AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Faith
I stood on the edge of the field with Jason as another rumble of thunder shook the ground under our feet. Shaking a few drops of rain loose from the clouds overhead, the faint vibration of it seemed to make the atmosphere a little heavier.
Uncomfortable, like being in a too-tight shirt you can’t pull off, the air pressure squeezed me so hard that I had to stretch my arms overhead to shake off the feeling.
The umpire shook his head, flashing all his fingers at us three times, making Jason clap his hands as he turned back toward the kids. “Fifteen more minutes, guys.” In the dugout, the players groaned and tossed their mitts against the ceiling for something to do. But I had Dom squirming in the bleachers to focus on until Jason bumped me with his elbow to snap me out of it. “We’ve barely had a chance to talk since you got back. How is everything going in the new house?”
That first little hiccup aside, I was living a dream I never dared to have for myself. “I love it, Jason. Everything’s going really well.” Rolling my eyes away from him again, I shrugged as I watched Dom answer his phone. “You know, except for the mom thing.”
Jerking his eyes wider when he snickered, he kicked at the light pole we leaned against. “Yeah. I know how that song goes. She’s still blowing up my phone.”
I swayed back and forth as I twisted my knees, trying to keep my mouth shut. But I’d known Jase all my life, and he grew up next to all that drama, too. So it was so easy to unload it all on him. “She had the audacity to come to my work today.” My hand flung out to show him how ridiculous the whole thing was. “Tossed Dom’s pills at me, then stormed out when I told her to mind her business.”
Cringing back at me, he dug his finger behind his ear and growled a little. “Yeah, but she’s not wrong about him needing them.”
I shrugged back at him as I rose on my toes to check up on Dom. Getting more heated with whoever it was on the other end of his call, he finally launched himself up from his seat, his hand waving. “Listen, I’m on board with whatever is best for Dom. But you know how he is.” I swung my finger at him, because he knew as well as I did Dom was a freight train who barreled through everything and everyone standing in his way when he was on a mission. “He has his own ideas about stuff, right or wrong, and we’re all along for the ride until he changes his mind.”
He shifted his hat back as he turned to face me, leaning into the fence. “I realize that, but you don’t have all the information. And I think if you did...”
The fence jingled behind us, and Travis leaned over the top next to me when I turned my chin. “Hey. I was just wondering if you wanted to go with us for pizza later?”
Realizing it wasn’t a group invitation, Jason widened his eyes at the field as he cleared his throat and pretended not to pay attention.
Tipping my head toward Dom in the stands, I smiled back at him. “No thanks. I think we’re just going to hang out at home tonight. We still have a lot of unpacking to do.”
A sigh escaped him as he rested his arms across the top of the fence and dropped his head. “So,” — he looked up and shrugged — “you think they’ll call the game or...”
Jason slapped my arm with the back of his fingers. “Good question. Let’s go talk to the ump and see if we can’t get this thing popping.” Leaving Travis standing there alone, we walked down the first base line as Jason groaned at being forced to interfere. “Listen, I’m not trying to be a dick or anything, Faithy. But you got to do something about that guy.”
I shoved my hands in my back pockets and shrugged. “I’ve told him in subtle and not subtle ways I’m spoken for. He never has been good at taking no for an answer, though.”
Midway through, he turned around and stopped me with a tug on my sleeve. “That’s going to get his ass knocked out again and Dom arrested. He’s not in a place to deal with that shit right now.” His eyebrows jerked back to the dugout. “He’s about a minute from going wild on that little bitch.”
Why anyone expected me to have some control over either of these grown men had me laughing back at him. “What do you suggest I do, Jase? Please give me one thing that’s within my power to do that I haven’t done already to make Dom feel more secure.” I shrugged back at him when he just stood there staring at me. “I’m sleeping in the same bed with him. Doesn’t that say anything about how committed I am?”
“Yeah.” Worried about his friend, but seeing how silly the whole thing was, too, he rubbed my arm. “Sorry. It’s only he has so much going on right now, and I can see that big powder keg about to explode. You know?”
Like the spark you sometimes get when you plug something into the wall, the air seemed to charge up a little more when the thunder rumbled again. I felt what he was feeling, too, but what could we do about it? I shrugged back at him and sighed as I slid my hands into my pockets. “We can’t stop him from losing control, but at least we know it’s coming. And we’ll both be here to help him put things back together again. He’s not alone in this.”
“Hey,” — his eyes drifted up to the main road behind me — “where’s he going?”
I spun around right in time to see Dom’s truck exit the parking lot. “I’m not sure. Maybe he got called in or something.” My phone slid from my pocket, and I moved my thumb across it and shook my head. “No. He didn’t message me or anything.”
“Un-un.” He came beside me, shaking his head as Dom turned onto the little side road. “He’s not going home, either. He’s heading toward the river.” His hands came to his head, pushing his fingers underneath his hat enough to lift it. “Shit.” Something about how his freckled face went paler sent a rush of heat through my entire body. “One of us better go after him.”
Lightning finally crossed the sky above us, and I touched his arm as I backed away. “You handle the kids. I think I know where to find him.”
Running toward the outfield gate, I wrestled the keys from my pocket as the announcer came across the speaker, “That’s the end of the game, boys. Everyone be safe.”
That I was in over my head with this became more apparent with every step as all those little clues everyone tried to warn me about started coming together to show me what I’d been ignoring. “Oh, God.”
Loving a person teetering between stability and chaos was a battlefield of doubts and regrets, each blaring at you too late like the tornado siren warming up at the fire department down the street.
There were days I thought my anxiety and irrational fears about the most ridiculous things might actually kill me. Your mind makes it that real sometimes.
I raced down the side road, my freezing, shaking hands clutching the steering wheel and my heart pounding so hard it felt like it might burst through my chest. My throat closed up on me, making it impossible to swallow, as panic surged through my veins. “Please, watch over Dom until I find him,” I whispered to whoever might be listening, fighting the fear no matter how my body tried to shut me down.
50
