Page 102 of His Last Shot
Scott wasn’t with me, so with panic rising in my chest, I immediately called him. I needed to know if everyone was okay. I told him about the truck and then invited myself over for dinner. Thankfully, they were fine.
I wasn’t. I’m still not.
Brandon arranges the table so that he can attempt the shot again, shaking me from the memory. “Oh, yeah, before I forget,” he says, raising his finger. He reaches into his back pocket. “Micah told me to give this to you.”
Dangling from his index finger, swaying back and forth, is an eight ball keychain. I freeze. “Micah?”
“Yeah. Didn’t I tell you? Micah and I went to high school together. He was the one that told me about you.”
Ten thousand questions are swirling around in my mind. “I haven’t spoken to Micah in three years. How did he know I was offering lessons?”
“You know how it is.” He shrugs. “Mutual friends and all that. He heard it through the grapevine. Said you were the best.”
All I can do is stare at the keychain suspended from his finger. “Here.” He nudges it toward me, encouraging me to take the gift I wasn’t expecting.
It’s from Rachel. It has to be.
With a tight smile, I take it from him and notice immediately that it has a peephole on the underside of the ball. I squint my left eye shut and raise the keychain to peer inside, my hand trembling the whole way.
The small micro picture, with its blurred edges, is of Rachel and me on my swing. She’s on my lap, and her head is resting on my shoulder with my hands on her legs. Both of us grinning from ear to ear at the camera.
I remember this day, the memories of it flood my brain in vivid detail. I had a picnic at my house with my family, Micah and Shelby, plus the OBGs. Jake took the picture.
It was the day Rachel and I said ‘I love you’ for the first time.
“What’s the picture of?” Brandon asks, breaking me from the memory.
I lower the keychain and shove it in my pocket. “It’s from Dexter’s. A cool shot of a rack of pool balls,” I lie.
Brandon leaves when his lesson is over, both of us satisfied with his progress. When I crawl into bed, I stare at the picture until I fall asleep, whispering ‘I love you’ to her in my dreams.
31
Sound Good?
Johnny
Three and a half years since the breakup
“Well, the good news is, even though the wound is deep, you didn’t slice a tendon. You’ll need stitches, obviously, and some after-wound care, which we include in the after-visit summary. I’m going to prescribe a round of antibiotics as just a precaution. If the pain gets to be too much later on today, feel free to take some anti-inflammatories. Then, just follow up with your primary care doctor in two weeks to have the stitches removed. Sound good?”
Does that sound good? No! None of this is good!
Today, while on the job, I was helping out the carpet installers. As I was cutting through the Berber with a carpet knife, I slipped and sliced the top of my hand wide open. From the base of my thumb to my wrist.
My left hand, my bridge hand when I hold my cue.
I know better, too. I was rushing to get the job done since we were running behind, and now my minor mishap has set us back even further. Because low and behold, when you slice your hand open, there is blood. A lot of blood. All over the carpet we were installing, which now needs to be replaced.
Scott is not happy.
And how do I know this? Well, he is sitting in a blue plastic chair next to the hospital bed I’m stretched out on in the ER, arms crossed and stewing in his anger.
“Sounds good,” I reply to the doctor, who looks about as old as Jake. “Quick question. I play pool. How long until I can play again since this is the hand that the stick rests on?”
“Hmm …” He pauses, pondering. “Definitely wait until the stitches are out. Test it out and see how it feels. Since the pool cue will rub along that same area, it may be tender. If it is, I would say a month, maybe.”
He said the stitches come out in two weeks. I’ll be playing in two weeks, tender or not.
