3. Maggie

The breath I had been holding slowly passed through my lips once I was safely outside the stadium, waiting for the bus. A heavy weight seemed to press into my chest as I battled with the overwhelming emotions that wanted to restrict every part of me.

The moment that I had looked in Tommy Mikals's eyes and felt those same sparks I had the first time I met Luke, it was like my entire world had been tilted off its axis. As if all of the carefully constructed walls I had put in place for the past four years to protect my heart had started to crumble, and that terrified me.

It had been almost four years of sorting anything that reminded me of Luke into a folder that I had shoved to the recesses of my mind. I had gone this far without having to revisit any of those feelings I had placed inside that folder. But the moment that Tommy had looked at me like I was interesting, like I was someone who was worth knowing, those feelings I had shoved away with the intention of never revisiting came pushing their way back to the front of my mind. Which was exactly why I decided I would be avoiding Tommy for the rest of the season. He was a distraction that I didn't need.

My breath was still coming in rapidly, and the breathing routine my therapist taught me came to mind. After the accident, my parents had made me start sessions. I wouldn't talk to them about what had happened, and all they wanted was for me to talk to somebody. Simply sitting in that room with the therapist had been one of the hardest things I had ever done. It made me feel weak, like I wasn't mentally strong enough to cope by myself. But after a few sessions, I realized that talking with a professional displayed my strength more than not coping on my own.

I went through the familiar steps of counting my breaths, using the realty ad across from me as my anchor point. After a couple rounds, I was able to fully function again. In my mind, the safest thing to do was to keep Tommy at a distance. There was no denying I found him attractive. I couldn't force my body to think otherwise, but I could minimize all interaction with him with the hope of never seeing him look at me like he did today. I didn't deserve to be looked at like I was someone worth knowing. If Tommy knew the truth about how broken I was, that look would have been one of pity and not interest.

The bus pulled up in front of me, and I swiped my card, smiling at Renarda, the driver, as I did.

"How are you today, Miss Maggie?"

"Opening Day is in two days, Renarda. Can life get much better?" Renarda had been driving the route from my apartment to the field for the past three years, and the two of us had grown an easy friendship. She never questioned why I always chose the bus, and her easy smile always put me at ease on the rides.

Olivia was absolutely right that the bus was not the most reliable means of transportation, but she also understood why I preferred it. The main reason being that I didn't own a car anymore because I couldn't afford to buy a new one. The other reason was as simple as not trusting myself to drive anymore. The bus got me safely from one place to the next, and I didn't have to feel responsible for anyone else's well-being.

But right then it didn't matter if I got home by bus or hot-air balloon; I wanted to be in the safety of my apartment where there wasn't an attractive man making me feel things I hadn't felt in a long time. My mom always told me I shouldn't run from my feelings, but it had worked well for me so far in life, and running from Tommy Mikals's smile was exactly what I needed to be doing right now.

The bus dropped me off around the block from my apartment. I didn't live in the nicest building in the city, but it wasn't the worst either. The paint was peeling off the walls, the gas for the stove and heat didn't always work, and sometimes Mrs. Adams across the hall played her soap operas too loud. My view out the back of my apartment might be of garbage, but it had its perks too. It was in a nicer neighborhood, and I had never left my apartment feeling like I was concerned for my safety, which said a lot for apartments in the city. Greg, the owner of the coffee stand on the corner, always gave me a free coffee whenever I stopped by to see him, and my entire street was full of street performers, which always provided entertainment.

Would I live somewhere else if I could afford it? Probably.

Of course I had dreams of seeing trees and the sky out of all of my windows, but that was a luxury I couldn't currently afford. I had to settle for my small, dark apartment that had very little natural light and always had the background noise of Mrs. Adams's television.

I left my keys on the counter in the kitchen before I dropped down onto my sagging couch. My mind was still playing through the series of events that had happened since I had woken up this morning. After fifteen minutes had passed, I finally concluded that I wasn't going to be able to think of much else. The only solution I could think of that would help get Tommy Mikals out of my head was allowing myself to think about him. So I pulled out my phone and searched for his personal social media page with the username I saw earlier.

The first photo was a rather artsy shot of him standing in front of The Bean in Millennium Park with a subtle announcement of his trade to the Cougars. It had been posted a couple of weeks ago and was the only photo of him in Chicago. I continued to scroll through his feed. There were photos of the ocean in California, of him surfing, and of him playing for his previous team in San Diego. But there were no photos of him with any women or at any parties for the past year. In fact, there was almost a distinct moment where Tommy's entire feed changed from the partying scene to outdoor activities.

It was rather odd that Tommy seemed to have dropped out of the party scene and the public eye, but his image was still plagued with headlines of him with women and alcohol. I knew there were recent tabloid articles that included pictures of him with women dangling off his arm as he left various nightclubs. But it was clear that Tommy must have been making an effort to not further the narrative in his own space.

Farther down Tommy's feed there was a period of time when the only girl on his arm was a tall, thin, blond woman who was beyond gorgeous. I tapped on one of the pictures to find the woman's handle before clicking over to her page. Her name was Sutton James, and she was a very attractive model. I wouldn't say that I was surprised to find that Tommy had dated a model. It seemed that he had run in the same circles as plenty of famous celebrities and beautiful women. But as I scrolled through Sutton's page, it was like every trace of the two of them had been erased. In female lingo, that typically meant the breakup had been bad. I flipped back over to Tommy's page and scrolled even deeper, thumbing through pictures of him chugging from a champagne bottle, pictures of women perched on his lap, and pictures of him looking like a completely different person than who I saw today.

After I had firmly reminded myself of who Tommy Mikals was, I closed my phone and threw it down on the couch next to me. He was a player. Someone that broke hearts so often, he forgot that he even did it. He was used to girls throwing themselves at his feet. He probably even had a list of girls that he'd hooked up with in every city he'd visited with his old team.

Tommy Mikals was the exact opposite type of guy I should be attracted to and not who I needed in my life right now. He should not be giving me the same feelings that someone like Luke had. Only after feeling like I had firmly refiled that folder in the back of my mind did I allow myself to finally relax. I couldn't allow myself to pursue any questions around him clearly trying to change his image, because if I ended up realizing that he was someone who had simply made some poor decisions when he was young, dumb, and stupid . . . well, then I couldn't use any of those articles as valid reasons to stay away from him.

My hand found my phone again and dialed the number I had had memorized since I was a kid.

"Maggie!" My mom's voice filled my ears and took the edge off all the anxiety that had built up inside me.

"Hey, Mom. How's your day?"

"It's good. Your father is still working, and I managed to get a little bit more done on my painting." My mom created beautiful works of art for a living. Growing up, most of my memories consisted of her in an old pair of paint-splattered overalls, a paintbrush tucked in the pocket and a bandana covering her hair.

"I can't wait to see it."

"How was practice today?"

"It was good." I wasn't sure what else to say. It wasn't like I could say, Hey, Mom, I think I met someone today that I could see myself liking. That would set off more alarm bells than me not having gone on any dates for the past four years.

"Did something happen?" Leave it to my mother to have a sixth sense for when something wasn't quite right with me.

"Just a normal day," I told her, trying to push the attention away from anything being off with me.

"It's two days before Opening Day and you're telling me it was just another normal day?"

I let out a sigh when I realized that she wasn't going to let this one go. It wouldn't hurt if I told her part of the truth.

"Met the new guy on the team this year."

"Tommy Mikals?" my mom asked.

"How did you know that?" My eyebrows raised in surprise. My mom was not normally in tune with professional baseball. That was reserved for me and my dad.

"Your father was talking about it this morning." I heard a sink turn on over the phone. "What's he like? Is he as bad as all of those news articles say?"

A part of me hesitated as I thought about how to answer that. "He seems nice so far. Not at all like I thought he'd be."

That seemed safe enough to tell her.

"Is he as hot as he looks in photos?"

"Mom!" I groaned at the thought of my mom and me both finding the same guy attractive.

"It's just a question," my mom replied absentmindedly.

Tommy's bright-blue eyes flashed in my mind. Along with the tattoos that stood out against tan skin on his arms during practice. And how his hair curled out perfectly from his baseball hat. Even the reminder of these small details seemed like they could take my breath away. I had never felt like I could be intoxicated by someone before. I cleared my throat, trying to break through some of the heat that had started to build inside me at the thought of Tommy.

"He's better in person," I mumbled, hoping she didn't read too much into me actually admitting that.

"Are you sure you're okay, sweetie?" My mom's voice dropped to a soft whisper. Every part of me hoped she was only circling back around and not that she had picked up on the very real attraction that I felt toward Tommy.

"Absolutely," I told her.

"Okay, well don't forget we have family dinner coming up soon."

"Of course. I'll see you guys then."

My mom told me goodbye before the phone line went dead. Even if I didn't feel like I was ready to admit to my mom that I was physically attracted to someone, just hearing her voice seemed to put some of my worries at bay.

I had a few hours before I would need to catch a bus that would take me to Burt's to meet Olivia. All I wanted to do was sleep, but I knew that was the last thing I needed to be doing. I had finally gotten to a place where I didn't feel like I wanted to spend all of my free time asleep, and I didn't want to go back.

So I did the next best thing and turned on an episode of Sex and the City to allow myself to get lost in Carrie Bradshaw's glamorous New York City life, leaving my own behind.