I found Rusty on the phone in our room. I figured she must be talking to her dad.
“Tell him hi for me,” I said.
Rusty gave me a funny look. Then she pointed to her phone and mouthed the name “TJ.”
My stomach felt a little weird when she said that. It was like having butterflies and cramps at the same time. My palms got sweaty too. I hadn’t talked to TJ since before the Half Dome trip, and I knew she was mad at me for missing the softball tournament. Of course, I had no choice, but I couldn’t tell her why. For all she knew, I was just her best friend who had been ignoring her.
Before I could think of what to do next, Rusty shoved the phone toward me.
“She wants to talk to you.”
Knowing TJ, it was more like she wanted to yell at me.
I took the phone, lifting it slowly to my ear. “Hey, TJ.”
The girl on the other end of the phone didn’t sound at all like my best friend. She sounded . . . cheerful.
“Riley! Yay — I finally get to talk to you. What’s going on?”
I didn’t know what to say. There had been a whole lot going on, and I was starting to get confused about what I could tell and what I couldn’t.
“Um . . . wow. Lots. We almost got eaten by a bear yesterday.”
“That’s what Rusty said. Sounds like a ‘killer’ vacation. And your mom said you were gonna shoot an ad for river sandals in some secret location. Was it fun?”
“Well, I haven’t exactly done it yet.”
“You guys need to hurry up! I want you to come back here so we can play softball and make brownies. Plus, Breanne’s driving me crazy. She talks about Flip like they’re dating, ever since we snuck into his office.”
“Yeah, I want to come home too. I was really looking forward to having a fun summer.”
“If you hurry back you can play All-Stars. We won our first tournament. I struck out fifteen!”
“That’s great, TJ. But with the shoe contract and all —”
“The high school coach was there, and he told me that if I keep up the good work, I could start on the varsity team my freshman year. I’ve been throwing two hundred pitches a night. I bet you can’t hit my rise ball at all now.”
It seemed like forever since I had played softball. I tried to imagine myself standing in the batter’s box, gripping the bat, waiting for TJ’s favorite pitch to come flinging out of her hand. In my mind, I hit it over the left field fence.
“We’ll see about that,” I said.
TJ continued. “Hey — I have all the Riley Mae softball cleats now. You oughta pay me for the publicity.” TJ giggled. “Riley? Are you there? Hello?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“Hello . . . hello? Riley, can you hear me?”
It was one of those times when you can hear the other person, but they can’t hear you. And then the call was lost.
It was okay. Even though TJ could hear me for a while, I don’t think she was listening.