraction.

At least it’s just my arm that’s injured. It’s still slinged up, so there’s not a lot I can do with it, but I can kind of figure out a workout plan. I end up basically doing a shit-ton of squats in my gym, and by the time I’m done, my legs are burning and all I want is a hot shower and a lie-down.

So, that’s what I do.

Sure, I miss playing, but it’s kind of nice to have some time to myself.

The downside is, by the time I’ve showered and gotten dressed and flopped down on the sofa in my comfiest track bottoms and sweatshirt, it’s only eleven a.m. How the hell do people fill time when they have nothing to do?

I decide I have no choice but to lie here all day, maybe with the help of my old friend ice cream, and watch movies. You might think that playing baseball is enough for me, that I don’t need any more of it in my life than I get. And you’d be wrong. I love baseball movies.

Lazily, I fire up the TV and access my huge library of movies. I feel like something classic today, something heartwarming. Aimlessly, I scroll until I hit it — The Philadelphia Diamond. It’s a movie I must have seen a hundred times, about a kid and his dad after the mom dies, but I could watch it every day.

I’m just getting to the good bit where the son finally hits his first home run when someone starts hammering on the door.

“Can someone get that?” I holler, but there’s no movement in the house. Damn. I forgot that today is Maria’s day off. I should have asked her to come in to help me out. Not that I need it desperately, but it would have been nice to speak to another human being. One who wasn’t bothering me, anyway.

“Go away!” I yell, but the knocker doesn’t give up. With a groan, I roll off the sofa and drag myself to my feet. “Fine, fine. I’m coming!”

If this is some marketing consultant trying to sell me something, I’m going to be pissed.

In an attempt not to be a total asshole, I sigh and take a deep breath before unchaining the latch and slowly swinging the door open, trying to script something vaguely polite to say to reject the sales pitch before I have to listen to it.

I don’t know exactly who I was expecting to find knocking on my door in the middle of the day, but Freya would have been my last guess. She stands there, beaming, clutching a little box in her hand. She waves when she sees me, her smile unfading. “Hey, Jackson!”

“What do you want?” I say, but before she can say anything else, I change my mind. “Actually, you know what? Never mind. Leave me alone.”

I don’t wait to see her reaction, and can’t anyway because I push the door shut right in her face and walk away. She hammers on it again, but I just return to my movie, sinking into the couch and turning up the volume so I can’t hear her knocking anymore.

It’s petty and rude, I know that. But I just can’t deal with her chipper attitude and belief that everything can be good in the world. I vaguely hear her shout through the door that she’s leaving a package on the step, and I ignore it. I don’t care. I don’t want to look. I’m not going to. I don’t need her package. She’ll go away, and I don’t have to think about her ever again.

Eventually, curiosity gets the better of me, though, and I climb off the sofa to sneak back to the door to retrieve it.

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