make eye contact, and I wonder if he ever considered my reaction before he fucked my girlfriend. Maybe.
He chokes up on the bat, his left foot swiveling and digging into the dirt. There’s hollering on the field. “Come on, throw it in there!” “Give ’em the heat, Reins!”
It’s an unremarkable pitch at an unremarkable moment in the game to anyone but me.
Despite the humidity in the air from the afternoon rain, my arm feels great. I take a breath and relax. Shake out my arm and stare at the dirt beneath my feet and feel the ball in my hand. Curveball. I’d learn to throw a curveball in junior high by an extremely patient pitching coach my dad hired for me. That crazy bastard would sit between the mound and the plate and have me throw a curveball. I was so terrified of hitting him. I picked it up quickly.
Let it go. Hit the glove.
I visualize the path the ball will take from the release to the leather. I twist, wind up, and throw the pitch.
I’m not sure what happened, but once it left my hand, I knew I’d held the ball too long trying to hang the curveball. Instead of brushing the outer inches of the strike zone, I launch the pitch too far right. Baylor gets a hold of it and sends it sailing to left field toward our unlucky left fielder.
Ez flips his face mask up and rushes to his feet to protect the plate.
Sweat runs down the back of my neck as I think about the pitch I just threw.
The inning ends with little commotion. An out at third, and a fly ball to center field.
I don’t look at the stands or the pitching coach probably wondering what the fuck that was about. Ez bumps his shoulder to mine. “I spit on his shoes.”
“Whose?”
“Baylor.”
Snorting, I stare at my mitt and then my hand. What happened out there? Why couldn’t I throw that curveball?
My dad told me once, after he tore his rotator cuff at the end of a three-game series on the road and was leading the league in strikeouts, that “The game usually gives you what you deserve, good or bad.”
For me, it goes back to Friday the thirteenth. I’d love to say I’m not superstitious, but maybe I am. Maybe it’s all because of the damn day of the week and the fact that we give up 7 runs and end the first game in the set with a loss of 6-7. Maybe it’s the two wild pitches I threw after that. Or that same time tomorrow, we’ll face off against them again. It’s not the last time I’ll see Baylor this year, and unfortunately for me, not the last of Brie.
“Bro, you add six and seven, it’s thirteen. How fucking bizarre is that?” Ez grumbles, confirming his triskaidekaphobia fear.
Noah, our shortstop, bumps me from behind after we shake hands with the Dirtbags. I purposely skip Baylor, and he knows why.
I drift my eyes to the stands after the game and notice she’s waiting for him.
“She fuck the entire team or just Wright?”
Squinting, I turn my head and stare at Noah as we walk off the field. Why the fuck would he ask that now, after the game we had?
“Shut the fuck up,” Ez tells him. “Don’t say that shit to him.”
Noah and me, we’re not friends, and though baseball players are certainly known for their egos, he doesn’t have one. I don’t know why I don’t like him, maybe because of comments like that. While it’s meant to be a jab at Baylor, I take it personally.
My attention finds her in the stands, her smile directed at the one she left me for. Soft, blue eyes, innocent, though her actions weren’t. She believed the rumors that I’d been fucking around on her. I hadn’t. Not once. But it didn’t matter. Damage was done and she did her part to destroy it. She seems unaffected by my presence, and I’m undone. Funny how that works. Time heals all wounds?
Bullshit. It exposes you.
For some reason, as I’m walking back to the dugout, I think about that woman from this morning. The one I bought coffee for. I bet she could make me forget about Brie. A thrill of excitement shoots down my spine.
In the locker room, the guys don’t say much about the loss, aside from Ez. He’s Italian, loud, and always has something to say.
Shirtless and holding ice to my shoulder again, I lean