Page 19 of Triple Play

That gets Felix’s low chuckle. “It’s not so bad. You get to talk to the cows in the morning.”

“What do you talk to cows about?” I ask.

A question met with silence. “Doesn’t much matter,” Felix says eventually. “I don’t get home much during the season.”

“You’ll see ’em in July, right?” Blake asks.

I turn to him. “What’s in July?”

“The All-Star Break,” Felix grinds out. It takes a second for me to realize why he’s angry—Blake’s assuming he won’t be an All-Star. At the club, when guys got like this, I’d wave over a friend. Most guys calm down with the judicious application of glitter and women saying That’s so interesting at everything they say, especially when it’s not. I don’t think that’s gonna work right now.

Okay, plan B. “What’d you want to be when you grew up?” I ask Blake.

He blinks at me, twice. “A ballplayer.”

Right, should have seen that one coming. “Felix, how about you?”

“A farmer.”

“Not a player for the Boston Monsters?” I prod.

“Yeah,” he concedes, “that too.” A brief silence settles over the car. “Um, how about you?”

Of course, he already knows the answer—because he asked me the last time we saw each other. I try to keep my voice even. “I always wanted to dance.”

“Any particular kind of dance?” Felix asks.

I can’t help it. I mutter really? under my breath.

That gets Blake’s attention. You okay? he mouths at me as if he’s ready to throw Felix from the car at my request.

He wouldn’t do that if he knew the truth. I swallow my guilt and motion to the windshield. “Truck up ahead just pumped its brakes.”

Blake frowns like he doesn’t quite believe me but has been told it’s rude to contradict a lady. Given the circumstances, I’ll fucking take it. I smile at him, sweet. His answering grin is just a fraction lopsided. Even his imperfections are perfect. I have no idea what he’s doing with me.

Still, I square my shoulders and answer Felix in my most innocent tone. “All kinds of dance, really. Mostly ballet, but there’s benefit to diversifying. So I did some jazz, even some tap.” And some exotic. I swallow that. “You ever just get an itch under your skin that makes you need to move? I guess I got that.”

“I don’t think I could do that,” Felix says. “Have all those people watch me while I was up on stage.”

At that, I crane my neck back—briefly, so as not to take my eye off traffic. “You know they watch you play baseball, right?”

“Yeah, but I get to wear a hat.”

I can’t help it—I laugh. For a second, it’s like old times: us hanging out together, drinking, telling each other about our day. Friends. Except for how I was in mesh lingerie and he was doling out twenties.

When I stop laughing, Blake is studying me. He doesn’t look pissed. But then I’ve never really seen him look pissed. That’s what Blake asked me the first time we met: why everyone in New England looked so angry all the time.

I told him it was probably because of all the anger.

“Do you still dance?” Blake asks me.

“Occasionally.”

“How come only occasionally?”

A throb goes through me, this one dangerously akin to longing. It catches me off-guard, how much I miss dancing—the competence I felt on a stage, even one with a pole as its centerpiece. “You know, stuff happens.”

“You don’t seem like the type of person to let stuff get in the way of what you want.” Blake smiles at me, that movie-star smile like he’s never had a dream shrivel up on him.

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