Chapter Ten

ten

There’s less than a foot of driveway between the garage door and the rusted front grille of Carol’s Jeep. It’d be plenty of room for all five foot nothing of Ellie were she wearing normal shoes, but she’s still sporting her father’s size 14 New Balances, so watching her try to squeeze through to the garage door opener is like watching an old slapstick comedy. Lucky for all of us, she narrowly avoids a fall onto the hood of Carol’s car, but when she mashes her pointer finger against the light-up numbers of the garage door opener, the buttons flash back in warning. Three wrong codes in a row.

“Do you need me to go in and ask someone?” I suggest, but Ellie either doesn’t hear me or doesn’t care to respond.

“What year did the Cubs win the big baseball thing again?” she asks.

“The World Series? 2016.”

This she hears loud and clear, and when she punches in 2-0-1-6, the garage door grinds to life. “You’re gonna love this,” Ellie says with a brilliant smile.

The garage door creeps up inch by inch, hinting at flashes of bold reds and royal blues behind it. It’s not until the door is completely lifted, hanging parallel to the Astroturf below, that I fully process what I’m looking at: a miniature, 18 x 20-foot Wrigley Field.

“No way,” I whisper. “No fucking way.”

Just the wooden recreation of the Wrigley Field sign would have been reason enough to drag me to the garage. Or the pitchback, stationed in the center of the fake grass outfield. But the back wall, covered in floor-to-ceiling craft ivy; the forest-green stadium seats, which are either perfect replicas or stolen straight from the third-base line; and the sizable collection of Cubs player portraits, framed and autographed…I think I just stepped into a miracle.

“This is Dad’s retirement project,” Ellie explains, flipping on a space heater in the corner. “I figured you would appreciate it.”

Appreciate it is an understatement. I want to move into this garage. I follow a few paces behind Ellie, each step weighted with the cautious excitement of a little kid entering a museum. “This is wild,” I say, not really to anyone but myself, but Ellie breathes a laugh anyway.

“The original plan was to build it in my room when I left for school,” Ellie explains, “but I like this better than sleeping in the garage when I’m home. Although Mom hates that she has to leave the Subaru in the driveway.”

I trail my fingers along the taped-off square in the center of the pitchback. It’s a little worn, but not enough to suggest any real use. “Does your dad play?”

“No, that’s leftover from Dad’s last project. Turning me into a softball star.” Ellie’s smile is small and apologetic. “He gave up on that one somewhere between sixth and seventh grade.”

“So you played?”

She sputters in dissent. “What part of me walking the mile would make you think that?”

I’m tempted to mention that not all softball players are runners, but it hardly feels like a relevant argument. “I guess the crossover between AP Art and extracurricular sports is…”

“Zero.”

“I believe it.” Beside the pitchback, a white paint bucket filled with baseballs catches my eye. The mitt balanced on top doesn’t have an autograph or any kind of sticker labeling it a collector’s item, so I slip my hand inside. It fits like, well, a glove.

“Remind me exactly when you quit playing again?” Ellie asks.

“Midseason junior year, when I tore my rotator cuff. Just in time for the recruiters to show up to watch me ruin my career in real time.” I select a baseball from the top of the bucket. Again, no autographs, no stickers, no nothing, so I throw it into the mitt, adjusting to the size and weight of it. Softballs are heavier, but the brace of my wrist and the clap of a ball against leather is the same. A prickle of familiarity inches up my forearms and toward my chest, and I fight the urge to imagine a life where I never had to take the mitt off. If everything had gone according to plan, I’d be gearing up for a third season pitching for a D1 team—ideally U of I, but I would’ve gone anywhere with a persuasive recruiter who could guarantee I’d be pitching all four years. It’s all fantasy now, but unlike most days, my reality isn’t so bad. It’s a decked-out garage, a mitt that fits, and a girl who’s waiting to see what I’ve got.

After a centering breath, I adjust my stance, wind up, and throw a knuckleball dead center into the pitchback. The net recoils, launching the ball right back into my mitt. Thunk . God, I missed that sound.

“Oh wow,” Ellie whispers. “You’re like good good.”

“Not like I used to be, but I still remember a little.” I wind up again. Curveball this time, right into the sweet spot. The pitchback does what it’s meant to do. Thunk , right back into the mitt.

“Seems like you still remember a lot.”

I turn the ball over in my hand, inspecting it for scuffs. “It’s like riding a bike. Once it’s in your body, it stays there.”

“Deep,” Ellie teases.

“Shut up.” I throw a third pitch, hitting the corner of the tape this time. Not my best. “See?” I point at the pitchback as evidence. “They’re not all perfect pitches.”

A flicker of something wicked and wild dances through her eyes. “It doesn’t have to be perfect to be good,” Ellie says, and the breathy rhythm of her voice tests my balance more than I’d ever admit.

“Using my own words against me, huh?”

“You know it.”

For the next few pitches, she watches me closely, her eyes hot on my skin with every throw. Eventually, she stops following the ball, examining only me. “How’d you hurt yourself?” she finally asks. The inevitable question anytime my softball career gets brought up.

I tap the mitt against my right shoulder. “Overuse. I kept pitching even when my shoulder started to bug me, and then during a tournament it just…” I shudder the memory away, unwilling to relive the details. “Long story short, bad form did me dirty.”

“Really?” Ellie arches a brow. “You look good to me.”

My stomach twists. She steps up behind me, and on my next pitch, I can feel her mirroring my movements at half effort, like a dancer marking her choreography. When my weight shifts, her weight half shifts. When I follow through, she half follows through. When I turn around, she blushes, caught in the act.

“You need a mitt if you’re gonna catch it,” I point out.

“Or you could just catch it for me.” Ellie rests a hand on my shoulder, watching her own thumb as it strokes tiny circles against the knit of my sweater. There’s no one here to witness her tenderness—not Kara or Otto or even Bo—but no part of me wants to remind her of that. “How’s your arm now?” she asks.

“Better. I can throw a little.” I tip my head toward the pitchback as if it’ll agree. “If I took it easy, I might be able to play in a community league or something.” Just the possibility sparks a little hope in my belly.

“You should,” she says. “It’s cool to see you do your thing.”

I slip off the mitt, and Ellie takes her hand off my shoulder. I shouldn’t have moved. “What about you?” I ask, wiggling the tension and the fluttery feeling out of my fingers. “What’s your thing? Apart from painting.”

She tilts her head, searching the ceiling for a response. “I dunno.”

“What do you mean you dunno?”

“I mean, there’s painting for pleasure, and there’s painting for school.” She holds out her hands with her palms facing up, weighing pleasure and school against one another. “It feels like two separate things, ya know?”

I nod, but I don’t know, really. Work feels like work. School feels like school. Getting high and watching RuPaul’s Drag Race feels like getting high and watching RuPaul’s Drag Race . I’ve never known a world with overlaps, one where I’m so passionate about one thing that I do it for more than one reason. “So what’s the difference?”

“For school it’s like…timed drawing and painting exercises and practicing different styles, right?” Ellie snatches the baseball from my mitt, holding it to the overhead garage light. It casts long, oval shadows, the perfect scene for a still life. “And I don’t get to just paint either. There’s so much art history and figure drawing and classes like Current Issues in Art. But when I’m just painting, then it’s just for me. No deadline or distractions. I can just make something because I want to.”

“But then what?” I press. “What if painting becomes your job? Say you’re the next Monet…”

She cuts me off. “I won’t be the next Monet. After grad school, I’ll be a health-care worker with a paintbrush.”

“And you’re cool with that?”

“Cool with it? I love it.” She tosses the ball underhand to me, but I have to lunge to catch it. “No one’s getting rich as an art therapist, which is why grad school debt is such a no go, but it’d be nice to actually help people. Then I can paint just to paint. On my own terms, you know?”

I study the crinkle of a smile reaching the corners of her eyes, feeling every bit the asshole for what I’m about to ask next. “And what if your mom won’t pay for grad school? Then what?”

As suspected, her smile falls. “Then I’ve honed a skill that I’ll use for a lifetime of homemade presents for my parents. So that’s something, I guess.”

I snort a laugh. “I bet your dad would love that though.” I tilt my head toward the curated collection of autographed player pictures. Even from across the garage, I recognize Fergie Jenkins’ mustache and a young Sammy Sosa, pre–corked bat incident. “You could paint his favorite player, or like, Wrigley Field.”

“Or Yankee Stadium,” Ellie suggests, and a tiny bit of disappointment curdles in my stomach. Right. Even standing right in front of me, her heart is in New York.

I toss the ball back to her as gently as I can. Without a mitt, she fumbles for it, then chases it across the Astroturf. “Are you gonna show me how to throw this or what?” Ellie finally asks, cradling the ball in both hands like a baby bird. I’ve never seen someone so unnatural with a baseball.

“I can try.” My gaze dips down to her feet. “But I’d ditch the clown shoes first.”

Once Ellie’s down to her socks, I find her a mitt and position myself behind her, fighting every instinct to close the we’re-definitely-just-friends amount of distance between us. I move her arm into pitching position, but the moment I let go, her arm drops a half inch, so I guide her elbow back into place with a gentle nudge of my fingertips. I like having a reason to touch her, even if it’s just like this. “So the secret is to keep your feet and shoulders squared off toward your target.” I plant my feet one at a time to demonstrate, drawing invisible lines between my shoulders and my toes. “See?”

Ellie nods and mimics me, peeking back over her shoulder to be sure she’s the perfect reflection of every shift of my weight and bend of my elbow. Set, aim, follow through. I mime throwing an invisible ball right alongside her.

“Like you’re throwing a dart,” I say, squaring her shoulders for her. She pulls back and proceeds to throw the ball straight past the pitchback, nearly knocking a framed Ron Santo picture off the wall.

“Should I take up softball?” she asks, full sarcasm.

“You’re not as bad as you think,” I say with a shrug. “You could probably join a community league.”

She squints at me. “You’re lying.”

“Of course I am.”

With a full-throated laugh that goes straight to my ego, Ellie chases down the ball again and gets back in position, wiggling her butt a little for effect. This time, the ball hits the netting, but when the pitchback does its signature and only move, she shrieks and ducks out of the way. I reach out my mitt to catch it. Thunk.

Ellie’s eyes stretch with horror. “You sure you weren’t a catcher?”

“What can I say? I’m a woman of many skills.”

After two more throws, Ellie starts holding up her own mitt. Five more and she catches it for the first time, startling herself a little when she does. Ten or so down the line, she throws one within the tape, and it shoots back right into the pocket of her glove.

“There you go!” I shout, sounding just like my old warm-up coach, but feeling twice as proud. “You did it!”

Ellie stares at me, slack-jawed and blinking in disbelief. “That was good, right?” she asks, barely holding back excitement.

“Yes,” I assure her. “That was really good.”

“That was really good!” She throws her arms into the air and the ball goes flying as she runs a miniature victory lap around herself. “New York Yankees, here I come!” As she stretches out her celebration, pride swells like a rising tide in my chest. At least I think it’s pride. Whatever it is, it’s warm and full and alive, and I hope it never goes away.

“You can pitch!”

“I can pitch!” she echoes, my very own verbal pitchback. She rounds out her victory lap, positioning me as her finish line, and she skids to a stop just in front of me, bright eyed and grinning from ear to ear. “Thanks for the help, coach,” she murmurs, then plants her mitt on my bad shoulder and, before I even realize what’s happening, presses her lips against mine.

When it comes to first kisses, Ellie Meyers is not a long, fireworks-and-butterflies type; she’s soft and simple, and it’s over before I can get a hold on what’s real. The head rush is instant, though, as is the certainty that if that’s acting, I need an encore. My hands find the curve of her waist through the emerald silk, drawing her back up onto her tiptoes and guiding her mouth to mine again. With a brush of my tongue, her lips part like two tiny ballet slippers, opening in a way that’s gentle, giddy, and so perfectly Ellie. A fluttery feeling bridges the arches of my feet, and with each sweep of my tongue against hers, I wade deeper into something I’m supposed to only pretend to have. Friends don’t do this. Group project partners definitely don’t do this. But here she is, and here I am, and nothing about it feels pretend. She tastes like coffee, and I’d drink her all afternoon if she would let me. Cancel Thanksgiving. Cancel Christmas too. Give me weeks and months to learn the plush of her lower lip, the way it rebounds when I release it from my gentle bite. Her kiss feels like hope, like coming home, and I never want to go anywhere else.

“El Bell! Can you come here for a sec?”

We startle apart, and I could choke on my frustration if my heart weren’t already lodged in my throat. Ladies and theydies, it’s the queer cock block and royal pain in my ass, Kara Meyers. She’s really outdone herself: not only has she cut short my make-out session with her daughter; she’s left us no time to discuss what it means. We stare at each other for a long moment and if my face looks anything like Ellie’s, I’m the color of a near-ripe raspberry. We’re frozen in the silence until she clears her throat.

“That’s, uh. That…that’s my cue,” she stutters. She slides the mitt off and passes it to me with trembling hands, and I watch as her cheeks turn a pale shade of pink. So we’re both shaken up. That’s sort of reassuring.

I open my mouth to ask a question, but I can’t seem to land on which one to ask. “Did you…what did…maybe we should?” My head feels like an overflowing aquarium, and each flopping fish of a thought dies before I can form a complete sentence.

“El Bell!” Kara yells again. “Did you hear me?”

“Y-yes Mom, coming!” Ellie shouts back, then lowers her voice to the volume of a sigh. “I guess we should get back inside.”

“You go ahead,” I say with a wave toward the door. “I’ll, uh, be there in a sec. I…I’m gonna check in with my parents.” I ditch both mitts and retrieve my phone from my back pocket, ready to invent some sort of important business that needs my attention just to buy myself some recoup time. Conveniently, I have three texts from Kat, so I won’t have to improvise after all. I’m about to open the notification when I feel Ellie’s warm gaze over my shoulder.

“Who the hell is Big Booty?”

My chest flattens against my lungs, completely bulldozed by embarrassment. “Oh, uh. That’s Kat.” I hit the side button, and the screen dips to black. “It’s just a joke.”

Ellie’s brows pinch together for a moment, but it’s so quick that I’m sure I imagined it. “Um, okay. See you inside.” Just like that, she’s gone.

When the door to the house clicks behind her, my sweaty palms and shaky fingers fumble to swipe open Kat’s messages. I could use a distraction from…all of that. It was what I wanted, right? For Ellie to kiss me? And it was better than I ever could’ve hoped. But was it a fluke? Did she change her mind about us just being friends? Or maybe she’s doubling back on her “no casual hookups” rule? I’m surprised to feel my heart squeeze, to learn that’s definitely not all I want from Ellie Meyers. Maybe she just got…carried away, and so did I when I pulled her back in for more. It’s more than I can make sense of, so I focus on my phone instead. Kat’s provided plenty in the way of distractions. She’s sent over two pictures in the last hour—one of their family dog, George, with his paws on the table and his giant basset ears dipping into the gravy bowl, and one of a Scrabble tile rack with the letters arranged to form the word QUEEF. Beneath the pictures, a quick text:

accurate portrait of how thanksgiving is going so far. how’s cleaning going???

I breathe a near-silent laugh at the pictures, but there’s a kick of guilt behind my rib cage at the cleaning comment. If I’d been honest with her about today’s change of plans, we’d be overanalyzing the hell out of that kiss right now. I’d walk her through every fact and question and messy feeling, and she’d hang on to every word, the way we both always do. Kat would probably crack a joke about my fake girlfriend being more complicated than her real relationship, and she’d have just the right pep talk to get me back in that house to do what I set out to do: schmooze. But I can’t tell her any of it, and without my usual sounding board, the unknowns feel too scary to face alone.

I don’t have a choice though. At least not for the moment. Eventually, I’ll have to admit that I chose Thanksgiving with Ellie over more time with Kat, and she’ll inevitably get every detail out of me. But not right now. Not when we’re both juggling chaos, and certainly not when we’re facing true tragedy, like a missed opportunity to play QUEEF in Scrabble with your Bubby. I keep the conversation focused on Kat instead.

scale of one to ten, how bad is it?

A full three minutes pass without a response, validating my choice to keep quiet on the drama of my day. Kat’s busy. Of course she’s busy. She’s introducing her boyfriend to her parents and grandparents and all bazillion of her cousins. She doesn’t have time to text me, and she wouldn’t have had time for me if I were there today. The uneasy feeling in my stomach levels out a smidge. Ellie is confusing, sure, but at least I don’t have to vie for her attention.

I pocket my phone and, before heading inside, slide the mitt back on for one last pitch: a fastball. No spin, no curve, just a steady, reliable pitch. Thunk. Straight into the center of the pitchback, then right into the center of my glove. I wish everything could be that straightforward.