Full Count (The Catcher Series Book 1)

by Bri Izzo

  “Didn’t you see my Jeep in the driveway? It shouldn’t be a surprise,” I state bluntly.

  “The neighbors are having a party, and there’s cars parked everywhere. I guess I didn’t realize it was yours,” she mumbles, turning away from me to empty the grocery bag on the counter. Cara and Laurie stand awkwardly, awaiting the result of this encounter: am I just going to leave them alone to have a girl’s weekend? Doubtful.

  Fix this, you idiot. I walk up behind her, careful not to touch her exposed skin no matter how badly I’m tempted. She already smells like her coconut tanning lotion, and I almost can’t handle it. Leaning to whisper in her ear, I request, “Can I talk to you… in private?” I watch her hiccup, as if I’ve literally taken her breath away, and I can’t help but feel the attraction. Good. I still affect her. She follows me into the laundry room just off the kitchen, and I imagine everyone pressing their ears up against the other side of the door. But it doesn’t fucking matter. I just need Buzz to listen to me.

  “Happy belated birthday. Does your mom know you’re here? I thought your party was last night,” Buzz wonders. She doesn’t seem as mad as the last time we were alone in her bathroom after she was done puking or after the abrupt end to her season two days ago. In fact, she seems much lighter like she isn’t carrying around a heavy weight anymore.

  “I just left, so no… no one knows I’m here,” I admit.

  “You just left? Are you okay?” she questions with heavy anxiety. She starts to reach out to grab my forearm but then refrains nervously.

  My nod stutters, completely contradicting my verbal answer. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

  “Then what’s with Benny?” she adds, taking a step closer to me. I’m shirtless, since that’s how I sleep every night, so my contracting muscles appear to be distracting her like the “V” of her patriotic bikini dipping down between her boobs is hypnotizing me. I fucking love when her eyes fall on me like this.

  “He thought I was going to do something stupid, so he jumped in my Jeep to come with me,” I chuckle. Her smile falls into a deeply concerned frown when I say that.

  “You weren’t, were you?” she asks in a demanding yet anxious tone. Her eyes soar into me, and I instantly feel worthy. Worthy of what, I don’t know, but she’s looking at me like I matter in this world, to her world.

  “No. I just had to get out of that town,” I whimper, letting my arms fall drastically to my sides. I just want to touch her and hold her and feel that we’re past whatever shit we’ve had going on because of Chase Morgan and Alex and everyone else. To combat for the tension in the room, I offer, “Do you want to take the boat out and go wake-boarding? Your season is over so you don’t have to worry about pitching if your arm is sore after.” I have to get her out of this cramped room before I do something stupid.

  “Once a coach, always a coach, huh?” she half smiles at me.

  As she heads for the door, I step in front of her and say, “I’m sorry, B.”

  “Oh, I know,” she replies. Her head drops to avoid looking directly at me, something we got used to doing over the past few months, especially with me being her personal pitching coach. The only way we know how to try to avoid the sparks between us from becoming fireworks is to dodge eye contact. “We’re cool, Sky.”

  “Are we really? Cuz I’ll make it up to you if we’re not,” I promise, reaching out to clasp her hand in mine. She’s warm and soothing, and she grips my hand like she really means it.

  Taking me by surprise, Buzz creeps up on her tiptoes and places her lips on my cheek and kisses me. Damn… she still gets me. “We’re good,” she whispers.

  When we’re on the boat, I’m driving it while Buzz is wake-boarding behind. Everyone else is seated watching her pull tricks like she’s a professional. The rest of the lake is pretty empty, but as we go around the lake we see families starting to head down to their docks and join us in the water. The smile on Buzz’s face puts me at ease until I look back to see where Buzz is in the wake and realize we’re way too close to the high dive dock. Luckily there’s no one else near it in a boat or swimming. I turn the wheel left to avoid it and slow down, but it’s too late. Buzz is too far outside of the wake and heads straight for the wooden dock attached to the high dive, and I watch as she sees it coming. It’s horrible to witness, real fear in her eyes for the first time, but our eyes connect for an intense moment before she’s about to hit the water and the dock simultaneously.

  “Benny! Take the wheel!” I scream, immediately jumping into the water. I don’t even turn the boat off or make sure he has control of it before I dive in after her. I swim as fast as I can towards Buzz, and thankfully her lifejacket is keeping her afloat. But she’s completely lifeless. I go into full on panic mode but manage to grab her around the waist and force her face out of the water. She doesn’t cough up any water, so I know she isn’t conscious. Her forehead is already bleeding profusely while her eyes are shut and nothing else is moving the slightest bit. I can’t fathom that she actually looks dead, but she does. My heart rate triples, fearing that I just killed my best friend. As I hold onto her around the waist I feel that her bottoms must’ve started to slip off from falling in the water, so I reach with my other hand to make sure they’re pulled up to her hipbones.

  “Benny!” I shriek at the top of my lungs. He’s driven the boat in a small circle to slow down and come back to pick us up. “Help me. I don’t know if she’s breathing, but she’s not conscious.” Oh my God. Fuck. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

  Laurie and Benny pull Buzz out of the water and onto the soft bench they were just sitting on in the boat. I prop myself up onto the edge and climb inside, immediately unbuckling her lifejacket. Before taking it all the way off I shift the bikini top that luckily didn’t fall completely off of her.

  “Buzz! Please, fucking, God!” I yell, hoping it’ll help bring her back to life or that she can at least hear me. With two fingers I feel for her pulse below her jaw line by her ear, and for a second I panic that I can’t feel it. She’s dead. No, please! I gently put my ear on her chest and hear her heartbeat. Holy shit. Thank God. But she isn’t breathing. I press on her chest with both of my hands to start performing CPR and don’t even think about hesitating to put my lips on hers and blow a hearty breath into her mouth. I’d rather be kissing her, but I just want her to be alive. I continue doing CPR on this girl I can’t imagine my life without, and my adrenaline just keeps pumping through me and won’t let me stop until she’s proven she’s okay.

  It takes me a minute to notice that Benny has started the boat again and is already driving back to the cabin. If anyone else says anything at all, I’m totally oblivious. I completely zone in on Buzz and nothing else. She finally coughs, and I turn her head to the side so the water she’s choking up will fall out of her mouth. The first thing she does after choking up the water is reach for her bloody forehead, but I stop her.

  “Hey, no! Don’t touch it,” I command, grabbing her wrist to avoid her irritating the gash. I whip off my wet t-shirt and wrap it around her head to try to stop the bleeding, and she lets out a painful groan. There is already so much blood covering her, and it scares the fuck out of me. Benny pulls the boat next to the dock, and before he can even tie it up, I scoop Buzz up into my arms and carry her like a baby as I head up the stairs to the house.

  “Are you awake?” I ask out of breath as I hold my t-shirt in place on her head. It’s already bleeding through, but I’m not sure what else to do. She doesn’t answer my question, but I can feel her warm breath on my bare chest. God, Buzz, please don’t die. I sprint into the house with her still draped in my arms and grab my keys on the kitchen counter. Then she starts squirming. On one hand I’m glad if that means she’s conscious, but I’m worried I’m going to drop her and slice her head open even more. “Sweetheart, you’re slipping,” I announce, stopping on the front porch. I grab under her butt to carefully bump her up above my hip bone, and I hear a whimper escape from her. “Hey, it’s gonna be okay. I got you, a
nd I’m going to take care of you.” I sincerely hope I didn’t just fucking lie to her.

  Placing her alone across the backseat of my Jeep makes me nervous, but no one is quick enough to come with us. I can’t wait for them; I’m already terrified Buzz is going to die on the car ride to the hospital. The sooner I get her there, the better. I have to leave without them. I do buckle her in around her stomach, but I feel bad because I know it’s going to irritate her bare skin since she’s just in a bikini. When I turn the Jeep on, I immediately put it into drive and head for the main road while trying to setup the GPS. I luckily get past all the cars lined up for the neighbor’s party Buzz was talking about this morning with only scraping one of their side mirrors, but I don’t fucking care.

  “Nearest hospital,” I say for the GPS to hear.

  “Nearest hospital is four point two miles away,” the woman on the GPS informs me.

  As soon as I hit the paved road, I floor it. I blow two stop signs when I see there’s no oncoming traffic, and thankfully make it through the one stoplight along the way without having to wait. I pull under the overhang of the Emergency room side of the hospital, throw the Jeep into Park, and scramble around to the back seat where Buzz lies completely still.

  “Somebody help!” I scream, reaching to pick her up again. She’s like a bunch of limp noodles strung together. When I have her chest against me for a second as I carry her, I feel a heartbeat, but that doesn’t settle my nerves one bit. For all I know, she’s going to have severe brain damage, and it’s all my fault.

  I carry her into the emergency room, and yell, “I need a doctor!” and a bunch of nurses bring over a bed on wheels and help me lay Buzz down on it.

  “That was quicker than we thought you’d be here,” one of the shorter, older nurses calmly tells me. Why is she so calm? My best friend is dying!

  “What do you mean?” I ask, breathing heavily like I just ran a full marathon.

  “Your friend called and said you were coming about thirty seconds ago,” she says before wheeling Buzz down the hallway. I watch as Buzz lies in her stars and stripes swimsuit, totally exposed compared to anyone else in the emergency room, with my grey blood-stained t-shirt now wrapped too loosely on her head. I knew it was coming undone while I carried her to my car at the cabin, but I didn’t have time to fix it. I hope that wasn’t a mistake. I look down at myself, shirtless now with blood smeared all over my hands and chest. Her blood. And I lose it. For the first time in my entire life, I break down, and I don’t care who fucking sees me. I collapse onto a nearby chair as I catch my head in my red hands. Life as we know it is over.

  21 Bianca Ferrari

  I wake up in a daze. Everything is foggy, and my head feels like it’s on a tilt-a-whirl. I try to lift my hand that’s closest to him, but a heavy tube weighs me down. I try to lift my head and when I’m unable to, I drop my eyes down to my hand to see a tube drilled into it, and my stomach drops. The spinning of the room has slowed as I determine it’s not my bedroom but a hospital room. The only constant in the room is the guy sitting at my bedside. I’m not entirely sure how well I know him, but the concern in his eyes tells me he knows me very well. There’s something familiar about him, but I can’t touch it. My memory is drowned, but knowing I’m in a hospital bed and in severe pain is enough to alert me that there was an accident. My forehead feels prickly like there’s needles stuck in it, and I want to feel it with my hand, but my arm is too heavy to lift. I know there’s something wrong with my appearance by the way this guy is staring at me.

  “Is there something on my face?” I ask when he doesn’t take his eyes off me. He’s trying to look into my eyes, but they keep drifting slightly above to my prickly forehead. I’m not even sure he notices.

  “No, why? Does something hurt?” he scrambles, sitting forward in his chair.

  “You’re looking at me like you’re watching your puppy be put to sleep,” I try to smile, but a shooting pain in my forehead stops me.

  “Wow,” he sighs, and I see his eyes harden. He’s really upset from whatever happened. “I guess you did lose all of your memory.”

  Scrunching my eyebrows in confusion should be easy, but instead it’s a warning to stop moving my face so much. “Ow! What do you mean?” I wonder. I guess that makes sense why I don’t know who he is to me. Although there’s still something familiar about him.

  “You’re terrified of dogs,” he enlightens me. “You substitute the world bunny for puppy no matter what the circumstance.” His face is stern, looking like he will never smile again. What kind of accident was this?

  “Really?” I lightly chuckle.

  “Yeah, ever since you watched me get bit by one while trying to save you from it,” he explains. “You were seven and I was eight.”

  “So you’re a grade older than me,” I thought aloud, trying to start the million-piece puzzle. This is going to take forever. “You’re friends with my brother?” At least I remember I have a brother and that he’s a year older than me; that’s a start.

  “I’m better friends with you,” he announces firmly. He never takes his piercing auburn eyes off me for even a second, as if at any moment I’m going to keel over and die. A warm sensation fills my chest. He’s significant, whoever he is.

  “Can I ask you something?” I hope. I just want the magic curse to bring all my memories back to me. I’m hoping the answer to my next question will trigger some.

  “Anything,” he squirms in his chair next to my bed, eager to hear my voice. His eyebrows lift in anticipation, but everything else remains serious. I don’t know if it’s passion or guilt or a combination of the two, but he feels something deeply for me.

  “Were we… in love?” I blurt out. I’m not even slightly embarrassed to ask him this even though, as kids, it’s a little ridiculous. The way he’s memorizing my slightest movements and features, it’s as if he thinks he could’ve lost the love of his life. A girl can only hope for a guy to look at her this way, yet here he is right in front of me. It’s unbelievable. Plus I really have nothing to lose by asking him this laughable question.

  “What would you do if I said yes?” he replies monotonically.

  “I think I would believe you,” I admit, surprising him. It’s a totally feasible explanation as to why he’s looking at me that way, let alone at my bedside in the hospital. His eyes widen in surprise as he tries to disguise a small grin.

  “Would you give me the opportunity to make you fall in love with me again?” he wonders with a dull hope in his eyes. Even if I say yes, I can tell that it won’t be the same as it must’ve been before.

  Giving him an answer is not even on my mind, his question now rising above mine on the Absurd Chart. “I’m so sorry that I can’t remember,” I apologize as tears sting my eyes like bees. It’s painful to have pretty much a blank slate in my head but be old enough to know I’ve lived a lot of years of my life already. I only know this because my body is almost the full length of this bed. I can barely recall a single memory. The more I look at him, the more familiar he becomes; I know he’s someone from my childhood because he looks just like an older version of a boy I used to know. Or maybe I’m thinking of the main kid from The Sandlot.

  “It’s not your fault, Buzz,” he tells me, lightly brushing his hand over mine with the IV in it. Surprisingly, it’s comforting despite the plastic tube separating us.

  Although I feel the sparks flying as he touches me, I focus more on how he addresses me. “Buzz? Was that my nickname?” I giggle.

  “Sorry, yeah. I’ll try to call you Bianca,” he says releasing his hand and dropping it to his side as disappointment takes over his face. No, no, no! Buzz must’ve been significant. I can’t just let that go!

  “No it’s okay. I like it,” I assure him. “Can you tell me how that became my nickname?”

  He proceeds to tell me a story about when we were trick-or-treating as kids where I dressed up as Buzz Lightyear; and the reason for me being terrified of dogs also sneaks in th
ere again. “You were so scared that dog was going to bite you, and I was even more scared because I could see how big the dog’s mouth was and your tiny ankle compared to it. I convinced myself you would have to go the rest of your life with one foot if I didn’t save you. So I tackled you from behind and the dog bit me instead. You’ve called dogs and puppies ‘bunnies’ ever since,” he rehashes the old memory for me. Wow and he was eight when this happened?

  “Were you in love with me back then, too? Cuz it kinda sounds like it,” I laugh. His cheeks blush a light shade of pink as he finally fully smiles at me.

  “Skyler!” I hear someone call from the hallway. I look at the doorway and see someone who appears almost identical to my brother as a kid, but I know it’s not him. He would’ve just walked right in here to see me. The guy next to me turns his head in response, and then it clicks. Skyler. I grew up with him! He nods at the guy in the doorway but then turns back towards me. And that’s Benny, my brother Rex’s fake twin.

  “Were you?” I repeat.

  “I’m not sure I knew what love was back then, but damn I do now,” he answers passionately.

  “Skyler…” my voice trails off. I watch as his expression completely falls. I don’t want to hurt him, but I’m just so confused and frustrated. “I’m sorry.”

  “Please don’t apologize. This isn’t your fault,” he pleads, lowering his head. Oh, no… he thinks it was his fault? Before I can ask what happened to me, he adds, “By the way, you used to call me Sky. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard you say my full name until right now.” That explains his depression a second ago. Ugh, I’m already failing. I can’t do this. I can’t.

  “I’m sorry,” I cringe, trying to move ever so slightly beneath the bedsheets. The tubes stop me though. Ugh, I’m so uncomfortable. How long do I have to stay in this constricting bed?

  He interrupts my self-pity party by saying, “Please don’t be upset. I’ll be here to help you through this. You’re not alone.”