Page 47 of The Art of Catching Feelings

The phone lit up with a call, vibrating in her hand, and Daphne automatically tapped the screen to accept the call before she could even question if she should.

“First of all,” Chris said right away, not bothering with a hello. “Fuck that guy. Second of all—no, second,fuckthat guy. That’s a horrible thing to say to someone, much less yourwife. Not to mention, it’s categorically untrue.”

Daphne had started to cry. She didn’t want to—she hoped it wasn’t obvious over the phone, although she had a feeling that her shaky breath was probably a dead giveaway. “Not completely untrue,” she said in a ragged whisper.

She wasn’t uncommonly beautiful. Her biggest hobby was to read, the most solitary of acts, and even her attempts to connect with people about books fell flat, if her weak social media presence was anything to go by. Until she’d had this incredible stroke of luck, her job had been solitary and boring, as well, and even now that her job was probably the most interesting thing about her, she felt like she didn’t deserve it. She hadn’tearnedit.

She didn’t even deserve this, right now. Talking to Chris, having him take her side and be kind to her. But it was also hard to deny herself, when it felt so good to hear.

“I’ve been drawn to you from that very first message,” he saidnow. “I still remember what it said. You said you were having to stay aggressively in the present, and maybe that was what those yoga influencer accounts had been saying this whole time. I liked the way you phrased that—aggressively in the present—and the influencer part made me laugh. Actually laugh, out loud, on the plane. I couldn’t remember the last thing that had made me laugh in the few months before that.”

She gave a shaky laugh herself then, pressing the back of her hand to her nose, trying to stop it from running without getting snot all over herself. Eventually she had to reach for tissues she kept next to the bed, putting the phone on mute while she blew her nose. On the other end, Chris was quiet, too, almost like he could tell she needed a minute to get herself together.

“God,” he said finally. “I hate that I’m not there. I hate that I can’t really see you, and talk to you, and tell you what that message and all the others since have meant to me. Notinterestingorcharismatic? That guy is a troll. I hang on every single word you say. And more importantly, Duckie, you have a goodheart. You reached out to me when you didn’t even know me, just because you saw I was hurting.”

Daphne closed her eyes. He couldn’t have picked a worse thing to say.

“I have to go,” she said, and hung up. She tossed the phone toward the end of the bed, where it bounced off her mattress and onto the floor. If she’d cracked the screen, it would only be fitting.

She couldn’t do this. It was getting out of hand. So she’d developed a crush on Chris Kepler. She’d get over it. She could extricate herself from the online relationship, keep the in-person relationship strictly professional, and move on. Kim had been right—this was a complete disaster.

But when she retrieved her phone, she saw that there was anew message in her texts. She knew it had probably hurt his hand to type it, and she felt terrible about that, too.

C: I’m sorry if anything I said made things worse for you. You’re not a failure. You’re the opposite, in fact, because you were able to see that you were unhappy and do something about it. That takes a lot of guts—guts I wish that I had sometimes. And I’m sorry if I’m moving too fast for you. I know things are a little complicated because of your divorce, my job, etc. I just really like you. I have from that first message.

Daphne couldn’t just ghost him. That would be the easiest thing to do, but a true coward’s way out. She had to figure out how to do things the right way, give him some closure. But she knew she wouldn’t be able to figure it out tonight.

D: Good luck at your game tomorrow. Thanks for talking with me.

C: Anytime.

NINETEEN

“So what did she sound like?” Randy asked. They’d taken five of the eight road series games they’d played and were back in their own clubhouse, lifting weights. Chris always felt such relief when he came back home after being away, but now it was even more acute. He was really hoping to get Duckie to agree to meet up with him.

He knew it was a long shot. They’d still barely spoken on the phone—and she’d been fairly distant the last week, actually, responding with quick little texts likehahaorI know, right?but otherwise saying she was busy. He didn’t know if that last phone call had made things weird somehow. For him, it had been one of the most erotic experiences of his life.

Shehadto be interested. What could be the harm in getting a cup of coffee? Or tea—he knew she preferred to drink that. It was tricky with his schedule, but he could make something work first thing before he had to head into the ballpark, or even super late if she was willing to meet up after a game. She seemed to stay up pretty late herself. In fact, she had a knack for texting him at almost the exact time he got home after a game, which made him wonder if she watched him on TV. She never said anything.

And now he was so conflicted about it all he’d resorted torehashing the whole situation for Randy—not only the anonymous texts but their brief one-sided phone conversation, too, leaving out the whole mutual masturbation part—just trying to get a read on it.

“She sounded…” Chris struggled to think of the word. The only thing that popped into his head wasfamiliar, but of course that didn’t make any sense. Maybe he’d heard her voice in his dreams.

God, he was so cheesy he embarrassed himself.

“Squirrelly?” Randy supplied. “Look, man, I’m telling you. It’sweirdthat she won’t give you any info. This is a catfishing situation for real. At the very least, she’s married.”

Chris frowned. “She’s divorced.”

He’d hated hearing about her ex-husband, but he’d been grateful that she’d trusted him with the story of what had gone wrong. It had made some things make more sense, like the fact that she seemed so unwilling to share too much of herself. She obviously had some insecurities about whether anyone would be interested in what she had to share, thanks to the shit her ex had said to her.

“Slow down,” Randy said. “I can’t spot you if you’re up and down like that.”

Chris set the barbell back on the rack, pushing himself to a sitting position on the bench. “You think she could still be married?”

Randy shrugged. “She can text, but she can’t talk? Sounds to me like she’s got someone already sleeping right next to her.”

The idea made Chris feel sick to his stomach, but he forced himself to consider it.But it was almost like he didn’t care to be alone with me, except for, you know. And even that felt like it didn’t matter that it was ME specifically, just that it was a warm body.

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