Fair Catch (Love and Sports Series)

Fair Catch

Book one in the Love and Sports Series

Meghan Quinn

Chapter 1

              Lexi was bent over, hands on her knees, panting, trying to catch her breath when a large, strong hand touched her back.

             
“Lex, that was your best yet!”

             
She couldn’t even gather words from the lack of oxygen running through her body to respond to her best friend and current human stopwatch. She just finished her last sprint in a series of sprints around the bases that she was randomly tested on by her coach. Her coach gives each girl on the team the chance to run the bases in under twelve and a half seconds at the beginning of each year. Lexi had been striving for eleven seconds and with the look on Parker’s face, it looked like she hit her goal.

             
She finally caught her breath and glanced up at Parker. “Did I get it? Did I hit eleven?”

             
Parker grinned and showed her the stop watch in his hand. She wanted to jump up and down out of excitement but she had absolutely no energy to do so. Instead, she flopped her body on the dirt as if she was going to make a snow angel and motioned for Parker to join her, which he easily did since he wasn’t the one sprinting.

             
“Thanks for the help today, bud.”

             
He leaned over and gave her a high five which she returned with a brisk snap of her hand to his. “No problem, shorty.”

             
Ever since freshman orientation at California University, Parker and her had been glued at the hip and he had been making fun of her height ever since. She didn’t blame him, though. She was a five foot three blonde with one hell of a bat and impeccable range in centerfield that would frustrate any heavy hitting batter. She received a full-ride scholarship for softball at Cal U. and had taken the school’s offer very seriously. She strived to be the best on the field and in the classroom, which she accomplished in the past three years of her college career but now that she was starting her senior season, there was a part of her that was missing and she couldn’t quite figure it out.

             
She looked over at Parker who was now sucking down the last contents of the PowerAde they decided to share. He was the shortstop for the baseball team and had the same work ethic as she did. That was why they were such great friends and friendship was all that transpired between them. They tried getting romantically involved once but it was way more wrong than right. It felt like making out with each other’s sibling, which was something they both didn’t want to revisit. So instead of becoming romantically involved they became emotionally attached. They went to each other for everything and when the year was over, Lexi dreaded saying good bye to her best friend who was already being looked at by a bunch of different professional teams. There was no doubt in her mind that he was going to make it big one day.

             
Parker tossed the empty bottle in front of them and said, “What do you plan on doing tonight?”

             
Lexi shrugged. “Not sure. I think Margo is coming back tonight. So maybe I’ll do something with her.”

             
Margo was Lexi’s roommate. They had a two bedroom apartment in the villas right near campus. Mostly all the athletes stayed in them. The villas were the best housing for students and they were closest to campus. They were mini apartments; each room had its own bathroom with a shared kitchen and common area. The best thing about the apartment was the common areas separated the bedrooms, giving ample space between her bedroom and Margo’s. She loved her roommate and teammate but Margo was quite loose with her men and Lexi liked to stay as far away from Margo’s room as she could whenever Margo had someone over.

             
Parker was shaking his head. “Nope, not going to happen.”

             
“What are you talking about?”

             
“You’re not spending your senior year locked up in your apartment like you have the past three years.”

             
She wrinkled her nose. “Hey! You make it seem like I’m some sort of hermit. I go out when I want to.”

             
“Yea on Halloween when the baseball team has a party, but that’s it. This year is going to be different. We have an easy course load and you know it, we pretty much are amazing at everything we do on the field so we’re going to learn to relax a little and have some fun.”

             
She was about to interrupt him when he held up his hand. “I don’t want to hear it. This is our last year and to hell if I’m going to let you sit around your apartment, wearing your dingy sweats while watching romantic comedies.”

             
“My sweats aren’t dingy.” She said while Parker practically lifted her off the ground.

             
“They aren’t sexy, that’s for sure.”

             
“Well when I’m home alone I’m not trying to be sexy for myself.”

             
“When you have a nickname known throughout the school as ‘Sexy Lexi’ then I think you need to hold some standards.”

             
She rolled her eyes. “I hate that nickname. Whoever started that needs to be shot.”

             
“Hmm, I wonder who that was?” He said with a sly grin.

             
They started walking toward the lockers to drop of their gear off when she punched him in the shoulder. “You started that?”

             
He rubbed his arm and said, “Hey watch the money maker.”

             
“Park, did you seriously start that ridiculous nickname?”

             
He smiled. “How could I not? Look at you!”

             
Lexi always hated when people called her Sexy Lexi, it made her feel like some kind of prostitute, which was what she felt like most of the time anyway. Her body proportions were way out of whack. She had a very petite frame which helped with her speed but she had breasts that belonged to a Playboy bunny and they were all real, which was another reason she rarely went out, because guys were only capable of staring at her breasts. She also had naturally beach blonde hair and light blue eyes. Basically she was your stereotypical California girl.

             
Lexi punched him again in the same spot, hoping she left a bruise. “You’re an ass.”

             
He grinned at her. “But I’m your ass!”

             
“I sure hope to God not.”

             
They got to a point in the events center where their paths would break since the men’s locker rooms were separate from the women’s. They stopped in the center, staring at each other.

             
“So what do you say? Will you come out tonight? The football team is having a party tonight and I could really use my beer pong partner at my side. What do you say?”

             
“Football party? Ugh Park, you couldn’t have chosen a different party? The football team is the most arrogant bunch of douchebags at the school.”

             
“They kind of have a reason to be with such a great winning record over the last decade.”

             
She shrugged. “Still just because you are good at your sport doesn’t mean you can be a bastard. Look at us, we’re amazing but you don’t see us strutting the campus with our wangs out.”

             
Parker looked down at her crotch and raised his eyebrow. “If you have a wang you want to let out I might have to reconsider this friendship.”

             
“Ugh, you are infuriating today.”

             
Parker pulled her into a hug and kissed the top of her head like he always did when they parted. “I’ll pick you up around eight. Wear something hot!” He gave her a quick a grin, smacked her ass and walked away.

             
Lexi watched his arrogant ass walk away and thought about how he could pass as a football player. Parker was one of the best shortstops she had ever seen and was quite the looker too. He was the dark and dangerous type but with a heart of gold. On the outside he looked like he could rip you into shreds with his bare hands, being six foot something and muscular thanks to the strength and conditioning program but he was a softy deep down inside. Almost all the girls on her team begged her to set them up with Parker but she never found any of them worthy enough.

             
She keyed in the code to get into the women’s softball locker room and threw her cleats in the bottom of her locker. The softball team had an amazing new stadium but their locker room was subpar. They didn’t have enough room to hang their bat bags in their actual lockers so they all piled them up in the middle of the room. It was easy storage but hard to grab your bag in a hurry when it was on the bottom of the heap.

             
She looked around the empty room at the different names that were displayed at the top of each locker and thought about how much she was going to miss this. Softball had been her life since she was in fifth grade and to not have it anymore was something she couldn’t quite comprehend. She had given up dances, sleepovers, birthday parties and pretty much every social gathering to drive around the west coast and play tournament after tournament. In the end it all paid off because she got to play her sport at the highest level of play and get a free education at the same time.

             
She thought about the last three years of her life and yes, she was well known in the sports community at Cal U. because of her ability to shatter almost every previous softball record but no one really knew her. People said hi and that was pretty much it. The closest people to her were Margo and Parker, but that was it. Maybe Parker was right, maybe she should relax a little this year and experience that social life she missed out on over the past decade of her life.

             
It wasn’t that she didn’t like being social, she just was trained to concentrate on her softball skills and education her whole life so she really knew nothing else. She didn’t really know what she was missing out on until she arrived at college and saw everyone interacting with each other.

             
When she was a freshman she didn’t want to get mixed up in any kind of social scene and lose focus on what was important so she stuck to herself most of the time and occasionally hung out with Parker and Margo. Her sophomore year, she found the method of handling college successfully since she had a 4.0 her freshman year and was the starting centerfielder over a senior so she decided to continue with her work ethic. By the time her junior year rolled around she made a goal to break almost every record possible, which she accomplished. Now that she was a senior and was looking back at her college career, she accomplished everything she wanted to. Instead of replaying the last three years of her college career, she should do something for herself. She wanted to see what it would be like to let loose and have fun while still maintaining her education and athleticism.

             
She could do it, she knew she could and Parker was right, her work load was light this year since she took a lot of summer classes in between each year to keep herself busy. By the time she graduated she would have a major in Journalism and minor in Communications, something she was damn proud of. What she was going to do with that? She had no clue, but she had a year to think about it.

             
On her way back to her apartment, after dropping everything off in her locker room, she decided that she was going to take Parker up on his offer. Not like he wasn’t going to let her get away with staying home though, at least she knew she was making the decision for herself.

             
She pulled into her apartment, took a quick shower and threw her hair up in a towel, she decided to let her natural wave take over tonight and let her long locks hang over her shoulders. If Parker wanted hot, she was going to give him hot.

             
An hour and a half later, she was dressed in her tightest black skinny jeans, deep purple tank blouse that hugged her figure and showed off a massive display of cleavage and she put on her purple flats. She would have worn her heels but knowing the party would be at the football house, the floors would be drenched with beer and she didn’t want to slip on the frothy liquid. What a way to make an entrance, she thought. She wore a little bit more mascara and eye shadow than normal but she kind of liked the way she looked so mysterious.

             
There was a knock at her door causing her to shove the rest of the peanut butter and jelly sandwich she was snacking on in her mouth as she went to open the door. Parker was standing at her door in a pair of worn jeans and a tight navy blue polo.

             
The look on his face was priceless when he saw her. She practically saw his mouth drop to the floor and his tongue hung out. Just the look she was going for. She thought to herself, eat your own words Parker!