I Have Lost My Way(44)

He hands her the bat, and she grips it like she’s trying to suffocate it.

“Relax,” Nathaniel says, coming to stand behind her. “Hold your hands one on top of the other, lining up your knuckles.” He reaches over to adjust her grip, wrapping his body around hers.

“Like this?” she asks in a voice that’s pure breath.

Her grip is just fine, but he doesn’t want to let go. He’s so tired of letting go. “Yeah, like that. Now open your legs.”

“Usually guys buy me dinner before they say that.”

Nathaniel’s boner is immediate, and as stiff as the Louisville Slugger. He adjusts his body away from Freya so she can’t tell.

“This wide.” Nathaniel nudges her feet apart, willing his boner to go down. He hasn’t been like this since he was thirteen. “The trick is to relax. Don’t anticipate the ball, receive the ball.”

“Receive the ball,” Freya teases. “Are we playing softball or having—”

“Nathaniel,” Finny interrupts. “You want to bat?”

No! Nathaniel does not want to bat. He wants to take Freya into that patch of bushes and rip off her clothes and press up so close against her warm skin that there’s no space between them. Afterward, he’ll buy her dinner.

“Here, take the Slugger,” Freya says, handing Nathaniel the bat, and even though it’s too light for him, he takes it because he doesn’t want to refuse this girl anything.

He stands at home plate, desire thrumming through him. The pitcher throws wide. Nathaniel could move aside and it’d be a ball, but instead he swings hard. He needs to do something with all the longing and craving and desire that he thought was dead but turns out was just dormant and is now volcanically erupting. The ball connects with the most satisfying of thwacks and goes flying.

Home run. Of course.



* * *



— — —

    The three missing players show up at the end of the third inning, and Freya, Nathaniel, and Harun are dispatched with a gush of thanks, two beers and a Coke, and an invitation to return next week.

“I’d come back if you guys did,” Freya says. “That was fun.” But she remembers that Nathaniel isn’t from here. He’s a tourist, meeting his dad. “Will you even be here next week?”

“Maybe,” Nathaniel says, shrugging as he pops open a beer. The foam explodes all over his hands.

He licks his fingers, and Freya thinks ten thousand filthy thoughts about what she’d like to do to, and with, those fingers. But before she makes yet another stupid sex joke, she takes a long chug of the beer and lets loose an equally long belch.

Nathaniel and Harun stare at her, both of them clearly deeply impressed.

“Me and my sister used to have burping contests,” she explains. “Though with Fanta, not beer. I always won.”

“Obviously,” Harun says.

“I used to be able to burp ‘Jingle Bells,’ ‘ABC,’ ‘Happy Birthday.’ Hmm. Maybe if I can’t sing-sing, I can burp-sing.” Freya takes another swig of beer. “Can one have a career as a professional burp-singer?”

“Probably,” Harun replies. “There are those guys who make a living as professional hot dog eaters, so why not?”

“Professional hot dog eaters?” Nathaniel asks.

“They compete. There’s a big match every Fourth of July,” Freya says. “That Japanese one always wins.”

“Nope,” Harun says. “He was disqualified.”

“Really?” Freya asks.

“Yes.”

“You’re messing with me,” Nathaniel says, laughing. “That can’t really be a thing.”

“It is,” Freya says. “So maybe there’s hope for me and my belching career after all.” She drinks again and attempts to belch the ABCs, but all that comes out is a pathetically dainty A. “Nope. Can’t even sing that way.”

The guys look at her with a gentleness that’s almost unbearable.

“I’m sure you’ll sing again,” Harun says.

“Are you?” Freya asks. “Because I’m not.”

“Stealing the song didn’t help?” Nathaniel asks.

Freya sighs. She knows that if life were a movie, she would’ve ridden down that elevator, holding hands with Harun and Nathaniel, and as soon as she’d spun out of the doors, out of Hayden’s grip, she’d have burst into song. And they all would’ve danced. With jazz hands.

But she knows that’s not how life actually works. Whatever boot has been stepping on her windpipe these past weeks is still there.

“It helped,” Freya says. “But not like that.”

“What will you do?” Nathaniel asks. Freya starts to give the spiel about fans and livelihoods and all she’s worked for when Nathaniel interrupts. “Not if Hayden fires you. What will you do if you can’t sing?”

Your numbers will drop. Your fans will forget you.

But that’s not the worst of it. That’s not what terrifies her or drives her. It never was. For all his expertise on fame, Hayden never really did understand this.

Maybe it’s the beer or the adrenaline or the way Harun and Nathaniel reacted when she lost her shit in the diner or the way they’re looking at her now. Or maybe it’s the feeling, which has been growing stronger throughout the day, that she has always known these two, even though they only met today. But something gives her courage. Or maybe hope. Or maybe hope gives her courage.