I can still see the two of them—Luke and Finley—as teenagers, bursting through our front door after school, buzzing with whatever joke or disaster the day had handed them. They moved as a unit back then, loud and inseparable, the kind of best friends who didn’t seem to notice anyone else existed. Except Finley always noticed me. Or at least it felt like he did, and that was enough to keep my stomach in a constant state of somersaults.
Fin was like a third child, a fixture in our house. My mother lit up around him. All he had to do was pop into the kitchen doorway and say something likeMrs. Rankin, tell me you saved some of that banana bread. I’d sit at the kitchen table doing homework, pretending I wasn’t listening, pretending I wasn’t waiting to be acknowledged. Finley would do something that completely short-circuited me—like flick a finger against my notebook and say,Hey, Ally, you get smarter every time I see you.He’d say it casually, teasingly, but my face burned for hours.
The best memories are the tiny ones: the two of them sprawled on our living room carpet, controllers in hand, arguing about cheat codes; Finley propped against the couch, hair falling into his eyes, glancing at me as if checking I was still in his orbit. Luke’s laugh—sharp and boyish—and Finley’s—warm and unguarded—filling every corner of our house.
They were competitive, no doubt. And as Luke started to separate himself from the pack with his accomplishments on the pitching mound, their relationship seemed to strain. Especially after Luke, at age fourteen, landed on the cover ofBaseball Todayas part of its “Top 15 Under 15,” naming him as the third best baseball prospect in the nation who was not yet in high school and the top pitcher.
But only a few weeks later came Luke’s bike accident with the drunk driver, ending any notion of baseball stardom. Luke was just one of the guys again.
I’d be willing to bet that, if Finley and I hadn’t married, the two of them would’ve lost touch after high school, as so many friends do. Their differences, which were easily concealed when they were young, seem so stark now. Luke is a bundle of energy, usually positive, occasionally not, but always moving forward, never sitting still—while Finley looks more and more like someone stuck in the mud.
“Luke’s had a rough couple of days, don’t you think?” I say, wiping my hands, turning to dice tomatoes for a salad. “Maybe we could dispense with the ‘superstar’ commentary?”
Finley chuckles, but it’s tight. “He’ll land on his feet. He always does.”
“Easy for you to say. You haven’t been charged with a felony.” I remove the chuck roast from the oven and check it. I went with a simple preparation, sea salt and black pepper, dropping chopped carrots and onions and some thyme inside the pot. Luke will eat the carrots if they’re cooked and flavored with broth.
“All I meant was, he’s got you for a lawyer. There’s nobody better.”
No, that wasn’t what you meant, but nice recovery, Fin.
“Something wrong?” he asks.
“Yes, something’s wrong. My brother is in danger of losing everything he’s worked for.”
He opens the fridge and removes a bottle of white wine. “And you’re a hundred percent sure he’s innocent?”
I look up from the chopping board, still holding the knife. “What?” I hiss.
“I’m just sayin’, just sayin’—he doesn’t make a lot of money. A little—”
“Since when has money mattered to Luke? This last summer, after what he accomplished at Mortimer, he had five different offers from Division 1 schools that would’ve tripled his salary, and he turned them all—”
“Oh, I know. Believe me, I know. We only talked about it every night for months.”
Instead of my anger boiling over, I simply deflate from exhaustion. I just need to hold out until the congressman’s trial ends. I’ll keep doing what I’m doing, tonight being an exception: work until bedtime, then come home and crawl into bed after Fin’s asleep.
He pours himself a glass of wine. “Actually, I’m surprised hedidn’ttake one of those job offers last summer,” he says. “I thought that was his thing, fixing up a terrible program and then moving on to the next reclamation project like a roaming messiah.”
I admit, I thought Luke would take one of those job offers, too, and for the very reason Finley gave. Once Mortimer reached the World Series last year, I figured Luke would consider his work done and move on to another struggling program. But then I remembered, they onlyreachedthe World Series; they didn’twinit. Luke would want to bring home the crown before departing.
My phone buzzes. A FaceTime call from Grayson. “Hey, squirt!”
“Hi, Mom.”
Something bright and warm flares in my chest. That single word reminds me, no matter how much else I’ve broken or fumbled, that I got this one thing right. Grayson is the greatest thing I ever made, the one joy that never slips from my hands.
“Luke isn’t here yet,” I say. “Dad’s right here.”
“Hey, buddy!” Fin calls out.
“Hi, Dad. So…how’s Luke doing? This whole thing is nuts.”
“He’s holding up okay. We’ll figure it out. It was obviously a misunderstanding.”
“I mean, if they knew Luke…they’d never think he could do this.”
Finley winces; yet another source of jealousy, insecurity—Luke’s relationship with Gray. When Luke moved back to Grace Park to coachthe high school team, Grayson gravitated toward his uncle, his spirit, his charisma, his competitiveness. Gray’s sport in high school was football, not baseball, but the whole jock thing was close enough. The bond they formed was not lost on Finley, who felt pushed out.
