That guy became my hero.
He wasn’t a big player. He only lasted six seasons in the majors. But he got into baseball operations, and guess what team he manages now?
The Chicago Firebirds.
The pretty pest from the airport and the lobby and the stairwell is right: I’m not a fifty million a year player. The Dodgers offered me even more.
But they didn’t have Doug Turner as their GM.
“You miss it already, don’t you?” Doug asks. His eyes jump down to the wicked scar that curves around my elbow on the inside of my arm.
“Yeah, but don’t worry,” I say. “I’m not doing anything to get in the way of making a full recovery.”
He nods and guides us back through the yard and over to the covered patio, where a full spread awaits us. “I get it,” he says. “It took me about a decade to get over retiring.”
“You’ve done okay for yourself.” I gesture around. “Summers in Chicago and winters in Scottsdale? I’d say being a general manager has its perks.”
“Yeah, but I’d still be playing if I’d had half your skill.”
“Or if you had your real knees.”
He barks out a laugh and we both pile up our plates and sit at the outdoor table. The weather is perfect—probably 70 degrees—and it’s the only thing Idon’tlike about December in the desert now that I’ve lived in snow.
It doesn’t feel like Christmas.
My mom always made sure that even though it was sunny outside, our apartment felt like a winter wonderland. I still don’t know how she did it, how she managed to make the mundane magical.
I know why she did it, though. Why she still does and always will.
I ask Doug about the team while we eat, but rather than talking about the holes in our roster, he turns the conversation back to me.
“How are your parents?” he asks.
“Fine,” I say.
“Is your dad still working at the Builder’s Bench? He promised he was going to retire this year, didn’t he?”
“He has officially retired and is talking about buying an RV. He said once my elbow has healed, he wants to drive to every one of my games.”
Doug chuckles. “How does your mom feel about that?”
I swallow hard. Doug doesn’t know as much about my mom as he does about my dad, but I get the feeling he knows more than I want him to. Of course, it’s hard not to put some pieces together when my dad attended every one of my playoff games last season and she didn’t make it to one. “That’ll be a game time decision,” I say, and leave it at that.
“Are they flying out for Christmas?” he asks. My chest aches with a familiar pain.
“No, I’ll go visit them.”
Doug holds my eye for a moment too long. Then he crumples his napkin and throws it away.
“Let’s talk about the coming season. The doc isn’t clearing you, so you have a full eighteen months to get ready for your next Spring Training. Right?”
My chest burns with something between guilt and humiliation. I was traded to the team to win them a World Series, and instead, in the last game of the league championship series, I tore a ligament in my elbow trying to throw out the tying run at home plate. I ripped my arm apart throwing that ball from right field, and it still wasn’t enough.
The ump ruled the guy safe.
My injury can’t compare to how bad I feel having failed my team. Failed Doug. It’s a pain no surgery can fix. “Coop?”
I blink. “Uh, yeah, I’ll miss all next season. It’s healing nicely, but the doc doesn’t want me risking reinjury. If that’s okay.”
