Hardball by CD Reiss (4)

five

Vivian

I hated going into Mom’s closet, because she wasn’t around anymore. It still smelled like her. As soon as I slid the door open, I was assaulted by rosewater and memories. I sighed and stepped inside.

She hadn’t been born to money, but my bio dad had gotten the house cheap when his four-minute-long career had turned a corner. My stepdad was a hard-working divorce attorney in a city that didn’t take marriage seriously, and he was generous and kind, but his career had skidded when his arthritis took over his life.

In the years he’d been married to my mother, he treated her like a queen. She never wanted for a dress, and what became apparent as the years went on and I plumbed the depths of her closet, she often didn’t want for a choice of dresses for any occasion. Some still had tags. Some were too expensive for price tags but had obviously never been worn.

I was an inch shorter than she’d been but the same shoe and dress size. As the years wore on, the contents of the closet had gone from dated to cutting edge, and in the hours before the Petersen event, I ran my hands along the sleeve of a matte gold gown that looked as if it had been smelted by a goldsmith.

“She never wore that one,” Dad said from behind me. He was having a good day, and the walker was in its little hallway, waiting for the rain.

I pulled the hanger off the rod and draped the fabric over myself. “It’s too much.”

He waved. “Please wear it. It’s a waste not to.”

Dad hated waste. I didn’t know if that was a new thing or if the excess he’d poured on my mother was the result of a surplus of love.

“All right,” I said, turning to the side and back again. “But if I can’t find the shoes that go with it, I’m changing to the blue one.”

Dad stood against the doorjamb with his arms crossed. His eyes stared in the middle distance. It was his Missing Mom Face.

“Dad?”

He snapped out of it. “I think the shoes are in the bottom rack.”

I crouched to hunt for them. Couldn’t miss them. Matching matte gold stilettos. Insane.

“You look just like her, you know.”

“Like mom?” I huffed.

That was a load of crap. My mother had been ethereal. She’d stopped modeling when she got pregnant and never got back to it because it was more boring than being a wife and mother.

He snapped open a drawer and rummaged around before pulling out a little velvet box. He handed it to me open. Two gold hoop earrings each strung with a single pearl.

“Wow. They’re gorgeous.”

“She was wearing them when we met. She said they were lucky.”

I couldn’t deny him, so I put them in my ears.

“Have you thought about dating?” I asked.

“You get married first.”

“Oh, please.”

“Who is this guy tonight?”

“A friend. I’m not his type, and he’s not mine.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

Of course he’d never address the fact that a man wasn’t interested in me. He thought any sane, straight man would want Vivian Foster.

“Nothing. He’s just, I don’t know. Nice, but I work with him, and—”

“He’s not a star in a romance novel?” I snapped the light off, but he kept on. “Those men don’t exist, peanut. We have flaws. We’re a little nuts but not in the ways you like.”

“I’m aware.”

He’d never understood why I didn’t go back to Carl when he called. Maybe I hadn’t articulated it well enough. Whatever forward motion Carl had without me had happened because I was gone. If I went back to him, I’d blame myself for every stumble in his life. I couldn’t shoulder his life as well as my own.

I put in my contacts, which I hated doing. I didn’t like touching my eye, and the whole thing made me nervous. But I blinked twice and looked at myself in the mirror. The mascara would look great without the glasses. I snapped my fingers. Blink. Blink. Boom. In.

As I got dressed, I reminded myself that my father was only looking out for me. He never spoke a word that wasn’t out of love. That train of thought took me to his sixty-fifth birthday in April. I had another signature to get from last summer’s twenty-five-man roster. Duchovney had gotten himself on the sixty-day DL mid-season for a meniscus tear, and that was it. He hadn’t been around to sign anything.

Not that dad would count to twenty-four and be disappointed, but I liked all my players in position.

Hello. I’m checking on the glove. Any word?

Lord help me. Was it him?

I rushed to my work purse and fished out the card Dash had given me. The numbers matched. It was him.

A thing?

I froze. A thing. He was asking. Why? And why had I said a thing in the first place?

I hit Send just as his message came in.

Sorry. Wasn’t prying. I typed before I thought about it.

How could texting be so awkward? I felt unbalanced. Should I wait to answer? Not answer at all? Soothe him immediately? What was the difference? I wedged my foot into the gold shoe with the six-inch heel, nearly falling over.

Wait. What?

That can be arranged

Crap! Was my subconscious doing the typing?

For the love of…

Still stuck on the cock in the mouth

Autocorrect has a new fan today

I laughed. I had no choice. It was that or die of shame, and since I hadn’t meant it, and he knew I hadn’t meant it, I was going to live.

See you at the Petersen

See you at the Petersen?

Oh. My. Fucking. God. Jim had better not have a problem with me talking to Dashiell-motherfucking-Golden-Glove-move-like-the-wind-hit-like-Tyson-with-a-body-like-a-Renaissance-god Wallace because I was going to see him and stand next to him s-o-c-i-a-l-l-y. My face tightened into an excited grimace I hoped to the good green gods I didn’t make in front of him.

I looked in the mirror again. Hair. Check. Makeup. Check. Dress. Body. Heels. Check, check, check.

How would I stand?

One heel out? Lean on a hip? How would I laugh? Big smile? Titter? Belly laugh?

No. Not that.

The mirror didn’t like that.

“Peanut,” Dad called from the doorway, two rooms closer than I expected.

I tipped a little as I buckled the second shoe and righted myself, dropping the phone to my side as if I were a preteen hiding what was on the screen. “What?”

“The guy’s here. The schlamiel you’re not interested in.”