Page 115 of The Foul Out

Piper stepped up next and threw her arms around my waist. My heart squeezed and my eyes burned. I couldn’t lose these three. I couldn’t lose my family.

“You’ll message me, right?” she asked, her head tipped back but her focus roaming.

“Every—”

“Don’t say something you don’t mean,” Harper said, her words hitting me like a slap.

My entire body tightened, and when I answered Piper’s question, I made sure I was looking straight at her mother. “Iwill message you and your mother every day.” It was a promise I intended to keep.

Harper’s jaw locked, and she looked away.

In front of me, Piper nodded and stepped away.

“Wait,” I said, darting to the cabinet. I pulled out several extra sets of headphones and held them out to her. “Take these, girlie. Just in case.”

“Thanks.”

I nodded.

“Come on, Piper,” Harper called as she herded Sam toward the door.

And as soon as the elevator doors shut. I collapsed into a chair in the living room and dropped my head in my hands, letting the sob I’d been holding back break free.

I. Could. Not. Lose. Them.

Me: Kyle stop. Don’t keep doing this.

Kyle: I said yesterday that I would message every day. And I will message every day.

Me: Cute won’t fix this. You lied to me for months.

Kyle: I never lied to you. Yeah I didn’t tell you something. But that’s not the same thing as lying.

Me: Funny Jace said the same thing about not working for eighteen months.

Kyle: Don’t compare me to your ex-husband.

Me: I wish I didn’t have to

Kyle: That’s not fair. What was I supposed to do, tell you right off the bat that I was part of the family that hated you and was ridiculously dead set on blaming you for something that you had nothing to do with? Because like I said yesterday you wouldn’t have ever talked to me if that was the case.

Me: Stop. Just stop Kyle. This can’t be fixed.

Kyle: I’m leaving tomorrow for seven weeks. You’re really not going to talk to me before that?

Me: No. I have nothing to say.

Five days,six hours, and ten minutes. It felt like longer. It felt like a part of me had died. I had come to spring training. I worked out. I practiced batting. I did sprints. I did the work. Because my team depended on me, and because I didn’t lose. My right side, the responsible side, was here, working hard. But the left side, the fun side of me, had disappeared when Harper left.

I studied the bottle of beer I wasn’t drinking while I sat at the table on the patio. I’d rented a house down in Clearwater, just like I’d done every year. And I let the guys come over and hang at the pool, like always. But I hardly talked.

A chair scraped against the cement, and then Asher dropped into the seat next to me.

“You okay?”

“No.”

“I feel that.” He sighed. For a long moment, he didn’t say anything else, and when he did, it was the last thing I expected.“I’m not telling anyone else, but it seems like maybe your misery needs some company, so I’m going to lay it out. Zara asked for a separation.”

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