I nodded along with him, a faux smile plastered on my lips while I saw a group of girls flocking to greet Brent specifically before he went out for the official start. Knowing I was watching, he leaned over and kissed a few of them on the lips and smacked some others on the ass. Yeah, a beast, I thought, fighting hard to keep myself from rolling my eyes.

We were playing another strong team, but our players seemed to have a competitive edge and laser focus. I didn’t quite understand baseball–or sports in general–but I knew that we had some solid guys playing on our team. It dragged on for a while and Garrett was completely involved in the game. America’s favorite pastime, I thought, sucking down what was left of my soda. We were up in points, and while I hated to admit it, Brent did seem to be a great baseball player.

“Wow, what a great game,” Garrett said, his attention snapping me back to reality. “I’m happy you came with me.” He leaned in to kiss me, and I got more into it than I should have–for show.

“Me too.” I kept letting him kiss me.

He finally pulled away. “Let’s go get some real food, babe.”

He took me to his favorite diner and told me about the nostalgia surrounding the place. He and his brothers would come here after games with their dad back in the day, but their dad became too consumed with work, and they started going by themselves to keep up the tradition. It was a cute story, and I wondered when I’d be able to chat casually about my mom again. I kept her memories bottled up like a dirty secret from others, just wanting to have her to myself.

She was all I knew. Then, I was thrown into a pretty abusive situation with Sylvia.

“I’m telling you, we have this next football game in the bag. Hudson has no idea what’s coming for them.” He was cute when he talked about things that made him excited–a little sparkle in his eye as he spoke.

I kept up a soft smile, holding his eye contact despite my mind wandering back and forth between the diner with Brent, my mom, and Garrett in front of me. Taking small sips of my coffee, I tried to make myself look more animated than I felt. Kelly might have been right.

“You’ve basically started your own soap opera.”

How much more drama could I get myself into?

Garrett turned at the sound of yelling coming from outside. Maybe I shouldn’t ask those types of questions to the universe. A group of guys were standing around while another one approached and was cursing up a storm, pointing his finger toward someone in the group.