They got to their motel around six in the morning. Everyone, including Adler and the coaches, was groggy and a little short-tempered, and there wasn’t much conversation. People mostly just wanted their room keys, so they could go in and get some more sleep. Louis was also handing out their per diem meal money—twenty-five dollars each—and checking their names off on a sheet of paper.
Jill had been assigned to share a room with Sofia, since they were all doubled up, except for Adler, as far as she knew.
“Which bed you want?” Sofia asked, sounding half-asleep.
“I don’t care,” Jill said.
Sofia grunted assent, dumped her travel duffel on the bed closest to the door, and then lurched off to the bathroom.
Except for sleepovers with people like Lauren, she had never shared a room with anyone before, other than her family, when they went on trips. Her family tended to be—private—about pretty much everything, and give each other a lot of space. But, before she got too anxious and homesick, it was probably worth remembering that going away to college would have meant having a stranger as a roommate, too.
Sofia came out in nothing but a baggy T-shirt and underpants, and got into bed, pausing only to set an alarm on her phone, and to call the front desk and leave a wake-up call for nine-thirty.
“Try not to make noise,” she said—and then, conked out with no apparent effort.
Jill took a Star Wars T-shirt, some sweatpants, and her toothbrush out of her bag, and went into the bathroom to get ready for bed. It was really weird to be going to sleep at six-thirty in the morning.
She would have liked to stream a Buffy episode or something, but even with earbuds, she was afraid of disturbing Sofia with the flickering light of the show. So, she decided to read on her iPad for ten minutes—which turned into an hour. Right now, she was working on War and Peace, which was a slog, but she was churning her way along—and whenever it seemed just too damn ponderous, she would switch off to a mystery or a beach book for a while.
Their wake-up call seemed to come about thirty seconds after she finally managed to close her eyes. Sofia wasn’t exactly the perky type—but, she was alert and efficient, and almost out the door by the time Jill had managed to get from sitting on the edge of the bed, to considering standing up.
“Don’t forget to be there for the bus at twelve-fifteen,” Sofia said, already on her way out. “It will leave without you.”
It wasn’t quite “Good morning! What a wonderful day!”—but it was helpful information.
Sofia paused, one hand on the door. “Was it just because yesterday was awful, or does it happen every night?” she asked.
That didn’t sound good at all. Jill looked at her nervously. “What do you mean?”
“The nightmares,” Sofia said.
Well, she knew she had nightmares—it had been happening regularly for several years, but didn’t know that they were noisy. At least, not every night. “I have no idea,” Jill said.
Sofia frowned, then nodded, and left the room.
With luck, they had just been gasping and thrashing-around nightmares, and not screaming ones.
She kept sitting on the bed, taking in the fact that she was all by herself, in a motel room, somewhere in Pennsylvania—and couldn’t quite remember ever feeling this lonely. So, she put through a video call to her mother, who must have been expecting that, because she picked up right away.
“How are you today?” her mother asked.
“Okay,” Jill said. More or less, anyway. “I wanted to say hi, that’s all.”
“Did you sleep?” her mother asked. “You look exhausted.”
She wasn’t about to admit that she’d had audible nightmares. “Well, it was a long ride, but I’m in the motel in State College, and it’s—well, fine, I guess. Is Maggie okay?”
“Yeah, she just came inside,” her mother said, and pointed the screen at Maggie, who was napping comfortably on her orthopedic bed.
God, she missed Maggie. And she was pretty sure she didn’t have nearly as many nightmares when Maggie was keeping her company.
“Did you know they call that part of Pennsylvania ‘Happy Valley’?” her mother asked.
News to her. “I haven’t seen any signs of that,” Jill said, “but I kind of haven’t left the room yet.”
“What about breakfast?” her mother asked.
Well, there was the whole problem of not leaving the room. “Mrs. Wilkins gave me some granola bars,” Jill said. “And the room has one of those little coffeemakers, so I’m good.”
Her mother did a poor job of not looking worried. “What about your teammates?” she asked. “Do they all have breakfast together?”
Probably, yeah. “I don’t know,” Jill said. “No one really tells you anything, and—” Which reminded her of something. “Oh, could you maybe mail me a couple of shirts? Like, maybe the green Lacoste one, and the red NHS one?”
“Sure,” her mother said. “But, what’s wrong with the shirts we just got you?”
“Mr. Adler wouldn’t let me on the bus,” she said, noticing that she was still damn angry about it. “You’re supposed to have a collar, but no one told me, and—they were all laughing, until Marcus let me borrow one of his. Except it’s huge, and it looks stupid.”
Her mother sighed. “I’m sorry. It’s such a strange new world you’re in. What’s the motel address? I’ll get a package together right now, but I’m not sure if they’ll deliver on Sunday.”
Good point. “I don’t know,” Jill said. “Maybe the Wilkinses’ house? Because I only have one there, and I guess we need to wear them a lot.”
“Okay, I’ll send them right off,” her mother said. “I’m sorry they laughed. It seems very unkind.”
“Lauren thinks that was just them acting like normal players, and not picking on me—but, I don’t know,” Jill said. “Maybe she’s right.” And maybe they hadn’t actually been laughing that much—although it had certainly felt that way.
They talked for a while longer, with her mother expressing sympathy—repeatedly, and reassuring her that Maggie truly was fine, and then trying to cajole her into considering venturing out of the room.
There was a sudden pounding on the door.
“Hey, Ladybug!” a voice yelled, and there was more pounding. “Come on, Mother found a diner.”
“Who’s that?” her mother asked.
“Probably Scott,” Jill said. “Maybe he wants me to go to breakfast with them.”
“Okay, that’s good,” her mother said. “I like Scott. Go do that.”
It probably made more sense than hiding in her room for the next couple of hours, until it was time to get on the bus to the ballpark.
When she opened the door, it was Scott, standing with Marcus and Hector and Jonesy.
“Come on, Ladybug,” Scott said. “Get suited up, we’re waiting for you.”
Apparently, she had a nickname now. “Can I meet you out front in ten minutes?” she asked.
“We’re very hungry,” Hector said, “so it’s cruel. But, if you must.”
She glanced at Marcus. “I think I need to wear your shirt again, until my mother can send me some of mine.”
He nodded patiently. “That’s fine, Jill. Hustle up, okay?”
Yes, sir. “Be right out,” she said.
“There’s no such thing as a girl, and ‘right out,’” Jonesy was saying to the others, as she closed the door.
She wasn’t exactly high-maintenance, but she did need to take a fast shower and everything. It took her about twelve minutes to join them outside, but Marcus was the only one she saw check his watch. Dimitri and a bullpen guy named Danny, who looked about thirteen years old, had joined the group, and they ended up at a diner that was about three blocks away, crowded into two adjacent booths.
Everyone was carefully budgeting their per diem, although she had looked up “The Palisades,” and found out that Hector really was from one of the very most exclusive parts of Los Angeles, and was probably not hurting for pocket change. And she and Scott were in pretty damn good shape, too, given their contracts—but, that didn’t mean that anyone else at the table was, and she decided that it would be tactful to stay within her per diem, too.
Hector—who guys were calling “Mr. Health,” because he kept a prized jar of raw Manuka honey in his locker, from which he would have one spoonful before each game as “a tonic”—ordered an egg white omelet, with a side of fruit and some cottage cheese, but almost everyone else went with things like pancakes and waffles, and Jonesy got something called The Lion’s Feast, which cost almost eleven dollars, but had a large array of eggs, pancakes, and breakfast meats, including scrapple. Marcus ordered poached eggs on toast, bacon, sliced tomatoes, and a glass of milk—and muttered to her when she chose French toast and fruit salad that she needed to have some protein. So, she added a side of fried ham and a dish of yogurt, and he seemed to be appeased. Or, anyway, he shut up about it.
Scott was more chirpy than the rest of them put together, and kept stealing food from people’s plates, even after putting away a huge stack of pancakes and four pieces of bacon. Everyone else looked tired, and when they got up, she noticed that Dimitri, in particular, was very stiff. There was no way he could possibly have been comfortable on the bus, even lying in the aisle. During team and pre-game stretches, Louis and Sofia always seemed to do extra trainer-assisted stretching with him, and she assumed that he had a significant injury history.
When they were walking back to the motel, Marcus fell into step with her.
“I wish I could have been more overtly chivalrous yesterday,” he said. “But, I was afraid that would only make things worse.”
It probably would have, yeah, since she didn’t want to look as though she needed protecting. “Scott told me Andrew”—to whom she had still never really spoken—“had a very—strong—reaction,” she said.
Marcus nodded. “Still waters there.”
Apparently so. Someday, she and Andrew might even exchange words. “Should I have picked up the check?” she asked. “I mean, to be nice?”
He shook his head. “No, you don’t want to throw it in guys’ faces. But, pay for a really good post-game spread some night, and you’ll win quite a few fans.”
That sounded like wise advice, and she nodded.
Because it was the second day after her start, this would just be a workout day for her. Lots of stretching, time in whatever weight room the visiting team got to use—lower body and core work, predominantly, playing a little catch, and either long toss or throwing a football with Scott’s road roommate, Danny. She would also probably run some stadium steps, and do a series of sprints. Plus, they would have team stretch, and maybe some PFP, too, depending on the home team’s schedule.
The stadium turned out to be unusually nice, with huge weight room and exercise facilities, a large indoor hitting cage and pitching mounds, and even a dedicated media room. Penn State’s varsity baseball team used the same field during their season, so there were actually three clubhouses, and she would have the Penn State one all to herself, for changing and showering, while they were in town.
Visiting teams were always assigned shorter batting practice sessions than home teams were, and she stood in the outfield with Shosuke and Danny. He was a high school pitcher from Louisiana, who had a mighty thick Cajun accent, and relied heavily on a good sinker and getting people to ground out.
The gates must have opened very early, because there were already fans in the stands when they were leaving the field. The State College public relations person, a curly haired woman in her forties, asked if she would mind stopping to sign autographs, and whether she would be willing to be interviewed by the local press, and since she had quite a lot of time to kill before the game started, she was happy to agree.
The whole thing took longer than she expected, but she and the PR woman both were mostly able to deflect any questions she didn’t feel like answering—and gradually, the reporters shifted into less stressful topics. By the time she got down to the clubhouse, the pre-game spread had been pretty well picked over, although it didn’t appear to have been at all lavish in the first place. So, she fixed herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich—which was going to get boring, sooner rather than later, helped herself to a bottle of water and an orange, and sat in front of her locker to read, until it was time to change into her game uniform. Christ, being a baseball player was so much more monotonous than she ever would have guessed.
The clubhouse was pretty rowdy, with a series of highly competitive Ping-Pong games going on nonstop, and Raffy and a couple of other guys were dancing around to some very loud salsa music. But, she was really only interested in her too-late lunch and her Kindle, and paid no attention whatsoever. Maybe they’d all had one too many Red Bulls or Monster Energy drinks or something. Rip It was another brand she had noticed around the clubhouse—and around National Guardsmen, for that matter. As far as she knew, team officials didn’t really want them abusing energy drinks, but they weren’t outright banned, either. Especially since they could accomplish pretty much the same thing by getting a few shots of espresso somewhere and adding a bunch of sugar to it.
On her way to the cavernous, empty Penn State locker room, she passed Adler in the hallway, and he stopped.
“You get why I gave you a hard time last night, right?” he asked.
Maybe, but she still wasn’t in favor of it. “After two different people explained it to me,” she said.
“Good,” he said. “When you didn’t come back out, I started to worry that you might be in there crying.”
Yes, she was the most delicate of tiny flowers. But, there was no reason not to be as direct as he was. “I was on the phone with my best friend, yelling about how mean you were being,” she said.
“Glad to hear it.” He started down the hall, then stopped again. “Are you hanging in, Cafferty?”
Was she? “More or less,” she said.
“Good enough,” he said, and continued on his way.
The game that night was one of those wandering, lead-changing ones, with a lot of pitching substitutions, and an unsatisfying rhythm. Jill spent most of it up at the railing with Shosuke, both of them watching, while Shosuke kept the chart, but they also showed each other the grips they used for their pitches. He threw lots of cutters and sliders, neither of which had ever really intrigued her, because—well—she was kind of in love with her hammer. Their mostly speech-free friendship had progressed to the degree that they could amuse each other by making incredulous or judgmental expressions, upon seeing the other person’s changeup grip and the like.
In the eighth, their third baseman, Geoff, went into second base hard, trying to stretch a single—his fourth hit of the day—into a double. Somehow, one of his spikes caught on the bag, and he flipped over awkwardly, landing with most of his lower leg pointing in the wrong direction.
Louis and Sofia ran out there, along with the Spikes’ trainer—since the fact that Geoff had screamed when he hit the ground made it clear that it was a serious injury. In the end, he was taken off the field on a gurney, and left in an ambulance.
The dugout was really quiet after that, and players on both teams were swinging at first pitches, trying to end the game as quickly as possible. The early word was that Geoff had a compound fracture of both bones in his lower leg, and was gone for the rest of the season, at a bare minimum.
The post-game spread was somewhat-cold meatball and chicken parmigiana subs, and people ate without much conversation, before filing out to the bus. A few of the guys were planning to go out to some bar, but no one invited her—and it really wasn’t something she wanted to do, anyway, especially since searching for eager local female companionship was the primary goal. She was fine with going back to her room, making a few calls, and then working on War and Peace.
She was in bed reading, when Sofia came dragging in a couple of hours later, looking very tired.
“How’s he doing?” Jill asked.
Sofia shook her head. “He’s having surgery to stabilize the fractures, and it looks like he did some serious knee ligament damage, too. He has a long rehab ahead. With luck—I don’t know. They’re trying to figure out how soon he can travel, so they can get him home to Oregon.”
Somehow, it felt like an extra bitter pill, on a night when the poor guy had gone four for four, and had to have been feeling on top of the Short Season world. “It can happen that fast, can’t it,” Jill said. “One minute, everything’s great, and then, just like that—” She snapped her fingers, and winced at the thought of his bones making a similar sound.
“It’s true of life in general,” Sofia said.
Yes, she knew that all too well. In fact, she and Lauren had talked for quite a while tonight about the randomness of everything, and how—frankly—scary it was.
Sofia disappeared into the bathroom to take a shower, coming out in black mesh shorts and an Ithaca College T-shirt.
“Is that where you went to school?” Jill asked.
Sofia nodded, rubbing her hair with a towel to dry it. “Yeah. And then, I got a master’s in kinesiology at Michigan.”
“Did you always want to be a trainer?” Jill asked.
Sofia peered under the towel at her. “Do we have Twenty Questions going tonight?”
“Sure, why not,” Jill said.
“Well, I’ll do ten, maybe,” Sofia said, and carried her towel into the bathroom to hang it up. “I was aiming towards being a physical therapist, but I love sports, and played a lot of softball, and I ended up going for athletic training.” She looked over. “You never played any softball at all?”
Jill shook her head.
“Do you hate softball?” Sofia asked.
“No, I really like watching it,” Jill said. Especially since almost every female friend she’d ever had had been a player. “But, for me, it’s sort of like comparing crew and kayaking. They’re similar sports, but also totally different.”
Sofia nodded. “Okay, I can see that.”
“Would you rather have been a softball trainer?” Jill asked.
Sofia shrugged. “Softball or baseball. Or—anything, really. Except for football. I did some work as an assistant when I was in school, and those guys really get hurt. I mean, I hate what happened to Geoff tonight, but if everything goes okay, he should be able to come back, and it isn’t going to endanger his life or well-being. Football is just madness.”
Jill had often felt guilty about enjoying watching the NFL, especially when players got carted off the field right and left during every game. “My father was totally into football,” she said. “He was an outside linebacker at Holy Cross, and sometimes, he got some snaps at tight end, too.”
“Pro-level talent?” Sofia asked.
Jill shook her head. “He always said he was at least two steps too slow.” She noticed that she was holding his dog tag—her usual reflex—and dropped it back into her T-shirt.
“You don’t talk about him much,” Sofia said.
“No,” Jill said. Except, maybe that sounded too abrupt. “It’s still too hard. So—well, I try to keep it from coming up.”
Sofia nodded. “I’d love to tell you that it goes away, but my mother died when I was a junior in college, and it really doesn’t. It gets easier, over time, but it never leaves you.”
No, grief hadn’t been at all what she would have expected it to be. There were still days when it felt as though it had just happened, seconds before, and she had the same chilling sense of utter shock. “I’m sorry about your mother,” Jill said.
“I’m sorry about your father,” Sofia said.
It was quiet for a minute.
“Well,” Sofia said, and picked up the room phone to request another wake-up call. She started to climb into bed, and then paused. “I don’t know if I should bring this up, but you know I’m a lesbian, right?”
She hadn’t, actually, so she just shrugged.
“Is that going to create problems for you?” Sofia asked.
And what would give her that impression? Jill frowned at her. “In what way?”
“We’ll obviously be spending a great deal of time together,” Sofia said. “A lot of people are going to think that you’re gay, too.”
Oh, please. “People already think that,” Jill said. Routinely. Constantly. They always had, and probably always would. Except, of course, for people who thought she was unusually promiscuous, and sleeping with half the guys on whatever team she was on. Old news, in her life. “What do I care?”
“Okay, but—” Sofia frowned, too. “Well, yes, I suppose they do.”
“I don’t think the notion of women playing sports should lead to any assumption of sexuality,” Jill said. “But, we both know it does. Especially when you play at a high level, and you’re tall.”
“Can’t argue with you there,” Sofia said. “But, I didn’t want to make things even harder on you than they already are.”
Which she appreciated.
“You’re a lot less irritating than I was afraid you’d be,” Sofia said.
Jill had to laugh. “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” she said. “That’s what they all say.”
With luck.