Page 24 of The Slapshot and the Single Mom
“Glad to hear I’m not the only voice of reason in your life. That probably wouldn’t work out well for you in the long run. I’m not known for making level-headed and smart choices.”
“Oh, yeah? What kind of choices do you usually make?”
He shrugs. “I like to follow my gut. It rarely leads me wrong.”
I meet his eyes again. “And what’s your gut telling you now?”
He leans in so close, I think he might kiss me. But then he stops, his mouth still several inches away from mine. “It’s telling me that we need to go play mini golf.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Jack
“I can’t rememberthe last time I played mini golf,” I say across the table from Maggie. After playing two rounds—when the first one was over, she poked out her lower lip in the saddest most adorable pout, and I immediately went over and paid for another—we found our way to a burger place not far away.
She grins at me, sipping her drink. “Oh, yeah? I used to go a lot with my friends when we were in high school.” She screws up her face, staring off to the side. “You know? I don’t know when the last time I went was either. I think Liam’s school did a fundraiser night at one when he was in Kindergarten. It was probably then.” She turns her smile back on me. “That was really fun, though. Thanks for springing for the second game. I really appreciated that. I wasn’t ready to be done yet.”
“I could tell. I was having fun, too. It didn’t seem like stopping was even an option at that point. We needed another round of mini golf.”
She chuckles, and I’m glad things between us have relaxed from the awkward tension after I picked her up. I know I’m partly responsible for that, but she had some stuff going on too. Whatever it is, she’s either resolved it, or at least managed to put it aside for now, and I’m glad.
“If you weren’t on a no-partying ban, what would you normally be doing right now?” she asks, surprising me.
Leaning back in my chair, I rub a hand over my mouth, contemplating that question. “Well, it’s early enough I’d probably still be at home. But Connor Jenkins, the teammate I usually go out with, and I would have plans to meet up somewhere later. Or he’d be hanging out on my couch being loud and obnoxious, possibly pregaming with a few beers. Nothing too crazy, but it’s nice to already be loosened up before heading out. In that case, we’d split a taxi or an Uber, hit our list of clubs for the night, have a good time, and stumble home sometime before dawn.”
Her eyes grow wide as I fill her in on my usual lifestyle. “You do that every night?”
I shrug. “Noteverynight. A lot more often in the summer, though. It’s more rare during the season, so we let loose pretty freely in the off-season. Can’t afford to let a night out affect practice, or worse, a game the next day. And while I still recover pretty well—the secret is having a few good hangover cures ready to go—now that I’m in my thirties, I don’t bounce back as fast as I did five or ten years ago for sure.”
Shaking her head, she grins. “You’re such a baby.”
Confused, I wrinkle my brows together. “I’m sorry?”
Laughing, she sits up, waving a hand back and forth. “No, no. Not in a bad way. Not like a crybaby or something. I just mean, you’re so young. ‘Oh, I’m in my thirties now, so I need more time to recover.’” For someone who claims she’s not calling me a crybaby, she just mocked me like I’m whining. “Wait until you’re staring down the barrel of forty, and then come talk to me.”
I let out a chuckle, and shake my head. “Please. You’re one to talk. You can’t be more than thirty yourself.”
Her eyebrows climb her forehead. “Try thirty-seven.”
“What?” I do my best not to let my jaw hit the floor. “Nah. You’re lying. There’s no way.”
She splutters. “What woman would lie about beingolder. I mean, by the time you’re twenty-one, there’s literally no incentive to make yourself seem older than you are.”
“Okay. Fine. That’s a good point. Still, though …” I look her over, taking in her face, her smooth skin, plump lips, dark hair. “Honestly, the only reason I think you’re probably thirty, ormaaaaybethirty-two is because you have a ten-year-old kid. I’d peg you as mid-to-late twenties, easy. If you told me you were thirty, I’d believe it, but thirty-seven?” I shake my head. “Did you sell your soul to the devil in exchange for eternal youth?”
Laughing, she shakes her head. “Ha. Hardly. I’ve been finding gray hairs for the last two years.” She ignores my scoff and continues. “Eye cream only does so much in the battle against crow’s feet.” Another scoff that she also ignores. “And we won’t even discuss the effects of motherhood.” When I scoff again, she glares at me. “Likeyouwould know.”
I hold up my hands. “Fine. True. I believe you that motherhood would change things, even if I don’t have any first handexperience with that. But none of those things invalidate the fact that you look about a decade younger than you are.”
She purses her lips, studying me, then finally says, “Okay. Thank you.”
“What about you?” I ask, deciding we should change the topic. “What would you be doing if you weren’t here?”
She chuckles, shaking her head. “I’d probably be home too, cleaning up after dinner and either griping at Liam about spending too much time on screens or spending too much time on a screen myself. I’m trying to spend more time reading real books or making stuff instead, but sometimes at the end of a long day, I just want to veg and scroll. It makes it hard to feel like I have the moral high ground, though, when I only let Liam have two hours of screen time a day.” She tilts her head. “Well, two hours of video games or iPads. I let him watch TV and movies. Given it’s a Friday, we might be having a movie night. We do that fairly frequently, especially in the summer. And if he weren’t going fishing with my dad tomorrow, I’d be taking him to the pool most likely. There’s one not far from us, and I like to take him as often as I can in the summer.”
“Sounds like a lucky kid,” I murmur.
“I don’t know about that, but I do my best.”
