I nodded, wondering why he was telling me his schedule. Did he think I minded that he was leaving so early? Because I didn’t. Was he laying the groundwork so he didn’t have to call me later? Because I got it, I knew he was busy. Big-time busy.
“Okay. Well. Thanks for coming over,” I said, trying to sound casual, even throwing in a fake yawn along with a stretch. “It was fun.”
I must have sounded a little too nonchalant because Ryan shook his head and said, “Fun?”
“You know what I mean,” I said, smiling.
“Fun is playing Xbox. Shooting clay pigeons. Going to the movies,” Ryan said.
“Okay. Let me try again. Last night … was amazing … mind-blowing … satisfying on every level.” I smirked and reached out to grab his hand, the covers dropping to my waist.
“That’s better. And I agree,” he said, squeezing my hand, his gaze lowering to my breasts, then slowly returning to my eyes. Everything he said and did felt deliberate and smooth, but also sincere.
We smiled at each other for a few more seconds, then his expression grew serious, almost soulful, as he said, “I really like you, Shea.”
“I really like you, too,” I said.
“I’ve been looking for a girl like you,” he said. “And you’ve been right here. The whole time.”
I held his gaze, all my defense mechanisms firing as I considered that he could get any girl in the world he wanted. Why would he possibly choose me? Then again, why would he lie to me? Especially after I had already slept with him? I felt myself taking a small leap of faith as I said, “Yes. Here I was. The whole time.” Then I leaned in for a long kiss goodbye.
Thirteen
The night before our season opening game against Rice, Lucy called me from her dad’s house. She’d been having a rough few days, missing her mother more intensely than usual, but sounded reasonably upbeat now.
“Big day tomorrow!” she chirped into the phone.
“Yep. How’s your dad feeling?” I asked, even though I’d seen him a few hours before out on the field and could tell that he was in an optimistic zone.
“He’s getting nervous. I just made his strawberry milk shake. Thank God I thought to ask Mom for her exact recipe. I never would have known to put in the malted milk powder. And then they’d never win again.”
I laughed.
“Is he not the most superstitious person you’ve ever met?” Lucy asked me.
“I’m not superstitious,” I heard Coach say in the background.
“Oh, yeah?” Lucy said. “Strawberry milk shakes for home games? Those nasty old tube socks from 1994? Mello Yello instead of coffee when you play higher-ranked teams? Big Red gum that has to be purchased from the Parkit Market? Not the E Z Stop. Not the Chevron. Not the 7-Eleven. But the Parkit Market.”
I smiled, thinking of the time, when I was in the third grade, that I threw a pack of Big Red in my mother’s cart in the checkout line. The next time I went over to Lucy’s to play, I gave it to Coach Carr, and, after thanking me, he offhandedly asked me where I got it. I told him the grocery store, and he nodded, smiled, then kneeled down and lowered his voice to a near whisper. “Let you in on a little secret.”
“What?” I said, leaning in, starry-eyed.
“Big Red is my favorite gum and I will enjoy every last piece of this pack … But if you want the very best, luckiest Big Red that money can buy, you need to go to the Parkit Market.”
“Why?” I asked, thinking that surely it all came from the same factories, like the one my grandparents had worked at when my mom was little.
“Because the Parkit Big Red helped us beat Texas in 1985, the year you and Lucy started kindergarten.”
“But we’ve beaten them since then,” I said.
“I know,” he said, nodding gravely. “And every last time, I had Parkit Market Big Red with me.” He stood up and patted his front pocket.
I remember thinking that we had lost to Texas since then, too. And wondered if that meant he had forgotten his Big Red gum for those games. Somehow I knew that wasn’t the case, and it didn’t work that way. We might not win with the gum. But we definitely were going to lose without it. And, in any event, we weren’t going to test the theory.
I tuned back into the banter between Lucy and her dad as she said, “Shea. Get a load of this. Daddy just said, ‘Those aren’t superstitions. They’re rituals.’ ” She imitated him, getting his accent and cadence exactly right, though her pitch was way too high.
I laughed and said, “Did he catch his cricket yet?”