Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 122219 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122219 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
After my first day back coaching the third week of April, I approached Avery under the fading sunlight. She was busy organizing the equipment on the field, completely wrapped up in her task.
I leaned against the fence in front of her, taking her in for a moment. “Hey,” I said, breaking the silence.
“Yeah?”
“I’ve been meaning to ask… How did you manage not to get sick after taking care of me for a week straight? What kind of superhero immune system do you have?” She went to grab the bag of baseballs, but I hurried over and lifted it for her, tossing it over my shoulder.
A mischievous smirk lit her face up. “Well, I figured one of us needed to suck it up. We couldn’t both be little punks,” she said, her voice dripping with a teasing tone. “Unlike some people, I can’t afford to be a baby about it. I had a team to coach and couldn’t afford to be sick.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “A little punk, huh? Is that how you see me?”
“You cried for five days straight, tossing and turning, telling me to take you out.”
I feigned a wounded expression, rubbing at my chest as if her words physically hit me. “For the record, I don’t think I had a normal flu. I think I had a newfound plague of some sort.”
“Sure, sure,” she cooed, stepping a tad closer. As the distance between us shrank, my heart beat a little faster. “But you’re lucky you had a solid nurse like me to look after you. You might’ve actually died if it wasn’t for me.”
“You don’t have to prove that point to me, Coach. I already know I would’ve been fucked without you.”
“Well, as long as you’re aware of how good you had it.”
“I am, which is why I want to make you dinner tonight as a thank-you for taking care of my punk ass.”
The warmth that bloomed across her lips made me echo her smile. “You cook?”
“For you, yes.”
She narrowed her eyes. “What are you going to make?”
“Baked ziti and garlic bread.”
“Mmm,” she moaned. The sound was enough to make me want to start humping her leg like the needy dog I’d turned into whenever she was near. She could’ve put a collar on me, and I would’ve allowed her to dog-walk me all around town with a smile on my face. “That sounds like a perfect Thursday night dinner. But”—she pointed a stern finger at me—“if I hear one sneeze from you, I’m calling you a punk for the rest of your life.”
I laughed. “Deal.”
“And don’t read too much into this, Nathan. I still don’t like you,” she expressed as she started to walk off with that playful grin still on her face. “So don’t you think for a second we’re becoming friends.”
I shook my head in complete awe of her stubbornness and inability to express that she and I were slowly but surely getting on better terms with one another. “Whatever you say, Avery. Whatever you say.”
I liked her stubbornness.
I craved her stubbornness. Avery’s attitude was one of the things I found most attractive. I didn’t know if that meant I was mentally unwell, but that was where my state of affairs had been. The flu couldn’t take me out, but my damn crush on Avery Kingsley might’ve been the thing to do me in.
23
AVERY
One Sunday morning, I suddenly awakened from my slumber due to the sound of a rooster crowing. I groaned as I pushed myself up to a sitting position and rubbed the exhaustion from my eyes. The sun was hardly up as I yawned and stretched my arms.
To my surprise, it wasn’t a rooster shouting good morning to me. It was Nathan standing in my doorframe with a big goofy grin on his face, making the loudest rooster sounds I’d ever heard in my life.
“What in the living heck are you doing?” I grumbled.
He had a stack of clothes in his hand as he walked over to me. “Morning, sunshine. It’s the third Sunday of the month.”
I blankly stared at him, probably with morning gunk in the corners of my eyes, still. “What’s your point?”
“It’s Sunday Funday on the Farm!” he exclaimed, placing the clothes in my hand. “I guessed on your sizes. I let you sleep in a little longer, but everyone else is already out there warming up on the field. I wanted you to be on my team, Team Blue, but everyone said it would be an unfair advantage to have you play on the same team as me. So you’re on the yellow team.”
“Nathan, what the heck are you talking about?”
“Every third Sunday morning, starting in the spring, my family gets up and plays a baseball game at the crack of dawn. The losers have to go through the garden and prepare brunch for the winning team. It’s a tradition. Sunday Funday.”