Chapter Five
Infraction
Bottom of the ninth. The past eight weeks of coaching the Terror Turtles might as well have been eight millennia. Brooke definitely felt eight thousand years old, and she still hadn’t heard from Ames. She’d stuck his ring in her nightstand drawer last night, her dream over; it was time to wake up to reality.
The score stood at eighteen to nothing. Poor Turtles. It sounded so close to Terrible Turtles that she swore their team name had been a self-fulfilling prophecy: both slow and terrible. They’d lost every game, in spite of Brooke’s dedication to practicing with them every single day after school and into the summer on days when she didn’t have to pull double shifts at the hospital in order to save up for school tuition.
“Go, Turtles!” she called half-heartedly, hoping that just one kid, once this season, might get a base hit. “Come on, José, you can get this one! Make it to first and the pizza and root beer are on me.”
The pitcher wound up. José stared him down. Zing! The ball sailed right through the strike zone.
“Strike three!” the ump said. “Game.”
Game. And season. Over.
It was all just so metaphorical.
“Bring it in here, guys!” Brooke gave high fives all around. “We’ll do pizza next week. My house.” They gave the other team a cheer, and then eleven little green t-shirts headed back to their minivans and hot summer days watching TV.
“Did I just hear you offer my house as party central for ten million pre-teen boys?” Quirt walked up, his hands in his pockets.
“What are you doing here?” She gathered up bats and equipment, slinging them over her shoulder to take out to her car. “Olivia out of town?” Quirt had been pretty engrossed in his girlfriend lately. Granted, Olivia was highly engrossing. Quirt had found himself an incredible girl.
“Let me carry that.” He took the bat bag and walked with her toward the parking lot. “Too bad about the Terrible Turtles.”
“At least they deserve to win the award for Most Consistent.”
“Consistently terrible.”
Brooke looked back at the field. Now that little league was over, how could she fill her thoughts, keep them healthy? Because they liked to go places they shouldn’t.
“So, dinner tonight? I’ll make Chef Boyardee.”
“You gourmet, you.” Brooke unlocked her car. “What’s the catch? Do you need money, or something?” Maybe he was going to buy Olivia a ring. The thought, of course, stung, but Brooke still wanted Quirt happy.
He let the ball bag slide to his feet. “Always, but no. It’s not that.” He’d blown through his life insurance money already, spending it on his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Brooke had been too young to tap into hers before her birthday last week, and scholarship money had had to come from that dreary beauty pageant system. Until it dried up at Miss Virginia, thanks to that politician LaBarge and his chronic pulling of strings behind the scenes to get anything he wanted.
Thanks, Mr. LaBarge. Thanks ever so.
“What’s going on? Don’t beat around the bush, Quirt. You know how I hate that.”
“Fine.” He put his phone up, displaying the Naughton News home page. Brooke scanned it.
Earthquake in Pakistan. Sad, but probably not the salient article. Lawyer Assaults LaBarge’s Son-in-Law. People she didn’t know were always fighting. Whatever. Someone who could’ve been a dead ringer for Dane Rockwell frowned in the photo. She almost clicked on it, but Quirt snatched the phone away and punched at its screen.
“Here.”
She let her eyes focus, and then she wished she hadn’t.
Sarge LaBarge’s Daughter Elopes with Doctor.
Great. Good for LaBarge, speaking of the jerk.
But then she looked closer. Beside the headline was a beaming photograph of Sergeant Faro LaBarge’s gorgeous daughter Charli. Charli the a Fulbright Scholar who had spent time dating a royal, the one with her own brand of capri pants selling at Target. But more to the point, the Charli LaBarge who beat Brooke at the pageant, possibly thanks to her dad’s influence, effectively dimming Brooke’s shot at a college education last year.
But who was that guy, blurring off to the side, her eloping cohort…
Ames.
Brooke’s eyes burned like a splash of lava had hit them. The fire raced over her entire body, and then spread to her insides, where they seared every nerve ending of all her feelings. This had to be a lie. And elaborate prank.
Or a nightmare. She pinched hard the skin on the back of her hand, but nothing woke her from this horrific dream.
Roaring in her ears put her into a cocoon.
“This wedding was a long time in the making. But we’re together at last!” the new Mrs. Crosby said. “We’ve been destined for this for years. Our dads went to school together, you know. It’s just no one expected it so suddenly. But St. Thomas was a beautiful spot for a destination wedding. Our parents flew out and my daddy gave me away.”
A few lines down burned a quote from Ames. “Charli’s amazing. I’m a lucky guy.”
Brooke squinted at a kissing picture through a traitorous well of tears.
Charli LaBarge, of all people? Really? Her knees threatened to buckle.
Get it together. Together. Together. Don’t let Quirt see you fall apart.
“Huh,” she said, shoving the phone back at Quirt. “Well, that explains that.” She flung open her car door and tossed the equipment bag in the back.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?”
Numbness took over her body, dulling the searing pain of it all, but she heard herself answer. “What is there to say, Quirt? He didn’t choose me. He chose her. They’re married. It’s done.”
She was a robot. The Ames Crosby Excuse Robot. Self-loathing option activated.
“I’m so sorry, Brooke. He’s a jerk.”
She whirled on him. “No!” They didn’t know the circumstances. He could have a valid reason.
Except what could it be?
The last vestiges of her Ames Crosby dreams expired right there at the edge of Chadwick Field. They were as dead as her plans for a good scholarship from the pageant to attend school somewhere more upscale than the Maddox Community College.
They were as dead as Mom and Dad.
“Maybe I’ll go make Aunt Ruth some dinner.” Her voice sounded like it came from far away. “Rain check on the Chef Boyardee.”
And rain check on ever again putting her trust in a man who claimed he loved her.