Best Laid Plans

I roll my eyes. “You two clowns do know it’s called work? That thing we do all day long?”

“Huh.” Shaw scratches his unshaven jaw, affecting surprise. “Is that the name of it? Did you know that, Charlie?”

The younger man feigns shock. “I had no idea.”

I point to the two of them. “Well, I’m glad to finally be the one to inform you, since you seem to be under the impression that it’s a pickup market.”

“Oh yes. That’s exactly what I was thinking when we responded to a shortness of breath call for the eighty-year-old Mrs. Miller,” Shaw remarks.

I give my buddy a sharp-eyed stare. “I don’t think it’s the eighty-year-old Mrs. Miller’s phone number that you were angling for.” I crack up as it hits me. The woman’s twenty-something granddaughter was the one who made the call and then seemed unable to look anywhere but at Shaw as he took grandma’s vitals. The trim, toned blonde ogled him the whole time, and I was positive Shaw would be shacking up with her tonight, but it sounds like nothing came of it. “You didn’t get the girl’s number?”

Shaw shakes his head.

And that means I need to give him hell. “You’re losing your touch, man. You need to retire and live life as a monk.”

He lets his head hang, forlorn. “I know. What is wrong with me?”

“Everything,” Charlie says in mock seriousness. “Do you need me to give you some lessons on how to win the ladies? Everyone knows paramedics have better game than firemen.”

I clap Shaw on the back. “You couldn’t close the deal. Clearly, it’s time to accept you’re an ugly, old bastard and you have zero game.”

“Same as you.”

“Of course. I’m hideous. I also need to jet.”

Charlie lifts a hand to wave. “I need to deal with some paperwork. See you guys later.”

“Catch you next time,” I say as Shaw and I take off.

“Speaking of closing the deal,” Shaw says as we leave the firehouse and head down the street, “are you ever going to close the deal with Arden?”

I stop in my tracks, bristling at the mention of the woman I very much want. I narrow my eyes. “What are you talking about?”

He sets a hand on his stomach, laughing. “Do you actually think I don’t know that you have it bad for her?”

As a matter of fact, I was hoping so.

“I don’t have it bad,” I deny, even though he’s as right as the Earth rotating around the sun.

“You can lie to yourself, buddy. But I’m not fooled. You should do something about it.”

I sigh as we turn the corner. I could keep up the ruse, but he’s already seen through me. What’s the point in pretending? “Fine. Fine. You win.”

He pumps a fist. “Called it. Even though it was patently fucking obvious, Twenty-Three,” he says, using his nickname for me, my number when I played pro ball.

“Like wearing-a-billboard obvious?”

He nods several times. “But that’s because I know your style. Maybe it’s not obvious to her. Which brings me back to closing the deal. Are you or aren’t you going to let the woman know you have a thing for her?”

I drag a hand through my hair. “I’d like to. But then what if it goes south?”

“South? The direction most relationships go?”

I laugh mirthlessly. “Yes. Isn’t that the truth?”

“Sure seems to be.”

“Hell, I went out with a woman who works at the retirement home, and now I get the cold shoulder from her when I go to visit my pops. I was a gentleman too. I made my intentions clear from the start. Nothing serious. But she wanted more, and now she scowls at me.”

“You can withstand a scowl, surely?”

“Yeah, I can handle scowls.” I take a deep breath. “But I don’t want Arden to scowl, you get me?”

Shaw nods, and we stop at his blue pickup truck, parked near the station. “I hear ya. Some women are special. You don’t want that to happen with your bowling buddy. But look at what happened to your major league career. You went for it, and you had no regrets, Twenty-Three.”

I was recruited out of college by the Texas Rangers and played minor league ball for three seasons with that organization. A relief pitcher with a killer curveball, I was called up to the majors and played there for one glorious season before my shoulder fried like a circuit board left in the sun.

Retirement came swift and early, but I didn’t let it get me down. I had choices. I’d parked all my major league money in a mutual fund so I could let it grow. I had no interest in lamenting what didn’t happen. I wasn’t going to be that guy clinging to one great year and never moving on. I’ve seen Eastbound and Down, thank you very much. And while Danny McBride is funny as fuck, there was no way I would become a washed-up baller clawing my way back to the pitcher’s mound. Instead, I moved on, since the world only spins forward.

When I was a kid and my pops asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I always had two answers—ballplayer and a fireman.

I always wanted both.

I’d done all I could on the first one, saved some good money from that year in the show, and it was time to head into career number two.

I’ve had no regrets—I’ve loved being a firefighter just as much.

Don’t look back.

Take your chances.

Go for it.

I need to fucking go for it with Arden, even if it means blowing out my shoulder.

The trouble is, in this analogy the shoulder is our friendship, and I honestly don’t want to see it blow up.

But that’s the chance I have to take.

She’s the woman I can’t get out of my head.

She’s no Darla. She’s no hairstylist. She’s the one I want for more than a one-and-done date. I want more than a casual thing with her.

I want all in.





*



“Pops, when you met Nana, did you know right away you wanted to take her out?”

My grandpa scrunches his forehead like it hurts him to think. In some ways, I suppose it does.

“I knew I wanted her to type memos for me,” he says, then winks, and that makes me happy, his awareness.

I laugh, patting his arm. “You old fox, falling for your secretary.”