He took it to another level when he started squawking.
“I’ve always known you were insane.”
Dad snorted. “I thought you were a tiger,hija mia.”
There he went. Leave it to my dad to bring up exactly what I’d been worried about. Had I really lost my guts? “I don’t know how to tell him. I don’t even know why he thinks he has feelings for me either, Dad. What am I supposed to do? He’s doing all these things and saying stuff, when he’s never even given me the idea that he thinks of me as anything more than a friend. What am I supposed to do?”
He gave me that look that said he wasn’t impressed that I was asking for his opinion. “Do you really want me to tell you?”
I nodded.
“When I met your mom, I knew exactly who she was. Everyone knew who she was. I’ve told you before, I didn’t talk to her first, she came up to me.” Dad smiled gently at the memory. “I didn’t have anything to offer her. I didn’t even finish high school and your mom wasLa Culebra’s daughter. It didn’t matter how many times I told her she could find someone better; she never left. If it didn’t matter to her that we would never be rich, then why should I push her away? I loved her and she loved me, and when you have love, you find a way to make things work.” He pressed the bottle to my knee again. “Youcan have anything you want in the world. Anything you’ve ever wanted, you’ve worked for, and I know that you know that. ‘I can and I will,’ remember?
“I’ll tell you this, too. I knew something was going on when you showed up at the house with him. No man is going to go visit your family because he’s bored. No one would spend so much time with you if he didn’t want more, and my birthday was months ago, Salomé.” He pointed at his heart. “Think with your heart, not your head. I’ve never known you to not take every opportunity you’ve ever been presented with. Don’t start passing on them now.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Where’s Coach Kulti?”
“He’s taking time off for the rest of the season,” Gardner answered before walking off.
I stretched my arms up over my head to really get a good stretch into those shoulder muscles always nagging me. All the while pretending like I didn’t hear the group talking twenty feet away.
“He’s been here all season, andnowhe’s decided to take time off?”
“I’m not surprised.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Really?”
“I bet Sal knows what’s going on.”
“Duh, she knows. I’m sure they spent last night together.”
A couple of my teammates giggle-laughed. Whores.
“You know, I heard she went by Cordero’s office and he gave her an ultimatum: Stop seeing him or he’d trade her.”
“No way! What’d she say?”
“Oh, I have no idea, but I think that’s why they were planning on benching her in the semi-final the other night. If that would have been me, and they told me I wasn’t starting, I don’t even know what I would’ve done. But not Sal, she just stood there. I didn’t see her bat an eyelash.”
“No shit. She’s never upset; I don’t think she feels anything. I know I’ve never seen her cry.”
Yep, still not looking.
“Me neither. Her entire life revolves around playing. She’s a robot or something.”
And that was my cue to zone the group out. To zone every single girl I’d at one point or another helped, including Genevieve.
A robot. They thought I was a robot.
I took a breath.
Everything was fine.
I only had one more game to go. That was it. Five more practices to get through before the season was over.