Quarterback's Secret Baby (Bad Boy Ballers) (14 page)

I cried after that final phone call with Kaden. After being the key word, there. I was mad at myself for it, too, lying there in bed sniffling and wiping my eyes at the same time I was clenching my fists and telling myself to stop being such a baby. He ended up going to Brooks and I couldn't even say I was surprised. It
was
the right decision for him. But I can't deny how the sudden knowledge that he was hundreds of miles away from me, and would be for at least the next two and probably four years made everything real in a way it hadn't been before.

He wanted to be with me, I knew that. And I wanted to be with him. It's just that, of the two of us, I was the only one who had had enough exposure to the harsh realities of life - the fact that we don't always get what we want, even if we really, really want it - to understand that it just wasn't going to happen. Not if he left to go play football - and how could he not? It didn't even cross my mind to ask him to somehow cancel his dreams of playing in the NFL for me.

So I cried myself to sleep that night, angry at myself and angry at the world for being so unfair. And then I got over it. Or, I appeared to get over it. I didn't mention Kaden to anyone anymore - none of my friends or family, no one at work. I didn't even allow myself to think about him. Anytime he popped into my head I just pushed the image of his face, or the memory of how perfect the sweet weight of his body on top of mine had felt, away. Every now and again a feeling of sadness would creep up on me, as if out of the blue. Often it was when I saw him on the front page of the Little Falls Times newspaper - he was still a local boy and everyone in town was still just as interested in his career as they had been when he'd been playing for Reinhardt High.

About eight months after he left there was a new photo of him on the front page. It caught my eye as I walked past the newspaper kiosk on the way into work and I couldn't keep myself from picking up a copy. There he was, still the same old Kaden. He had a different haircut now, less shaggy high school boy and more smoothly groomed up-and-coming NFL player. He was also standing next to an absolutely gorgeous woman. They appeared to have their arms around each other. I walked into the office and threw the paper onto the table in our waiting room, desperately fighting against the horrible sinking feeling in my stomach.

And what did I expect? That he wasn't going to meet girls at Brooks? That he wasn't going to be swimming in a sea of pretty, smart, ambitious young women who were willing to do anything they needed to do to land a football player?

In November of the year I graduated high school, Ray got a raise at work. Between his new salary and my earnings from work, we as a family were in a better financial position than we had been for a long time. We even managed to start saving a little each month. Not much, but enough to give everyone a sense of security that had been sorely missing from our lives for as long as I could remember. Christmas that year was a good one. My mom, still very sick, was going through one of her better phases. Ray, Alisha and I took charge of the gifts and made sure that CeeCee, Rosa, and my mother had a nice, big stack of neatly wrapped gifts under the tree on Christmas morning. It was early that afternoon, as we all sat in the living room with the smell of roasting turkey wafting through from the kitchen and wrapping paper scattered all over the living room, that Ray caught my eye across the chaos.

"We did good, Tasha."

I smiled. "Yeah, we did. Did you see mom's face when she opened that necklace?"

Ray nodded, grinning. "I'm just glad we could do this, Tash. Who knows how many more Christmases-"

"Ray," I begged, "don't."

I still couldn't handle talking about my mother's illness. I couldn't even think about it. No matter how clear I was on the prognosis (and I was clear, because it was usually me or Alisha who took her to her doctor's appointments), it simply wasn't something I felt able to face. Ray was different. His way of dealing with things was talking about them, meeting them head-on. I knew my refusal to talk about it upset him. But it was Christmas, so he let it slide.

"OK, Tash," he said gently. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to-"

"Dinner's ready!" Alisha's voice interrupted us, calling from the kitchen. My stomach rumbled in anticipation. Ray grabbed Rosa and I helped my mother make her way to the table where a feast - a feast I had had a huge hand in preparing - awaited us. We said grace and tucked in.

About half an hour later, just as everyone was starting to slow down, my mother looked up at me and said:

"Tash, why do you look so sad?"

Suddenly everyone was looking at me. There was real concern on their faces, too.

"Darn," I said, forcing a small laugh. "I didn't realize I was being so obvious." A weak attempt at a joke - and one everyone saw through right away.

"Young lady, there are more fish in the sea," my mom said. "I see you working so hard for this family, trying to put a happy face on, but do you think I don't also see that look in your eyes sometimes when you think no one's watching? We all see it. This has been going on since before the summer and I just think it's time to put it to rest now. Everyone at this table - except CeeCee and Rosa, and believe me, they'll know soon enough - knows what it is to have a broken heart. Now you listen to me. You are smart, beautiful, kind and loving. There are a million men who would be lucky to have you."

The last few bites of candied yam on my plate blurred as I looked down at them. Dammit.
Don't cry. Don't cry!
But it was happening, whether I wanted it to or not. Someone squeezed my hand - Alisha.

"You're not as good at hiding your feelings as you think you are, Tash. And no one here is telling you how to feel. What we're saying is, we appreciate everything you do and we love you. You're not alone, you know. Just like your mom said, we've all been there."

Maybe it was that enough time had passed by then, maybe it was the fact that I was feeling emotional about Christmas anyway, but for some reason, their words just sunk in a little deeper that time. When I went to bed that night I felt something I hadn't felt for a long time - hope. Kaden was gone, it was true. But where that fact used to fill me with a feeling of devastation, that night it just presented itself as what it was: a fact. He was gone. I was not. The power to make my life as good as it could be was in my hands, not his.

The new year brought me a new sense of purpose. The feeling of walking through sludge, of fighting against a current, had mostly dissipated. It was even possible to see a headline about Kaden, or a photo, without wanting to hide in a bathroom cubicle and weep. I threw myself back into my own life. At work, that meant a raise and at play, it meant I started socializing again. With friends from high school but also with a couple of my work colleagues. I became quite close to a woman who had gone to Reinhardt a few years before me and who had just returned to Little Falls after going away to college to get her law degree. Her name was Jennifer Brown and she wore pantsuits and was obsessed with finding a husband. We developed a routine of going to a coffee bar a block away from the law office a few times a week, where she would regale me with tales of her dating adventures. One day, she told me she'd met someone who was perfect for me.

"Really?" I asked, half-hopeful and half certain it would be another dud - she seemed to have a talent for finding duds. "And? Who is he?"

"Well," Jennifer said, leaning across the table and pausing dramatically. "He's a lawyer and he's good-looking."

"And is he fifty years old?" I asked, smiling, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"No, he's twenty-six."

"Why aren't you dating him?"

"Because I'm dating his friend - Josh - and I only met him last weekend when Josh introduced us. I immediately thought of you. He seems pretty perfect. We should go on a double date, don't you think?"

"I don't know," I said, stalling. Jennifer was cool and she was a good lawyer but I didn't trust her taste in men. "What's his name? And is he really good-looking or are you just saying that?"

Jennifer shook her head and gave me a look. "God, Natasha. Would it kill you to go on a single date? You never mention any men in your life! His name is Michael and yes, he really is hot."

The waitress brought our coffees to the table and I looked outside at a snowy, gray Little Falls. Jennifer was right. It wouldn't kill me to go on a date.

"OK," I said, taking a small sip of my too-hot coffee.

"OK what?"

"OK I'll go on the date!" I laughed. "But if he's a weirdo, Jennifer, I'm never going to trust you again."

"He's not a weirdo, Nat. You're a weirdo. Do you know how many guys at the office have a crush on you? They all think you're some kind of unattainable ice-queen."

"Jen," I chuckled, "there are only, like, four guys at the office. And at least one of them is married."

Jennifer waved her hand in the air dismissively. "So? Blake and Chris both like you. Haven't you noticed how they're always coming to you for help with stuff they could totally do themselves?"

"Um - are they?"

Blake and Chris were both in their thirties, both lawyers. It had never even crossed my mind to consider either one as a romantic partner.

"Yeah, they are. I'm not saying you should get with either one of them, but still, it's so funny that you miss stuff like this. You're so clueless!"

Jennifer was very direct. It didn't bother me much because she had a sort of good-natured way about her, like she wasn't implying that she herself had any sort of clue, either.

"I guess I just - ugh, I don't know!" I said. "I'm busy at work. I don't notice people creeping around my office trying to flirt with me. And Jen, they're old."

"Oh, I know. They're not that old, but you're only nineteen and I know how old thirty sounded when I was nineteen so I get it. But we're on for the double-date, then?"

I shrugged. "Sure, why not?"

I did it, too. Jennifer booked us a couple of hours at the bowling alley - she seemed to think quirky activities were the thing to do on dates - and introduced me to Michael the lawyer. And she was right, he wasn't a weirdo. He was perfectly nice. Well-spoken, funny and, although I didn't quite agree with Jen's assessment of him as 'good-looking,' he wasn't bad. The double-date seemed to go well. At the end of it Michael asked me if I wanted to go out again sometime and I said yes. Then he kissed me on the cheek and left.

Spring came, and then early summer. Life was steady. Michael was steady. We only saw each other about once a week, due to mutual busyness, but the relationship hadn't progressed beyond a few tepid make-out sessions. It wasn't that I didn't like him - I did. And some part of me understood that dating men was now the expected thing to do as a young, single woman. But there no heat between us and after a few months had passed it was becoming increasingly obvious that my efforts to convince myself that it would just naturally grow were wasted. It was after another double-date with Jennifer and Josh that Michael pulled back from me abruptly when I turned my head away from him as he tried to kiss me. We were sitting in his car outside my house.

"Why are you even dating me?" He asked abruptly. It wasn't a question I was prepared for. I tried to play it off.

"What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean, Natasha. It's a simple question. Why are you dating me?"

"Um," I stammered. "I'm, uh, I'm dating you because I like you. What do you want me to say?"

Michael rubbed his forehead slowly. "I know you're young," he said, "so it's possible you just don't know how this works, but I've tried to be patient with you. We've been seeing each other for months now and we've hardly done more than kissing. And even then I always get the feeling that you're just doing it to get it over with."

"Well, I, uh-"

"Don't you think that's strange?" He continued. "Usually when people date it's because they want something more than friendship. I've tried to be respectful and understanding but the truth it, this isn't going anywhere, is it? Anywhere past friendship, I mean?"

I opened my mouth to say something reassuring but before the words came out I just closed my eyes and hung my head slightly. He was right. I didn't feel much of anything when Michael put his hands on me. Not disgust, not lust.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled. "I thought it would come - I thought that's what dating was, but..."

"But it isn't coming, is it?" He asked. "Your feelings, I mean? You don't really have any for me, do you?"

"That's not true. I do have feelings for you. I really like you. It's just, it's not-"

"Not in that way, right? It's OK, Natasha, there's no need to try and spare my feelings here, it's not like it isn't obvious. I just think it's beyond time for me to end this. It's painful for me to be in this state of constantly hoping for something I'm not going to get, and it's no good for you, either. We should both be with people who want to be with us. The way men and women want to be with each other."

"You're right," I whispered after a long pause. "You're right, I'm sorry. Michael, I really am sorry - I didn't mean to waste your time, I just-"

"That's fine, Natasha. I appreciate the apology, But I have work in the morning so I should probably be getting home."

Michael's tone was firm and cold. I looked up, surprised to hear it like that, and saw the same thing in his eyes. There was nothing else to say. In silence, I gathered my things and got out of the car, closing the door behind me and watching as Michael drove down the street away from me. Then I walked into the house, monitoring my own mental state, waiting for the emotions to come, whatever they were.

None came. Not that night, not the next day, not ever. I didn't miss Michael. Beyond a cringing embarrassment at stringing him along for so long, something I hadn't intended but had managed to do just the same, there was no sense of loss. If anything I was just relieved I didn't have to go on any more 'quirky' dates and spend money I'd have much rather put in the bank.

So there was really no adjustment to make. Life with Michael became life post-Michael and nothing much changed at all, barring his absence. Jennifer kept dating Josh, and she seemed sympathetic to my explanation that I just hadn't felt any passion with Michael.

It was on one of those long, hot August days that are typical in Little Falls that I found her in her office with some paperwork I needed to make copies of. She was sitting in front of her computer.

"Oh, hey," she said, looking up and noticing me. "Isn't this the guy you used to date in high school?"

My stomach did an immediate flip but I kept the expression on my face neutral and walked around behind her so I could see what she was reading. Kaden Barlow no longer had any hold on me. Surely I could manage to look at a photo of him on the internet.

On the screen, there was a photo of Kaden. He looked quite different - a lot more styled, with a trendy haircut and an expensive-looking, perfectly fitted suit on. He was standing with two people - a gray-haired older man and a pretty young woman. He had an arm slung around the woman's waist and they were standing very close to each other.

"Yeah," I said, "that's him. What's going on? Did he do something scandalous?"

"Nah, it's just some publicity photo for a charity event at Brooks. They're calling him a 'future NFL star.' Damn, girl. Why didn't you lock that down when you had the chance?"

I must have betrayed a certain level of discomfort with that question because a few seconds later, Jennifer immediately began to apologize:

"Oh, shit, Tasha. I'm sorry. I didn't - I didn't mean to pry or anything. I just thought you-"

"No," I said breezily. "It's fine. We were just really young. And you know the situation with my family. I couldn't leave, he couldn't stay. It was what it was, you know?"

"Sure," Jennifer replied, looking worried. "Yeah, of course. I forgot about the thing with your mom. I'm really sorry, Natasha."

I was doing a very bad job of hiding my discomfort, that much was obvious. Best to get out of there as soon as possible, to try and salvage at least some of my dignity.

"It's nothing!" I reassured Jennifer again. "Really! Now can I get that paperwork or not?"

At least I didn't obsessively think about the incident for hours afterward. So seeing a photo of Kaden still had an effect on me, so what. He was my first love, the man I lost my virginity to, and there hadn't been anyone since him. It definitely brought up some memories. But that's all they were. Memories. Everyone had them. No big deal.

At least that's what I told myself. I didn't have a choice. What else could I have done? Admitted that just seeing an image of Kaden on a screen still did more for me than any man ever had, before or after him? No. That wasn't a truth I was in any way prepared to face. So I didn't. I just brushed it under the rug of my mind and left it there. It's surprising how easy it is for us to fool ourselves, sometimes.