I got those tickets for you,” Scott said over lunch the day after he got home. “They’re for Thursday. Field box, third baseline, just before the visitors’ dugout.”
“Wow, thanks.” These were far better than the ones he used to get for her and Ben, which tended to be on an upper deck, or out by right field, a position Scott never played. She and Ben had laughed over the fact that he clearly wanted them as far away from him as possible. He was a third baseman. She’d be sitting right near him. “Who are you playing?” she asked.
“Yankees.”
Cass had second thoughts. The Boston crowd that came out for Yankees games tended to be a little rowdier and more committed to their beverage intake than usual. She wondered how Kate would feel. Surprisingly, Kate had no problem whatsoever. “A Yankees game by the visitors’ dugout? Are you kidding? I wouldn’t turn that down for a trip to Nantucket.”
Cass rode in to Fenway with Scott to meet her. When they pulled up outside the players’ parking lot, he took out his wallet and held out sixty dollars.
“That’s okay,” she said. “I have money.”
“Whatever you brought, trust me, it’s not enough. A burger costs like a filet mignon.” When she hesitated, he dropped it in her lap. “It’s on me,” he said. “A night at Fenway.”
“Thanks,” she said. “That’s really generous.”
He gave her a look. Soft, like before. But then it was gone. His gaze turned toward the growing numbers of people striding down Jersey Street toward watering holes like the Cask ‘n Flagon to get a head start on their revelry. “I’ll meet you here after.”
Cass and Kate strolled around a bit and chose a pizza place that didn’t serve alcohol. They chatted and ate, Kate teasing Cass about her huge appetite.
A group of young men, all sporting various well-worn Red Sox caps, stopped outside the restaurant window to wait for a lagging friend. “We don’t have all day, asshole!” called out one wearing a YANKEES SUCK T-shirt. The friend retorted with something out of earshot, but the men outside howled with laughter, and the YANKEES SUCK guy grabbed his crotch in response.
Cass rolled her eyes. It was so familiar, just like half the guys she grew up with. Kate, however, seemed frozen in panic, ready to run if the small herd of men suddenly decided to stalk their prey in the pizza place. Cass studied her. “Have you been out at all since . . .”
“I go to meetings and out for coffee, and stuff. But, you know . . . not out out.”
Cass knew that Kate was going to a counselor in Cambridge. “You like the new person you’re seeing?” she asked.
“She’s great. But it’s not like it goes away overnight. I don’t know if it’ll go away, ever.” She leveled her gaze at Cass. “I have to tell you something. I think I’m going to press charges. Those guys could do it to someone else—what’s to stop them? They got off scot-free with me.”
“That’s not your fault, Kate. You were petrified.”
“Yeah, but I’m not anymore. I mean, I’m scared, but I’m not begging for my life. I have to do something or it’s just left as it was: me all beaten up . . . them laughing.”
The terror of that night rose up around them: Kate’s guilt at having gotten herself into the situation in the first place; Cass’s guilt for hesitating before rushing to help.
Fear and shame. An alcoholic’s constant companions.
“I’ve thought about it a lot,” Kate went on. “If I do nothing, I live like a victim for the rest of my life, knowing I didn’t have the guts to try.”
“I get that, and I think it takes a lot of courage, but I have to ask . . . what if he comes after you for trying?”
“He said he would, if I ever went to the police. Said he’d kill everyone I love, too. But I have to do what I can to keep this from happening to someone else. Besides, he was so messed up, it was probably just the drugs talking.”
Jesus, I hope so, thought Cass.
As they headed toward Fenway, Cass pondered Kate’s choice. She was proud of Kate for reclaiming the power those sociopaths took from her, and trying to spare some other poor girl the same fate. But a rape trial. They would dig around in Kate’s messy personal life and try to make it her fault. And if the guy got off, as so many of them did, that threat he’d made . . .
Cass felt slightly ill at the thought of it and tried to distract herself with gratitude for this day right now, a warm September night, and the feel of a ticket to Fenway in her pocket.
The gates opened and they had to stick close not to lose each other in the erratic surge of the crowd in the cool, dark underbelly of Fenway. Walking up the ramp toward the park itself, Cass remembered the few times she and Ben had actually gone to the games instead of scalping Scott’s tickets; how the dimness below would morph into a scene so saturated with color that it took a moment for your eyes to adjust.
And there it was: the impossible green of the field, the rusty red of the warning track, the feeling that you’d finally arrived at the Emerald City after trekking through the dark forest.
Their third-row seats were between home plate and the visitors’ dugout, and Cass guessed that they were some of the best seats in the house. So generous of Scotty.
She walked down to the low wall that separated the fans from the field. Yankees players were scattered across the grass taking turns batting and fielding. When the current batter finished and turned toward the dugout to get his mitt, his face was in clear view.
Tate Hogarth, her friend from rehab!
She knew he’d strained his back early in the season and had been on the injured list ever since. But apparently he was back in the lineup because there he was heading right for her. She said his name and he looked up.
“Cass?” His grin was wide as he strode over and hugged her across the wall. “My Lord, girl, what’re you doing here?”
“Well, I guess I’m about to watch you play!”
His gaze dropped down to her protruding belly. “Look at you, all round and rosy.” He glanced back up, his look purposeful. “How’s it going? You doing okay?”
“Good,” she said. “Really good, Tate. You?”
He nodded but looked away. “Better, now that I’m playing.”
Fans started to congregate, invading their little bubble of reunion with baseballs and tickets for Tate to sign with proffered Sharpie pens. He shot a pointed look at Cass. “You got anything for me to sign?”
She rooted in her purse and pulled out a grocery receipt. He wrote something on it and handed it back. He waved to the fans, called out, “Thanks, folks!” and headed into the dugout.
Cass looked down at the receipt. He’d written a phone number and the words Call me when the game’s over so we can get together and catch up.
When Cass went back to her seat, Kate was staring at her. “What was that all about? You’re buddies with everyone in the league now?”
“An old friend,” said Cass. “He gave me a push in the right direction when I needed it.” It was just cryptic enough for Kate to know not to ask more questions.
Cass continued to think about it, though. Tate had been the one to get her to approach Scotty with the bargain plan. Other than a few glitches, it had worked out better than she ever could have imagined. Cass wondered where she’d have ended up without Tate’s advice.
Nowhere good, that’s for sure.
* * *
A little before seven o’clock the Fenway Code of Conduct was announced, including “please avoid balls in play” and “drink responsibly” and “watch your language.” The three guys in the seats behind Kate and Cass hooted at “drink responsibly” and Kate stiffened.
Cass murmured, “These idiots need that tattooed on their bodies somewhere.”
“Preferably their dicks,” said Kate. Cass let out a loud laugh, and even Kate chuckled.
They were still smiling when a family took the seats in front of them. The little boy eyed someone’s bag of popcorn as he scrambled past. “I want one of those,” he said, though he was already holding a hot dog and a drink.
“What are you, kidding me?” joked his father. “I’m gonna have to take out a second mortgage if you keep eating like this. The game hasn’t even started yet, ya locust.”
“What’s a mortgage?” the boy giggled.
One of the guys behind Cass and Kate said, “What’s a locust, is what I wanna know.”
“Isn’t it one of those yoga moves?”
The third said, “For chrissake, it’s a bug. Like a grasshopper.”
“Grasshoppers don’t eat that much.”
“Yeah,” said the other. “And what do they eat? Grass? That’s cheap.”
“You two are officially stupid,” muttered the third.
The Red Sox players’ names were called as they sprinted onto the field. “On third base, Scott McGreavy!” The announcer’s voice echoed out over the park. Cass and Kate cheered and screamed his name. He didn’t look over, but he tossed a little wave as he jogged by. When he got to third, he squinted toward home plate, a little smile playing around his lips. Cass could feel it as if he were grinning right at her. Happiness. Scott was happy she was there.
For a moment she felt her chest swell in response and then tighten as she reminded herself, once again, of Rule Number Two. She gritted her teeth waiting for the warring emotions to pass. Joy and sadness. Real life. This was how it felt when you weren’t in a constant state of anesthetization.
And alcohol was everywhere. It seemed half the crowd was holding clear plastic cups filled with amber liquid that sparkled like melted gemstones in the waning sunlight . . . drawing her in like the goddamned Holy Grail . . .
“Come up with any names yet?” said Kate.
“Names?”
“Yeah, there’s this funny custom of naming babies—maybe you’ve heard of it?”
Cass forced a wan smile. “Oh,” she said. “I was just going to call her Baby. Or maybe Pumpkin, for the very attractive shape of my stomach.” She patted the hard roundness of her belly, and the urge to medicate her emotions began to dissipate.
Everything passes, Patrick had told her once. And the stuff that doesn’t pass doesn’t get better by drinking. It only gets worse.
Cass gazed out across the park, at the tens of thousands of people who had come to watch a bunch of guys play with a stick and a ball. So much of life defied explanation. People wanted what they wanted, often without having any idea of why they wanted it. They just followed their fascinations, their obsessions, their hearts.
And here we all are, she thought. At Fenway.