Jesus, help me. Maybe all three.
“I’m only thirty-four,” he basically said in a tone that might have hurt my feelings a decade ago. Eyes wider than usual, or at least what I considered “usual” based off the faces I usually saw him rocking on camera. Yep, he was insulted. “Why are you makin’ it sound like I’m in a walker?”
I blinked again, fighting like freaking hell to keep from laughing, because he really was making this way too easy. Way too easy. And way too fun, even though he’d lost his mind with his retiring talk. “I’m just working off what you said.”
His mouth was still open a little as his eyebrows knit together, 100 percent offended/shocked/hurt.
But not sad at least.
So I couldn’t help it. I snorted. “Hey, you’re the one throwing yourself a pity party for one. It felt like an invitation. You’re the one implying you’re an old man and all that.” All right. And there we were with us going back to young Bianca who had treated Zac just like Boogie, teasing and messing around and normal.
But he deserved it. He was asking for it.
I hadn’t exactly planned on jumping right into it, but old habits die hard. And there were worse things in the world to do than picking on Zac Travis when he was being dramatic. I could be on drugs.
Zac blinked again, thinking. I could tell he was freaking thinking.
And then, then, I looked at him with an expression that said you’re an idiot. Because that was younger Bianca too. Okay, and teenage and adult Bianca, especially around people I trusted and felt extra comfortable with.
My heart was on a different page from my brain, and that was okay.
Then and only then did his mouth curl up. Then he shook his head with a laugh that sounded like it surprised him. “All right, all right. You made your point, kiddo. I’m not old. I know I’m not. Other teams might feel that way, but I don’t feel like it. That’s what I was tryin’ to say. I’m not done yet.”
“You’re not that old,” I clarified, trying to goad him out of his little world a little more, inch by inch.
“No. I ain’t old period.” He gave me a side-look that had his cheek twitching. “Not really.”
But it was too late. We were too in this now, and this was too familiar. Too easy. “You’re sure you can still handle throwing a ball a few feet?”
He laughed, and it was light and awesome, and I couldn’t have expected how glad that made me. “A few feet?”
My response was to shrug at him.
That lopsided smile of his released itself into the world. “I don’t remember you bein’ this much of a pest.”
“I don’t remember you being such a negative little Nancy.” I spooned some more beans and greens onto my spoon before adding, “Seventeen-year-old Zac would be telling Old Fart Zac right now that he should quit crying because some people might not believe in him. You remember how much grief people gave you in college? How they told you that you were too skinny back then? Young Zac would tell you to suck it up and take advantage of every opportunity you’re given, even if that means going back to being second string again. Or third string. Who knows, maybe one of these young bucks will get hurt and they’ll call you and ask you to take over. Just saying.
“If teams think they don’t want to even consider you in the first place because you’re in your thirties now, don’t give them a choice but to notice you. Post your workouts on social media. Take advantage of your Picturegram platform. Show everyone you still got it, and even if nothing happens, at least you’ll know you tried. Seventeen-year-old Zac would be snapping his fingers at you to get to it, and you know it,” I told him with a smile.
He didn’t laugh or even smile at my comment like I’d hoped.
Maybe I’d pushed too far based on the expression he had started giving me before slowly turning his head toward the blank television screen. He didn’t say anything for so long, I got just a little bit worried he was going to be mad now.
I mean, we weren’t really friends. Not anymore. We had been.
And I wasn’t the same person who used to be able to joke around and talk shit to him because I’d been so secure in our friendship, or at least in the affection he’d felt toward me because of what I’d done for him.
But I told him the truth, and I wouldn’t take it back. If I never saw him again after tonight, at least he’d have the memory of me calling him out in the future if he started to feel sorry for himself. Mamá Lupe had thought he’d walked on water, and in Paw-Paw’s eyes, Zac could do no wrong.
I thought he was pretty great too, but that didn’t mean I was going to sit back and blow smoke up his butt so he could float around longer or make him think that quitting was okay. And if you wanted something, you didn’t quit when you came up to a hurdle, not if it really meant something to you. You pushed it over and jumped over it. I didn’t care what anybody said. I didn’t have the biggest audience on WatchTube, and that didn’t mean that I didn’t try as hard or didn’t try my best with every video I posted. I wasn’t less than someone else because they had more than me, and I wasn’t any better because I had more than other people. I hungered for myself. For my future.
And just as he opened his mouth to tell me to mind my own business, or who the hell knows what, his cell phone rang.
My old friend, who had come by to catch up with me, cast me a quick look I didn’t know what to think of
