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“Okay.”
Neither of them moved. He seemed unsure of what she wanted. “Is this where I hug you goodbye and warn you about the ways of men?” He plodded toward her, his arms outstretched for a hug.
Instead of hugging him, she took hold of his arm and pulled him toward the door to the side of the house. “This is where we go to the yard and play catch. I’ve got half an hour before I need to leave for the airport.”
“Catch?” He noticed the bag in her hand. “Why would we do that?” He made to pull away from her, but she tightened her grip and continued towing him along.
“Because I should’ve done this when we were children, and I didn’t, so I’m doing it now.” They reached the backyard.
“That doesn’t make any sense.” Matt shoved his hands in his pockets and looked longingly at the back door.
The yard was grass and clover with a few yellow patches. Overgrown bushes lounged around the periphery of the yard, as though giving it an audience.
“Stand over here.” She dragged him to a spot, handed him one of the gloves, and moved a couple dozen feet away. “We’re doing this.”
He didn’t put the glove on. “You just want a reason to throw baseballs at me.”
“Maybe.”
He rocked back on his feet, suddenly fidgety. “You know I don’t play baseball.”
“Yeah, and I finally figured out why. I always thought it was because you were angry at Dad for not agreeing to coach so you could play with your friends. But that isn’t it.”
She pulled a baseball from the bag. “You blame yourself for him leaving. You’ve told yourself that if you hadn’t asked him to coach, the fight wouldn’t have happened, and things would’ve been different. Well, they wouldn’t have been.” She tossed the ball to Matt.
He caught it just in time to keep it from smashing into his chest. He didn’t throw it back.
“Dad would’ve left over something else,” she said. “It was never your fault. Now throw the stupid ball. We’re playing.”
He dropped the ball on the ground and scowled at her. “This is pointless.”
“A lot of things in life are pointless.” She threw another ball at him, fast and hard, and this time wildly off-center because she wasn’t practiced. He didn’t reach for it, and it flew harmlessly by him into one of the bushes.
She picked up a third and fourth ball from the bag. “Some things you do just because they’re fun. Sports, art, dancing, dressing up for New Year’s Eve…” She threw the ball, aiming more carefully.
He caught it and dropped it onto the ground next to the first. “Dad didn’t leave over something else. He left because I asked him to coach a baseball team.”
“Not your fault.” She lobbed the fourth ball. He batted it away with the glove, still scowling.
She picked up a fifth and sixth ball. She hadn’t bought nearly enough, she realized. Maybe there weren’t enough baseballs in the world. “Fathers are supposed to coach their kids’ teams. He should’ve jumped at the chance to spend time with you.”
“But he didn’t.”
“Yeah, because he wasn’t a great dad. A lot of the time fathering was beyond his abilities. And that was his fault, not yours.”
She threw the seventh ball. It went way too low.
Matt swatted at it while jerking out of its path. He swore, shook his hand, and glared at her. “Sheesh, Olivia, are youtryingto hurt me?”
She’d been stupid to think this would do any good. It wasn’t. “No,” she said, deflated. “I’m trying really hard to un-hurt you, but I don’t know how.”
His expression softened and his shoulders, once rigid, relaxed. He ambled over and pulled her into a hug. Her little brother was so tall and strong. All grown up. And she couldn’t fix any of his childhood. “I know,” he said. “Don’t worry about me.”
Emotion was making her throat tight. She buried her head against his chest. “Hard times can make us stronger. We just have to figure out how to make that happen.” She had to figure out how to trust people not to leave her. She could do it. Shewasdoing it by going to Denver. “You’ll be a better father than he was because you know firsthand how important it is.”
“Whoa, there.” Matt pulled away from her. “You’re getting ahead of…pretty much everything. I don’t even have a girlfriend.”
“Yeah. You should change that. There are a lot of great women out there. Probably one of them would put up with you.”
