The Truth About Air & Water (Truth in Lies #2) (42 page)

“I play first base.”

“First base.
Nice.
I like first base. And how’s your season going for you so far?”

“Not too shabby. Hitting two seventy at bat and mid three-hundreds for on base.”

“Very good. A hot bat. How long have you been with the Grizzlies?”

“Second season. We can’t all be Presley and serve half a season before getting called up to the majors.”

She glances over at me as if she’s forgotten I am here and then again, centers her attention on Hillman again. “Nothing wrong with the minor leagues,” she says softly. “At least you can still shop at Costco without getting mobbed.”

“
That’s
what I was telling Presley. All that fame makes it tough. Right, Tally? You two probably can’t go anywhere together without being hit up for autographs and photos.”

She gets this bemused look. “Something like that. So how old are you? A year older than me; I’m guessing twenty-three? I’m sure your time will come soon enough. Hitting two-seventy and three-fifty for on-base is going to get someone’s attention. Just watch out for those line drives toward first, right?”

“Right.” Hillman laughs but looks uneasy by the suddenly serious look on Tally’s face. “Good guess. Yes, I’m twenty-three. First base is good. Stats are there; I can’t complain. I used to pitch but that was a long time ago,” Hillman says nodding in my general direction.

Tally looks over at me. “Pitching is as much of a mental game as a physical one.” She turns in her chair leaning toward Hillman. “So how he’s doing? Better, I hope, because he sure has had to sacrifice everything to get
here
.”
She waves her arms around the bar and laughs at her supposed innocuous dig at Fresno.

Hillman looks at me and gets a little smile. “He’s coming along.”

“That’s good. That’s good.” Tally gets a little smile too.

I nod as a way to enter the conversation and prove my existence to her. I haven’t actually paid all that much attention to Hillman’s play at first base. I’ve been too focused on my own stuff.
How is that possible?
Maybe because I have five people around me at any given time, even here in the minor-leagues.
Perhaps I’ve just been too self-centered.

“Centered on self,” I say aloud.

Tally’s head whips around and she looks at me intently. “
What
did you say?”

“I’ve been too centered on self, lately,” I say unable to meet her eyes. As LA manages to assail me once again.
I need to talk to her about LA soon. Now.

“No kidding,” Tally says dangerously soft.

I look over at Hillman. “I didn’t know you used to pitch. You’re good at first base though. Awesome stats, too, by the way.”

“Yours aren’t too shabby, bro.” Hillman turns to Tally. “He’s hitting two-sixty, and his on-base percentage is improving. He’s over three hundred. He’s getting worked out—or is that
worked over
—pretty well. And, it’s tough to concentrate on anyone or anything else with an entire entourage all around you,” he says more to me and then grins wide as if to help me out. He slides his chair back and gets this curious look. “I’m going for another round. Tally, can I get you anything? It looks like Brandy has her hands full.” The three of us look up and over at the waitress all the way across the bar from us. She carries a tray full of empty drink glasses and none of Tally’s drink order.

Why can’t I be the cool guy here?
But no, I’m too busy admitting to a long list of character flaws so she’ll be sure to never really like me again.
And then, there’s the LA thing.
I need to call Kimberley for the update about that some time tonight.
Please God, let Kimberley fix it or make it go away. I still need to tell Tally.

Meanwhile, in less than a minute, Hillman steps in again offering to play the white knight by offering to place Tally’s food order for a hamburger with the bartender and get her the coveted Patron shot with the orange slice from the bar.

For some reason, I’m reminded of Sam Wilde, hovering over her and taking care of everything. Twenty-nine hellos from Tally in the past three and half months haven’t exactly tided me over and now Hillman appears to be moving into the open slot
Thor
may have vacated, since he’s obviously not here with her.

We both watch Hillman saunter off with Tally’s food and drink order as if he’s been knighted by the queen. He has a wide smile and a new swagger. He stops and talks to Brandy and mouths the words, “put it on our tab.”

So, I’m paying. Perhaps, in all kinds of ways I don’t know about yet.

With I’m-a-jerk status now established, I look over at Tally. “I’m sorry I should have asked if you wanted something.”

“I don’t know, Prez, have you ever actually asked me what I wanted?” She catches her lower lip between her teeth and shakes her head and then she sighs. “Not a problem. Doug took care of it.”

“Yeah, well Doug would like to take care of just about everything for you right now, I’m afraid.”

“Are you
jealous
, Elvis?” Tally asks and then laughs a little but she seems off and yet I’m captivated by her sounds already.

“Don’t call me Elvis,” I say trying to gain some ground in some way around her since I can feel myself falling straight down into her abyss.

“I always call you Elvis. It’s my thing. Don’t deny me my thing. Not tonight. I’m running the show tonight.” Her eyes get this dark green, and she winces a little as if she’s remembering something sad and then it’s gone. She’s smiling again. I’d like to think it’s for me but then Hillman returns with her tequila shot at the exact same moment. He sets it down in front of her and tells her he ordered it just the way she likes it pointing to the dish of orange slices he’s put right next to her.

“How do you know what I like,
Mr. First Baseman
?” Tally teases.

She’s flirting with him right in front of me.

Now, I’m pissed and wounded.

Hillman looks at me in a you-good-with-this? kind of way and then grins at her. “Presley told me.”

“
That,
I find hard to believe. He doesn’t know what I like. His best friends call him
Prez
, by the way.”

She leans forward and considers the tequila shot looking at it like it’s her new favorite toy. She holds it up to the light and swiftly drinks it down, and then she’s biting into the orange slice. The entire ball club appears to be watching Tally do her tequila shot and that orange slice.

“Mmm…Patron very nice. Smooth. Perfect,” she says only to Hillman, who looks like a Kindergartner getting a gold star for exceptional spelling with his first word. She glances over at me. “I think we should definitely talk, but I am absolutely starving so I’ll eat and then maybe later we can…
catch up
.” She gets this weird-ass grin.

“Sure. Maybe later sounds good.”

What am I? A twelve-year-old with my first girl crush all over again? I’ve already been through this once with her. I know I won’t survive this time.

Talk to her? Forget talking to her. No more talking to Tally.

Except about the LA thing. Except once I talk to her about the LA thing she won’t talk to me ever again.

So, fuck talking altogether.

Brandy
brandishes
Tally’s hamburger as well as a knife and fork and a unopened bottle of French’s mustard. I’m curious about all this extra utensil power and the condiment choice Tally’s got going. But all I can do is watch in wonder as she slathers the mustard all around and then proceeds to cut the hamburger in half, then quarters it, and then slices it up into eight equal parts. It’s not a hamburger anymore. It’s a cut-up mess on her plate. She forks a bite.

It’s erotic just watching her chew and swallow.
And she seems to know this. She smiles at me.

“You’re supposed to eat that whole, you know,” I say with a shake of my head trying to clear this hypnotic effect she’s having on me in the space of fifteen minutes. “Pick them up and eat them one bite at a time.”

“Is that so? Well, you’ll have to teach me sometime.”

Our table for four contains no less than four other ballplayers now besides me, Hillman, and Tally. They are all crowded around to watch the San Francisco Ballet’s star ballerina eat her food. I’ve never witnessed anything quite like this. One minute she’s chatting away with Hillman as well as the others at the table asking all kinds of questions about playing baseball; and in the next, she’s teasing them about their secret aspirations to play for the Yankees. “Come on, everyone wants to play for the Yankees except
Prez
here, of course.” She looks distinctly vicious for a couple of seconds, and then she smiles.

I’m a goner with that particular smile and shocked into answering.
Nobody knows that I secretly hate the Yankees, although Tally seems to. I give her a questioning what-are-you-doing-to-me? look. “Overrated,” I say to the overly interested group of ballplayers. “Not a fan of New York.”

“Me neither,” she says softly.

Then, Hillman asks her why, even while she’s remains singularly focused upon me.

“I left the chaos of New York to come home and be with family. I needed a simpler life. An easier pace. Sort of.” She laughs again. “SFB keeps me on my
toes
. Ha ha.”

“So you’re off for the summer, right?” Hillman asks beating me to the question I didn’t think to ask.

“Not exactly. Paris is a possibility. Moscow.” She lifts her chin in defiance with that one. “Fresno,” she says smiling. “I’m here on business so to speak checking out the facilities for my director, Mikhail Rostov. We’re looking at the expansion program for SFB, which may include this little oasis for the fall line-up. I told him I would check it out to see if the venue works for our
Swan Lake
performance. Stage. Lighting. Accommodations. At the Saroyan Theater. I’m to meet with them tomorrow for Mikhail. We’ve been here before. There are a few special requests for the accommodations we need for a bigger production like that.”

“Nice,” Hillman says.

“Fresno isn’t exactly San Francisco,” I say, finally managing to work my way into the conversation that’s been whipsawing back and forth between Tally and Hillman for the past five minutes.

“No, it’s not, but it could lead to something. You never know.”

A loaded answer to a stacked question, I guess.
I’m not sure how to respond. The band starts to play so I don’t get to.

“So Tally,” Hillman says with an easy grin. “You seeing anyone?”

“Yes,” she says although her smile seems off again. “Sam. His name is Sam. I was…sort of seeing Sam.” I look up and over at her use of past tense. She turns her attention back to her food and ignores my probing stare altogether.

“Was? And
sort of
means no sex,” Hillman says with an easy laugh, looks at me, and then slaps my shoulder. “You’re good, bro. You’re in.” He smiles wide and winks at Tally and then saunters off with her latest request for tequila shots for the entire table after announcing his intentions of getting Brandy’s phone number before the night is over.

“Sam. Sort of seeing Sam.
Was
?” I ask, forgoing any attempt to play it cool.

“Sam. I was sort of seeing Sam. I guess that’s another reason I’m here.” She gets this grim expression and looks away.

“Another reason. What’s the first again?”

She looks a little unnerved now. “I thought we were going to talk about this
later
?”

“Right. Eat your food then.”

She proceeds to eat a quarter of the burger over the next ten minutes. Food seems to be a religious experience with Tally and, on some level, I realize I already know this. She glances up and catches me watching her intently, her lips part as if she has more to say but then slowly shakes her head and tells me she’s not hungry anymore and slides her unfinished burger over to me. “Did you eat?” She asks. I shake my head. “You finish it then,” she says quietly. “I’m going for another shot since Hillman’s taking so long. And I need to make a phone call.”

“I thought one drink was your limit.”

She gets this wounded look. “Don’t fuck with me, Prez. Not here. Fresno is neutral territory. Don’t pretend to know anything about me when you clearly don’t.” Her words are like a slap in the face, but I can’t take my eyes off of her as I watch her walk away.

Hillman returns and follows my gaze. “Man, you’ve got it bad for her. You might not remember why you two broke up and what you had with her once, but your soul surely does. If you don’t ask her to dance, I will.”

“Hands off,” I say quietly.

“That’s what I thought.”