Page 75 of The Trouble with Players

“How much time?” he asked.

“Until I don’t want to die.”

He laughed. “Fine. But I really gotta get back to her. I took off before I found out why she’s here.”

“Please apologize for me.”

“Of course.” He leaned forward and kissed me. “This is gonna go down as a classic story someday.” He climbed to his feet and took off for the house. “If you change your mind,” he called.

“I won’t,” I called.

His laughter followed him until he disappeared on the path.

I fell onto my back and lay there for a long time feeling mortified that my outburst was the first impression his mom would have of me. There was no changing that. It happened.

I texted Gina and informed her of what I’d done. She let me hide out at her house until it was time to get ready for the game. Only then did I head back to my house. I tiptoed inside and silence surrounded me. I breathed a sigh of relief.

I climbed the stairs to the second floor and stopped in my room. I expected Crew to have left his away jersey out for me, but since he hadn’t, I opened his top drawer: boxers and socks. I opened his middle: shorts and T-shirts. I opened his bottom: baseball pants and his jerseys. I knew they wore white on the road for away games, so I nabbed that jersey. I wondered why his home jersey was in there. Did he have two?

I dressed in the jersey, cutoffs, and sneakers. If I was gonna re-meet his mom, I wanted to look my best. I curled my hair and swiped on some makeup. My necklace kept catching on the jersey, so I removed it and left it on the dresser, then met Gina out front.

“Look at you,” she said when I stepped up to her car.

“Crew wanted me in his jersey.”

“That’s super cute,” she said. “You ready to meet the mother again?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I said, knowing I’d have to face her sooner or later.

Once we arrived at the field, we made our way to the first base line. “Do you see her?” I asked, my eyes on my feet for fear of dying of embarrassment.

“You said blonde and blue eyes?” Gina whispered.

“Yes.”

“I don’t see any woman fitting that description,” she said.

I lifted my head and looked around. Gina was right. His mom wasn’t around.

We opened our chairs and settled in amongst the host families.

“Peyton,” Sam called, leaning against the fence down on the field. “Nice shirt.”

I smiled.

“Sucks about Crew,” he said.

“What about Crew?”

“That he’s sick,” Sam said as if I should’ve known.

I stood and moved toward him. “Sick?”

“That’s what Coach told us.”

My eyes moved to the players behind Sam playing catch. “He’s not here?”

“You didn’t know?” he asked.

---