Page 6 of Somewhere Only We Know (Healing in Cincy #4)

NATE

PRESENT DAY

I t’s like seeing a ghost. Our eyes locked from across the field and what felt like hours is really only a minute. When she leaves, my gaze stays glued to the spot where Jax was standing with her sister and Chance.

I haven’t talked to her since I left the semester before we were set to graduate.

I didn’t plan to leave. But when my dad got sick, being states away and baseball were two things that no longer mattered.

And as I think that to myself, I realize that in leaving school and baseball, I also left Jax behind.

That was always a fear of hers and I unfortunately made that fear come to fruition.

A baseball hitting me in the chest brings me back to the present. To what I’m supposed to do. To my job. I look over at Bryce who threw the ball and give him my best glare.

“Girls later. Baseball first,” he tells me. And he’s right. This game is one of many that will help us when we’re in the playoff hunt.

I pick the ball up off the ground and throw it back to him.

I try to put all thoughts of Jax out of my mind.

But it’s hard when I know that she’ll be in the crowd watching us play.

That little piece of knowledge feels like college all over again.

And it’s clear, after years apart, that she’s still a baseball fan.

So, at least that’s one thing that stayed the same.

I go through the motions of our warmup and stand by my teammates as the National Anthem is played.

I’ve never once regretted being drafted to Cincinnati all those years ago.

But now after seeing Jax, who’s gotten even more beautiful as the years have passed, it’s throwing me for more than a curveball.

It’s making me wonder how we’ve been in the same city and have never crossed paths.

We take the field and I jog out to the sideline to take a couple of warm up throws.

When the umpire signals, the guys and I take our respective spots in the field.

I love playing in the outfield. Most people look at outfield positions as a last resort.

And for a defensive position, it is. We’re the three spots keeping the infielders from running to the fence to get a ball.

We’re the ones who keep a long single from turning into a double.

We make the diving catches and climb the wall to save a fly ball from becoming a home run.

It’s my favorite thing about this position.

But as I try to keep focusing on why I love this position and my mind from looping back to seeing Jax, it’s the one time I wish I played an infield position.

At least that would give me a reason to focus.

Because being in the outfield is a surefire way for my mind to wander when I should be focusing on my job.

I adjust my hat as the count is up in our favor and chew my gum harder in an attempt to focus. But it doesn’t work. I keep thinking about her. The girl I left behind. The last text I sent.

More often than not, I always wondered what Jax was up to.

I assume she got her degree. Does she use it?

I would hope so. All she talked about was marketing.

The small things she would do to help companies reach their tended audiences.

Did she meet someone after I left? Are they still dating? Or worse, is she married?

The crack of the ball against the bat jolts me back to the game. It sails into left field and I move into position before it’s caught.

Three up, three down.

We jog off the field and into the dugout. I’m not up to bat until later on, so I take a spot at the fence with some of the guys.

“What’s up with you?” Chance asks. “You’ve been off since warmups.”

“Girl problems?” Bryce chimes in with a question.

We watch as our guy hits the ball between shortstop and third. Cheers from the crowd and dugout are rampant.

“I just saw someone that I hadn't seen since college and it threw me off,” I tell my two gossiping friends.

Chance and Bryce are the two I’m closest to on the team despite Chance just getting traded here a few weeks ago. That’s normal for baseball as it’s a business first and foremost. It also took nothing for Bryce to add him to our twosome.

“Unrequited love. My favorite,” Bryce says.

Chance laughs and I glare at him. But it’s not a far off assumption for him as Bryce is more of a romantic than most of the married guys on the team.

“It definitely wasn’t unrequited,” I tell them both.

“Oh, shit. This is grounds for drinks after the game.” Chance declares before getting his helmet and batting gloves on then leaving us to go stand in the on deck circle.

I groan but don’t argue. They’d drag me out after the game regardless if we won or lost.

And that’s where I find myself hours later.

I take a large pull of the beer Bryce set in front of me.

I don’t usually drink during a series, but if I’m spilling my guts to him and Chance, I need something.

Because if I’m going back into the recesses of my mind during that time, alcohol will certainly help dull that ache.

“Did he say anything?” Chance asks when he barrels into the bar and clambers onto the empty bench. He’s very reminiscent of my mom when she goes to meet up with her girlfriends for their monthly lunch dates. Those women can gossip like no other. And so can baseball players.

I give him a look and he blows me a kiss.

“So…who was it that you saw?”

“My–” soulmate, love of my life, the only one I’ve wanted to be with …what do I call Jax? Because calling her my friend would seem so little of a word than what she was to me. “We went to college together, met at eighteen, boy falls hard…”

“Did she reject you?” Bryce asks with panic in his voice.

I look down into my beer, hoping it will give them the answers that I have yet to still get from that day. “Not at first.”

“So what happened?”

“My dad got sick my final year and I transferred closer to home with a semester left.”

The text that I sent to Jax over winter break still haunts me.

I never saw myself to be one of those guys who ends a relationship over text.

Because that’s the coward's way out. You can’t say you love someone, tell them they’re your future, and then end it through a text.

That means you didn’t love them enough to face them head-on.

But I had no choice. My dad was too sick by the time I returned home that I was terrified to even go to the bathroom for fear of what I might find when I came back .

But I did what I did with Jax and that’s the biggest regret of my life.

“You transferred with a semester left of school?” Bryce and Chance shout at the same time.

Thank goodness we’re the only ones on the patio.

This tavern is a staple in Cincinnati and one we don’t tell people about because we choose to keep this hidden gem to ourselves.

So them freaking out like this keeps my face off of social media with possible rumors flying.

“Yes. And it was the right thing to do,” I tell them.

Well, maybe not the right thing considering going from a top tier Division 1 school to a barely known Division 1 school made getting drafted that much harder.

But I made it after busting my ass that semester so that scouts would take notice.

They did and I’ve been in Cincinnati for the last six years.

“I mean, you did right by your family. But was leaving that easy?” Bryce asks and in our years of friendship, this is the most serious I’ve heard from him.

No . “Next to my dad getting sick, leaving was the hardest thing I ever did.”

This is much too heavy talk for drinks after a game. So I finish off the rest of my beer and look to them for another round. Standing up from my seat, I head to the bar and when I get the bartender's attention, I ask for another beer and a refill on our pitcher.

I doubt that Jax would ever want to speak to me. After all, I did leave her when I promised that we would graduate together. I promised a lot of things to her, and to myself.

I’m looking at the alcohol on the shelf when the door to the bar opens and my mind goes back to that day.