Page 8 of French Kiss

4

A Good Feeling

Year Three - February

San Francisco

It wasJosh’s idea to make a bet on a game we had no chance of winning. “I have a good feeling about today,” he said, walking through the Presidio in San Francisco, where we could just begin to see blue water through the trees as we topped the last hill.

I had to wait a minute before I could answer him without sounding winded from the hill, so I pretended to think about what he’d just said, bobbing my head from side to side.

“You always have a good feeling. It’s called optimism.”

“Ha!” he said. “I don’t think a single person who’s met me would call me an optimist. I’m a born cynic.”

“A person can’t be both?”

“So, like, a person who always happily looks forward to the worst possible results?” He laughed, which made me laugh. It was the best part about hanging with Josh. We always found the humor, even in the most stressful circumstances. Especially then.

“If anyone could straddle that line, it would be you,” I said.

“Fair enough. I do love a good tragic outcome.”

Even so, I couldn’t understand why he wanted to make such a sucker’s bet about a game we were guaranteed to lose. My tendency to make rational decisions made me even more skeptical of Josh’s sudden optimism about our Ultimate Frisbee odds.

Our team had never won a game.

“Let’s talk more about this good feeling,” I said, wondering if he’d had a tarot card reading or something.

“I can’t explain it. It’s just a sense I have that our luck is about to change.”

We were heading to Crissy Field for our ritual Friday game, which mattered far more than any of us ever acknowledged. Especially to me.

I couldn’t bear to lose at anything and took the game way too seriously. Every time I laced up my shoes and jogged a steady one mile to warm up before stretching, I felt a killer instinct bent on winning, if only because winning was a possibility. Every loss we racked up—and there had been dozens at this point—was like a personal dagger in my gut.

Our failure to win proved that effort didn’t always pay off, and I hated to admit that could ever be true.

“So if you’re betting on a win, do I have to bet against you? Because you realize that if I’m betting on us to lose, it’s not gonna incentivize me to play better.”

“Clearly,” he said. “No, I’m thinking we wager against the other team.”

“You mean Maddox.”

Josh’s face erupted into the closest he ever came to an evil smile as he began nodding furiously, rubbing his hands together like the inventor of a dastardly plan. “I want to win the game and take his money.”

“Ah, I’d like that too. I could use some cash. But I’m not sure I could take the double humiliation if we lose.”

“Then play to win, Hannah.”

“Right, okay,” I said. Like it would make any difference. “And do you really think your good feeling and my attempt to play like a champ are enough to clinch it for us?”

“Just might. Never doubt the power of positivity,” Josh said, walking a little faster down the hill in anticipation of victory. It was hard not to be swept along by his magical thinking and his overall good nature.

I looked over at him as he trudged up the hill and considered telling him about Jordan, a guy I’d just started dating. It had only been a couple weeks and I hadn’t told my friends yet. I wasn’t sure if there was anything to tell. But it always felt strange to keep stuff from Josh.

Still, something stopped me from mentioning him. It wasn’t that I thought Josh would be bothered, but… part of our bond was being romantically downtrodden and single… together. I decided not to mess with his mojo right before a game, especially since I didn’t know if Jordan was a keeper. I owed him at least that much.

Over the past week, Josh had seen me through some particularly rough nights at the hospital. We all had those moments when the attending doctors came down hard on us and made us feel like we knew nothing, despite the years of training and study. In part it was their job to teach us, and in part it was their job to break us down and instill some humility. We were responsible for people’s lives and heath, and we couldn’t take that lightly.

---