by Gemma Bruce
It was a small, square room with a chipped rectangular table in the center that was surrounded by padded folding chairs that had seen better days. An Allegheny Times sports page lay open on the top along with a dog-eared copy of Sports Illustrated. The swimsuit edition, naturally.
A row of lockers lined one wall. Each consisted of an open cubby for uniforms and equipment and a smaller metal locker for personal stuff—most of them padlocked. A wooden bench ran along the front.
The bare bones of baseball.
On the adjacent wall, three doors led to other rooms. J.T. put her coffee and Ding Dongs on the table and crossed the indoor-outdoor carpeting to see where they led. The carpet was thread-bare and stained and was laid directly over concrete. Hard on the legs and feet, but probably the best they could do.
Past the row of lockers an opening led to the showers. She glanced inside and couldn’t repress a shiver of mortification. She hurried on. No more showers for her. Not even for journalism.
The door to the trainer’s room was open. Barely fifty square feet with a massage table, an ancient-looking footbath, and a locked cabinet that held pharmaceuticals. The next room held a lumpy couch, a brand-new HD widescreen television, and video equipment.
Just like men; they’d walk their pains and strains over concrete just to get to the TiVo.
The third room was locked. It probably belonged to Bernie. J.T. went back to the lockers and considered her options. She supposed a good newsperson would take the opportunity to snoop inside them. She, however, was loathe to do it and wondered what that meant in the scheme of sports news.
She did walk down the row, looking at the names written above each place, seeing who bunked next to whom. If there was an obvious pecking order in the choice of lockers.
At the very end there was a locker with a cardboard sign thumb-tacked to the top. TOMMY B. He had his own locker? Which meant he must spend a lot of his off time with the team. He’d been at the field most of yesterday.
Maybe he was here for moral support. The Beavers could sure use all the help they could get.
There was no uniform in his locker, not that there would be. And no lock on the metal door beneath.
What the hell. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder and lifted the catch. A pair of sweatpants, a sweatshirt, and a copy of Ten Business Strategies for Success.
Maybe Tommy was about to invest in some local business. Or a chain of fast-food restaurants. At least he was thinking ahead.
By the time a lot of athletes retired, they’d blown their fortunes and if they didn’t get picked up by a major network as an anchorman, or hired on a coaching staff, they ended up selling cars or insurance. Like Larry Chrysler.
It didn’t surprise her that Tommy was thinking ahead. He was smart, except his marriage to that model. She filed for divorce after two years and walked away with a house, two cars, and a bundle of money. But smart men were often dumb about women. You read about it all the time.
Especially in the tabloids, you idiot. She quickly shut Tommy’s locker.
She sat down at the rickety table to drink her coffee and checked out what the Allegheny Times had to say about the Beavers. They weren’t even mentioned.
She tossed her trash in the can by the door and wandered out toward the field…. Someone was already there.
Chapter 7
J.T. heard the whap, whap of the ball machine before she saw the batter. It was Boskey, swinging and missing just like the day before. His anxiety was palpable even thirty feet away.
She’d seen it before. A player suddenly hits a slump, everybody starts correcting his swing, his stance, his grip, and pretty soon the guy is so tied up in knots that it looks like he’ll never dig himself out of the hole.
And the more he worries, the worse it gets.
Bad enough when you’re paid millions of dollars. Chances are management will be patient on the expectation of riding it out. But when you’re at the bottom of the bottom? It had to be hell.
J.T. walked slowly toward the cages. Maybe he’d be willing to talk once he’d swung himself out.
She stood by the mesh, watching until the machine spit out its last ball and rumbled down to nothing. Boskey started gathering up balls using his bat like a golf club to smack them back to the other end of the cage.
He caught sight of her and gave a halfhearted smile.
She felt for him. But there was only one way out of a slump—fight your way back. She opened the gate and slipped inside. Began picking up balls and tossing them into the hopper. They didn’t talk until all the balls were back in place.
Boskey picked up his bat.
“Don’t you think you’ve had enough for now?”
His mouth tightened. For a second J.T. was afraid he was going to cry. Then he shrugged. “Guess there’s not much point, is there?” He held the gate open for her to go through, then he followed her.
“There’s no point in making yourself crazy over a little slump. What goes down has to come up again. It’s the nature of the world.”
“Yeah, but it’s baseball’s nature to can my sorry ass—” He stopped, blushed up to the roots of his buzz cut. “If I don’t go up this year…” He trailed off, shook his head, and wandered off toward the clubhouse.
Other players began to arrive. J.T. recognized the pitcher, Enrique Sanchez, making his way down the warning track to the bullpen. The first baseman Jerry Oblonsky, who’d been a Frontier League all-star two years ago, was throwing ground balls to a utility infielder, the kid with the freckles. Phil something.
Bobby Kurtz alternated between running in place and doing push-ups. The guy was pumped. Too bad he couldn’t share some of his energy with the others. With their first game a week and a half away, the team looked like they were on vacation.
J.T. spent the morning moving from the infield to the batting cage to the bullpen, talking to whichever players were free.
She asked questions about Tommy. None of them knew why he was in Gilbeytown, but most of the team took his presence for granted. He came back to town several times a year. Especially last season when he’d spent so much time on the DL. He grew up in Gilbeytown. Bernie was his uncle. Of course he cared about the team. Same old same old.
But he wasn’t at the park that morning and she felt queasy thinking he might have returned to Portland.
She talked to Enrique Sanchez, who was living with the Plaskis of the Plaski dry cleaning sign. Tears rimmed his eyes as he told her how he missed his family who lived in the Dominican Republic, how he sent money home and was just waiting to get picked up by a minor league team so that he could afford to bring his wife and children and mother to the States.
She talked more with Danny Lewis who seemed happy just to be playing ball. He knew that one day he would go back to Illinois and work in his father’s hardware store. But for now he was doing just what he’d always wanted to do. He was good natured and not bitter about never making it to the majors or even the minors.
Jaime Ramirez, the third baseman, seemed content to make eyes at her. Other than that, he didn’t have much to say. Though J.T. quickly figured out that he and Kurtz were pretty tight. It was an odd combination.
Everyone had a story, and J.T. was interested in them all. She wasn’t sure how Skinny would like it. But he said in-depth, and dreams and hopes and disappointments were pretty in-depth if you asked her.
Her mind kept drifting to Tommy B., wondering where he was and what he was doing.
When the team began to run plays, J.T. moved to the dugout. No one seemed to mind, including the bench coach, who just nodded and went back to ignoring her.
Boskey continued to swing and miss and drop flies and miss plays until the infield coach told him to take a break and replaced him.
He slumped back to the dugout and sat down. Twisted his cap in his hands and hung his head. J.T. moved over to capture the moment in her notebook. Instead she found herself trying to bolster his spirits.
“What’s wrong
with me? I can’t hit, I can’t catch. I can’t do anything right. They’re going to cut me. I just know it, and then what am I going to do?”
J.T. pretty much knew. He’d return to his hometown in disgrace, spend a few weeks moping, and then start hitting the want ads. She’d seen it happen to better players than Boskey but had been too young and immature for it to matter before.
Now, she was surprised to realize how much she was interested in the fate of the gawky young man.
“Maybe you’re overthinking your game. Just go out there and think ‘banana splits.’”
Boskey screwed up his face. “How come banana splits?”
“Or something else you like. One of my high school coaches taught me the trick.” Of course it hadn’t worked in the playoff game with the Coach watching. But it did work. It had worked for other girls who were in a slump. “The theory is, if you think about something else, you don’t angst over your playing, and your ingrained training will take over from your head.”
“Huh?” asked Boskey.
“Just try it,” urged J.T. “It can’t hurt.”
Boskey slumped even farther on the bench. “I can’t get much worse than I am now.”
The bench coach leaned over and looked down the line. “Boskey. Get out there.” His voice was resigned. J.T. saw the writing on the wall from where she sat. Boskey was on his way out.
He pushed himself off the bench, his body language broadcasting failure.
“Banana split,” J.T. whispered as he passed her.
He nodded and climbed up the steps to home plate.
The first ball whizzed by him. He swung at the second and missed. He shot a desperate look over his shoulder. J.T. nodded and mouthed “banana split.” He took his stance. She could see his mouth moving. Sanchez sent a fast ball straight down the middle.
J.T. heard the crack as Boskey made contact. He stood there, stunned, as the ball looped over Sanchez’s head.
“Run, Boz, run,” Pisano yelled.
Boz took off for first.
The ball bounced at Rob Brown’s feet.
“Play the damn ball, Brown,” yelled Kurtz.
Rob caught it on the hop. Took his time throwing it to first base, and by the time it fell into Oblonsky’s glove, Boskey was standing on the bag. Everyone on the bench jumped up.
“Way to go, Boz!” cried Danny Lewis from center field. His grin was as wide as Boskey’s. Oblonsky high-fived him. The only two who didn’t get in on the congratulations were Ramirez at third and the shortstop, Bobby Kurtz.
J.T. scribbled in her notepad, jotting down each player’s reaction and the sense of camaraderie. She was beginning to love this team.
She was also getting hungry. She was considering a quick run out for fast food, when Tommy arrived.
She saw him the minute he stepped into the sunlight and damn if her heart didn’t skip a beat. Amazing, a heart could actually do that.
Larry Chrysler was with him, but she barely noticed. Tommy was wearing a suit and she’d never seen anything more beautiful in her life.
Hell. She’d just been disgraced for an alleged dalliance with two baseball players. And here she was ogling Tommy B. She’d be better off—safer—with a Big Mac.
Then he smiled at her and she tossed away the burger notion and gave into the rush of pleasure she felt.
And then to an equally strong feeling of dread. He was leaving. That’s what the suit must mean. Just as she was getting to know him. Before she got her story she meant. She needed a story. Her throat felt thick. Her eyes began to burn. Some kind of tough sportswriter she was.
He got a few wolf whistles. He and the guys did some back-slapping and hand jiving.
J.T. didn’t join in. She couldn’t seem to move. It was hard enough to take a breath. Of course it didn’t have anything to do with the way his shoulders filled out his suit coat, or his tan above the crisp white shirt. She was impervious.
“Aren’t you a little overdressed for batting practice?” she asked hopefully. Please don’t say you’re leaving. I just got here.
“I had a meeting this morning.”
“Oh.” She waited but he didn’t volunteer any more. She knew the what and when. Now she wanted to know the who, why, and where.
“Saw Boskey when I came in. He looked pretty damn happy. Said you told him to think about banana splits. You know what he was talking about?”
J.T. felt her cheeks grow warm. She shrugged. “Just trying a little trick I learned in high school. It worked. He made it to first.”
“That’s major. What was wrong with his swing?”
“His head.”
“Psychology, huh?” He smiled at her.
She could have melted under its warmth. Immediately became suspicious. The last time she’d seen him, he’d been ready to boot her out of the ballpark. “Whatever works.”
“Well, if it works for Boskey we’ll have to name a seat after you.”
What was going on? Mr. Grump seemed to be in excellent spirits. J.T. knew it wasn’t because of her, but she was inordinately cheered anyway.
Mind on your work, girl. Right. Work.
“How did your meeting go?” She tilted her head, projecting polite interest, while she willed him to spill.
Tommy’s eyes narrowed and his smile became ironic. “Nice try, Ms. Green. Gotta go.” And he left, striding away from her like a soldier marching off to war. Okay like a soldier in a thirties movie, perfectly coifed, with the sun picking out the gold in his hair and sending shivers down her spine.
Maybe she was too fanciful to be a sports reporter.
“You are a sports reporter,” she chanted as her mantra. You are a sports reporter. You are a sportswriter.
Maybe it would be better if he did leave. Because now she was wishing she hadn’t stopped him when they were in his car, and wondering how she could get him to do it again.
“Well, ain’t you a Dapper Dan,” said Bernie, rocking back on his crutches to take in Tommy’s suit.
“Went to confession.”
“Nah, you’d still be there,” said Larry, who’d followed him outside.
Tommy laughed. He felt great. He only wished he could tell Bernie his news. He and Thelma had come to an agreement about the factory property. She was having her lawyer draw up the papers. But if it leaked out before the three-day review, Charlie would find some way to squash it. He’d just have to keep it to himself for a few more days. He didn’t like this. It seemed like his whole life was suddenly based on subterfuge.
And here came Miss Subterfuge, herself. J.T. Green was sidling toward them, looking like an innocent young ingénue.
Tommy thought Larry and Bernie were underestimating her. Even if Skinny had sent her here on a dead-end assignment, Tommy had no doubt she’d make news out of it.
She was savvy and tenacious and conniving. Well, maybe not as conniving as he’d originally thought. But dangerous. In more ways than one.
Every time he saw her, his pulse went into overdrive.
She was wearing that huge Yankees jacket again. But he knew what was under it. Just the thought of it made his head spin. He couldn’t imagine her in stilettos and ermine. But he could imagine her naked, sweaty, and writhing beneath him.
And he was hit by a jolt of contrition so strong that he almost looked around for his fourth-grade catechism teacher. She could sniff out an impure thought before you thought it. Make you feel like a worm before you even confessed to anything. He didn’t have anything to confess. Well, not too much.
He shook his head to clear it. His cell rang just as J.T. reached them.
“Damn.” He flipped it open. Looked at the caller ID. Not his agent. His mother. Great. Another one who always knew when he was up to something. And he wasn’t even up to anything.
Yet, said the devil inside him.
“Hi, honey. Am I interrupting?”
“Of course not, Ma.”
“I’m making pot roast tonight.”
“Great. I’
ll be there.”
“Good. I called Nonie but she wasn’t home. Is Bernie there? I’ll invite them, too.”
“Hold on. I’ll get him.” He walked back to the now-silent group and handed Bernie the phone. “For you.”
Bernie shifted his weight to one crutch and took the phone. “Hey, Genie. How’s my girl? Good. Yeah, Nonie had to take her mother to the doctor’s this afternoon. She oughta be home soon. Hey, thanks. We’d love to, but Bernie Junior’s got a little league game tonight.”
He turned his head. Tommy saw him shoot a look toward J.T.
Tommy shook his head.
Larry grabbed the phone. “Hi, good looking. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks, but I’ve got other plans.”
“Larry.” Tommy grabbed for the phone.
Larry twisted away. “But we’ve got this reporter from Atlanta here. And I bet she’d love to come. Yes, she’s a girl. Abe Green’s daughter. Yeah. Yeah. That Abe Green.”
“Larry,” warned Tommy through gritted teeth.
“Yeah. She probably is. It’s a lonely life. No. I’m sure she doesn’t have plans. Great. I’ll tell her. Bye now.” He folded the phone and handed it back to Tommy.
Tommy glared at him. Then at Bernie.
Bernie quickly turned away. “Ramirez, you can’t stop a grounder if you ain’t watching the ball.”
Tommy had seen the third baseman ogling J.T. She was already wreaking havoc with the team. Now, they were siccing her on his family.
Then he saw her face. Those two rosy spots were back again. She’d heard the whole interchange and she was embarrassed. He felt like an ass.
“Really,” she began, her cheeks growing redder. “I can—”
“We’d love to have you,” he said automatically. He’d get Larry for this later, but he didn’t have the heart to embarrass her further. She looked so vulnerable. And if he were honest, he’d been toying with the idea of suggesting they go to dinner—just not at this mother’s.