Weasley High: The Baseball Club

Tomatoes and Secrets!

Chapter 8

Tomatoes and Secrets

Amira’s POV

I couldn’t stop smiling.

Not on the way home.

Not when I dropped my bag by the door.

Not even now, standing in the kitchen, elbow-deep in tomatoes.

Mom glanced over from the sink where she was rinsing rice in a wide plastic colander. The sound of water rushing over her hands, the soft rhythm of her fingers sorting out bad grains—it was all so normal. Familiar. Ordinary.

But me?

I was anything but.

“Be careful,” she said, not looking up. “You’re chopping too fast.”

“I’m fine,” I replied quickly. My grip tightened around the knife, slicing too thin, too eager. Juice slid across the board, bright red and sticky, and for a second it looked too much like blood.

“You’ve been grinning since you walked in.”

“I haven’t,” I said, even though we both knew I had.

“Yes, you have,” she replied, wiping her hands on the towel. Her eyes were sharp. Mom didn’t miss things. “Did something happen at school?”

My heart jumped. I tried to make my face blank, casual.

“No. I mean… yeah. Just—first day stuff. It was… a good day.”

She squinted. “A good day?”

“Yeah,” I said, reaching for the onions. “Everyone was nice.”

“You’ve never said that about any school before.”

I didn’t answer right away. My fingers worked over the onion’s skin, peeling it back slowly, letting the layers curl onto the counter.

Maybe this school really was different.

Or maybe it was her.

The girl behind the mask. The catcher with brown eyes sharp as sunlight and arms that didn’t flinch even when the ball came in like a bullet.

Peyton.

I blinked. My throat was suddenly dry.

I remembered the way her glove snapped closed, the pop echoing down the field like thunder. How she didn’t look up once—until that moment. That stupid moment. Her eyes met mine and I hadn’t been able to move since.

“You’re smiling again,” Mom said.

I dropped my gaze to the cutting board. “No, I’m not.”

She hummed, unconvinced. “What’s his name?”

My heart stopped.

I looked up, startled. “What?”

She smirked, like she’d caught me. “come on tell me, who is he?”

I laughed nervously, trying to play it off. “What are you talking about?”

“You’re glowing, Amira,” she said, stirring the rice now. “You’ve been floating around this house like someone stuck helium in your sneakers.”

I bit the inside of my cheek, trying not to react.

“It’s just school.”

She gave a soft laugh. “If there’s a boy making you smile like that..."

My heart skipped, the knife in my hand stilled.

"Just make sure he deserves it.”

Boy?

Mason's face loomed into focus.

I loathed boys.

Ugly, silly, pompous creatures.

I felt a pinch deep in my chest. Not pain exactly—more like a sudden, invisible grip tightening around my ribs.

She thinks it’s a boy.

Of course she does.

That’s the natural assumption. The safe one. The one we can all laugh about over dinner without feeling like the walls are too close and the air’s too thin.

But it’s not a boy.

I cleared my throat. “I told you. It’s just school.”

She didn’t say anything. Just stirred the pot. Let the silence stretch out between us.

I focused on the onions again, trying to keep my hands steady.

But my mind had already drifted.

Back to the bleachers.

Back to the way the sun caught the dust in the air.

Back to Peyton crouched behind the plate, like she belonged to that field and nowhere else.

I remembered how tight my chest felt when she missed a pitch. How I flinched like it was me who’d failed. And when she caught the next one with ease—how my body relaxed without permission.

I was too aware of her.

And not in the way you notice someone attractive and move on. This was different. Deeper. My brain kept pulling her forward like she’d planted herself there.

She probably hadn’t even thought of me.

It was just a glance.

But for me?

That glance lasted the rest of the day.

I finished with the onions and reached for the salt, fingers a little shaky. Not from nerves exactly. Just… energy. That nervous kind that makes you want to run but also stay completely still.

Mom placed the lid over the pot. The smell of tomatoes and oil and boiling rice filled the space. Familiar, grounding.

But I didn’t feel grounded.

I felt like I was lying by omission. Like my mouth had said one thing but my body knew better.

“Set the table, will you?” Mom said.

I nodded, grateful for something to do.

Plates. Cutlery. Napkins.

I laid them out slow, methodical.

I knew what this was.

I’d read enough novels. Heard enough whispered conversations. I wasn’t dumb.

This was a crush.

A full-blown, inconvenient, all-consuming crush on a girl who hadn’t even said my name yet.

I pressed my palm against the dining table, eyes closed for a second.

What do I even do with this?

And more than that—what if she knew?

Worse—what if she didn’t care?

“Amira?” Mom called gently.

“Yeah?”

“You’re staring at the wall.”

“Oh,” I said. “Just thinking.”

“About school?”

I nodded. “Something like that.”

She smiled faintly. “You’re allowed to have good days, you know.”

I looked up.

“I know,” I said, almost whispering.

And I meant it.

But it still didn’t make this easier.

The secret. The feelings. The uncertainty.

It was all loud in my chest, even if no one else could hear it.

I took a deep breath. Tried to tuck it all away. Fold it up and pack it neatly in the corner of my mind where no one could touch it.

But it kept creeping back out.

One backward cap.

One glance.

One girl on a field who didn’t even know she’d unraveled me.

And I smiled again.

But this time, it hurt.