“I wouldn’t lie to you, Josie.”
“You might. My own father did.” I blink back tears. “I kept that suitcase in my closet, packed and ready, for another six months because I still couldn’t believe he’d abandoned me that way. That haunts me. How trusting I was. How stupid.” Tears spill over, and I flick them away hurriedly.
A quiet settles over us, but it’s a restless silence. My words fill the space around us, creating space between us.
Garrett finally says, “That’s why you don’t trust me. Us,” he adds. “I guess your mom thinks I’ll turn out to be like your dad, too?”
“You’re so much alike. She met my dad in high school. And he was sweet to my mom and charming and he made her laugh and he made her heart beat like crazy.” I wonder if he realizes he does that to me. “The things she felt are the things I’m starting to feel.”
“The things I already feel.” His chin rises with determination. “How do I prove I’m not like your dad?”
“I don’t know. Time, I guess. Can we take it slow?”
“I thought we were.”
“Slower, then.”
He sighs, leaning forward so that our foreheads touch. I want to pull him close even as I’m trying to push him away. “If that’s what you need, we’ll try slow. But there’s another thing that might help.”
“What?” I ask.
“Let me meet her.”
…
When I get home, Mom is out. A date with James. I’m glad. I need time to think.
I set my pack on the kitchen table—it feels so much heavier with the ASU folder inside. Restless, I wander through the house we’ve turned into the first real home I’ve had. Even as I tell myself I’m not heading anywhere special, I end up in Mom’s room, my heart suddenly racing.
The past, like all good monsters, is hiding under the bed. Flipping up the burgundy quilt, I kneel down and pull out the plastic white tub. The lid is layered in gray dust that catches in my throat when I pop it off. Lying on top is the baseball glove my dad bought me when I turned twelve. Black leather with red laces and “Joe” stamped into the palm.
How do you deal with the fact that your dad doesn’t want you? That maybe, most likely, he never did?
I’d just turned thirteen when Mom told me there would never be an airplane ticket in the mail. Even then, even though the texts and emails had slowed to a trickle, I didn’t believe her. I thought she was trying to turn me against him because by then the divorce had turned ugly. But the article came out soon after. Two months later, a Google alert told me my father was in California for a visit. He never tried to see me. He never even called. I finally understood that when Dad said it would be easier for me without him, he meant it would be easier for him without me.
After that, I didn’t know how to be me. I was confident and strong, and then I wasn’t. The day I started to feel better was the day Mom drove me to the dump and I took my Yankees-blue suitcase, still packed with all the things I couldn’t look at again, and sent it flying down to lie buried with everything else no one wanted.
He didn’t want me? Well, I didn’t want him. I didn’t want baseball.
I didn’t want dreams.
The only thing spared during the purge was this glove. Mom said she wanted to keep it, without explaining why. I know now she saved it for me. I press it to my cheek, breathing in deeply. The glove smells of old leather and disappointment. But it also feels like a piece of me.
Where do I go from here? Do I stick with my plan? Or do I consider the future Garrett is dangling before my eyes? It scares me. To pack my heart and my future in a new suitcase and follow a whole new path.
Can I do it?
My inner voice says no. It says don’t take the risk.
Of course it does. It’s the voice of my thirteen-year-old self.
Chapter Thirty-Six
The following week is a whirl of activity as Garrett and I finish the feature, editing together the questions and answers along with commentary on recent changes to the game. We’re both impressed with how it turns out. We also call two more games—both of them Cholla wins that clinch our spot in the playoffs. The guys are all swagger and bluster and I take great joy in playing the role of snarky non-believer while secretly I’m starting to think they actually might win State.
On Tuesday, Mai officially ended things with Anthony. She did it in true Mai fashion. Bluntly.
“I told him he was becoming a distraction from what really mattered.”
“Mai!” I winced when she told me that night.
“I know. It sounded as bad then as it does now.”
“Are you okay?”
She shrugged, but I couldn’t remember seeing her look so sad. “I’ll be fine.”
We were quiet for a long moment. “What happens when you see him?” I asked. “How did you leave it?”
“I fixed it. I think.”
It turned out better than I expected. After a weird couple of days, Anthony seemed his usual chill self. They settled into being friends…friendly…though he didn’t eat lunch with us again.
I was planning to bring Garrett over and tell Mom about our broadcasting experiment, but she came back from her date with James with puffy eyes. She brushed off my offer of pralines and cream, which is the only known antidote for sadness.
“I’m fine,” she said. “It was my decision. It wasn’t going to work. Better to end it now.”
But she started the week in a funk and never came out of it. I found her
