Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 44920 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 225(@200wpm)___ 180(@250wpm)___ 150(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44920 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 225(@200wpm)___ 180(@250wpm)___ 150(@300wpm)
“Says the catcher,” I teased, but Tye looked out on the water.
Oops. Neither he nor Dominic seemed to react well whenever I brought up their recent events on the field. Not that I knew much about them. I tried a different tactic. “Dominic? Justin? What about you guys? What was the worst part of playing pro ball?”
“That’s easy,” Dominic sighed. “It’s shitty.” Justin nodded his head in agreement.
“Shitty in what way?” I looked to Dominic, but he didn’t seem to want to elaborate.
Finally, Justin sighed. “Shitty was—is—a pitcher on our team. His real last name is Smitty, but trust me, he didn’t earn his nickname just because it rhymed.”
“How could one pitcher be such a problem? Don’t they only play every couple of games?” I was fairly sure that pitchers had to rest their arms.
Justin had an answer for that. “When you’re on a team, you’re together with the same group of guys all the time. In the dugout. During practices and spring training. If there’s an asshole in the group, you can’t get away from him.”
“Especially if he sets out to make your life miserable,” Dominic added.
I scooted closer to him and reached out to touch the sleeve of his long-sleeved t-shirt. This Smitty guy was starting to sound a lot like Frank. “I’m sorry.”
“It was my fault,” Dominic said.
“Not it wasn’t,” Tye said sharply. But then both men fell silent.
Finally, Justin spoke again. “He was on our college team, too. Dominic’s and mine. And he and Dom both met this woman they liked, and Shitty, with his lousy personality, didn’t stand a chance. She chose Dom and from that moment on, Shitty decided we were the enemy.”
“Was that your ex-wife?” I asked Dominic.
He shook his head. “No, that was a long time ago, before Yvonne.” He captured my fingers in his, squeezing lightly. I wondered if the other two men could see that in the dark.
“So what did he do?”
“Everything he could to be a prick,” Dominic said but didn’t elaborate.
“He played shortstop,” Justin said. “Dominic, I mean, not Shitty. Shortstop sometimes needs to cover second or third base if the baseman is out of position or chasing after a ball. In that case, the pitcher might need to whip the ball to the shortstop covering the base, but Shitty never did.”
“It wasn’t that,” Dominic said. “I could handle that. It was the way he treated Tye.”
“What did he do to Tye?” I looked across the fire, but the man himself wasn’t volunteering any answers.
Justin sighed. “Everything he could. Pitchers and catchers work very close together. And that asshole wouldn’t even recognize how good Tye was.”
“Not just with being a catcher, but Tye knows baseball inside and out,” Dominic said. “He watches every game he can, knows stats about all the players. When a heavy hitter from the other team came up to the plate, Tye knew what kind of pitches were the most likely to keep him from getting on base. But Shitty didn’t listen out of spite.”
“Didn’t he get in trouble?” I asked. The story reminded me of a massage therapist at the chain I used to work for who manipulated the booking system to make sure she always got the best tipping clients. Eventually, she was fired.
“We got in trouble,” Dominic said. “Well, Tye and me.”
“Shitty didn’t seem to have a grudge against me,” Justin said. “But he was an all-around asshole, so it affected all of us. But mostly these guys.”
Finally, Tye spoke. “He didn’t even care about getting strikeouts. He just wanted to do what he could to fuck things up for me.”
I bit my bottom lip, trying to keep a question inside, but it came tumbling out. “Is that why you… left?”
Dominic tensed next to me as we watched Tye. Finally, he spoke. “They were going to send me down to the minor league team,” he said finally. “Because of my bad knees and all the crap that Shitty did. Guess they figured that a pitcher was more valuable than a catcher.”
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly. I wanted to go over there and hug him, but I didn’t know if he’d welcome that. Instead, I looked over at Justin. “Then what happened with you two?”
“All for one, and one for all,” Justin said quietly.
“It was time,” Dominic added. “A baseball player’s career usually isn’t that long, and we had plans. Have plans.”
“They’re wonderful plans,” I said softly. I couldn’t imagine this Smitty guy leaving his career in the big leagues to go back to school in order to help others.
“And all we have to do is pass the damn LSAT first,” Justin grumbled.
I threw him a sympathetic smile. It always seemed to come back to that.
Right then and there, I vowed to help them as much as was humanly possible in the time we had left together. At least their dreams seemed obtainable—unlike mine.