In the reflection of the rearview mirror, I watch him unload bags of apples into the trunk and close it. He puts the cart away then opens my door, tossing a Red Bull and a purple bag of Doritos on my lap. Before I can open my mouth, he shuts the door again and rounds the front of the car, opening the driver's side door.
"All those apples are going to get bruised. They're going to roll around back there," I say, cracking the Red Bull.
"Not for eating," he says. He doesn't expand on that, and I'm still too angry to ask. Just because he fueled me with my favorites doesn't mean I forgive him for stopping me from punching James.
Thirty minutes and two stops later, I'm standing on home plate at Gilmore Park, shivering.
"Are you going to tell me what the fuck we're doing here?" I ask, crossing my arms.
Mateo dumps the bags of apples on the grass ten feet from me and hands me a wooden bat.
"Therapy session," he says as if that's meant to explain everything.
When I don't respond, he goes on. "I used to do this before I got tattoos, and honestly, sometimes still do. It's part anger relief, part emotional reckoning. Have you ever hit a baseball before?"
I grit my teeth and stare at him. Is he for real?
He shows me where to put my hands on the bat and shifts his body behind mine, placing his hands over my own. I hate how well he fits there. How well I fit in his arms. It makes it hard to remember what this isn't.
Feelings.
A relationship.
"I'm still mad at you," I say.
"Step with your left leg and swing," he says, guiding my hands. "Just like that." He backs away and walks slowly backward toward the apples. "Try it without me."
I do as he says.
"Good. Okay, now try to hit the apple."
He tosses an apple my way, and I swing and miss.
"That's okay, try again."
He tosses another, and this time when it hits the bat the core explodes.
Well, shit. That felt good.
"Another one," I say.
Mateo tosses a third apple, and this one explodes too.
"We don't need to talk, but we can," he says. "Or you can talk, and I can shut up and throw you apples."
"Shut up," I say. "More."
He throws three more apples, and I only miss one.
"He saved me," I say after hitting another apple. "I needed saving. I craved it."
"What did you need saving from?" Mateo asks, his voice even and soft.
"My life. He saved me and then used me. I got pregnant with Coop, and he discarded me like I was a used condom. Like I wastrash. And you know what? I believed I was. Why would he want me when my own dad didn't?"
I wipe bits of apple off my face and get back in the stance Mateo taught me. He says nothing, and I'm grateful as I miss another apple.
"You said you were saving me from myself," I say, standing tall. "But that's what Cooper did. Being his mom saved me from myself. I thought I was destined to be discarded, to be the one who never came first. I'd come to terms with my life and what I could expect from it, but then I held him in my arms for the first time. It was no longer about me coming first because he always would. And every move I've made since has been for him."
