Long Ball(63)

He laughs. “Obviously I’m fine with needles.”

“Did the tattoos hurt? Machismo aside?”

He rubs his chest through his sweater, almost subconsciously. “Honestly, not really. It hurts more where the skin is thin, but it kind of just feels like scratching.”

I have a sudden wild desire to push my hands under his clothes and trace along his ink. Dig into him with my nails. To tattoo him with my touch.

Embarrassed by the thoughts, even though he doesn’t know them, I force myself back to the game. “What would you be, if you could do anything?”

“I’d be a doctor. Someone who makes a difference.”

I wish I could tell him he already makes a difference. He’s made a difference to me, anyway.

But that sounds trite and overly mushy. So I stay silent and just nod.

The south gallery path is bordered with planters a couple feet high separating the cement from small hills covered with shrubs and trees, making it feel more private than the busier spot by the plaza entrance.

Then I realize that I know nothing about his current career choice.

“What do you do now?” I ask.

“Nothing that makes a difference.” He’s dismissive, but I’m too curious. I’m about to push him when he points at the red and gold statue. “This is why I don’t understand art. Subjectivity doesn’t even come into it. It’s just weird.”

We walk past a few big, smooth lumps painted with different patterns. “I can’t disagree, but I think modern art’s supposed to be a metaphor.”

“For what?”

“For whatever you want it to be? I’ve always thought of it as Rorschach’s, in a way. Only the artist knows what they’re really meant to be about, but unless they tell us, we see what we want to see. They’re a reflection of ourselves. A way of connecting our subconscious and conscious minds.”

“Like horoscopes.”

Surprised, I turn to him. “You don’t believe in those either?”

He shakes his head. “They’re too broad. Anyone could connect with the vague generalizations.”

“That’s true. I hate astrology; I don’t like the idea of things being pre-ordained.”

“You don’t believe in fate?”

I shrug, hanging back until the couple with the stroller passes us. “The idea that no matter what we do, how hard we work, that everything will end up a certain way we have no control over? I hate that idea. It takes the point out of everything.”

“You don’t think God answers prayers?”

I chew my straw, mulling it over. “It seems like a contradiction. If things are as God wants them to be, then prayer seems silly. If God knows your heart, he should know when something’s too much for you to bear and step in when you need it, no asking required. But I’d like that over the whole ‘everything’s already set in stone’ thing.”

“I like to think of it more like a journey with only the destination mapped out, not the route you take. We’re going to get from A to B to C, but are we going to fly? Walk? Crawl over broken glass making every bad choice along the way? I like having the freedom to get where I need to be on my own terms.”

“That’s an interesting take on things. I like it.”

“Thanks.”

I continue mulling over what he’s said. “Maybe there’s something to be said for the destinations being more set than the details. Sometimes it certainly feels like my choices are being made for me, pulling me along like it or not. Unexpected roadblocks.”

“Maybe they’re not roadblocks, they’re detours.” He gently spins me around.

I swallow. “Like you and me?”

A flock of tourists press close, noisily intruding on the moment.

With a surprising strength, Dylan hauls me up the side of one of the planters and pulls me behind a tree away from the walkway. “What are you doing?” I pick a twig out of my hair, surprised more than off-put..

“I just don’t want to share you.”

My heart thuds at his words, and I’m suddenly awkward and shy. “That’s silly. No one’s trying to steal me away. And if they do, maybe it was meant to be.” My joking fades at the look in his eyes.

“They’d better not. I can’t stop thinking about last night, Rachel.” His voice sends heat slamming through my bones, melting me from the inside out. “I pulled you off the path to do this.”

He presses me against the trunk of the tree and crushes his lips to mine with an urgency that makes me want to laugh in relief—because he feels it too, the insane electricity that’s been charging the air between us all day. Our tongues tangle, fingers thread together, squeezing tight, mirroring my nipples’ reaction to his chest pressed against mine.

Breathless, I break the kiss because if I don’t I might pass out here in the shade. Immeditately, I miss the warmth of his mouth against mine.

Dylan pulls me into a hug, surprisingly sweet after what just happened. “Come on. Let’s keep walking and see more of the weird art.”

“I have a better idea.”

It’s a half an hour walk, but I feel like I float the entire way there, strolling along in companionable silence with Dylan, laughing and pointing out things that are meaningless after the fact but seem funny at the time. None of it sticks with me, except for the company and the curve of his smile, the lines of his jaw.