Page 100 of The Fall Classic

Hey there! Driving through tonight on my way to Columbia—any chance my favorite girls are free for dinner? Would love to see you, Lulabelle too if she’s around Let’s make it happen!

He sent it to Marlowe, Nicolette, and me.

The man who “had to work” all through my mom’s illness, being gone every other week while I came home from school to an empty house. The man who took out new loans instead of paying off the old ones that would have helped his daughter. The man who has always taken the easy way out, the path of least resistance, the way of least involvement. The man who loves the idea of love more than the strings that come along with it.

The man who chose everywhere else but home.

Logan doesn’t resemble my dad in the slightest.

But does his career?

I let the question sit there, ugly and unresolved, and peer out the window to see Logan on his phone, pacing and nodding. “Got it. I’ll be there,” he says.

Do I really think that driving to the airport to see him off would change the fact that Mullet Ridge is my home and the road will be his? Major League Baseball will take him all over the country dozens of times each year. From February to October, he’ll be a stranger to his family.

Like my dad.

I don’t drive to airports to see would-be boyfriends off because I don’t get to be that naive. I don’t get to believe that love conquers all or that if you wish and dream hard enough, anything can happen.

I don’t get to be that girl.

Pretending otherwise is like a knife to my own gut.

My phone buzzes with another text, this one from Marlowe.

Marlowe

Of course! I’ve made reservations at The Black Oyster at six and Sal’s at six-thirty. Tell us which one works better and we’ll be there. Love you, honey!

Her exclamation points are the twist of the knife.

Marlowe is that girl.

She’s clung to the idea of my dad, the belief that he’ll finally change, finally choose her, finally care enough to stay for more than a weekend here and there. She has no love to spare for me, but she has plenty for him. And maybe it’s her—what was the term in my behavioral-economics class?—scarcity mentality. It makes her afraid that if she gives any love to me, she won’t have enough for Nicolette, Lulabelle, or my dad.

I wonder if the fact that I was first in his heart is why she tolerates me but doesn’t love me. She thinks I have a stronger claim on my dad’s love and that’s why he can’t spare as much for her.

How does she not see that we’re all in the same category of “people Raymond fits in between business trips when he wants his ego stroked”? We serve the same purpose as a fan club serves a star. He wants to feel good about himself, and he’s so charming, he’s always found a way to give people enough to keep them wanting more.

The warmth from a minute ago is already gone when Logan steps back onto the truck, his call finished, and a quiet resignation settles over me like a layer of dust.

Logan’s leaving.

I’m going to dinner with my dad tonight.

Both will hurt for different reasons. If that hurt can tamp down some of this irrepressible hope, it will be worth it.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Georgie

Saying goodbye to Logan makes me feel like someone has slapped a sepia filter on the world that makes everything dusty and muted and …

Sad.

I want to shake the world and say, “You knew summer was coming to an end and leaves were going to change and fall off, and you let yourself believe it would never end, and this is what you get for it!”

But something in me protests, insisting that it wasn’t supposed to skip seasons like this, going all the way from a verdant summer to a bitter, colorless winter.