Play by the Rules

by Frey Ortega

  I blinked. I was dumbfounded by what she had said. “You did the best you could, Mom,” I answered weakly. How did I go from wanting to give her a piece of my mind, to…this?

  I suppose a little part of it was the idea that I gave my mother a chance, even though I didn’t quite understand what I’d done to lead up to this moment.

  Was my mother this…motherly before? I feel like she was, once upon a time, and then the two of us just stopped getting close.

  So maybe she was right. Maybe I was partly to blame.

  Okay, well, I knew I was partly to blame.

  She gave a little snort in reply. “You were always the strong one of the bunch. I didn’t need to baby you as much, Emmett, because even though you had a flair for the dramatic, I just thought maybe that was your more colorful side coming out,” she said, and chuckled underneath her breath. “I didn’t pay you much attention because you were always so independent. Maybe this was just a façade, or maybe I had just been too late to really get to know you better.”

  There were no other words I could say except to mutter a soft “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry, Emmett. If anything, I’m just sad for the lost time we could have spent getting closer. I may be your mom, but I’m still human. We make mistakes. But just because we made those mistakes, it doesn’t mean I screwed your life up. Kids often forget that their parents are humans too. We’re not perfect. We try to be as perfect as we can, but we can’t be perfect. At some point, you’re responsible for your own actions, even though we try hard to instill good values in you,” she said. “And I can’t answer this puzzle for you, sweetheart. This is something you have to figure out on your own.”

  I frowned. “But that’s the thing, Mom. I don’t know if I can trust him. I want to. I really do. I just don’t know if I can.”

  “Well, I don’t know that I can answer that question for you, Emmett,” she said softly. “But can I ask you something? Do you even know what a quarterback does during a football game?”

  I blinked, and my eyebrows furrowed in question at that. “No,” I answered honestly. “I don’t.”

  My mother sounded amused when she answered. “Well, sweetheart, a quarterback is the one making all the plays in the game. He’s the one who has to know his teammates’ strengths and weaknesses. He has to be confident, because if he isn’t, then their team might fail. If someone doesn’t put their trust in him, they could lose the game. He has to be able to work with his team, and he has to know their strengths and weaknesses. He’s taking those things into account on the fly, because things could go wrong on the field at any moment. But at the same time, for this all to work, the team has to trust the quarterback, too. If they don’t, then playing the game is useless.”

  “So he wasn’t just trying to play me?”

  “I can’t say that for sure, because I don’t know him, sweetheart. But this is what he does for a living. He might have just been bringing his A-game into dating you. If you were asking for my opinion, though, I don’t think he was being malicious towards you,” my mother said. “I think he just liked you so much, he came on a bit too strong.”

  “But what about what he said about being serious, about being for keeps?”

  “Like I said, maybe he was coming on a bit too strong. Confident men are attractive, but the reality is that only a fine line separates confidence from arrogance. That line can be off-putting to a lot of different people.”

  My mother was making a lot of sense, throwing a lot of sage advice at me in that calm, cool tone she always had. I’d once thought that the coolness of her tone suggested that she was trying to remain distant from me. But she wasn’t. Maybe it was just an affectation that she adopted with me because I hadn’t opened up to her like my other siblings had.

  Damn. Where was this mother when I was growing up?

  I suppose the one good thing is that she was here when I needed her most. But I felt terrible simply because she was being honest with me in a way I needed. I was sure I could have talked to any of my friends and they might have said the same things as she did, but there was just something about finally connecting with someone I thought would be cold to me all my life…and realizing I had been looking at things wrong. I just needed to frame things properly.

  Give him a chance. Let him prove his words. The only answer to the question is to give him time.

  Hell, I could give him as much time as he needed.

  My mother continued to speak. “Besides, from what you’ve told me, it’s not as though he’s asking you to move in with him or marry him. He’s just asking you to take him seriously. Don’t date around, or go looking at anyone else while he tries to build something stable and serious with you, that’s all,” mom added. “That’s about all a person can ask another, anyway.”

  “I screwed it all up, though,” I said. “I don’t even know if he wants to see me anymore.”

  “Well, give it some time. He says he doesn’t play by the rules…well, dating doesn’t have any rules, honey. Sometimes when it’s right, it’s right. Send him a message, apologize, maybe be honest. Take things slow, but give him a chance. And next time, try not to overthink everything, okay?”

  “That’s not something I can just do though,” I said. I felt defensive already, and this was just me talking to my mother.

  Granted, my mother and I had never openly talked like this before.

  “The only thing we can hope for is that you do your best, sweetheart. Don’t let an opportunity for love pass you by just because you don’t know if what he’s saying is true or not. Let time be your answer to your own question, because the only way you’ll ever get an answer you’re satisfied with, is by giving him time to prove that what he says is true.”

  I had to take a moment to take it all in.

  My mother was right.

  I didn’t think she would be like this. Hell, maybe the way I was looking at the world was all wrong. Maybe I had internalized my defenses so much that I had pushed even my own family away.

  God, I was learning too much about myself tonight.

  “When did you get this wise?” I asked. “I thought, you know, I actually thought you didn’t like me. Most of the advice you gave that stuck with me—like about the pool stick, or about being alone—those are the ones that I remembered. I’ve never heard you speak this calmly before.”

  “Maybe you just didn’t know how to listen then, sweetheart, and I certainly wasn’t helping things. I didn’t know how to get my message across to you. We were all still growing up. Hell, I’m still growing up even though I’m sixty years old. You’ve got to understand, sweetheart, I was a teen mom. I had kids, one after the other, and you were my youngest. Even though you were different and I should have known that the way I raised your brothers and sisters wouldn’t have been received the same way, I didn’t know any better then. I do now. I’m sorry you had to grow up feeling like you couldn’t talk to me, Emmett.”

  I felt heat behind my eyes. There was this curling sensation in my chest that flourished into something…deeper. That was really the only way I could describe this feeling, like a sense of sadness. Maybe I was just sad about the lost time me and my mother could have had.

  At least there was now. At least there was this moment.

  “What should I do, mom? If you were in my shoes, I mean, what would you do?” I asked.

  My mother sighed. “I would find a way to apologize. Some people like doing small gestures, others like doing big, elaborate, grand gestures to do so. If I really like this guy and I messed up, I apologize, and I try to make it work.”

  “How do I go about doing that?” I thought aloud, and sipped on my coffee.

  “Well, that’s for you to decide, sweetheart,” my mother said. “I can’t decide on the specifics for you. But I can tell you that all of the answers you’re looking for starts and ends with giving him the time to prove his words are true. Now, I’m sure this is a terrible time for me to ask this question, but if I don�
�t ask it now, I wonder when we’ll ever have a talk like this again. Emmett Yang, am I going to meet this football player of yours?”

  I laughed at that. My mother even had a sense of humor. I could have made a joke about how Joe wasn’t mine and how that was preposterous, but that’s what I wanted, wasn’t it? For him to be mine.

  It was just taking some time for my mind to catch up with my heart.

  “I hope so, Mom,” I said. “But like you said, I have to fix this first.”

  “That’s my boy,” she said. I could almost hear the smile in her voice. “Just take a chance on him. He sounds like a good guy.”

  With that, my mother ended the call.

  I knew what I wanted. I knew the answer. I wanted Joe.

  But did he still want me?

  Chapter Sixteen

  There was only one thing I knew that could fix this situation, and although I didn’t know if it was the correct way, it was certainly the only way, barring some sort of romantic-slash-creepy pronouncement of undying love, maybe with a boombox, and perhaps this would all be done in the pouring rain, in front of Joe’s house.

  I’m not sure his neighborhood would appreciate the noise disturbance. Joe might’ve loved it, though. He certainly seemed to be the type to appreciate bigger gestures.

  So, I was going to go with the biggest gesture I could think of. I smiled to myself as I thought about how I was going to get it done.

  The day after that debacle of a date, I tried to make amends with Joe. I didn’t spoil my surprise, but I wanted to show him that I was sorry for what had happened. Part of it was just to preserve what little part of Joe still liked me, and the message I sent him was hopefully to make sure that he wasn’t going to find someone else just because I screwed things up.

  I knew it was a fucked-up reason. If it had been Joe who made the mistake and not me, I would have let him do what he wanted to do. I would have told him that I didn’t deserve him, even though I was probably also the one to push him away. But in all the romantic comedies I’ve watched and read, they always tell you to fight for your relationship. If it was something you wanted, it was something worth fighting for.

  I thought maybe, if that was how Joe saw things, that was probably how I should approach this, too. I needed to see things his way, instead of just focusing on how I was seeing them. I needed to make an effort to see how he saw things, too, even when every minuscule part of me was telling me to focus on self-preservation.

  Still, I was too chicken to actually call him, so I just sent him a text message.

  I’m sorry for the way I acted. I know I was in the wrong, and I fucked it up. I also know you probably deserve better than me, but if you’ll give me one more chance, I hope I can make it up to you soon.

  He didn’t reply until about a few hours later, only saying the word “okay” before sending me a couple of different emojis. There was a smiley face, a little heart, that one with the two hands up like it was some kind of hug, and a kissy face. I didn’t know if he forgave me or not, but the lack of communication told me that I was going to have to work harder myself. And I couldn’t really blame Joe, either. Throughout all of our interactions, he’d been the one actively pursuing me. If I really wanted to show him that I wanted this just as much as he did, I was going to have to do something more than a text message.

  But what if he didn’t want me anymore? What if I was doing all this and it was all useless, because I ruined my chance?

  Okay, Emmett. Stop overthinking. You might fuck it all up again.

  I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. I just needed to do what everyone around me said and work on this if I actually wanted it. I couldn’t just give up. My friends and family seemed to have my best interests at heart, and I honestly couldn’t say the same of my own self-sabotaging psyche.

  I’d even decided that this new, not-always-overthinking version of me should change things about my apartment. The old sanctuary had been darkened by the fact that I had managed to mangle one of the best things that had happened to me since moving there.

  Also, I realized I would never make spaghetti again.

  Well, maybe not in the foreseeable future.

  As I tapped away on my computer, I recalled the conversation I had this morning with Talia, just as she was about to head back into another couple of months of work. It was a bittersweet goodbye, as always, because I knew I wasn’t going to be seeing her for a while.

  “It’s like you have a fucked-up version of Princess Syndrome,” Talia muttered. “A self-deprecating kind, or something.”

  “I know I screwed up, okay? I know all of that already,” I said. “What’s Princess Syndrome, anyway?”

  “It’s not a real sickness, first and foremost, but it’s more like you overly criticize every man who ever shows interest in you so as to drive them away. Typically, it’s because the person with Princess Syndrome has an ego more bloated than a whale carcass, but yours is…different.”

  “Okay, I don’t need to know the details. I already know I fucked up.”

  “You sure did.”

  “I know that. I also know that I need to fix this.”

  “Only if you want to.”

  “I do want to.”

  “Then stop talking about it and actually fix it.”

  “I am.”

  “Oh. Wow. That’s new.”

  “I’m not sure if that’s sarcastic or not.”

  “A little from Column A, and a little from Column B. What are you actually doing to fix this?”

  “I’m finishing my article and sending it to Dale.”

  “You’re fixing this situation by…doing your job?”

  “Yup.”

  “I guess in a very Emmett sort of way, that sounds exactly like what you’d do. I fail to see how this is going to win him back, though.”

  “Believe me, I’m doing my best,” I said. “The only way that I know how.”

  “Do you need any help?”

  “Not right now,” I replied, smiling. “It’s nice of you to offer, but when this is done…I’ll let you read it.”

  “Godspeed then, Emmett Yang. Good luck. I better see a tabloid article about you and Joe Kaminski next time I land.”

  I smiled. It was nice to know I had a friend who still had my back, in spite of how I managed to mangle the only thing that seemed completely perfect. It was as though the universe had decided to serve me my dream man on a silver platter, and I tried to dine-and-dash on it.

  I was probably mixing metaphors or not making any sense, but I wasn’t about to split hairs about this. I fucked up badly. I needed to do something about it. And though my way was probably the least romantic way I could think of, I thought that if I did something too over-the-top, it would seem fake as hell.

  I wanted to make a serious effort. I wanted to show Joe that I liked him. And I was beginning to see that my mother was right—throughout all that had happened between Joe and I, it wasn’t as though he was expecting me to immediately enter into a serious relationship with him. He just wanted my time. He wanted time to prove that he was sincere, and I had rebuked him because I was so concerned about how everything had appeared, all nice and wrapped in a perfect little bow.

  The fact was, I still needed to work on that. But I needed to work on this more.

  I pushed up my glasses and typed away on my keyboard. I was looking through my article, making sure I had the right words, and finished up my second draft when there was a knock on my door.

  Blinking, I sauntered over from my desk to the door, and peeked into the peephole.

  It was Dale.

  “Dale?” I greeted, just as I unlocked the doors and opened it for my boss-slash-friend. “What’re you doing here?”

  Dale was smiling and looking like he had just come from the spa, radiant and shiny and…well, handsome as ever. He was dressed like a young professional, while I was in a light sweater and a pair of booty shorts.

  What can I say? I was just lounging about a
t home, anyway.

  “Well, hi there!” Dale said, smiling as brightly as he always did. “I’m on a trip from the office to come see one of my favorite writers and friends and help them get this draft going! Also, I figured you could use the company.”

  I blinked and gave a little smile of my own. “You don’t have to,” I said. “But thank you.”

  “Nonsense. Besides, it was boring there, anyway,” Dale answered back. He lifted his hands, pulling up a little paper bag. “I brought some food. I hope you like vegan sushi and tamari!”

  I didn’t even know what vegan sushi was, or if it was even a thing, but I just nodded and smiled as I moved out of the way and let Dale into my home. “I’m just finishing up my second draft now. I actually wanted to talk to you about some of the stuff I’m writing, so you coming here is good for me.”

  Dale nodded. “Well, it’s not as though we’ve been up to much in the office. Some of the other writers on staff are finished with their deadlines, but the higher-ups want this article out as soon as possible. Don’t tell anyone I told you this, but they’re kind of putting the heat on me to get you to finish the article faster.”

  I blinked. “Why is that?”

  “Well, you know how you and Joe went out on that date?” he started, walking over to the couch and taking a seat, immediately bringing out the boxes of vegan sushi and little cups of tamari. “Apparently, a couple of paparazzi rags managed to snap a few pictures. Our CEO’s got enough weight to his name to let them release the story a little bit delayed, but that means we have to get your article out before you get thrown out to the wolves.”

  “That…that certainly is a bit of a shock,” I said in a measured manner. “I don’t know what they want with me, but I don’t mind taking that challenge head-on.”

  Dale grinned, popping a piece of sushi into his mouth. “That’s the spirit.”

  “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about my article,” I said. “Joe asked to have his story be upbeat and light, and I’m still going to do that. But I wanted to put a personal touch on it…especially since the date, and the dates after that, you know? Actually, you know what? Here. Read what I have so far, and you can take a look.”