It wasn’t lost on me that I was sitting in the wrong place. On the other side of the pool, a cluster of teenagers, their music floating over. I had caught bits of their conversations as I’d passed them—once by the food, once in the house. Bits of a foreign language that discussed Adele and parties, Spring Break, and Twitter. I knew most of them, we’d been clubhouse brats together, back when we were eleven or twelve. Then they’d moved on to private schools and new friends, weekends spent somewhere other than the club, my spotting of them less and less, their game seats up in boxes and not in the dugout. It had been a clear parting of ways and now, I was a million miles away. Sitting next to their fathers, chiming in on conversations that would cause them to roll their eyes and itch for an escape.
They were all glued to their phones, clustered together in the cabana. I watched them, half of their heads down, their conversations seamless, despite the constant movement of their thumbs. Maybe having friends was the secret ingredient needed for a phone addiction. I watched Katie Ellis giggle and tried to recall where I’d left mine. Probably the truck. My last sighting of it had been days earlier, no real need for it when I was with Dad.
In the past, he’d tried to push me to join them, had seemed to think that social interaction with them was crucial to my happiness. But over the last few years, he’d thankfully given up. I didn’t want their friendship, certainly didn’t need it. Not when we had absolutely nothing in common.
“Need a drink?” Thomas Grant stopped by my chair, putting a gentle hand on my shoulder.
I looked up with a smile. “Sunkist, please.” I liked the man, the patriarch of the Grant dynasty, which had owned the Yankees for the better part of the century. A man who had taken me under his wing at a young age, a beam crossing his face whenever we met, my future in the Yankee organization all but guaranteed with his fondness for me. And the occasional hints that I should marry his son and live happily ever after as a member of the Grant family? I could handle those.
“You got it.” He squeezed my shoulder and stepped toward the house.
The conversation around me was about a Cleveland Indians trade, and I pushed out my feet, settling deeper into the chair, the warmth of the fire heating my shins, the weather still cool on the Hampton coast. We were at the Grants’ massive Hamptons estate, an impromptu barbeque grown bigger by the inclusion of wives and kids, the four teenagers on the other side of the pool just a small part of the party. Tobey Grant, a sophomore at Harvard and the future king of the Yankee empire, caught my eye, his cup lifting to his face, his gaze holding mine as he took a long sip, then lowered the drink. I looked away, back to the fire. We’d had a thing, once. Two years ago, during spring training. A few stolen kisses in a Hilton hallway, his hand sneaking up my shirt. He’d been my first kiss. It’d been okay, the second time better. I thought it had made us something; he hadn’t. It was really just that simple.
I watched red-hot embers flake off wood and float into the sky. There were times when I loved the idea of dating Tobey, when I warmed to the Grants’ not-so-subtle push of us together. There were times he loved the idea of dating me. Those times just never managed to line up, our occasional make-out sessions never enough to convince each other that a dedicated relationship was worth pursuing.
One wife trickled over to our group, her curvy body draping over Cook’s lap. She was a new one; his last had had an issue with prostitutes, and his use of them. This one had been around for two years. I had a side bet with Dad that she wouldn’t make it to five.
“Love has its own timeline, Tyler. Remember that.”
He told me that in the moment before he took the field, the crowd roaring to their feet, swallowing my response. I was upset over Tobey, my frustration hidden behind fifteen-year-old attitude, my sunglasses masking any flash of irritation his occasional presence sparked. He’d walked into the stands, moving sideways down the row in Section 17 with a girl. Some tart in cut-off shorts and a tight tank top, her hair straightened, enough makeup on that I could see her eyelashes from my spot by the first baseline. Dad must have caught my look, my quick glance away. He stayed silent for two damn hours before slapping my back on his way out to the mound, his advice tossed out gruff and concise, no opportunity for discussion, the game needing to be played, strikes needing to be thrown, teenage feelings muffled.
It hadn’t been the greatest advice in the world. And for me, a confused teenager who wasn’t even sure I liked Tobey, it was useless. I asked Dad about it later that night, in a booth at Whataburger, the restaurant empty, one employee mopping the floor.