I didn’t know what to say to that.
I wanted her to love me.
Even more, I was excited that she did.
“You still love me?” I asked, feeling my voice crack halfway through the question.
This wasn’t her first time to say it to me, and hopefully wouldn’t be the last, but hearing her say it now left my heart feeling so full that I couldn’t help but pull her into my arms.
She’d been mad at me.
Very, very mad.
So mad, in fact, that I could only hope that she got over this aversion to the military and decided to stay with me.
“It won’t be forever,” I said softly. “We still have three months until I have to leave. And only six weeks after that before you can see me all over again. I’m not sure what the next year and a half will hold for me placement-wise. I know that I’ll be in either Coronado, but I don’t see any reason at all that we can’t find you a school to go to close to there…”
She laughed. “Hopefully they take volleyball scholarships.”
I squeezed her into my arms and dropped my mouth to the top of her head.
“I’ll pay for your damn school if they don’t. It’s my fucking fault you’ll be out there anyway,” I told her.
She sighed and pushed farther into my arms.
“I left all my dad’s stuff at the back of the store,” she mumbled.
I couldn’t help but ask, “Where were you hiding?”
“I wasn’t,” she said. “I was in the book section reading the epilogue of a recently released book. I saw you walk by twice, but since you saw the short shelf, you assumed that I would be able to be seen over the shelves.”
I couldn’t keep the chuckle in as I said, “You’re bad.”
She shrugged. “I’m yours.”
Chapter 27
My new diet consists of looking at pictures of Symphony until I lose my appetite.
-Perry to Banner
Perry
October
I felt the ball hit my fingers and I screamed for Blue to get it.
She did, setting the ball toward our outside hitter who promptly slammed it into the opposing outside hitter’s face.
The ball went wild and flew into the stands, and I found myself jumping up and down with excitement as the referee blew her whistle.
It was official, we were district champs.
The crowd around us went wild, and I couldn’t help jumping into Blue’s arms as I screamed at her how beautiful she was for getting the ball.
Blue laughed right along with me and twirled us around.
Soon the entire team was surrounding us with excitement.
District champs.
Again.
It was fucking awesome.
“Here we come playoffs!” Blue screamed.
I hugged her tighter.
When I turned my head to look for Banner, I found him grinning his cute little ass off clapping his hands right along with my dad. Though, my dad was doing it quite awkwardly thanks to his prosthetic hand holding onto his cell phone at the same time.
There was a strange man sitting next to my dad, talking to him, and I frowned.
Banner winked, showing me that it was all okay, and I shrugged and went back to my celebration.
“Whew!” Coach Beasley said as she threw her arms up in the air. “Now that that’s done, I’m going to have a baby!”
We all stopped where we were standing and stared at her.
“What?” The other Coach Beasley, the man, heard her say it and came to stand beside her.
“I’ve been having contractions all day. And my water broke during half-time.” She paused. “Somebody may want to tell the janitor that the water near the spot where I was sitting isn’t Gatorade.”
We all cheered for a different reason this time and laughed when the coaches left instead of giving us our usual pep talks.
My mother came up to me and wrapped her arms around my shoulders, pulling me in tight.
“You did good, baby,” she said to my head.
I knew I had.
But it was always great hearing it from my mother.
She meant the world to me.
“Thanks, Mom.” I squeezed her just a bit tighter. “That means that we can go get Taco Bell, right?”
“There is no way in hell I’m eating Taco Bell,” Dad said as he joined our huddle, throwing his arms around us and pulling us in tight. “I have to go to work tomorrow at five. If I eat Taco Bell, I won’t even be off the toilet by then.”
I didn’t even care that my hair had somehow gotten caught on his prosthetic hand.
I felt so freakin’ happy right then that it was a miracle.
A month ago, I wouldn’t have thought it was possible.
But when I looked up into Banner’s eyes, I knew that it was.
He blew me a kiss and I caught it with my mouth, bringing my teeth down hard in a resounding clack.
He threw his head back and laughed before turning to talk to Titus, who was busy staring at Blue.
But I noticed that he never quite took his eyes off of me.
Which was good because I never took mine off of him, either.
***
November
“Oh my God,” I said as I stared at all the bikers that were lined up at the fence. “What the hell?”
Trance was walking up from the row of bikes, as was Viddy. Behind them were about thirty other bikers.
I blinked in shock.
“Perry!” I grinned at Viddy and walked to her where she enveloped me in her arms. “Are you ready?”
“I think I’m more nervous than he is,” I admitted as I pulled back.
Before I could get too far away, Trance had me pulled into his arms, too.
“Hey, girl,” Trance said. “And you shouldn’t be nervous. My kid was born to play this game.”
I had a sad little feeling in the pit of my stomach.
“There are about fifty recruiters here,” I said. “How freakin’ funny is that? They’re not even going to make it to playoffs, unlike us, might I add. I get one recruiter, and he gets fifty. Fifty of which know that he’s going into the Navy next month.”
Trance laughed and pulled me into his arms, throwing one arm
