The Mrs. Degree (Accidentally in Love 2)

Remember how superstitious I used to be? Going through the same pre-game ritual from the minute I wake up to the moment I get in bed to sleep? Well, funny story—I’ve been dreaming about you lately, and it’s been messing up that ritual, and I thought MAYBE if we connected, it might break the spell, and things could go back to normal. I’ve been shit at work. At the last game, I let two passes get intercepted, and the fans are beginning to turn on me, ha-ha. Thought seeing you would work, and I can explain more over coffee? Dinner? Either or both, I have a game Monday night, but Saturday or Sunday would be great.

I promise it won’t be weird. Just two old friends catching up…

Here is my number in case you need it.

555-218-9950

Hope to hear from you,

Jack

I can’t take my eyes off this letter, or that phone number, or his signature scrawled at the bottom in dark, bold strokes.

He’s always been so sure of himself, and he’s sure of himself now, confidence not eluding him the way it does with me. He walks tall, chin up, eye on the prize in a way that has intimidated me a bit in the past. I never had the confidence he did. I never walked into a room as if I owned it the way he does.

Commanding presence.

Self-assured.

Never any doubt he would accomplish what he set out to accomplish.

I’m not like that.

Staring down at the note, I worry at my bottom lip.

The ghost that has been haunting me for seven years has finally found me.

Chapter 2

Jack

Dear Penn,

Dear? No, too personal.

Hey Penn!

Nope. Too casual.

Penn. I know it’s been ages and first I want

Penn. I cannot stop dreaming about you. Can’t sleep, been tossing and turning. Call it superstition but I had to see you to try to get rid of this curse you seem to have over me so I can play.

Definitely don’t tell her she’s cursed, you idiot.

It had taken me a good hour to compose the note I’d stuck into an envelope and handed to her brother (along with my contact information), not knowing I would see Penelope in his home. When I pulled up that driveway, I assumed I’d be hopping out quickly and going to the door. I thought I’d do a quick intro—shake Davis’s hand—give him the note I’d written, and be on my merry little way.

Bim, bam, boombalaka.

After all, I only had seventy-two hours in town. There was no time to dawdle.

She is not the person I thought would be opening Davis Halbrook’s front door, and she certainly hadn’t been glad to see me.

She had looked shell-shocked.

Pale, color draining from her face.

I mean, let’s be honest, I’d known there was a chance Penelope wouldn’t be excited to see me, but I was hoping for more than five minutes of her time once she answered her brother’s door.

Ten minutes.

Twenty.

I’d held out hope that seeing me would spark a bit of something more. A memory? Our old friendship?

Shifting my car into gear, I back out of her brother’s driveway with a pep talk the same as I’d pep talked myself on the ride over. I’d conned Halbrook’s address out of Old Silus, made the trip over, and hoped for the best. I promised the old man I wouldn’t abuse the address once I had it, telling him I couldn’t get through to Halbrook’s staff in order to send him a paper invitation to an anniversary party I was throwing for my folks.

My folks?

Both of them passed away in a car accident three years ago.

The lie felt as wrong as it had been, and I regret telling it as much as I regret ringing Davis Halbrook’s doorbell when I should have just… I don’t know.

Dug deeper for a phone number and called?

No regrets, Jennings.

Your life is not built on them.

Onward and upward, Jennings. Forward looking.

I shake it off—literally give my body a shake—as I rev the engine on this rental car. Punching in the hotel’s address, I speed back toward the city as Halbrook’s brick mini-mansion grows smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror.

I remember him well enough from his days playing ball because he was playing it long before I was. As my girlfriend's older brother, he traveled a lot when she and I were dating, but she had no interest in flying around the US to see his games. Not the same way I would have if I were his sibling.

Penn was content with the times he would show up unannounced on campus and take her to dinner somewhere fancy, then Costco and Target to stock her fridge and buy her whatever else she needed.

He paid her rent and tuition the way a parent would.

Back in his day, Davis Halbrook was something of a celebrity, short-lived as his career was. I’ve always been surprised he faded into obscurity and never became a broadcaster the way some retired ballers have.