Page 92 of Home Run

Millie: Deal

“Didyou hear from Tan this morning?”

Tan.

I slipped my phone back into my pajama pants pocket. The boys had headed back to New York after winning two games against the Nats, and the third in the series would be played on home ground.

“Yes.”

“Sweet. Me too. Hesent me this hilarious meme of Boomer Jones running around the bases. He’s funny.”

“I know.”

“I think the Lions will win, Mildred. I can feel it. Their team is definitely the strongest, I’ve been comparing team stats this morning. D’you know Tanner ended the regular season with an on-base plus slugging of .914?”

Ugh.“Yes.”

“One of the best in the league.”

“Iknow.”

“What time does the game start tonight?”

Gah. That did it, I lost track of counting out the supplements I had to take every morning—a concoction of pregnancy tablets and other vitamins Tanner had gotten from his nutritionist designed to keep me in tip-top shape. Problem was, they all looked the same, and unless I was paying attention, I couldn’t remember which one was which.

The jars I’d taken them from weren’t much help either, as I’d removed all the lids. I needed a better system, or the firing of these questions to stop.

Preferably the latter.

“Mildred? What time does the game start?”

“Same time as it did yesterday, and the same time as the day before that.”

“Okay, wiseass, you could have just said seven thirty.”

With an eye roll, I scooped the pills off the counter and knocked them all back with a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice.

“Why are you so pissy this morning? Do you need some coffee, is that it?” My idiot brother grinned, and hewas lucky he was far enough away that I couldn’t reach him.

I’d woken up wanting to hit something, and he was as good as anything else.

“I’m not pissy.”

“Um, yeah. You are.” He scoffed, snatching my bagel before I could as it popped up from the toaster.

“Give that back.”

“You snooze, you lose.” His grin widened. Sometimes it made it worse that it was exactly the same as my dad’s. It did today, anyway.

“Matty, give me back the bagel.”

“Okay, fine, here,” he replied, passing it over, only to take a massive bite out of it first.

“Jesus. Why are you such adick?”

“Why areyouso moody?”

“I’m not moody,” I snapped back, right as my throat thickened and a torrent of tears pushed itself up my throat, brimming in my eyes so quickly I couldn’t see.

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