This Much Is True by Katherine Owen Page A

side mirror, he’ll see me pathetically waving. His silver Volvo merges with the traffic, and he disappears into the mass of thirty or so cars after a few minutes. And I can finally breathe again.
    What the hell was that?
    Yet I am the one who is about to cry as I slowly ascend the stairs and stumble into Tremblay’s pointe class exactly ten minutes late. She glares at me. Naturally. I just wave her off and take my time putting on my toe shoes. What the hell is wrong with me?
    And what is going on with Rob Thorn? Why do I care? When will my life ever be normal? Why do I have to feel these extreme almost debilitating rounds of emotion every waking minute of every flipping day? Why? Somebody please tell me why.
    * * * *

CHAPTER FIVE
    Linc ~ The Valentine’s Day girl
    E MERGING FROM THE SANCTUARY of my aunt and uncle’s guest house, I move somewhat stealthily through their kitchen side door. I’m assailed by the strong odors of cheap beer and overcooked pizza. Smoke fills the air as if someone has forgotten to rescue it from the oven soon enough. I do a quick survey of the kitchen and see Charlie cutting up the rescued pizza and serving it up on a cookie sheet. He gives me the thumbs-up and turns to talk to some blond girl, who is helping him with this party-host detail. The noise level is already at the awesome-party stage; and I rapidly count at least eighty people. Uncle Chad and Aunt Gina picked a fine time to be gone for the evening and leave their only son in charge.
    The music blares, and the general feeling of high-level party chaos prevails and completed by the hundreds of sparkling Christmas lights that must have strung up in a hurry for this event. The only thing this party needs to complete the ultimate party theme is a Piñata. Then, I spy one in the fair corner of the great room where some girl, who wears an overly tight T-shirt and a loosely-tied blindfold around her head, drunkenly swings a Nerf bat at the pink and blue paper- mâché donkey. Charlie does know how to entertain, or break all the rules, equally.
    I help myself to a bottled imported beer from the refrigerator and consciously avoid the keg that is set up on the far end of the black granite counter-top of Aunt Gina’s normally pristine gourmet kitchen. I didn’t want to come, but Charlie insisted that I swing by and celebrate the long weekend since I was around. My baseball team has a curfew, but my dad took care of things with the coaching staff that basically allows me to forgo those installed rules that apply to everybody else but me. I had the coach’s grudgingly-given permission to stay at my aunt and uncle’s house, away from campus, and avoid the check-in routine. I was covered, like always, because of who my dad is.
    Meanwhile, my dad is already headed back to L.A. His work is done. He set things up with my sports agent in terms of which teams are expected to be at my game tomorrow against Oregon State. We lost today, and I will pitch tomorrow. So, yes, technically, I shouldn’t even be here; but the meeting with my agent and my dad and talk about the upcoming draft left me on edge. So I took off, after dropping those two off at the airport bound for LAX and promptly left after the Cardinal team meeting and ended up here. Charlie mentioned inviting a few friends over since it was a long weekend, but this has turned into a full-blown party.
    I recognize a number of people from Paly from years before, and I do what I can to avoid direct conversation and just incline my head in their general direction; even so, that anti-social move only takes me so far. After being drawn into the fifth conversation about me and baseball and my big-time draft rumors, I install myself against the farthest wall and keep to the shadows and privately cajole myself for being here at all. I begin to plan my exit, so I can avoid any further encounters with old high school classmates and fan-girls looking for a good time with an almost-famous baseball player.