Sweet Spot: Homeruns #4 (5 page)

“Way to make an entrance, Stoney.” Fucking Clint. Leave it to him to be the guy to call me out.

I
stared
at Nick gaping at me and tried to remain impassive. I wasn’t ready to see him, even though Drew had reminded me several times there was no way I’d go the entire six weeks without running into him. I’d spent more time than was healthy running over the inevitable confrontation, trying to figure out what I wanted to say to him. I had it all planned out, but my prepared speech couldn’t happen in the presence of others. Even if he was out, both of us were at work.

The player behind him shoved Nick when he hadn’t moved a millimeter in close to a minute. He was being playful, but whoever was behind him was not amused. “Damn, man, we’ve got a schedule to keep! Get your ass in a seat or get the fuck off the bus.”

“I’m going,” Nick hollered over his shoulder. He paused momentarily as he passed my seat and I held my breath, worried he’d try to claim the seat behind me. There were still plenty of empty seats further back, so there was no reason for him to sit so close. “You look good.”

It took everything I had to pretend I hadn’t heard him. If I said anything, I’d wind up saying far too much. Instead, I pulled out my tablet and went over today’s assignment. I’d almost regretted telling Rebecca I wanted to tackle the Mavericks’ social media presence because now I spent most of my time in a long-forgotten office outside the training room. Everything around me smelled like old feet and jock straps. She’d apologized for sticking me down there, but the regular offices were going through renovations and it was the only desk available. The bright side was the Mavericks now had a social media presence, which was a good thing for me because people saw my images. This was a great job, but it wasn’t going to last beyond early fall at the latest, so I needed someone to notice me before the end of the season.

When we got to the park, I rushed off the bus to capture some video of the team filing off the bus. I’d seen a professional team in another sport do something similar with every game and the fans went crazy for it. Thanks to a string of good years, the Mavericks fans were salivating for whatever glimpses of the team we’d give them, so I hoped this would satisfy their thirst.

Of course, everything was going well until the moment Nick stepped off the bus. I fumbled with my phone when he stared me down and once again stopped in his tracks. I should’ve been happy seeing him so unsettled, but I wasn’t. No matter what’d happened between us in the past, I didn’t want him to fail because of me. I began to understand why Drew was so concerned about both of us being in the same place for the first time since it all fell apart. I stopped recording and shoved my phone in my pocket as he stepped aside, crouching down to re-tie his shoe. If I got lucky, I could grab my bag and rush ahead before he stood.

I should’ve known better than to hope because luck has rarely been on my side when I’ve needed it. Nick stood and fell into step beside me. “Hey, I didn’t realize you were going to be here.”

Of course he didn’t. If the asshole hadn’t cut me out of his life the way he had, he would’ve known. I’d eventually accepted that whatever happened between us was all on him. I gave him the space he needed. The night of our talk, I tried telling him I didn’t need the amount of time he was giving me, but it was no use. He’d already made up his mind, and he’d lost the right to know anything about me.

“Well, that tends to happen when you tell people to fuck off,” I responded in a hushed tone. “This isn’t the time to talk about this.”

“Could we talk later?” he asked. I made the mistake of looking at him. Nick’s eyes were dull, the corners of his mouth downturned. His shoulders slumped forward in defeat. “Look, I don’t expect shit from you, but you deserve an explanation.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” I told him flatly. The pitching coach hollered for Nick to catch up, saving me from any further conversation.

My hands were still shaking as I worked to set up my gear along the third baseline. I carefully laid out my backup camera and spare lenses, then sat down and read over the shots Rebecca wanted once again. This was my first real test and I wanted to do well.

A while later, the team came onto the field to stretch and I went to work. About every tenth shot, I found my eye, and the lens, drifting to Nick. I pressed the shutter release, telling myself I was only focusing on him because the guys at the house talked about he would likely make it to the majors this year. It’d be good to have some stock images showing the hard work he put in during spring training, because there were detractors out there who believed the same bullshit Nick did; that he was where he was because of his dad. The haters were wrong, and I wanted to show the world what a hard worker he was when the time came.

While I still wasn’t a fan of the slow pace of baseball, I’d come to appreciate it over the past few years. Even so, the spring training matchup was about as interesting as watching paint dry. One by one, I checked off the list of shots I was supposed to get and then packed up to wander around the park. Eventually, I made my way around to the bullpen, where the entire pitching staff were screwing around. Most of them wouldn’t throw a single pitch in the game, which left them to entertain themselves.

Carefully staying out of view, I pulled out my camera and zoomed in on Nick, who was sitting at the back of the group not saying a word to anyone. His head hung between his shoulders as he casually tossed the ball from one hand to the other. He looked as though he’d rather be anywhere but in the pen. The foolish notion crept into my mind that maybe he’d realized baseball wasn’t making him happy. I snapped a few pictures, hoping to show these to him and ask why he looked miserable if he was following his dreams. With my image checklist complete, I disappeared to the team bus. There was plenty of work to be done, and waiting until we got back to Mesa seemed pointless.

T
he mobile hotspot
I’d been given had a shitty signal, which meant I still had plenty of work to do when we got back to the training complex. Rebecca wanted me to get a few snapshots up on Facebook and Twitter as soon as possible. I could hear the team getting showered and ready to leave as I sat at my desk sorting through the folder of usable images I’d selected and picked three to schedule to post throughout the night and into tomorrow. One of the full squad warming up, another of Bailey Michelson knocking one out of the park with the team in the background, and one of the bullpen.

I was officially done for the day and free to go home, but I felt like a prisoner in my little office. I didn’t know if Nick was still out there or not, but I wasn’t about to risk running into him in the clubhouse.

A quick rap on the door pulled me out of my stewing about what a prick he was for thinking he could step back into my life as though nothing had happened. I looked up and found Nick waiting to enter. “You have a minute?”

“Not really. I have to sort through these pictures and find the best ones to put up on Facebook. Your dad’s trying to pull out all the stops this year to make sure the team has as sparkling of an image off the field as they do on it. That means a lot of long hours for me, because I’m the grunt they can dump all the shit work onto.” Great, I was rambling. Unless Nick had forgotten everything about me, he’d know I was nervous about having him so close to me. He was one of the few people who still affected me.

“I won’t take much of your time,” Nick promised me. His icy blue eyes shone with hope and fear. There’d been a time when his eyes were my favorite sight in the world. Seriously, they were unnaturally blue. If I didn’t know from those mornings we woke up next to one another, I’d think they were contacts meant to lighten and brighten his irises. “I wanted to stop by before I left to see if you’re free tonight.”

Before answering him, I turned back to stare at my computer screen, which proved to be a mistake. Instead of seeing him in real life, I was met with a candid shot I’d filed into a hidden folder on my laptop. Nick was in the middle of warm-ups, his body bent in half, his tight ass and solid thighs on full display.

“I have a lot to get done,” I lied. “There are three appearances I have to work this week plus I have to catch up on some schoolwork. Luckily, they’re letting me do a lot of my coursework online this semester since I’m in the middle of an internship.”

“Come on, Cody,” Nick pressed. “I’m not asking you for much, but I would like a chance to sit down and apologize for being an asshole.”

“Like I told you this morning, there’s no need,” I assured him. “It would have been nice to hear back then, but I’ve moved on. Did that a long time ago.”

“Okay, but I’d still like to explain myself,” he countered. “Look, I’m not expecting us to pick up where we left off or anything, but I was an idiot to walk away the way I did, and now we’re both here and we’re going to have to deal with one another for a while. I’d rather not have my bullshit between us.”

Nothing gave me the impression he was being insincere. If anything, he sounded as though he needed this for himself, not for me. As long as I remembered he couldn’t be trusted to stick around or act like an adult, I couldn’t see the harm in sitting down to listen to him.

“Fine, but I can’t be out late. I have to work early tomorrow for some breakfast meeting,” I told him, pissed at myself for caving so quickly.

“Awesome. Give me your number and I’ll shoot you a quick text so you have mine,” he requested as he pulled out his phone. “You can text me whenever you’re ready tonight and we’ll figure out where to meet. I know it probably sounds demanding of me, but it’d be better to do it somewhere close to the hotel since I don’t have a car. I don’t want to put you out by asking you to pick me up.”

“You sure you’re not going to change your number as soon as you send me the text?” I mentally kicked myself for being such a little bitch. I was doing a shit job of hiding how much Nick affected me. Still, it pissed me off when I did finally cave and try calling him and found out he’d changed his number so I couldn’t contact him.

Rather than bite back, Nick slumped his shoulders slightly. “I deserve that. Look, I’m sorry, and I hope you’ll understand it was nothing personal, but right now I really do have to get out there, otherwise the bus is going to take off without me.”

It was totally personal. At least, it was to me. I’d never admit it to anyone, but those two weeks with Nick added up to the only meaningful relationship I’d ever had. Even though it crushed me when he walked away. He’d done it because he was a selfish ass who was incapable of thinking about anything other than his own career. Okay, so it was more like Sean helped me realize it after Eric told him I was miserable back home and Sean called to talk me down. They were all pains in my ass sometimes, but I was lucky to have a group of guys around me who understood what I was going through and wanted to be there to help me.

Nick entered my phone number into his cell, the same number I’d given him the night we met, and walked away. I went back to working on selecting and branding the images to share and tried to not stare at the dark display on my phone, hoping he’d actually text me. It was over five agonizing, pathetic minutes later when the Minions notification tone went off on my phone. Like Pavlov and his fucking dog, I immediately stopped what I was doing to see what Nick had to say.

I know I’m an asshole and don’t deserve a minute of your time, but thank you. I won’t lie and say I will make it up to you because that’s not possible. I only hope you’ll hear me out and maybe we can eventually be friends again. I may not have shown it, but I still think of you as one of the best friends I’ve ever had.

I considered going home and relaxing for a bit to make Nick sweat, wondering if I was going to call or not, but I couldn’t do that to myself. Okay, so it was more like I didn’t want the guys to know what I was doing. Until Nick and I were on steadier ground, I needed to keep our meeting to myself.

I composed a very short and to the point text message to Nick as I wrapped up my tasks for the day.

I’m done. Let’s get this over with.

I hit send before second-guessing the curt tone of my words. It was better this way, better for him to think he was an inconvenience and I had other things I’d rather be doing than for him to know this was a moment I’d thought about more times than I could count. His reply was almost instantaneous.

Just got showered. I have to get dressed and make sure there’s nothing else I need to do. Meet you by the players’ entrance over on our side of the complex?

Fuck no. No way in hell could anyone see us together here. If word got back to Drew that we were talking, there’d be no hope of keeping my family out of my business.

No, meet me at Java Joe’s. I should be there in about thirty.

The first time I’d stumbled into the little coffee shop, it’d given me the same feeling I got when I walked through Eric’s back door. The staff was friendly, although not overly so, the coffee was strong, and it’d be almost empty at this hour.

“You’re back,” Ben greeted me. “I was beginning to think I’d scared you off the other day.” Before I could even reach the counter, he had my hazelnut latte waiting for me. We’d bonded one night when I was researching some new photo editing tricks. It turned out he was also a photographer, although he bucked the idea you could learn anything in school that you wouldn’t learn by simply taking pictures and looking online for ways to improve. I wasn’t sure I agreed with his argument, especially since he was making drinks in a coffee shop and I’d landed my dream job, but I respected his opinions. I’d also seen his work and understood that the biggest difference between us was I’d had a way to get my work seen other than hanging my best pieces on the walls of a dark coed hangout.