When You Were Here

throwing.
    And then I realize I’ve been out here for hours. Because suddenly Sandy Koufax is exhausted. She jumps in the pool and starts paddling. I look up at the sun. When did it get to be so low in the sky? How did it become six in the evening when it was three just a few minutes ago?
    I might as well join my dog, so I walk straight into the pool, cargo shorts, gray T-shirt, flip-flops, and all.
    It’s something, at least, the feeling of water sloshing all around me. I dunk my head, sinking under it all, then I come up and tell Sandy Koufax all the things I wish were different right now.

Chapter Two
    Jeremy is shooting aliens, Ethan is trying to convince Piper that an earthquake of 9.0 magnitude will hit Los Angeles in the next 365 days, and half the girls volleyball team is schooling half the guys baseball team in pool volleyball. My former teammates are in the deep end on the other side of the net, getting clobbered by the bikini-clad athletes.
    I turn up the volume on the sound system because Retractable Eyes is up next on the playlist, and this band is awesome. But before the opening chords sound, I hear the beginning of “Great Balls of Fire.”
    On. The. Piano.
    I turn to the living room, and the aliens must have extinguished Jeremy because now he’s leaning over the piano and he’s thinking he’s Jerry Lee Lewis.
    “Dude, don’t touch that.” I walk over and stand next to the keys.
    He pauses. “Just let me play this one song.”
    I shake my head. He knows this is my one rule. “Don’t.”
    He pounds on more notes, and he’s about to hit the chorus and to sing it too, belt it out, and I’m so not okay with this on so many levels because this is my mom’s piano. She wasn’t some classical performer or piano teacher or anything. But she liked playing for fun, banging out a show tune now and then or a Cole Porter number. Crossword puzzles, gardening, and a few old standards on the piano—those were her little things in life , the little things she did, the little things that made her happy.
    “Jer. Off.”
    Something in my voice stops him, so he backs off, holds up his hands. “Sorry, bud.”
    “Go get one of Laini’s guitars if you want to play something,” I say, easing up a bit on my best friend.
    “I wish you’d let me have it. You know you’re never going to use the piano.”
    Jeremy’s been on this music kick in the last three years. He’s convinced that learning to play piano, guitar, drums, whatever, is going to help him with the ladies. I’ve seen no evidence of improvement in his scorecard with the opposite sex, but he can play the chorus from pretty much any top-ten most-downloaded tune of the moment. Maybe someday that skill will amount to something. For now, it’s entertainment. And for now, and for forever, the piano’s not for sale.I remind him of that as he takes off for Laini’s mausoleum of a room.
    I survey the scene in my yard. Trevor, the lunking first baseman who I threw bunted balls to for the first three years of high school, smacks a volleyball in Cassie’s direction. She tries to spike it back but hits air instead, and the ball skips out of the pool. She jumps out to grab it. She has the smallest bathing suit on, and she’s also the weakest player on the team. Trina comes up behind me and whispers in my ear. “I see you watching her,” Trina says as she runs a finger down my arm. What she doesn’t say is, I see you watching her and I don’t care , because, like me, there is little Trina actually cares about, least of all whether I check out other girls, even though I’m not checking out Cassie. If I were checking out girls, I’d only have eyes for one girl.
    The incredible and vexing one who’s not here, even though the lasagna she made me the other day is still in my fridge.
    Trina trails her index finger across my palm, then adds, “Kicking in for you?”
    “Starting to.”
    Trina brings me goodies too, only hers work better than food. She flashes a knowing grin, and I watch as she disappears into the kitchen, wearing low-rise jean shorts and a tank top that shows off her brown skin.
    Jeremy returns with my sister’s most expensive classical guitar. Laini played until eighth grade and was pretty damngood, so good my parents were thinking of sending her to some expert teacher at UCLA for lessons. But as with all things remotely American, Laini decided she wanted nothing to do with it. A guitar, even classical guitar, was the most American