Page 12 of Running Home to You
“Did you really throw a cigarette at Seaborn?” Mick tipped back and forth in a rocking chair suited for a front porch. None of the furniture in the small house was sensible or cohesive, but its asymmetry was part of its charm.
“Yeah, she’s lucky I didn’t deck her. DeHaven grabbed me from behind, tried to throw a hood over my head. They chased me around the whole fucking bar and Seaborn tackled me in the kitchen,” Abby said, provoking laughter from her captive audience. “A waiter tripped over us, spilled burgers and fries everywhere.”
“I would’ve paid to see that.” Mick snorted. “Don’t worry about Seaborn. She’s just jealous that you’re going to be hitting cleanup this season.”
She shrugged. “The manager blacklisted us, which sucks. I like Sunny’s.”
T.K. waved her off. “Give it a week. They’ve shredded like three of my fakes and still let me in.”
“Court was out of line,” Kate said from the spot next to Abby. “Sorry for what she said to you.”
“It’s okay.” Abby didn’t want to relive the low blow. Instead, Kate’s remorse surprised her, just like her hand in the car. Just like her apparent willingness to jump after her, even if now she wouldn’t look at her, picking at the threads of the couch instead.
She didn’t remember falling asleep, but woke to the blue wash of the television a short while later. The rest of the living room was empty. Empty except for Kate. She clicked off the TV and draped another blanket over Abby in the dark. “Thank you.”
Kate hovered, a dim outline in the nearby glow of kitchen appliances. “Are you feeling better?”
“Yeah,” Abby said, though the telltale signs of sickness were emerging along her raw throat. “Thanks for letting me crash here. And for tipping me off about the swim. I know you don’t like me very much.”
“Little did I know you were going to jump in anyway,” Kate said. The floor creaked as she pivoted to leave, but then she turnedback. “That was nice. What you did for the freshmen. You didn’t have to.”
Abby shrugged. “It was nothing.”
As her vision adjusted to the darkness, she noticed the crease in Kate’s chin deepen with a frown.
“I don’t not like you, Abby. You’re just chasing something that I really want too.”
Abby nodded, wishing she had something better to say than “I know.” She considered apologizing, but she wasn’t sure why. Maybe to continue their conversation. Maybe to erase the frown that hadn’t left Kate’s face.
“Well, get some rest,” she said before shuffling out.
“Yeah. Good night, Kate.”
Abby’s eyes fluttered closed, and she sank into the deepest sleep she could remember, safe in the presence of her teammates, and the memory of Kate’s hand on her own.
After months of resenting her arrival at Insley, Kate prayed she’d find Abby. The morning after initiation, she discovered a neat pile of blankets on the couch and nothing else. Her stomach hardened. More unbearably, the hollow place in her chest that had opened on the dock grew with regret, with empathy, and a loneliness she didn’t understand.
She searched for Abby during class, swiveling each time someone entered, but she never showed. On the quad, she glimpsed every person she passed just in case. She prayed. She prayed that nothing worse happened. That she’d see Abby, confirm she was okay, and that exposed hole in her heart would close, allowing them to return to rivals.
Before practice, she hurried to the locker room, certain she’d find her. Still nothing. Just the team suiting up in unusual silence. Kate joined the juniors in their corner bank of lockers.
“Have you seen her?”
“No, but the seniors are MIA too,” Jill said.
Kate sighed as she flopped down to the splintered bench and kept an eye on the door, not that Abby had ever shown up before. She hadn’t even claimed a locker.
T.K. popped her gum while she braided Jill’s hair. “You think she snitched to Whit?”
“Didn’t take her as the type,” Mick said. “But shit is tense.”
Coach Whitley cleared her throat behind them. “Hutchins, can you come with me please?”
“I wasn’t there,” T.K. whispered as Kate passed her.
Dana Whitley’s office had once belonged to the last men’s basketball coach before they got a new gymnasium, and it was still furnished as such. Other than a computer, everything reeked of the seventies, from the squeaking banker’s chair to broken filing cabinets. Coach Whitley commuted from Portland, so perhaps she considered refurnishing the office impractical. Plus, the team didn’t have money even for small luxuries, trekking to most away games on buses and bunking five to a room in motels.
“Take a seat.” Coach Whitley stepped behind her desk.
