Balk Read online

  BALK

  By

  Joy Eileen

  Dedication:

  To Grammy

  I wrote a baseball book for you!

  Balk

  Copyright © 2017 Joy Eileen

  Published by Joy Barnett

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  Published: Joy Eileen 2017:

  Edited : Lawrence Editing

  www.Lawrenceediting.com

  Proofed Kim Ginsberg

  Cover Design: KP Designs

  Balk

  bôk/

  verb

  1.

  hesitate or be unwilling to accept an idea or undertaking.

  2.

  BASEBALL

  (of a pitcher) make an illegal motion, penalized by an advance of the base runners.

  I took a lot of liberties in this book when it came to the softball season. I needed to make these changes in order for the timeline to work. Please don’t get mad at the weird season timing. It’s fiction so sit back and enjoy the ride.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  From the Author:

  Chapter One

  WALKING into the girls’ locker room and having my nose assaulted with the smell of vomit was something I wasn’t expecting. Not because I had a weird fetish where I secretly hoped to walk into the locker room, or anywhere else for that matter, to the smell of slightly digested food and stomach acid. I made a mental note to research people with odd obsessions of stomach pyrotechnics, which then led me to wonder about the people who’d actually study the afflicted puke worshipers.

  I mean, not that I was judging.

  I was sure there were worse things to research. I was unable to compile a list as to what those were, because a moan filtering from one of the bathroom stalls threw off my train of thought.

  "Hey, are you okay?" I asked the bottom of a pair of cleats barely visible in the gap from the tiled floor and metal door.

  "Kenna, is that you?"

  "Yeah, Nene, it's me. What do you need?"

  Renee Thorne was the short-stop on our high school softball team. We’d been playing together since elementary school, both of us advancing to varsity our freshman year. Now at the end of our senior year, we were going into our last season undefeated.

  Don’t misunderstand, even though we played together, Renee and I weren't friends. She had natural talent. The game came easy to her.

  I, on the other hand, worked my softballs off to get my position. While I was diligently pitching balls over and over again under the watchful eyes of my highly paid pitching coach, Doc. Renee and the rest of the team socialized with the outside world.

  In other words, Renee was popular. She had it all, the long blonde hair, chocolate-colored eyes, sexy curves, and her outgoing personality made her skyrocket up the high school social ladder. Me, not so much, driving a deeper chasm between us.

  I had the body of an athlete and the awkward thoughts of a nerd. But hey, my parents say I'm a catch.

  My chestnut hair—okay, it's brown, but chestnut makes me feel more exotic—was thrown back in its usual ponytail. So when Renee feebly pushed the door open I was able to catch her hair before it fell into the water as she launched for the toilet without mine getting in the way.

  Holding her hair with one hand and rubbing her back with the other, I waited for her dry heaves to dissipate. Renee pushed away from the toilet and leaned against the stall, tears streaming down her face.

  I leaned against the opposite wall, handing her a wad of toilet paper so she could soak up some of her tears.

  "Don't cry. I know you feel like death right now, but you'll get better soon." Awkwardness enveloped me like a strict parent watching every move I made.

  Renee gulped in a huge breath and started sobbing. Her head rested on her knees as I looked on in horror.

  "Do you want me to see if the nurse has anything for your stomach?" I asked, wishing I could magically disappear.

  "It's not something I ate," Renee cried softly.

  My back pushed harder into the wall, not wanting to catch whatever bug was now swarming around the bathroom stall waiting to inflict its evilness in me. I pulled my jersey over my mouth in hopes with one less entryway it would keep me from contracting the germs.

  Renee looked up from her knees. Her brown eyes surveyed my act of self-maintenance. A tiny quirk of her lip made a dimple show on her cheek.

  "You can't catch what I have, McKenna."

  "Are you sure? You never know what kind of nasty things are floating around at this school. I'm pretty sure high schoolers are a close equivalent to Neanderthals. I read a study once where—"

  "I'm pregnant." Renee’s words stopped my rant.

  My mouth dropped open, dislodging my shirt from protecting it.

  "Please, don't give me a lecture on the research you’ve done on teen pregnancies. I seriously can't handle something like that right now."

  "I wasn't going to start rambling off different statistics. Give me some credit."

  I was totally going to start rattling off statistics. It’s my go-to when things get awkward.

  Renee rolled her eyes, probably guessing I was lying.

  "What are you going to do?" I asked.

  Situations like this were something I was not equipped for. This was a best friend’s job, or at least someone with social skills. My stomach churned as I tried to think as a best friend would. I came up blank.

  "I don't know. My parents are going to kill me." Tears poured down her cheeks at the thought.

  I reached behind me and tugged at the toilet paper roll. My intention was to hand her another wad of paper to wipe up her face. The look of panic she wore sent my anxiety skyrocketing, erasing my mission from my brain until I had unraveled the whole roll.

  Renee noticed the massive pile of toilet paper covering my arms and began laughing hysterically. She grabbed some of the unrolled mess and blotted her cheeks. Her laughter died quickly, her hand resting on her flat stomach.

  "Are you going to puke again?" I scooted to the corner to give her more room.

  "No, there isn't anything else left in me."

  "Well, there's a baby."

  This is why I shouldn’t be around people.

  Stuff like this flies out of my mouth, because I was born without a filter. I tried to explain my disability to my parents when I
was younger. It didn't work. Or I should say it didn’t work until little Jimmy broke his arm.

  That was the day I informed Jimmy’s dad that statistically Jimmy wouldn't have broken his arm if his dad had paid attention to him, instead of staring at his neighbor bending over to pick up the paper.

  That was the last time I was forced to go on a play date.

  It was also the beginning of my sports career. My parents pushed me into every sport, trying to find somewhere I belonged. After many failed attempts, and once getting kicked out of a dojo for choking a sensei.

  For the record, nobody told me when you tap the ground you’re supposed to let go. I just thought he was doing some weird karate clap.

  I found softball.

  The day I threw my first pitch was the day I felt something akin to affection for sports. When it was time for my pitching lessons, or a game, my stomach didn't knot up with anxiety or hatred like it did with any other sport. Assuming it was a sign I belonged on the mound, I threw myself, pun totally intended, into practicing and becoming the best pitcher I could be. It also helped I’d developed a huge stalker like crush on an up and coming pitcher named, Trip Butler.

  Renee's bottom lip trembled. I moved to scramble into the next stall for more paper, positive another water work explosion was about to happen. She surprised me by throwing her head back and laughing instead.

  "Why you? Out of all the girls on the team, why did you have to be the one to witness my total breakdown?"

  "I was thinking the same thing," I told her truthfully, which made Renee laugh even harder.

  "The socially inept one and the slut. We sure do make a pair."

  My breath hitched. "You're not a slut. I think it's like one out of four teens get pregnant. Although it is at an all-time low, I think I read something where it’s around sixty-three percent in the US, so your situation’s nothing out of the norm."

  "So it was inevitable for me to get pregnant?" Renee giggled, while slow, heartbroken tears trekked down her face.

  "Well, when you engage in intercourse without birth control, yes. Even if you use birth control it isn't one hundred percent effective."

  "Kenna, please stop. I can't handle any more percentages."

  My mouth snapped closed, and I bit the inside of my lips to stop the incessant rambling from spilling out. We stared at each other, until I couldn't handle the awkwardness. "Do you want to come over to my house tonight?"

  I'm not sure why I asked, but it seemed like the right thing to do. She looked so scared at the thought of telling her parents.

  “Yes." Her answer came immediately, and her face looked just as surprised at her answer as I was when I asked her.

  "Whoa..." Renee exclaimed when I hit the light switch to my room.

  My cheeks heated as she took it all in. To be fair, my room was a little obsessive. The same pitcher I fell in love with years earlier, who was now on the San Diego Pappies in the American Baseball League, was plastered over every inch. Posters and signed jerseys graced my walls, showing my support and my stalker tendencies.

  "You would be attracted to Trip Butler. You realize he has sworn numerous times he’d never get married?" Renee asked. She walked over to one of my posters to get a better look.

  "He hasn't met me yet." My face flushed, realizing I had spoke out loud.

  When Trip made his announcement of his eternal bachelorhood, I had the urge to rip his posters down. There I stood, my hand poised on the top of one of my many posters, staring into his bright blue eyes. They were set in determination as he released the ball from his hand, ready to strike out the unsuspecting batter. In the end my hands couldn't go through with tearing his beautiful face from its residence.

  I vowed to myself I’d change his mind one day. I was sixteen at the time and he was twenty-three, making his name in ABL. Two years later, I still felt confident of our impending nuptials.

  Renee plopped on the bed, leaning on the headrest, a pillow pressed to her stomach. "Baseball players aren't all they're cracked up to be. Trip even says he isn't the type to be monogamous. You’d be better off with a good guy, Kenna. Or no guy at all." She picked at invisible lint on the pillowcase in her lap.

  "Is the father a baseball player?" I sat on the edge of the bed, watching her.

  She was quiet for so long I assumed she wasn't going to answer. "Yes, but you can't tell anyone." Her eyes connected with mine, drenched with desperation.

  "You can trust me, Nene."

  She let out a bitter laugh. "I believe you. The sad thing is I think you may be the only one."

  "That's not sad. It's kind of cool I have someone to trust me. I'm not really good with people, but I haven't had a real friend in, well, ever. I know you have tons of them, but I'm willing to help you in any way you need."

  "They aren't my friends, Kenna."

  "Huh?"

  "They’re just around me because I'm popular. When I found out I was pregnant I couldn't think of any one of them I could turn to."

  "Well, now you've got me."

  Renee looked up and provided me with a real smile. "I never thought I’d say this, but I'm glad it's you."

  "You should be."

  "Well, at least I know I've got you until you convince Trip Butler you're the love of his life."

  "Lucky for you, I plan on graduating college before snagging that man in my Kenna web."

  Renee chucked her pillow friend at me, giggling.

  Chapter Two

  Three weeks later, my high school softball career ended. I’d pitched every game, winning the championship for the fourth year in a row.

  Now I sat in a torture device, otherwise known as a hard plastic chair, in front of my teammates’ loved ones at our varsity banquet.

  I hated these things.

  The urge to start acting like some type of zoo animal while people gawked at me was strong. These thoughts always came at the worst time. I'd never gone through with the impulse, but like they say, there’s a first time for everything.

  I sat next to Renee and four other senior girls from our team. Thankfully the night was coming to a close and the last thing on the agenda was announcing where we’d committed to going to college.

  Coach Hamm rattled off the stats of Noel, our second baseman before having her announce the college she picked.

  After Noel made her announcement, Coach Hamm turned the mic over to our pitching coach, Coach Rutching, or Bruno as he always wanted the team to call him.

  With extreme force I kept my mouth neutral instead of wearing the sneer pulling at it, making my nose twitch from the opposing signals pulling and pushing around it. Renee smacked my leg, giving me her big eyes, silently telling me to cut it out.

  Coach Rutching annoyed the ever loving hell out of me. Doc, my private pitching coach, whom my parents paid for, couldn't stand him. Doc made me swear I wouldn't heed any advice Coach Rutching gave me.

  It was a double edge sword. My pitching skills harnessed from Doc won championships, yet the school blindly assumed Coach Rutching was a fundamental part of the winning process.

  Bruno cleared his throat, a nervous habit that made my skin crawl. Even though I'd been offered scholarships all over the United States, I committed to San Diego State. Coach Rutching was furious when he heard my decision.

  San Diego State wasn't a tier one school, and according to Bruno, I was wasting the talent he had "honed" the last four years.

  Cue epic eye roll.

  He didn’t understand it was my future husband’s alma mater. Obviously Bruno had no idea what he was talking about.

  Renee pinched my thigh, bringing me out of my musings just in time to hear Coach Rutching go into his speech about me. "The moment I saw McKenna pitch her freshman year, I knew I’d found my star. She’s one of the most dedicated girls on our team. While the other girls were out being teenagers, you could always find Kenna on the field practicing."

  Thanks for bringing up my inability to act like a normal teenager, Bruno.
<
br />   Jane, our right fielder, let out a light snicker. Renee whipped her head around and gave her one of the meanest evil eyes I'd ever witnessed. Jane averted her eyes to her shoes, thoroughly chastised. My teeth bit into my cheek to keep from letting my tongue slip out to taunt Jane more. I was fairly certain I was on the verge of making a face at her before chanting nanner, nanner, nanner.

  "McKenna had offers from all over the US. Some of the top tier schools were calling me night and day to get her to commit. Her dedication to all academic areas makes her even more valuable to any college, as she will be entering having already earned her associates degree. That being said, she's also very dedicated to her family, making her choice easy. McKenna Raine." Coach Rutching looked at me, his eyes flickering over to Renee before landing back on me.

  Renee sucked in a sharp breath and pinched my leg again. I raised my eyebrow at her before making the dreaded walk to the podium. It only took six long strides to get there, and I was proud of myself for not busting out monkey moves at every step.

  "Hi." I waved at the crowd, wishing the podium had a portal to a wizarding school in it.

  My knee hit the solid wood podium, my entrance to witchcraft and wizardry denied. "I have committed to San Diego State after graduation. I'll be studying physical therapy with an emphasis on sports injuries and have been extended a spot in their PT program as long as I continue to meet their requirements and standards."

  Coach Rutching clapped me on the shoulder and I took that as the permission I needed to go back to my chair. Coach Hamm stepped up to relieve Coach Rutching since I was the only player he represented.

  Before Bruno could step away, Coach Hamm slung his arm over Coach Rutching's shoulder, keeping him at the podium. "Before Renee comes up for her announcement, I wanted to congratulate Coach Rutching."

  Bruno's eyes widened, making Coach Hamm let out a soft chuckle. "Don't worry, Bruno, I have permission from your wife to let the cat out of the bag. Or should I say baby? It's with much happiness I get to announce our own Coach Rutching's expecting the next great pitcher with his lovely wife, Anna."