I study my hands, the ones that have held bats and baseballs and school pens and laptops … and Annabelle. Cain is right, I can’t leave without seeing her, without hearing her out.
“They always realize, in the end, that they’re meant for one another, huh?” I smirk at him.
Cain grins like a cat who caught the canary. “Every damn time.”
Forty-One
Annabelle
The stairs to the house behind me are old and dilapidated.
I sat on them two hours ago with a sniff at the dirt and a worry that a splinter would go right through my jeans, but I sat anyway.
I’d found it a while ago, this craftsman-style home with a sloping roof and stately front porch. It has promise, needs a lot of work, but with the right eye, it could be beautiful.
The stairs are the things that pulled me back to it, though. There are about twelve leading up to the grand porch and front door … which are a lot of steps for the front of a home.
But then again, the big moments between Boone and I always happen on stairs. Back in high school, we’d ended on a set. And just a little while ago, my fall down the science building stairs had spurred a reconciliation.
I was hoping that this broken, creaking set would bring me luck today.
After I confessed to Ramona and James, they accepted my apology with open arms. And I asked James to reserve this lot, put it on the back burner and keep it out of the realty listings for a little while longer. I had an idea.
It has taken Cain convincing Boone to come out here and meet with me, and my hands will not stop shaking as I wait for him. When I hear the crunch of his tires on the long gravel driveway to get to the front porch, my heart begins to gallop.
I haven’t seen him in three and a half weeks. So when he unfolds his long body from that car, I swear, my mouth starts to water. Damn it, he looks so good. He’s let his usual scruff grow out into a little bit of a beard, and it makes him look even more rugged and mysterious than he already is.
“Hi.” My hand makes a small wave as he nears me.
We both look uncomfortable. Boone stands at the bottom of the steps, a few feet away from where I sit farther up. “Hey …”
A beat passes. “Can you sit?”
He obeys but keeps a good foot of distance between us.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet with me. I first want to say that I’m so happy for you. Boone, you did it, you made your dream a reality. I’m really so happy for you.”
He tips his head a bit. “Thank you.”
Okay, he’s not going to make this easy. I deserve that.
I take a deep breath. “I know you might not believe me, but I was going to tell you. That day in fact. I had the contract because I was going to call Kenneth Kutch to turn it down, and then I was going to explain it to you. I was … it was all about my mother. You have no idea what I have to prove. My mother … she left us! That show could have given me the platform to show her that the daughter she left behind isn’t worthless. She did …” My voice cracks and I know he can see the tears I’ve been trying so hard to conceal from him for what seems like a lifetime. “She did so much damage.”
I have no idea why I’m getting so emotional out of nowhere, but he’s in front of me and it all just comes pouring out. I promised myself that I’d go into this rationally, but I can’t hold onto the icy demeanor I’ve put on for a decade. Not with him, not if I am going to put everything out on the line.
“You don’t even realize, Boone. How damaged I was. How damaged I am. When we started talking, dating … whatever it was that we were to each other, I was already cold. My mom left us, she left me. Her only daughter, her kid. She wanted nothing to do with me, only wanted to exceed in her career. She loved work more than me. And no amount of love from my father or other family members could ever bridge that Grand Canyon-size gap. Each time you picked someone over me, ignored me for sports or friends or just because I really didn’t register all that much to you … it chinked away at what little pieces of my heart still existed. I only had half of that organ when I met you, and with each denial of your feelings for me, more of it crumbled. When you kicked me out a week ago … I think it just about broke me.”
A sob chokes me, and I hear a strangled noise next to me. All at once, Boone is scooping me up into his arms. “I believe you, I believe you.”
He rocks me against him, cradling me and kissing my hair. We’re apologizing without words, just holding each other and communicating through the healing properties of touch.
“I know that I made a huge mistake. I turned it down. I came clean to Ramona. My dad and I have been talking about how her leaving affected both of us. I won’t try to convince you that I’m changed, or that I deserve a second chance, but I just needed you to know all of this.”
Boone sits me up, looking straight into my eyes. “I was going to come here and … honestly, I didn’t know what I was going to do. Part of me still doesn’t trust you, but part of me is so hopelessly gone over you that I was going to take whatever you said and believe it. I wanted to put up a bigger fight, but I just can’t.”
He takes my hands, kisses them, and then carefully kisses each cheek where the tears have made paths of sorrow on my flesh. “I understand, probably more than you think I do. I told you why I don’t drink, right?”
I sniffle, shrugging. “Yes …”
Boone takes a deep sigh and looks straight into my eyes. “I’ve never talked to anyone about this, but I probably should have told you. I should have conveyed just how alike we are. Anna … half of the things I do in my life, probably more than half, are to spite my father. My senior year, about a month after we broke up, my father got laid off from his job. He had no other real skills, had no college degree, and was too old to be hired anywhere else. So, he turned to alcohol. And has stayed nice and drunk since. It’s cost my family nearly everything; my mom has had to work three jobs, I’ve busted my ass to excel at baseball and in school. His failures have caused my inability to give in to my dream completely. It’s why I wouldn’t leave school to play professionally. The way my dad has ripped apart my family because of his lack of education, I had to get my degree. I know what it’s like to want to prove somebody wrong on such a raw, cellular level. I know how you feel when you feel desperate to act out, to make that person recognize your achievements in any way possible.”
I touch his face, feeling his pain as mine while he tells me his story. “I had no idea.”
“And you should have. It was all starting to unravel back in high school … and I won’t blame the breakup on that, but I know how closed off I was. I know how I hurt you with my indifference. And … yes, you fucked-up big time. But I also walked away. Again. I should have been a man, stuck through the tough times because that is what I told you I would do. I’m sorry for that.”
We’ve come a long way since that day on the steps, but it is a little bit gratifying to hear him say that.
Boone continues. “I know how you feel, and I want to hold you up and show you the light. The light of how incredibly amazing you are. Annabelle, you are a star on a hit television show, and you’re about to be a senior in college. You work with amazing people who can show you so many hidden secrets about the career you want to get into. You are smart, sharp and have a unique eye. You know when to bullshit and when to grit your teeth and smile. You’re honest and loyal to a fault. And I know you don’t think you are … but you’re kind. You would never turn away a child or a person in need. Outward bubbliness and exaggerated niceness might not be your strong suit, but you are kind. You don’t need her approval. The people who love you the most know how incredible you are.”
I search his eyes. “I’m not sure I even know how to feel that love.”
He puts my hand to his heart. “Feel this. That is love. The love I have for you, because I’m more in love with you than I can ever hope to put into words.”
The tears that were already carving paths down my cheeks begin to fall f
aster. In my life, I have never felt good enough to be loved on such an unconditional level. But by Boone forgiving me for my mistakes, giving me a second chance, and then showing me how his love can help me heal even further … that ice that’s always resided inside my soul melts.
It gives way to emotion that overwhelms me. I bury my face in his shirt and sob. When he tips my chin up, I grin a watery, snotty smile.
“I’m sorry I’m such a mess. That I’ve always been such a mess.”
Those full lips part in a wry smile. “You’re so far from a mess, you’re intimidating at times.”
“I love you, too, by the way.” My heart feels lighter as I tell him how I feel, as if it’s been waiting to get that cinderblock of emotion off of it for years.
He kisses me until the tears stop, until both of our breathing is ragged and heated. I pull back, snuggling into him, because I just want to hold onto him. It feels like forever since I just held him.
“So, what is this place?” Boone says into my hair.
I pull back. “Well … I saw it two weeks ago when we were scouting listings for these new clients. And I kind of just … fell in love with it. I’m not sure why, it needs so much work. I obviously can’t afford it. But it … it kind of reminded me of you.”
A grunt of curiosity echoes from his chest, and he stands up and walks down the front porch stairs. That big grizzly of a man, who just admitted he loved me, stands in front of the house I picked for him, hands on his hips, studying it.
Those caramel eyes assess every groove of the roof, the columns on the porch, the front door and shutters. My heart pounds harder than it had when he told me he loves me. Not that I wasn’t still internally freaking out about that, but matching people to the home for them is my calling, my passion. And this is the most important pairing I’ve ever attempted.
“I love it. But … I’m leaving. Why would I buy a house here?”
I get up and walk down the steps. When I get to Boone, I wrap my arms around him. “Well, at the sake of being nauseously romantic, this is the city that brought us back together. I think it might be nice to have some roots here, even if you’re leaving right now. Come on, it’s not like you don’t have the money. And … I don’t know why, but I just know this is your house.”
That smile that hooked me in high school smirks down at me. “You mean our house.”
Forty-Two
Boone
One Week Later
In the last week, I told Annabelle I love her, bought a house in the town I was moving away from, left said town, received a million-dollar bonus, and am suiting up to play in my first major league baseball game.
To say that I have emotional whiplash would be an understatement.
But as I stand in front of the locker with my name on it in this Texas baseball institution, the stadium I’d now be playing in, I take a moment to pause. Everything in my body is calm, buzzing like an engine about to go full throttle, but at the same time, calm. I am sure of myself, there is no turmoil left.
I accomplished everything I’d set out to. I graduated, and with that degree in my hand, I could let go of all of the emotional baggage where my father was concerned. I don’t need his praise, and I don’t care that he is downing whiskey at home while Mom sits in the luxury box I reserved for my friends and family tonight. She finally quit two of her jobs, at my convincing. I’ll work on making her leave her main source of income, because she doesn’t need it anymore. She has more than enough money sitting in her bank account now, I’ve personally seen to it that it was deposited into a singular account for her and only her. One day, I’ll make her see that it is time to leave that asshole … but for now, I am just happy that I can be the one to take care of her, instead of her breaking her back for me.
My dream, the reason I wake up in the morning, is finally coming true. In just twenty short minutes, I am going to run out onto that field in front of thousands of fans, and my closest loved ones, to play the game I love. I can’t even describe the elation I feel, or the focused adrenaline shooting through my veins. I always imagined that I’d be scatterbrained and hectic at this moment, but it’s like I have blinders on. All I can see is exactly how to win this game.
And then there is the greatest thing of all. For a long time, I convinced myself that love was a silly side requirement in life, that I didn’t need it to be happy. How fucking wrong I have been? Having Annabelle say those three words to me, and having her here for the past week as we organized and rearranged my life … I can’t imagine doing this without her. After everything we’ve been through, the breaking up and the fighting and hating and eventually loving … it all clicked into place. We were meant to go through all of that hell to get to where we are right now.
I bought the house, in the end. Annabelle was right, it is my house. Our house. It’s going to be her project to run with, of course, and she said that it would help her miss me less now that we’’’ be apart a lot.
The idea of that strikes a sharp pain low in my gut. This is the part of love and baseball I have feared … leaving the woman I want to spend every minute with behind. I heard from other guys in the minor leagues, and always read interviews from the legends, of how difficult it is to miss milestones with their families. That this career means sacrifices in your personal life. I’ll be one of those guys now, trying to make time for Annabelle while I play all around the country.
But it won’t be like this forever. She’ll graduate in a year, and until then we’ll figure it out. There is no other option. I am in love with her, and I’ll never let anything come between us again.
“Hey, rookie, it’s time to go.”
Someone claps me on the back and I stand, pulling my brand new hat down low and flexing the brim in.
The rest of my life is about to start.
As they announce my name and number while I jog onto the field, I look up to the box where she sits. There was my woman, wearing my new jersey, her future last name printed across her back. She didn’t know it yet, but I was going to make my high school crush my wife someday.
Of course I came to win, but victory and fame don’t matter so much anymore.
The biggest prize I ever won is already sitting up in the stands, watching me live my dream.
Epilogue
Annabelle
One Year Later
“It’s about to go live on the website!”
Boone all but squeals. My six foot something, rugged, athletic fiancé just squealed as he refreshes the Internet browser once more.
And yes, you read that right … fiancé. About a week after he played in his first major league game one year ago, we realized that we were kidding ourselves if we were going to “go slow” with a long distance relationship. We hadn’t fought so hard for each other, for love, to just give it up over hectic schedules and constant travel.
We drove, flew, and bus-tripped back and forth for some three hundred and sixty-five odd days to make our relationship work. And then, I finally graduated and could relocate to be with Boone on his days off. During the off-season, we obviously spend much more time together than when he is playing at ballparks all over the country every other night.
But then a week ago, exactly two months after my college graduation, Boone Graham got down on one knee and asked me to be his lawfully wedded wife, with a hell of a sparkly rock. What? I might be a changed, open, emotional woman, but I am still a materialistic bitch. I love a good diamond ring as much, or more, as the next girl. Don’t pretend you don’t as well.
I wrap my arms around his waist, peering over his shoulder. “I can’t even look, I’m so nervous.”
“Babe, it’s going to be great. You’re going to sell out in like a minute flat. The hype about this has been insane. And I tweeted it earlier today. You know my followers love you.” Boone grins at me.
He recently got a Twitter account, which has amassed almost two million followers in a little under a month, and he is obsessed. My fiancé had never been a socia
l media kind of guy, so he was late to the party. It was kind of cute watching him discover how to live tweet The Bachelor, which is our guilty pleasure show.
I like to brag that I have twice as many followers as him, and I am not a professional athlete. And then he’ll argue that I am a national television star and that isn’t fair in the competition for social media fans. We are still annoying each other and having great make-up sex because of it.
As she promised, Ramona fixed everything for me with Kutch and the Flipping Channel executives. I stayed on at Hart & Home throughout my college tenure, up until I took a break two months ago. And that had been at Ramona’s doing as well. She asked me, at my graduation, what I wanted to do in my career. It took me about a day to realize that I want to take a break from the show to focus on designing my own decor line.
And since the two people who have given me everything already have a line, they gave me a little bit more. Ramona was over the moon that I wanted to release my own collection under her line, and I worked twelve-hour days every day since May to design the twenty pieces that would be featured in my first line. It helped to distract me when Boone was on the road, and when he was here, he made me coffee and gave me back rubs to help burn the midnight oil.
You’re the One I Don’t Want Page 17