He knew I was eavesdropping, and later on it would make me laugh. I was holding two cans of black beans when I turned to him and said to Trevor, “I was eight. Zac started calling me Little Texas because I had this T-shirt I wore all the time with the Texas flag on it. For Christmas, I tried to draw a big Texas on a T-shirt for him, and that’s when I started calling him that.” I looked at Zac and raised my eyebrows. “Why? Do you guys want to start paying me past royalty money for coming up with his nickname?”
Zac tipped his face up toward the ceiling, and I had to pinch my nose when Trevor stuttered, “No. I was only asking. Zac, take me off speakerphone this second.”
“I was just kidding about the royalties.” I laughed, watching my old friend close his eyes as he kept cracking up too.
“Zac!” the manager hissed before getting cut off by Zac taking him off speakerphone.
But I could still hear Zac respond. “She was jokin’, Trev. It wasn’t like we ever made T-shirts with Big Texas on them.”
“But you should,” I called out to him before turning back toward the beans.
“Bianca just said we should. Maybe once I get on another team—”
Once he got on another team. I smiled at his optimism. I was glad he wasn’t back to being all “woes is me, I might have to retire.” I’d be glad if I never met that Zac again.
“Yeah, we’ll talk about that later…. No. I just don’t wanna talk about it now. You want somethin’ from the store?” Zac picked up another package of pasta and dumped it into his cart.
Zac spoke into his phone for another minute or two.
I wondered what his manager wanted to talk about and why Zac didn’t want to bring it up in front of me.
And I didn’t let myself be disappointed when he immediately asked me if I had The Lazy Baker T-shirts.
I didn’t.
He asked me why not, and I told him why—because I hadn’t thought about it.
He didn’t bring up anything else about his phone call with Trevor for the rest of our shopping trip or the journey home.
Boogie was his best friend, not me.
And that was fine.
I just couldn’t let myself forget it.
Chapter Eleven
“Yeah, he’s puking again,” my sister Connie said into the phone as I finished putting my groceries up about a week later.
I made a face at myself as I elbowed the refrigerator door closed.
“Oh shit, he got some on his shoes. Gross! B, I’ve gotta call you back! I’m sorry!”
“No, don’t be sorry. Hope he feels better! Tell him I love him!” I called into the receiver as I heard my nephew, Guillermo, retching in the background at the gas station they had stopped at.
“K, bye,” Connie said before instantly hanging up.
My poor nephew. Apparently, Luisa, my niece, had been saying since the day before that she wasn’t feeling well. My nephew had claimed he was feeling fine, but an hour into Guillermo and Connie’s trip down from Killeen to spend the weekend with me, it had gone downhill real quick. Yermo started blowing chunks on the side of the road, and then he’d blown some more chunks at the gas station they stopped at. Apparently, Richard, my sister’s husband, had called to tell her that Luisa had started projectile vomiting too. So of course, they were turning around and going back home.
It made sense. And if it kind of screwed me on the two videos I’d planned on filming tomorrow, well, it happened. I only hoped for all their sakes they got better soon. I’d figure it out.
It had been about two months since the last time I’d had someone come over and be my “guest,” and that was because I’d been pushing it to do one with Guillermo and Connie. Setting my phone down, I thought about my options. Boogie had plans, I knew that. I thought about a couple of friends who were aware of what I did on the side, but they weren’t crazy about being on camera. I needed Deepa’s help doing other things out of the frame, so she was no help. My parents weren’t anywhere nearby either, even though they were backups to the backups to the backups. It was really last minute to try and find someone else, especially when I had all the ingredients I was going to use ready to go. I’d already cleaned the hell out of my kitchen and didn’t want to waste that either.
Who else could I ask?
I thought about it as I made a quick dinner of pasta, olive oil, parmesan, red pepper, and some leftover broccoli and chicken breast. And it was while I was eating in front of the television, watching another episode of the Turkish romance I was catching up on, that the idea came to me out of nowhere.
And like with most of the scary things in my life, I asked myself, What is the worst that could happen?
It took me two whole minutes to find CJ’s Picturegram account and another two minutes to write and then rewrite the message I wanted to send him.
THELAZYBAKER: Hi, CJ! By any chance, do you know anyone (or 2 people?) that might be interested in doing a video with me tomorrow? I can pay in food or a little bit of money.
Straight and to the point. Perfect. Chances were, he probably got so many messages that mine would get buried, but it was worth a shot. Maybe, worst case, I could recycle an old video? If my nephew was feeling better, I could try to switch shifts with some people and go up to Killeen next week? I knew I had to work on Saturday. Some of my followers would complain, but some people complained about everything. I’d had someone whine once about the color of my shirt; it had hurt their poor, sensitive, little eyes, according to them.
I mean, I couldn’t magically make someone appear to be in one with me.
For one tiny second, I thought about Zac…. But he didn’t have time. He had messaged me a couple of times since the day we’d been grocery shopping, but from the pictures he posted on his Picturegram, he was busy doing drills and whatever the hell else he worked on during his time off from football. I was glad he was posting more workout stuff on his accounts, like I’d suggested weeks ago.
But I didn’t want to bother him or guilt-trip him into doing this for me. Because I knew that if I told him I was in a tight spot, he would offer. And that, more than reaching out to CJ, made me feel like I would be taking advantage of him.
Plus, CJ had kind of hinted at being interested in being in one of my vlogs, hadn’t he? And if he said no, it was no big deal. He was already busy with his own preseason. But maybe, just maybe, he would know someone who would be interested.
An hour later, when my phone buzzed, I was surprised as shit when I saw the icon for Picturegram on the screen and CJ’s Picturegram handle in small letters beside it: CJDANIELS NEW MESSAGE.
Worst case, he was going to say no, he didn’t know anyone, and that would be that. No big deal. I opened the app and went to my direct messages.
CJDANIELS: Hey. What time tomorrow?
Oh shitttttt.
I wrote him back immediately.
THELAZYBAKER: 10am? Honestly, I have the whole day. I usually film during the day, but I can make it work anytime. [smiley face emoji]
I was rereading what I wrote him when a reply came through.
Don’t get excited. He might still not know anyone.
CJDANIELS: OK.
OK?
Well, it wasn’t a “no” at least. What else could it mean? Maybe he was going to ask someone for me?