Page 64 of Making It Count
“I like when you call me ‘babe.’ I say it more than you do, so it’s nice. When I let it slip that first time, I didn’t think you heard it.”
“No, I heard it. And I liked it, but I didn’t want to say anything because I thought you might take it back.”
“Why would I do that?” Shay asked.
“Things have been weird for us,” Layne replied. “I mean, we have a four-year history of basically not talking unless we had to because of the team. Then, we finally talk. We kiss. It’s great. We don’t talk about it. The next day, we go into lockdown, and the season is over when it shouldn’t have been. Then, we’re at our homes, and I’m starting a job. You’re planning to come back here. My mom gets sick, and we stop talking. I get sick, and I don’t know how to tell you because I don’t want to worry you. And now, we’re here, on our first actual date, but you’re in another room, and we’re eating ramen on our beds.”
“But we’re doing it together. That matters,” Shay replied. She held up a pretzel. “Cheers.”
“Cheers,” Layne said with a giggle.
“How bad was it, really, Layne? You were in the hospital.”
Layne looked away for a minute before she finally returned to look into Shay’s blue eyes and said, “My mom was worse than I was, but when I was a kid, I had asthma.”
“What?”
“It was never really serious. It only flared up at certain times. I had an inhaler, but I rarely had to use it. I worked on developing my lungs with sports. I do still carry an inhaler, but it’s for emergencies only, and I haven’t had one of those in a long time. Well, I had recent emergencies, yeah, but before COVID, nothing in years.”
“I didn’t know you had asthma.”
“No one but my mom and my old doctor knew. My inhaler was even expired because I hadn’t needed it refilled in so long. I had a mild case when I was younger, but I thought I was fine. Then, when I got sick, the asthma made it worse, so yeah, I had to go to the hospital.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“Are you really okay?” Shay asked. “They’re starting to talk about how people have lingering symptoms, Layne. I looked things up after you told me you got sick.”
“I’m still struggling to breathe when we run, yeah, but I just got over it. It’ll get better. I get tired sometimes when I didn’t use to get tired, but other than that, I feel fine. Can we talk about something else, though? This is supposed to be a date.”
“Sorry,” Shay replied. “I wish I was sitting there next to you.”
“We wouldn’t be sitting.”
“No?”
“No. We’d be lying in this bed watching a movie, and I’d be holding you.”
Shay smiled and did that little head tilt thing she did sometimes.
“You’d be holding me, huh?”
“Yes,” Layne replied. “I want to hold you. God, Shay, I want to kiss you so badly. You have no idea.”
“Oh, I think I do.”
“I shouldn’t have stopped us that night after the game. I should have–”
“If you wouldn’t have, we both would’ve been naked, and Roy would’ve gotten quite a show when she walked in.”
Layne laughed and said, “God, could you imagine?”
“She has that high-pitched scream… I can see her yelling, ‘My eyes! My eyes!’ and running into the bathroom or something.” Shay laughed loudly.
“While we’re trying to get dressed again,” Layne added.
“No way,” Shay replied. “We’d get under the blanket naked. She could get her crap and take it to someone else’s room. Had it gotten that far, I wouldn’t have let her walking in stop us.”