Second Chance (25 page)

“Welcome home!
” she says
.
The other g
uys walk in and drop their bags
.

“What is that glorious smell?” Bubba
asks
.

“Dinner,” Dylan says
as
she wipes
some
f
lour
off
her arm
.
“I hope you’re not
mad,
”
she says
,
her eyes directed at me.

“
How did you get in?
”
I ask.

“
You left your bedroom door unlocked.
”

I narrow my eyes
.
“So
unlawful entry is justified if it comes with a home cooked meal?” I ask her
.
I frown at her smile, her thoughtful gesture, her appearance in general
.
“Since when do you cook?” I ask.

“Ha,” she says
.
“
Me
?
Cook
?
That’s just a fire hazard.
”
 

Before I can respond, out walks
Lenny, holding a steaming pot of lasagna in
hands covered with red oven
mitts
.
I didn’t
even
know we owned oven mitts
.

“
Dinner’s ready
,
”
Lenny
says
.

The guys
pass us
to get
to the kitchen
, shoving each other
like little kids running to get to the front of the lunch line
.
I notice
Travis give Dylan a double take
.
I watch her closely and I don’t know if
I should be happy she’s
here, or angry
.
But I’m not surprised
.
She turns and heads back to the kitchen
with
her bouncy gait
.

I
drop my bag and follow
her
, annoyed that
something has
so naturally
shifted
.
In the room
.
Inside of me
.

***

Dinner is amazing
—
homemade
garlic br
ead
and
lasagna
.
They found enough
extra
chairs in our basement so we could have a meal around the table
.
Dyl
an folded napkins under our mis
matched
silverware
.
She lit two candles on the table for ambiance
.
She claims she found
the candles
in
the
kitchen cupboard but none of the guys will fess up to owning them
.

“
This was
fantastic,
Lenn
y,” Miles says and she tries to hide her
pride in the fact
that five ravenous guys have inhaled every
scrap of food on the table
.
 

Bubba pats his full stom
ach and asks Lenny to marry him.
I catch
Lenny blush
.
She’s
always had a thing for Native American guys
.
It never occurred to me that
Bubba is
completely her type
.
I also notice Travis’
s
eyes scanning Dylan’s face one too many times
.
But he couldn’t be attracted to her
.
She’s a m
ess, with her hair falling out o
f her pigtails and she’s still wearing that stupid apron
.

Dylan wants to talk about the game
,
but s
he doesn’t ask the score or how many base hits we had
, all the normal questions you’d expect
.
S
he wants to k
now
why
the dugout is called the dugout
,
and what we think while we’re running the bases
,
and if we could play for any pro team who would
it
be
,
and what exactly is a Lobo
,
and if we couldn’t play baseball again, ever,
what would we do with our lives
?

I
just listen
because this is the Dylan I missed
.
I spend most of the meal watching her eyes absorb ev
ery face around her
,
and watch
ing
her mind absorb every word
. S
he’s so good at b
eing right there, in the moment.

I look around the
room at all these eyes on her
and
realize there’s safety in numbers
.
Maybe I can handle having Dylan back in my life if I keep it to big groups
.
I just have to avoid being alone
with her
.
That’s when I feel the force of her energy
seep through my skin
.
That’s when
she plants herself deep in my veins, like
she’s part of my blood stream
.
When her energy
is
widely dispersed,
like right now, it doesn’t trap me
.

This is my new survival plan
.

Travis leans forward and gives
Dylan his full attention
.
He focuses h
is green eyes on hers
, hitting her with a gaze
I’ve seen girls fall to mush under
.
I’ve heard girls nickname him the
Best Catch
,
not only because he’s
our
catcher
,
but because he’s 6’
2
” and single
.
I have to admit it, he’s an amazing player
.
He
can cover any
position
in a pinch
.
Even though he’s tall, he can run the bases as well as the sprinters
.
He has the most home runs of the season
.
He’s
more than
aware of his skills
, so
he’s awarded hims
elf a reputation
equivalent
to God
.

“What do you do?” Travis
asks
Dylan
in a tone that is more interrogating than f
riendly
.
I glance at
Dylan but she isn’t intimidated
.

“Lately, I’m a
full-time
star doodler,
”
she says
.

“A what?” he asks.

“I draw stars on everything
.
It’s this weird habit.”
She flips her hand over to show she’s drawn a few stars on her palm
.

Travis tries a different question
.
“Do you live here
?” he asks
.

“No
,” I chime in
.
I know Dylan
well enough to predict
that
her
eccentric
answers could go on all night and I’m not in the mood
.
Travis,
Dylan
,
and the entire table turn to look at me
.
I set m
y glass of iced tea
on the table with a loud thud
.

“She’s just passing through town,” I say
.
Her eyes meet mine for a second and
they
narrow.

“Are you in school?”
Travis
asks.

“It depends what you consider school,” Dylan says
.
“
I believe in self
-
directed
education
.
It’s this
new,
hands
-
on approach to learning.
”