Edith ask Jewel as I hurried away.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Most of the crowd had already filtered from the baseball field, heading home. The line at the ticket booth dwindled down to only a few people, and I passed them, eyes peeled.
All the air whooshed from my lungs as I spotted a figure down near the far end of the fence, Royals uniform, hat backward with blond hair peeking from underneath.
Walsh.
My body refused to move forward, but my brain started to immediately soak up the details.
Walsh didn’t have his bat bag with him, but he did have his mitt tucked underneath one arm. He fiddled with his fingers as he spoke to the tall man in front of him, one who, I noticed, held a clipboard. Walsh nodded to whatever the man said, his attention totally captured.
Until his gaze slipped past the man to mine.
I was thrown back to a moment so long ago when the same thing happened, back in the hallway on the last day of school. Walsh, completely in his element, looking directly at me as if I’d spoken to him. Back then, I’d glared at him with all the anger I could muster.
Now, looking at him evoked a kaleidoscope of butterflies to stir in my stomach.
The next few moments happened in rapid succession—Walsh’s lips moved quickly, my brain too slow to try and read what they were saying, and the man passed over a small business card before walking away.
And then Walsh strode straight to me.
Part of me almost wondered if this was a dream; the boy coming toward me could’ve been a mirage or someone else entirely, but my heart knew. My heart would know him anywhere.
Walsh’s lips twitched a little, and he stopped a few feet away. His expression was filled with a nervousness that made my blood hum, holding his baseball mitt between his hands. “Sophia.”
I held my bag tightly to my chest. “Hi.” Despite my brain willing me not to, I found myself taking a step closer, the blood rushing to my head. The last time I was this close to him, his skin had been slipping against mine, his lips touching my lips, intoxicating. It brought a stinging feeling to my throat. “Who was that guy over there?”
“His name’s Tom Fletcher. He’s the coach for the Fenton County baseball team.” Walsh’s voice sounded a little stunned. “He was asking me a few questions.”
“Did he ask you why you quit just before the final game started?” I asked, my malfunctioning brain forgetting what tact was.
One corner of his mouth quirked up. “He did.”
“And?”
Walsh shrugged. “I told him what happened. About how I didn’t want to play for a cheating team. I’d rather never play baseball again than be grouped in with a team of people who cheat their way to the top. I told him…” His lips twitched again. “I said that I love the sport.”
I almost smiled at his words. “But you hate the game.” I wanted to kick myself so badly in that moment for ever thinking that Walsh knew about the team’s methods of winning. “And what’d he say?”
Walsh lifted up the small card Tom gave him, and I watched as he turned it over. “Told me to call him on Monday.”
A wave of relief flooded through me, one that nearly made my knees weak. “The fact that he wants to talk to you more is a great sign.”
“Yeah,” he chuckled almost incredulously, looking into my eyes. “I guess it is.”
We stood regarding each other for a moment, neither one of us talking. “Was it scary telling the umpire about the cheating?”
Walsh raised his eyebrows a little bit. “I didn’t tell him. Zach did, actually.”
Zach confessed about the cheating? I wouldn’t have seen that coming. But it made me look at him in a different light, in a different way. He stood up for something that was right, and I admired him for that.
I wanted to go on, to say what I’d been rehearsing for the past day and a half, but my mouth refused to open, my tongue refused to cooperate. It seemed that the erratic heartbeat in my throat swallowed my ability to speak.
Walsh cleared his throat first, shifting on his feet. “I’m sorry. About what happened.”
I began shaking my head. “You don’t have to apologize, Walsh. Seriously. I do. I never should have written that stupid article—especially not after we spent so much time together. That was messed up of me.”
Walsh blinked like I’d been speaking a mile a