Page 106 of Off Pitch

“Man, Mushy Knox isn’t something I had on my bingo card for this year,” Lane laughs.

“Dick,” I say, smacking him lightly with my hat. “You’re supposed to be helping me.”

“I’m not sure what I’m supposed to help with when you already know the damn answer.” I eye him curiously, and he sighs. “Stop being afraid of getting hurt like that again. That’s not Harlow, and it never will be. She’d never betray you like that.”

“It’s not that easy,” I sigh, head in my hands.

“Look,” Lane says, putting a hand on my shoulder. “I know we’ve all joked about this and teased you both through the season. But you also know that we’re here to support you at the end of it all.Bothof you. Knox, you’re actually fucking happy. And she’s happier than she was before she met Derek. That’s not nothing, and I think it’s something worth exploring.”

“Maybe,” I say uneasily. “I just hope I don’t fuck this up before we even get to that point.”

“I was wondering if you were coming back,” Harlow jokes as I walk into the penthouse, a bag of Thai food in hand.

“Sorry,” I say as I set the bag on the kitchen island. She joins me here and slides on top of one of the barstools. “I had to practice a little extra today.”

I decide not to mention my talk with Lane.

“Why did you have to practice extra?” she asks, taking the food containers out of the bag and setting them on the counter in front of her.

I grab us both a bottle of water from the fridge before I sit next to her on the adjacent barstool. “Because I pitched like shit today.”

“Why?” she asks, wrinkling her brow and opening up her pad see ew. “You never pitch like shit.”

“Not sure,” I reply. “Happens, though.”

“Are we back to short answers now, Spencer?” she asks, smiling, but I can tell she’s nervous. “I thought we’d gotten past all of that.”

“Sorry,” I sigh. “Just been a long day, I guess.” I place my hand on top of hers, and instead of providing comfort, it just gives me more unease. That talk with Lane doesn’t seem to have helped a goddamn bit. If anything, it just made this more complicated.

“Okay. Well, we don’t need to talk unless you want to. We can just eat.”

I want to tell her that I don’t want silence.

I want to talk.

I want to hear her voice because it’s become my favorite sound.

But I don’t say a word.

Instead, we eat to the sound of our forks hitting off Styrofoam containers and Harlow nervously tapping her feet against the island.

When we finish eating, Harlow jumps up to sit on the counter in front of me. “Okay, I can’t take the silence anymore. What’s going on, Knox? This morning, you didn’t want to leave me and asked me to wait here for you while you were gone. But since you came back, you’ve barely even spoken to me. Is everything okay?”

She softly presses her hand against my chest in concern. “Honestly, Lo…” I take a deep breath. “I have no fucking idea.”

“This has to do with us, doesn’t it?” she asks, voice breaking.

“Yeah,” I say, unable to meet her eyes.

“Because things feel different…”

“Things shouldn’t feel different, though, Lo. This is a fake relationship.”

In the silence that follows, I hear what I can only imagine are the pieces of Harlow’s heart shattering to the floor.

“Fake,” she manages with a derisive tone, tears welling in her eyes. “What about this feels fake, Knox? Does this honestly feel fucking fake to you?”

No!I want to scream.No, this all feels real, and it scares the fuck out of me, Harlow. I know I can trust you, but I don’t know if I can give you my heart.

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