One True Thing (3 page)

“Yeah,” I say. “I have to call home anyway. The family freaks out if I don’t call twice a week.”

“I get that—my parents have me on a strict call schedule too. See you next time,” she says, pointing her keys and unlocking a new red VW.

“See you,” I say and turn toward my street.

Gramps answers my call on the first ring. “Good evening,” he says briskly.

“Hey Gramps, it’s Jenna,” I say, knowing that they’re about the last people in the free world who would get caller ID.

“Baby J!” he says, sounding surprised even though I call them every Monday night. “How are things in the big city?”

“Garvin is hardly the big city,” I say, although compared to Grand Junction, it’s practically New York. And according to Gramps, just as dangerous.

“You being careful?” he asks, ignoring my remark.

“Yes sir. I still have the pepper spray you gave me.” Gramps tried to get me to get a concealed carry license, but I think having a gun on me is going a little far.

“That’s good darlin’. You never know who’s cruising around looking for trouble in a place like that.”

“I’m perfectly safe.” I can hear Gram in the background over the sounds of FOX news that runs 24-7 on their TV. “What’s she saying?”

“Your grandmother would like to know when you’re coming home for a visit.”

“I was just there two weeks ago,” I say, picturing their sitting room with the matching overstuffed La-Z-Boy recliners.

“You know it’s not the same without you here for Sunday supper,” Gramps says. They’re trying to be good about letting me live on my own, but I know it’s hard for all of them. Times like these I wish for a brother or sister to help take the heat off.

“I’ll work something out with Mom,” I say.

“Hold on, Gram wants the phone,” he says and I can hear him pass the handset to her. They only got a portable phone when they figured out that they could talk without actually leaving their chairs.

“Hi baby,” Gram says. “Listen, I wanted to tell you that Mrs. Edwards’ grandson is home from college—things didn’t work out for him there so he’s working with his daddy at the dairy. I thought maybe I could invite him to supper the next time you’re in town.”

I make a face. Sam Edwards is exactly the kind of guy I left Grand Junction to escape. Big, with muscles that would soon give way to a gigantic beer-belly like the one his daddy’s sporting and no conversational skills past the latest score of whatever team is playing that season. So many of my friends from high school are married already, spending their nights skinning the deer that their men bring home and planning the weekly dinner menu. No thanks. “I’m…” I look around for inspiration. No way can I survive an entire meal sitting across from Sam Edwards and both families’ expectations. “I’m kind of seeing someone up here.” I immediately want to kick myself—that was the exact wrong thing to say to get Gram to back off. Ginny Taylor is not one to let something like that go.

“You are?” Her voice rises with happiness. Like everyone else in my family, they think that my dance career is a waste of time and that none of this is going to help in their ultimate goal—finding me a man to marry. “That’s wonderful! Now I want you to bring that boy right on down here as soon as you can. I’ll get a special Sunday supper going so that we can all meet him.”

“Gram…” I try, but she’s not stopping.

“Do you think he’ll like pot roast? He’s not one of those vegetable people is he? There’s so much to do—”

“Gram!” I insist. “I’m not bringing him home anytime soon.”

“Well why not, sugar?” I can hear the disappointment in her voice.

Um…because he’s imaginary? “I will,” I backpedal. “It’s just that we’re really busy right now with school and the recital coming up…”

“Okay, but don’t make it too long,” she says. “You were dating that lovely Jake fella the last time you brought a beau to the house.”

I wince at the name. I never told them what happened between us. Jake said all the right things to get me in bed and then keep me there—that he loved me and he promised I was the only girl in his life. Not that it was complete torture at first—as the starting running back for the football team he looked good and felt even better and I was so proud sitting there in the stands cheering him on at every game. A wide-eyed freshman dating a handsome senior—every girl’s dream, right? What an idiot. My face heats up with shame at the thought of it. Everyone else on the team must have known he was seeing two other girls in two other cities. Apparently I wasn’t the only one he was making promises to.

“This is so exciting!” Gram continues in my ear.

“I’ll come down soon, I promise,” I say, making a mental note to break up with the fake boyfriend within the next couple of weeks. She’ll be disappointed, but like every other time one date didn’t lead to a ring and a proposal, she’ll get over it. “Tell Mom I’ll call her soon.”

“I will,” she says. “Bye.”

“Bye Gram,” I say.

“Wait!”she shouts into my ear. “What’s his name?”

“His name?” I ask. I look up to see that I’ve already reached my apartment building. My eye catches on the gleaming red Triumph parked in the parking space. “Tyler,” I say quickly without thinking. I feel a moment of panic and then relax. What’s the harm? Not like they’re ever going to meet him. “His name is Ty.”

Chapter
Three (Ty)

“Killer game dude,” Rowan says, swatting me on the shoulder with his glove as he passes my seat on the bus.

“Thanks,” I say. I can’t help grinning. My bat is hot right now, just where I need it to be. “You too. You’ll get the no-hitter next time.” He was so close, but a double in the eighth blew it for him. The minute the ball left the bat you could hear it was a good hit. It just about killed all of us.

“There’s always next time,” he grins, grabbing a seat toward the back.

“Basking in your success?” Mitch says, sliding into the seat behind me.

“Hardly,” I say. As much as I like to win, I hate to talk about it. It’s embarrassing somehow.

“Back to back homers?” Mitch whistles. “That’ll get you noticed. Did you see the look on that poor pitcher’s face just before they yanked his ass out of the game? I almost felt sorry for the guy.”

“The last one was a lucky shot,” I say with a shrug, hoping he’ll stop talking about it. “You had a great couple of innings too.”

“Come on. Coach only put me in because we were up by five. Between your batting and Rowan’s pitching, the rest of us are just field decorations.”

“That’s bullshit,” I say. “Okay, I’m having a good season. But we both know that bats run hot and bats run cold.” I look around to make sure nobody’s listening as the driver closes the front doors and puts the bus into gear. “Everyone has their turn.”

“Well, it’s definitely yours right now,” Mitch says. He looks over the back of my seat to the book in my lap. “German Existentialist Literature?”

“Yeah.” I wiggle the highlighter at him. “With all the traveling and games five days a week I’m seriously behind.” Not to mention that if my grades slip too much further my baseball scholarship’s in jeopardy, something I can’t afford when I’m finally this close to making things happen. All I need is a few more hours in the day.

“You just need to learn to sweet talk those TAs a little better,” Mitch says, pulling out his tablet and headphones.

“Right,” I say. I haven’t sweet-talked anyone in months, not since I broke up with Hailey last summer. Thinking about not having any girls in my life was easy. Actually doing it is getting harder every day.

There’s not much to see on the three hour drive back to Garvin—hills and scrub trees and the occasional small town, so it’s easy to finally get some work done to the hum of the other guys on the bus talking, messing with their phones or listening to the movie that’s running on the monitors overhead. Sometimes we pass through one of those micro towns, their main streets literally two blocks long, with their raised wooden sidewalks splintering in the sun and most of the glass fronts boarded up. Almost all of them have a big fancy courthouse sitting in the middle of a square right in the center of town—big brick reminders of what life used to be like in this part of Texas. As we roll out of town I look into the yards behind the peeling picket fences at the rusty swing sets and the above-ground pools and wonder what it would be like to grow up in a place like this. And what the people in a place like this would say if they knew we were watching.

I’m always relieved when we get back on the main road as it rolls over the hills, nothing to see out the window but vultures hopping around road kill and cows dotting the scrub as they bend their heads to forage what they can from the dry ground. The tiny towns depress me and make me feel even more like an outsider in this part of the country. Much better to be flying through a town like this instead of stuck in one.

It’s dark by the time we pull into the parking lot at school. Some of the guys have been sleeping and there’s a lot of groaning and stretching as the lights on the bus flip on and people stand and grab their stuff.

“Where you headed?” Mitch asks as I swing my backpack over my shoulder.

“Home I guess.”

He checks his phone. “On Saturday night? Come on, you can do better than that.”

I shrug. “Like I said, I’ve got a lot of work to do and we have a ton of games next week…” I know how lame and pathetic that sounds the minute the words are out of my mouth.

“Plenty of time for all that,” Mitch says as we hop down onto the asphalt parking lot. “Come to the bar with me. We’ll have a couple beers, some wings…you have to eat.”

I think about it for a split second. All that’s waiting for me at the apartment is a frozen pizza and Jessie and his stoner friends playing video games for hours in the living room. Plus, if I blow Mitch off one more time he probably won’t ask again. “Okay. Just for a little while.”

“Great!” Mitch smiles and taps his phone. “Nina’s meeting us there, and she’s got some hot friend from class with her.”

“All right,” I say, my stomach already clenching at the thought. A friend of Nina’s. How am I going to get out of this one?

“Do you want a ride?”

“How about I meet you there?” I say, nodding toward my bike.

“Okay. Just follow me, it’s not far.”

I get on my bike and follow Mitch’s blue pickup truck out of the parking lot, the whole time wondering if he’d notice if I just passed him and kept on going to the apartment. But bailing on him again isn’t going to exactly cement me into his list of friends. Too soon, his blinker flips on and I follow him to the parking lot of McCarthy’s. I’ve been here a couple of times with people from school and it reminds me of Foley’s in Union Square—it’s kind of a trip to see a genuine Irish bar full of dark wood and green accents here in the middle of Texas, but nobody else seems to notice the irony.

The parking lot is full of pickup trucks and American cars, so I pull the bike up onto the sidewalk in front of the bar and set the kickstand down. I get an approving nod from a guy in a huge cowboy hat as he walks by, taking in the perfection of each line and stroke of paint.

“Nina’s already got a table,” Mitch says, as he walks up to the door. He’s got his urban Texas cowboy uniform on—dusty boots, big belt buckle and a beat-up trucker hat, his Saturday night going-out clothes. He’s so Texas he’s even got tiny little cowboy boots hanging from his rearview mirror. I’m not sure the t-shirt and jeans I threw on in the locker room are going to measure up. I follow him through the door and the wall of noise is immediate. The place is packed with people standing three deep at the bar and lined up next to the pool tables in the other room.

“There she is.” Mitch waves to Nina and I slowly follow him over there. As packed as this place is, she’s the only dark face in the whole bar. I wonder if it bothers her. It doesn’t seem to, which is amazing to me.

I say hi to Nina quickly and sit on the other side of Mitch as far away from her as possible. It’s not that I don’t like Nina, but there’s no way I can explain it to them and still keep the secrets the way I need to. She’s insanely pretty with her curly black hair loose around her shoulders and a body that won’t quit. Her skin is a deep, golden color and I have to admit to a tiny pang of jealousy when she leans over with one hand on Mitch’s cheek to whisper in his ear. In a lot of ways, she reminds me of Hailey and I realize that it’s not just the sex I miss—although that’s a big part of it. It’s the little gestures, the tiny indications of possession and desire that go along with it, the outward signs of belonging to someone. I shake my head. I meant it when I swore off women this year because fucking around isn’t what I came here to do. Keep the focus on baseball and avoid complications. And women like Nina were nothing but full-on complications.

I look around the bar as Mitch gives Nina a deep kiss and several of the guys are staring our way. A guy in one group leans over to say something to his buddies and they all laugh. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what they’re saying. So much for college towns being liberal and open-minded. Just another reason to keep my secrets to myself.