I give him a sharp nod.
Fuck yeah, I can.
Except, apparently,I can't.
The start of the inning is a complete disaster. I throw two wild pitches and end up walking my first batter.The home crowd is grumbling, and my heart is racing. This isn't exactly the impression I wanted to give Sage at her first baseball game.
But the thought of having to leave this all behind in order to follow her and stay in my kid’s life has those earlier feelings of being off-balance and out of sorts showing up with a vengeance.
I try to shake it off and focus on steadying my breath.
I don’t want to lose this again.
The familiar sounds of the stadium filter away; the sights, sounds, and smells that I've grown up around disappear. The only thing that matters is finding Griff’s glove with the ball.
The next batter is ready, and I wait for Griff's cue, nodding when I see it.
I wind up and let it fly, my slider landing perfectly in Griff's hand, and the ump calls a strike. Two more quickly follow, and the batter leaves home plate defeated.
The next three go mostly the same, with only one of them landing on base, only to get tagged out by Hiro at second. As the Thunder leave the field, my gaze darts up to where Sage sits. She's looking at her friend, laughing at something, but I watch the friend nudge her with her shoulder and tilt her chin toward me. Sage's head whips around, and she looks at me, flashing a thumbs-up. I chuckle under my breath. Fuck, she's adorable.
In the dugout, I drink some water and roll my shoulder a few times before leaning on the railing to watch my teammates go up to bat. The other team might not have been able to get a run on us in the first half ofthe inning, but their pitcher proves to be a tough one, and the first inning ends with no score.
Then I'm up again. This time, my focus is where it needs to be. The inning is fast and clean. Two strikeouts and a ground out, and we're heading off the field again. The crowd is cheering now, and my confidence is returning to normal levels.
Sage is sipping from a big fountain drink and looks like she's having a good time. I probably shouldn't let that mean anything to me, but damn it, it does.
The next several innings are tight and tense with both teams scoring a small handful of runs. It’s the bottom of the eighth when Coach walks over to me.
“You good to finish the game or is that arm tired?”
“I can handle it,” I say firmly.
He stares at me for a long moment, and I know he’s analyzing everything, trying to decide whether he should take my answer at face value or not.
“Okay. Finish out today, then we’ll rotate you off the next couple of games to give your arm a break.”
“Got it.”
My teammates manage to score two runs, giving us a small lead over our opponents. But I know I've got to hold them off so we don't lose that lead.
When Griff and I take to the field, he walks up to the mound with me instead of taking his place behind home. He places his hands on my shoulders and asks, “You ready?”
I nod. “Hell yeah, I am. Let's finish this.”
Griff slams his mask down and jogs back to his position. The first batter takes the plate and I strikehim out quickly and easily, along with his teammate, who goes up next. But that’s where my luck starts to falter. The next thing I know, there’s a runner on first and a runner on second, and I'm staring down a batter with a full count. If my next pitch is a strike, the game is ours. If it’s not, then anything could happen.
It's close. Too close.
The energy in the stadium is tense. But not as tense as the energy coiled up inside of me. This might just be a regular season game to everyone else, but for me, with Sage in the stands for the first time, it's a hell of a lot more.
It’s my chance to show her this part of me. And damn it, I want to impress her.
I look past the batter, right at Griff. He signals my pitch, and I wind up.
Strike three.
The crowd erupts, and within seconds, I'm swarmed by my teammates rushing the mound as we celebrate our win. As a group, we jog off the field, and my gaze lifts to scan the crowd. Sage and her friend are on their feet, clapping and cheering along with the rest of our fans.
