Page 53 of The Best Friend and the Shortstop

I start to argue but then decide maybe she needs this to save face. I’m not out to crush her façade. She can do that on her own.

“Yep. You did. I mean, if we never kissed back then, who knows.” I shrug again, but deep down? I know. Nikki knows. We would have kissed eventually. I’m coming around on just how inevitable we are.

“For what it’s worth, I always thought you looked like you fit.” She reaches across the console and squeezes my forearm, her words almost a compliment, but not quite.

“Thanks,” I say, and she slips out the passenger side and scurries up the stairs to her apartment door. I wait to make sure she gets inside, then flip the car around to head home so I can shower and get my head on straight.

I’ve been putting off calling my mom, and I could probably use her wisdom right now, so I press call on the Bluetooth. She answers after the second ring.

“Mija. How was your game?” She doesn’t always watch. It makes her nervous.

“It was all right,” I say. I haven’t been telling her about my struggles; she has enough going on. She should know about him though.

“Dad showed up,” I say.

I told her I asked him not to come for a while. She never reacted to that news either way.

“Well, he loves you. He’s a really terrible husband, but he is so proud of you.”

I laugh out hard.

“What? Don’t laugh at me, that isn’t nice.”

“No, no. It’s just that . . . it’s such a cliché thing to say. Mom and Dad are splitting up, but we both love you very much. I’m twenty-two. I don’t need the kid gloves.”

“Ah, baby boy,” she says, that mocking tone only she can get away with. I settle into my seat and relax more, my hand slung over the wheel as I slow down. “You will always need kid gloves.”

I chuckle.

“Perhaps.”

I don’t really want to be filled in on how court went, so I let her fill me in on her day. She has an advanced class of students this year, and they’ve been reinvigorating her love of teaching. It’s nice to hear her talk about her work like this. For years, it’s always sounded exhausting—parents yelling at her for reading choices, students cheating and getting caught. This year seems to be low on the negatives, at least professionally.

“And how is Nikki?”

I smirk at her tone. It’s always there, every time she asks about Nik.

“She’s good,” I say.

Silence builds for a few seconds.

“Alex, is there something on your mind?” she asks.

I replay my tone in my own head, and I don’t think there was any way she could read me and know that Nikki and I have gotten together. Maybe she just has that mom thing. Sixth sense. Eyes on the back of the head. Wiretaps.

“Yeah,” I sigh out.

“Lay it on me, son,” she says, and I hear the porch chair slide on concrete. She’s getting into advice mode, which is good. I need some.

“You know how you and Julianne are always meddling,” I start.

“What? We don’t meddle,” she says, her tone clear that she knows they do.

“Yeah, mmm hmm. Okay. Anyhow, you know what I mean. You two have always sort of pushed?—”

“Gently nudged,” she corrects. She sounds excited, and that makes me feel a little scared.

“Right, well, the nudging. We maybe, finally, sort of?—”

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