Page 46 of Most Likely to Match
Rick gestures to the foam finger still on his hand and the remnants of our stadium feast in the cup holders and littered around our feet.
We should probably clean that up.
“You’re trying to impress us,” Rick says simply.
It’s hot, and I’ve been drinking beer, but I still manage to flush a few shades deeper. “Well…yeah.” I wasn’t exactly trying to hide it.
“He said you guys are working together?” Matt asks, like this is the worst idea he’s ever heard of.
I pick up my warm beer, the cup sweating almost as much as I am. “Yeah. I…it was his idea,” I say. It sounds bad, like an excuse. By the looks on their faces, they agree. I should have known better, should have decided against it for the both of us.
“I’m going to a therapist,” I say, then freeze at the horror on their faces. “I’m not…I don’t mean to…” I shake my head. Set my beer down again and turn in my seat to face them. “I know you guys probably hate me. Dean probably hated me. And I deserved it. I think he still thinks there’s a possibility that I had something to do with it all.” I close my eyes against the hurt of that. “And maybe you think that, too. I won’t sit here and try to convince you, but for the record,” I say, holding Matt’s and Rick’s individual gazes for a prolonged breath. “I wasn’t. But at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter that I wasn’t, because I still created the environment for it to happen, and I didn’t do anything to help him afterward.”
Or, at least, I didn’t do enough.
“I’ve spent my adult life thinking that I wasn’t cut out for dating or relationships. I was voted Most Likely to Succeed and I just leaned into that instead.” I shrug. “It felt safer, I guess, than putting myself in the position to hurt someone again. But when Dean came back, I was curious for the first time. Not only about dating or whatever, but about what it might be like to be with someone, to claim them and to be claimed by them.”
I reach for Rick’s hand where it rests on the arm of his seat because now feels like the time totouchsomeone, even if he’s too far away for me to reach him. “I’m not vying for sympathy here or anything. I’ve just realized after getting Dean back that maybe I’m a little bit fucked up.” I laugh at the understatement. “But I want to be deserving of him. I want him to trust me. I want Most Likely to Succeed to apply to more than my stupid business.”
Matt gazes out at the field, presumably uncomfortable with emotional outbursts. Rick stares at my hand resting on the seat between us; Dean’s seat.
“Look, you guys don’t have to forgive me or whatever.”
Matt snorts, clearly frustrated, and mutters something under his breath.
“It’s kind of funny, don’t you think? How the tables have turned?In high school, I was afraid that my friends wouldn’t think Dean was good enough. And now his friends know that I’m not.”
Rick looks at me, finally, wary and cautious.
“But I want to be. I’m trying to be.”
“How will you know?” Rick asks. “When you are?”
This is a big question, a big conversation for a girl who’s only filled out the intake form for a therapist. “I don’t know,” I say. “I guess that’s up for Dean to decide.”
Matt leans back in his seat, staring over my head again. He sighs, elbows Rick, who turns to him and shrugs. Like they’ve come to a collective conclusion, one communicated telepathically, they turn back to me. “Okay,” Rick says.
It’s not forgiveness. It might not even be acceptance. But for now, it’s good enough.
We win,though just barely, and by the end of the game, Dean seems more interested than when we started. The normal thing to do after a game, especially after a win, would be to grab a drink, keep the good times rolling, as it were. But we’re all overheated and under-hydrated, so when Matt says he’s ready to return to his hotel room’s AC, Dean gives him and Rick back-slapping bro hugs. Matt offers his hand, and we shake, though his other hand still stuffed into his pocket. Rick gives me a one-armed side hug, and I am happier with than I thought I’d be.
Dean and I walk silently until the next intersection, and he stops at the top of the stairs to the TTC. “Thanks for coming today.”
“Thanks for inviting me.” We loiter until the sound of a train’s squealing brakes rises from the depths of the subway. “Did you get some good photos?”
He looks down at the digital camera’s display screen, his thumb moving quickly over the buttons. “I like them.”
“Can I see?”
He turns the camera toward me. There’s the sky, the field, me. Abug on his knee, Rick and Matt in profile, me. Me laughing, me cheering, me standing above him, my hands in the air, my hair bouncing behind me. I don’t know if I look beautiful or not, but I know that being the object of his affection makes me feel that way.
“Do I get a picture of you one day?” I ask.
He smiles down at the camera, the blush on his cheeks from more than the heat. “You gotta be fast to catch me,” he says, noncommittal. “Do you want to come over?” he asks. “For a swim?”
“You want me to take the train and then another train all the way to the suburbs with you so I can swim in your pool?” I ask with fake incredulity.
He pauses to think about it. “Yeah.” He nods.
