We don’t talk through my first set, and he shakes his head when I offer to trade off and on with him. I tend to step side to side when my muscles recover, keeping the burn at bay and making the most of the tingles as blood rushes to the skin. I catch Cannon’s eyes on my feet, though, so I abruptly stop to get his attention. I tap a toe until he looks me in the eyes. God, his face is beautiful. His eyes are this deep ocean blue, and his hair is the kind that I’m sure looks good right out of bed. I smile at him with tight lips, silently urging him to spill it, whatever his unexplainable issue seems to be. His expression tightens, his eyes pinch, and his gaze dips to my neck for a full breath.
“My cousin Zack, he’s our catcher. Our starting catcher.”
“Well, I mean, that’s not really decided yet, so . . .” I know where this is going. I’m used to it. It’s partly the reason we’re in Indiana.
“No, you don’t get it. Zack and me, we’re family, and we’ve had this plan for years, to do this together. Our dads have had this plan. Zack, he gets the best out of me. Throwing to him is basically the entire reason I’m out here. And, I mean, just because your dad is the coach . . .” His eyes droop with this desperate plea for me to bend to his will, without forcing him to finish that sentence—that incredibly offensive, full-of-false-assumptions sentence. If I were another guy, he wouldn’t say these things. He’d tell Zack to suck it up and compete. Double standards are so obvious to the one getting stung by them; meanwhile, the perpetrators are ignorant to their own biases.
I guess I’m glad I got the sweet kiss before this conversation. It was a nice kiss, and I choose to keep it separate from this display before me. Maybe I’ll pretend they are two completely different people—the New Year’s Cannon and this sexist one who doesn’t want a girl in his boys’ club. Nodding silently to myself, I glance to the floor as I close the distance between us until I’m close enough to flatten my palm on the cold wet cotton clinging to his chest. He’s rock hard beneath my touch. Damn if both Cannons aren’t built to perfection.
With hooded eyes, I lift my chin just as he tucks his, the feel of his heartbeat strong underneath my hand. I tap out its rhythm a few times and his gaze flits briefly to my fingertips, then back to my eyes. The slight tick up on the right side of his lips probably means he thinks things are going his way. They’re not. Not even close.
“Cannon Jennings from Indiana by way of New Mexico, you have no idea what I’m capable of, so I wouldn’t rush to judge. Maybe I’m the catcher who makes you great. Or maybe I make someone else great, and you, you ride pine a lot more than you’re prepared to.”
My lips close with the satisfied curve that comes along with saying the perfect thing at the perfect time in the perfect way. I let the smile linger as I back away until my shoulders run into the cool metal of the bar and I situate myself, ready for a second set. I lift an eyebrow. In the face of my challenge to pick a side, he does, leaning forward to spit on the concrete, just beyond his shoes.
“This is bullshit,” he says, shaking his head as if I’ve actually broken some sort of law by being good at a game. He tosses his empty water bottle in a nearby recycle bin with a flick and picks up his keys and a towel from the wall on the other side of the gym. He holds up a hand to wave at the old man behind the counter; he grunts in return. Bright light spills into the gym as Cannon pushes through the heavy metal door without bothering to give me a final glance. It slams closed behind him, and I move with the weight on my shoulders to begin my second set alone.
It’s the same every time. Every team. And I’ll prove him, Zack, the whole fucking roster, wrong, the way I always do. It’s a shame I had to kiss him first. And that he had to be so damn good at it.
3
Cannon
I didn’t tell Zack about my little run-in with Hollis. Pete doesn’t exactly make newcomers feel welcome at the gym, so I’m thinking she won’t be back anyway. Hell, the only reason Pete can stand me is that Zack’s been coming here for three years.
I noticed he charged Hollis for a day pass. I’ve never seen him do that once. Ha! He certainly never charged me before my parents were able to get automatic payments set up for him. That’s probably half the reason he likes me, honestly. My mom works in programming and she built him a website. Until last month, Pete just collected cash and stuffed it into a zipper bag to take to the bank every Friday.
Practice and workouts start for real today. Not that the impromptu January second practice wasn’t real. Two miles is a lot longer than I thought it was; I was pretty gassed and still several seconds over. It’s going to take some work to pull off two miles in under ten minutes, but not nearly as much work as it’ll take Zack.
Where my body is long, he’s squatty. His legs are built for catching, power pedestals digging into the ground, ready to stop everything and pounce for a throw to second—not necessarily the kind of legs that hustle around bases. He’s always been a great hitter, though, so his lack of speed shouldn’t hold him back. The whole situation is stressing him the fuck out, though. He hasn’t stopped badgering me with questions I don’t have the answers to since the team meeting and running drill three days ago.
“You don’t think she’s actually on the team, do you?”
“Isn’t there some sort of rule against this?”
“What happens if she gets hit with a bat?”
“Can she really handle your slider? I mean, come on.”
I feel another question coming on, perched on the tip of his tongue, waiting to plunge out of his mouth while we sit here in the school parking lot. It’s our first day back after winter break, too early for him to start in on this shit. I have a statistics class I need to get my head ready for; I can’t be all jacked up with my cousin’s anxiety.
“You think she was the starter at her old school?” He’s asked me this one already, twice. He already confirmed Hollis didn’t play softball at her last school by scouring her social media, going back years. It’s always been baseball for her. She’s always been special it seems, racing through the doors that “daddy ball” opened for her—all-star teams, batting cleanup, MVP. It’s bullshit is what it is, and I get why Zack’s pissed. But I wish he’d start doing something about it rather than just talking—er, whining.
“Who?” I answer my cousin finally, mostly to be a dick.
He punches my arm with the side of his fist.
“Come on, man.”
I scowl at the throb left in the wake of his hit.
“Piss off. You’re lucky I’m left-handed.” I rub the spot and breathe out, overexaggerating the exhale so maybe Zack will finally get it. I don’t have the answers to his questions, and I have my own questions.
“I don’t know. Why don’t you look up their season,” I suggest.
“Smart, yeah.” He’s already got his phone in his palm, his thumbs typing in the search bar.
Eventually, I step out of the car and toss the keys to my cousin at the curb. Zack’s not great at getting up early, so he eats breakfast during our car rides to school. I don’t like how other people drive, and prefer being behind the wheel anyhow.