“I’ll pay you back for the ones I wasted.” I’m quick to reply, but he isn’t paying attention. His eyes have drifted closed with the spoon full of soup in his mouth.
He moans as he pulls the utensil out, gently chewing the soft veggies in the stew. “Mmm, ’mygod. This is fucking amazing. Holy shit.” He quickly shovels in a few more bites.
“Careful,” I warn. “I did throw up when I was sick with that bug.”
“You’re right. It’s just so good,” he compliments but lowers the spoon. “No wonder it’s your favorite. Oh, have a seat. You don’t have to stand in the doorway.” Pulling his legs up, he gestures for me to sit at the foot of the bed.
I take the offered spot and manage a tight “Thanks.”
He pauses, spoon halfway to his mouth. His blue eyes flicker to the soup, then back to me. “You’re being . . . nice.” He winces. “Sorry, that was rude. I meant—”
“No, I get it.” Picking at a loose thread on his comforter, I try to get my words together. “I realized yesterday that I . . . Well, I know I can be an asshole, and-and maybe I don’t want to be an asshole, you know?”
He hums thoughtfully before taking another bite. “Our teammates call you Sour, you know.”
I blink in surprise. “I . . . did not know that. I guess it’s because of my attitude?”
Nodding, he lowers the soup container. “That, and we’re matched up at practice. They call me Gin, and there is a brand of gin called Hendricks, and a gin sour is a type of drink . . . It was actually pretty well thought out.”
“Yeah,” I chuckle. “It was.”
Those sapphire eyes study me for so long I worry I might have something on my face. “You should laugh more,” he says after a moment.
My reply is one hundred percent honest. “I’d like to.”
Ellingsworth’s jaw drops dramatically. “Wow! Are we friends now? I need us to be friends because friends share their soup recipes, and I need this recipe.”
“Whoa there, Ellingsworth. Recipe sharing is reserved for best friends, sorry.”
“That implies we’re at least friends, right?”
I swallow a lump in my throat, trying to force down my apprehension. “Yeah.” My voice cracks. “Let’s be friends.”
His grin is shit-eating. “You know the first rule of friendship, right?”
I stare blankly back.
“No last names,” he declares, nudging my hip with his blanket-covered foot. “I get to call you Hendrix. Or do you go by something else?”
“Hendrix is fine,” I rasp. “Or some people call me Rix.” And by some people, I mean my only other friend, I add silently. “I’ll call you . . .”
“Tahegin. Or T.”
I notice he doesn’t suggest “Gin” like our other teammates call him. Do only best friends call him by that nickname? Or, perhaps, did he get his nickname the way I got mine—without being asked if he liked it?
“So, is it your favorite?”
“Huh?” I replay our last few minutes before realizing what he means. “Oh, um. Kind of? It’s more like a lack of options. I like potato soup if I make it. Most everyone else puts bacon in it, so I don’t even bother trying to order it when I go out. Did you know people have started putting ham in broccoli cheese soup? I mean, come on. It’s broccoli cheese, not broccoli-ham-cheese.” I shut my jabbering mouth, cheeks going warm. He probably doesn’t want to hear me go on and on about soup, of all things.
The frown on his face seems to back up my last thought. That is, until Tahegin speaks again, and I realize he was intently studying my words. “You didn’t eat the other soups. You don’t like bacon or ham. Is it only in soup or all food?”
A painting hanging on his wall suddenly has all of my attention. It’s teal and sapphire blue, reminding me of his eyes, and textured. It’s really, really interesting.
“. . . Rix?”
“I don’t eat meat.” The confession grates against my throat on the way out. Throughout my entire adulthood, I haven’t told anyone except Micah and the Rubies’ nutritionist once I signed with the team. As a kid, others my age would tell me I was weird, so I learned to keep it to myself.
“Oh, that’s neat,” Tahegin says, surprising me. “You really should have sat with us at the hotel restaurant in Denver. The vegan burgers were so good.”
“Hmph.”
He studies me. “I’m guessing not everyone in your past has had the same reaction as me.”
I fall back with a sigh, arms over my head as I sprawl across the foot of his bed. Cool air kisses my exposed ribs on either side, and my hat tumbles to the floor. Too lazy to get up, I leave it there for now. Then, I throw an arm over my eyes so I’m not tempted to meet Tahegin’s inquisitive gaze. “Nope. Kids are fucking ruthless.” I repeat his words from yesterday.
That gets a chuckle out of him. “Since you were a kid? That’s a long time to be a vegetarian.”
“Hey, I’m not that old!” I feign appall. “But, yeah. I, uh, had Alpha-gal as a kid. They say it can go away over time, but I was always too nervous to try meat again. And now . . . I don’t know. I’m good without it, I guess.”
“I get it.” He sounds as if his mind is far away. “One time when I was, like, eleven, I ate my dinner and went to bed, then got up a few hours later feeling . . . off. I thought I was hungry again, so I rummaged around the pantry for a snack. Eventually, I settled on—” He pauses to stifle a gag. “God, I’m so sorry. Anyway, I ate some str—” Another muffled gag, and I have to hold back my laughter with a hand over my mouth. “—st-strawberry applesauce. Later, I woke up feeling super sick and made a mad dash for the bathroom. I tried, Rix. I tried so hard to make it, but the”—gag—“applesauce just exploded out of my mouth and nose. I left a trail of it all the way into the bathroom—luckily, the floor was all tile. When I was finally done puking, I had to clean up that lukewarm, pink—” He breaks off with another heave, and I can’t keep my laughter in any longer.
I guffaw so hard my belly hurts, and tears slip from the corners of my eyes. Tahegin laughs, too, so I don’t feel too rude for my outburst.
“Deadass,” he manages around his laughter. “I can’t even look at you-know-what in the grocery store when I pass by. Hell, I can’t even say the name of it without gagging. It was so horrible.”
“I can imagine.” Wiping my eyes, I prop myself up on my elbows and look at Tahegin. His blue eyes are watery, though I’m not sure if it’s from gagging or laughing. I realize I’m smiling at the same moment I realize that we’re just silently looking at each other, a smile on his lips, too.
“What changed?” he asks before the moment can become awkward.
