were sorry for being an asshole.”
I exhale. Okay. Not as bad as I thought it’d be.
“You also mentioned you’d made some poor choices over the last year and you had a lot of regrets, but you wouldn’t go into detail,” she says, releasing her words slowly and carefully. “I actually Googled you after we hung up. I mean, I was wide awake anyway and curious as could be. All I saw was that you were in a car accident about a year ago, and that it shattered your right shoulder in five places and forced you into early retirement.”
I find it hard to believe she hasn’t Googled me until now. But it’s also refreshing.
“Yeah,” I say, jaw clenched. “That’s pretty much what happened.”
“I don’t know what kind of regrets you have,” she says. “I’m almost afraid to ask. Not that you’d tell me anything. And not that it’s any of my business. But you seem really unhappy, and I’m pretty sure it has to do with your regrets. I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you want to talk about them, I’ll listen.”
I don’t respond. I don’t know her well enough to explain the things I’ve done or to fully express the magnitude of my regrets. They run deep. Deeper than the gash on my face and the wound in my soul.
“Anyway, then we talked about how ever since you retired, you feel like you’ve been treading water, and you’re kind of at a loss as to what to do because baseball was your life for so long,” she says.
“I said that?”
Aidy bumps her elbow against mine. “Sure did.”
“I, uh . . .” Slicking my hair back, I clear my throat. “I don’t usually tell anyone those things.”
“It’s probably why you’re so tightly wound all the time.” Aidy pulls her hands from her pockets and clenches her fists. “You’re like this. Angry. Hard. But you need to relax.” Her fists release and she drags a hand down my arm, which stiffens at her touch. “Even your arm is all tensed.”
An older woman walking a Pomeranian passes us, giving us a bright-eyed grin as her gaze flicks between us. She thinks we’re together, which I find hilarious because the two of us strolling side by side must look like the sun hanging out with a rain cloud.
“Before you hung up,” Aidy says, “you said you wanted to stop being heartless. Maybe you were just being dramatic, I don’t know you that well, but I don’t think you’re heartless, Ace. At least what I know of you. Grumpy? Sure. Moody? Definitely. But you’re not heartless. A heartless person wouldn’t feel remorse for the things they’ve done, and a heartless person sure wouldn’t have texted me asking if they could send an autograph to the little boy with tears in his eyes.”
My shoulders feel lighter, and I glance down at Aidy, watching the way her hands animate when she talks. She keeps tucking a piece of hair behind her left ear but it refuses to stay put for more than a few steps at a time. Still, it doesn’t faze her.
We’ve circled the block now, returning to the spot just outside my steps, stopping under the shade of a red-leafed maple.
“Did I say anything else?” I ask.
Aidy turns to face me, her chin pointing up as she stares to the side with her brows furrowed.
“Nope,” she says. “That was it, really. You were just plastered, and I think you needed to let it all out. Not sure why you picked me.”
She laughs, and I agree. I have no idea why I picked her, though it’s not like I have an overabundance of options these days. Guess she’s easy to talk to. I don’t really have anyone like that now.
I’ve let too many people slip away over the years. And the ones who tried to come around this last year, I pushed to the wayside, convinced they were better off without me in their lives.
I’ve done some shitty things in my life.
And I’ve made some bad calls.
But standing here, watching Aidy chew the inside of her lip and stare up at me like she doesn’t see the living, breathing monster inside me, gives me a sliver of hope that I didn’t have until today.
This woman, this beautiful, Mary-fucking-Sunshine of a woman, doesn’t believe I’m heartless.
My chest falls as I exhale, and I jam my hands into my pockets because my fingers twitch with an urge I haven’t felt since I’m not