Page 41 of Untying the Knot
“I have noticed them. So did you find a good place?”
She bites into her cone and then says, “There’s this rooftop restaurant downtown that moonlights as a nightclub, and I swear it’s the best-kept secret. The brunch is phenomenal, the views are everything, and because it’s also a nightclub, the breakfast drinks are a bit stronger than usual, which adds to the experience. It’s called Bar Seventy.”
“Oh, you know, Banner has been there a few times. He’s told me about it.”
“It’s worth all the rage. You haven’t been?”
I shake my head. “Not much time to do anything during the baseball season, especially in the morning. That’s when I usually visit kids at the Children’s Hospital.”
She clutches her chest. “You do?”
“Yeah. There are a lot of Bobbies fans there, so when I don’t have an early game, I try to visit as much as possible, or do whatever is on the list of charitable visits the Bobbies have created. And when I’m not doing that, I’m in the gym or in the cages, getting reps in.”
“Baseball really is your life, isn’t it?”
“It’s been that way for a really long time,” I answer as I lick up a drop of ice cream dripping down my cone.
“Do you ever wish you had a life outside of baseball?”
“All the time,” I answer truthfully. “I miss out on a lot of things in life because I’ve been consumed by my goals. And there are times at night when I stare up at the ceiling, unable to sleep, wondering if it’s all worth it, especially now hearing about your adventures. I can’t remember the last time I took a vacation or focused on something other than my swing, my reps in the gym, or what I put into my body. Sometimes I just wish I could . . . relax.”
“You can, you know.” She takes a very small bite of her ice cream. “You can let loose, have fun, kind of like you did tonight.”
“Yeah, I can.” I look into her eyes and realize that I’m having fun right now because of her. When I reach the bottom of my cone, I show it to her. “You know, I’d be willing to offer you the best bite of the cone.”
Her eyes fall to the fudge-filled triangle and then back up to my eyes. “What’s the catch?”
“You find some time for me to take you out on a date.”
Her teeth pull over her bottom lip before she takes another bite of her cone. “I don’t really do relationships.”
“I’m just talking a date. One date.”
“One date where you fall madly in love with me. It’s inevitable,” she says confidently. “I can already see the intrigue and challenge in your eyes.” She shakes her head. “Best we just leave this as is . . . running into each other randomly.”
Yeah, I’m not sure that’s what I want. Sure, fate might have brought us together and keeps reconnecting us, but I’m not interested in continuing to leave it up to fate. Not after seeing her again. Not after being around her energetic, sassy, zero-fucks attitude again. I like her and want to spend more time with her.
And after all the flirting tonight and from the past, I’m a little confused by her answer. I would have sworn she wanted to start something just as much as I do.
“Why don’t you date?” I ask.
“Do you want the short version or the long version?”
I pop the end of the cone in my mouth. “I have time, so give me the long version.”
“Well, it’s the classic tale of not wanting to live my life by example.” She finishes her cone and then pulls her legs into her chest as she leans her side against the back of the bench. “My parents, even though they’re still together, have an absolutely terrible relationship. I’m not sure they actually love each other anymore. I think they just stay together because it’s easier than going through a divorce and everything that entails. Mom always followed Dad around from base to base even though she had a career of her own, and she began to resent him for it. She took it out on me. And I saw the ugly side of parenting, the ugly side of a relationship and marriage, and I want nothing to do with it.”
“Wow, I’m sorry, Myla. I’m sure that couldn’t have been an easy environment to grow up in.”
“It is what it is,” she says with a shrug, clearly not wanting to get into it.
“You do realize, though, that you’re a different person than your parents, right?”
“Yes,” she answers. “And I don’t believe I’d make the same mistakes as my parents, but I’m also not well educated on how to be a good partner. I don’t know what a healthy romantic relationship looks like, and I don’t want to subject anyone to my drama. So I just don’t bother.”
I slowly nod. “I can understand that, but you might be missing out, you know?”
“Are you saying that because I turned you down?”
