Page 51 of Hard Hitter

“Please, I think you can call me Charlie by now,” he replied, giving Quinn another quick back-slapping hug before moving on to his daughter. Charlie wrapped Rae in a tight hug and said quietly, “You know, I might be a little premature on this- I’ve only known him about twenty-two years- but I like this one. You should keep this one around.”

“I kinda like him, too,” Rae said, smiling and reaching out to Quinn to loop her arm through his.

Charlie raised a finger animatedly and gasped as though a lightbulb flicked on over his head, “Oh! I have an idea! I’ll be right back.” Withthat, he quickly made his way out of the kitchen, leaving Quinn to greet the rest of Rae’s family.

Margaux pulled him into a hug and gave him a short peck on each cheek. She told him how wonderful it was to see him and that she was proud of him.

Camille smirked, glancing between him and Rae before making the announcement: “You two are definitely having sex. It’s really good, too, isn’t it?”

Quinn coughed and felt his face turn hot, chancing a glance at Rae. He expected her to look equally called out, but simply returned her sister’s sly grin, “Yep, lots of it.”

“Girls!”Margaux snapped, gesturing toward the little boy and girl giggling around Harry, perfectly oblivious to the adult discussion. “There are children in here.” She flicked her eyes between Quinn and Rae briefly before surprising the hell out of him when she added, “But if I’m speaking honestly, I have to say it’s really not surprising you two are so good together- you’ve had amazing chemistry since you were children.”

Camille’s husband, Josh, was not at all what Quinn had pictured in his head. He had always imagined she would end up with some hot-shot lawyer or business executive, but Josh was a nerdy guy who worked for some big tech company. He was tall and lanky, and admitted to not having a single athletic bone in his body. Their two children, Peter and Chloe, were almost a fifty-fifty split of their parents, and were rather precocious little kids.

Quinn was talking with Josh about the kind of fitness regimen a professional athlete has to keep up with when Rae caught their attention.

“What the hell is Dad doing out there?” Rae was peering out the kitchen window to the patio.

Camille leaned next to Rae and looked outside, “Oh boy...he’s putting up that movie projector. A hundred bucks says we’re about to relive your childhood. He’s going to point out every moment he knew you and Quinn were meant to be.”

“Oh God, I think you’re right,” Rae sighed. She peered back over her shoulder at Quinn whose stuck-on smile had returned after such a welcome greeting from her family. “I hope you’re feeling reminiscent.”

They ate dinner out on the patio where there was a long farmhouse table decorated with ornate place settings, crystal vases spilling over with greenery and blue flowers. It was something Quinn would expect to see on the head table at a wedding. The silverware was real silver, the plates and bowls were pure white and Quinn felt like he was supposed to somehow fill his plate without getting anything messy on it. They all had large goblet-like wine glasses in front of them, and two maids in knee-length black dresses circled the table when necessary to offer different wines, no doubt from the DeRoses’ own vineyard.

This wasn’t the first time he’d eaten with the DeRose family, but he never thought he would get used to their lifestyle. It wasn’t always this formal; he remembered eating pizza from the local pizza joint at the kitchen island with Rae, Jett, and Chris, or taking whatever food was made for them into the living room to watch a big game or play video games. But their special occasion dinners were fancier than some of the finest restaurants he’d visited in LA.

After stuffing themselves with the delicious four-course meal, Charlie called them all to the other end of the patio which was set up like an outdoor living room. He had indeed put up the large projector screen and Quinn had no doubt the videos he planned to show would be all about Rae’s childhood, and by extension his own. The good parts, anyway.

Sitting down in the middle of the sectional next to Rae with his arm around her, he grew excited to see some of his best non-baseball moments relayed on screen.

“Dad, this is insane,” Rae shook her head as Charlie fired up the projector. “Where have you been keeping all these videos anyway? Did you really get them all converted to DVDs?”

“Of course I did,” Charlie said, now taking a seat next to Margaux. “I knew this day would come eventually and I would have to point out how ridiculous it is that you didn’t see it before.”

“Uh-huh, I’m sure you just knew,” Rae said, leaning into Quinn, now turning their attention to the large screen in front of them.

The screen was black and the wordsJune 21, 1998popped up. Already grinning, Quinn knew exactly what was special about that date, though he had no idea any of it had been captured on film. Charlie’s voice came over the speakers now and the video showed an excited Rae standing next to his seven-year-old self. He was scrawny and looked like a scrubby little kid, in his oversized t-shirt and ripped jeans, through which you could see both scraped and skinned knees.

They were standing in front of the skee-ball machine and Quinn was holding a fried corndog and not paying much attention to Rae as she explained the game to him, too absorbed in actual food to think about anything else.

“I think I ate like four of those that night,” Quinn said, watching as young Rae took her first throw, sinking it into one of the 100-point slots and turning to young Quinn with a smirk. Young Quinn looked stunned, nearly dropping his corndog before taking his own turn. The pair went back and forth scoring in the 100 and 50-point slots, the game becoming increasingly competitive with the sound of Charlie’s commentating until they were both teasing and laughing together. Even when Rae won.

The video flashed ahead to the two of them standing in front of the dunk tanks again, this time with Rae throwing and Quinn giving instruction until she finally hit the target and dunked a clown. Rae jumped up and down cheering herself on as Quinn stood by laughing and enjoying her victory.

When the screen went black again, the dateSeptember 4, 2000popped up followed by a video of Quinn’s first-ever birthday party that was thrown in this very house. Next was a baseball game at the local ballpark shortly after they’d met Chris and Jett, then a shaky video from 2002in which the four of them were constructing one of many blanket forts in Rae’s basement.

“Rae, no way are we putting those girly lights in here,” A twelve-year-old Quinn stated, arms crossed over his chest as Rae brought in a string of white lights. “This isn’t some princess fort- you’re outnumbered.”

“But we need light in here and these are pretty!” eleven-year-old Rae protested. “We already have all the Christmas lights up we’re going to use, Mom said we can have these.”

“No,” Quinn said firmly again. “We already have your girly purple sheets.”

“Uh-oh, Mom and Dad are fighting again,” Jett said, training a video camera back and forth between Quinn and Rae. Chris, hanging another light purple sheet snort-laughed, but looked away quickly at the sight of Quinn’s glare.

“Shut up, Jett,” Rae snapped. Turning her attention back to Quinn she corrected, “They’re notpurple, you caveman. They’re lilac.”

“That’s it, take them down,” Quinn said, throwing his arms up. “I can’t sit here and read Sports Illustrated or watch Monday night football surrounded bylilacsheets.”

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