Chapter Seventeen

Jake

It was morning and I felt like shit. My ribs ached like a bitch and my back felt as if someone had kicked me in the kidneys. I was lying on the mattress of my childhood bed. The thing was like sleeping on a wet sponge, and though a huge collection of pillows and blankets had made it comfortable when I’d crashed last night, this morning, my back was in agony.

A hot shower helped, as did a mug of crap coffee, but they didn’t stop the real pain. That came from looking at my father’s dismal life. The house was a mess and falling apart. The kitchen was empty of edible food except for beer. And the laundry had piled up so high, the entire house reeked.

First things first. I needed food, so I headed out to the grocery store, then back afterward to do the laundry and dishes. And all that time, my father snored loud enough to wake the dead. I was just sitting down to a grilled cheese sandwich when I heard the first stirring of life from Pops’s bedroom.

I tensed as always. No one with a hangover ever handled the morning well, though it was way past noon. So I ate my sandwich with slow care while silently calculating odds.

Would Pops start the day by attacking me? Or trying to be conciliatory? Fifty-fifty.

Would Pops notice all the housework I’d done? One hundred percent yes. But would he be grateful? I gave it a 1 percent chance. Pops didn’t know how to be grateful.

But here was the real question. Was Pops ready to take control of his life? I’d placed his bottle of naltrexone on the table, just in case. It was the medication that had saved me from alcoholism, but so far, I was the only one in the family to make it work. Would Pops be ready today? Would he finally turn his life around this afternoon? The probability was so astronomically small, I amused myself by guessing at the number of zeros behind the odds against it.

And yet here I sat, hoping he would prove me wrong.

I was just swallowing the last of my sandwich when the curses began. He was calling himself names, which was a surprise. But then he hadn’t realized I was here yet. A moment later, he came bumbling out of his room while pulling on a shirt. But the moment he saw me in the kitchen, he froze and gave me an angry glare.

I cut him off before he could speak.

“You’re not late. Larry covered your shift.” I should have stopped there. I knew I should have, but I couldn’t resist throwing in a jab. “It would be nice if you offered to take his shift tonight. Otherwise he’ll be pulling a double.”

“Don’t tell me how to handle my own son.”

I didn’t respond. I knew I’d thrown the first punch, so I buttoned my lip. Instead, I stood up and poured him his hangover cure. It was a ridiculous concoction of tomato juice, cayenne pepper, and herbs that were supposed to put hair on your chest. It had been handed down from father to son for generations of alcoholics. And I swear, it was one of the primary reasons I’d wanted to stop drinking.

Pops took it and slammed it back like it was a beer.

“Omelet?” I asked. “Or grilled cheese?” Those were the mainstay of my cooking talents. Plus a burger or microwaved hot dog, but I knew Pops wouldn’t want either of those.

He didn’t answer, and in the silence, the blare of the washing machine finishing was cringeworthy loud. I got up and headed to the machine, but not before I saw my father notice all the things I’d done. The dishes were washed and in the drying rack. The overflowing garbage was emptied. The living room was picked up and the empty beer bottles gone.

Then his gaze landed on the pill bottle of naltrexone, and his upper lip curled in disgust. Mine did, too, as I transferred the load and added the next. It took me some time to finish. That was good, because I was already feeling my own temper build. I hated doing my own fucking laundry. Why the hell was I doing his?

By the time I made it upstairs, he’d found his tablet and was listening to some interview. It took me three seconds to realize it was one of my interviews. The pretty redheaded reporter was asking me how it felt to be a hero. It was a bullshit question that had pissed me off when the woman had asked. I answered as I always did.

“I’m no hero,” I said firmly. “All I did was save my own butt. And fortunately, I was able to help a couple others at the same time.”

“That’s a big deal,” the woman purred.

“No, the big deal are the guys who put their lives on the line every day. Firefighters, cops, the military.”

I walked into the kitchen and grabbed eggs out of the refrigerator. I’d already decided to make an omelet. If he didn’t eat it, then I would. Housework always made me hungry. Pops thumbed off his tablet and glared at me.

“You can’t keep risking your life like that. You didn’t have the right equipment. You could have been killed.”

There were a thousand responses I could have made. Another day, I might have. But I was in pain and had just spent hours doing someone else’s housework. That made me completely intolerant of my father’s usual bullshit. Or maybe it was because I saw the bottle of naltrexone in the garbage.

So this time, I cut straight to the chase.

“And you can’t keep using my life as an excuse for your drinking. I win a game, you celebrate at the bar. I lose a game, you commiserate at the bar. I save my girlfriend and a kid from a burning building, you go drink because it scared you. Or you were proud. I don’t know what bullshit goes through your head, but I’m done.”

I put the eggs back in the refrigerator. I wasn’t sticking around long enough to cook them. I was just too fucking tired.

He said things back at me. Angry words. Excuse words. I’ll-do-better words. I didn’t care to listen. I’d heard it all before, so now it was just noise that I worked damned hard to block. I grabbed my phone and called for an Uber. Then I headed for the door.

He was there before me, his expression unexpectedly terrified. I was just going to step around him, but he said two words that made me pause.

“Thank you.”

I froze, mentally wondering how my predictions had gotten so bad lately. I’d given it a 1 percent chance that my father would ever say those words. And in my pause, he gestured around the house.

“I see what you done.”

I nodded, unsure what to say. Unsure what to think.

“I liked that girl last night. Seemed like a real nice one.”

She was. She is. My mind stuttered. I didn’t like the idea that Ellie had even met my father. The contrast between her father and mine was stark enough to be painful. I wanted to be Ellie’s hero. Instead, I’d shown her last night just how pathetic my life was compared with hers. Sure, I could play baseball. Or I would, as soon as my ribs healed. But she had the loving family, the sister who teased and cared for her, and even a cousin who threatened to beat up anyone who hurt her. What did I have? A drunk father, a mother who’d bailed on me and taken my sister with her, and an angry, jealous brother.

Meanwhile, Pops was warming to his theme. “She reminds me of your mother. When I first met your mom—”

Memory lane, here we come. Except I didn’t have the patience for it. “I know this story. And I’ve got to get to practice.” It was a lie. I’d already told Coach that I was going to take the day off to rest. I didn’t have to be anywhere…except away from here.

“Um, okay.” His gaze roved around the room as he searched for a way to keep me close. And for some incomprehensible reason, I still stood there. I should have just walked out, but he’d already surprised me once this morning. Maybe I was hoping for something else.

Eventually he found a topic. He pointed at the calendar, at the words written in big red letters: “All-Star Game.” “You still got those great tickets for us?” He looked back at me. “I know you aren’t playing this year, but next year, you will for sure. Especially if Nunez keeps hitting for shit.”

There were a hell of a lot more factors than Nunez as to whether or not I’d ever make it to the All-Star Game as a player. But as fans, Pops, Larry, and I had been going since I started hitting home runs in Little League. It was the one vacation we did every year and gave me my best memories. And also some of the worst. Because Pops never failed to get shit-faced at some point. Which left my brother and me taking care of him in a cheap hotel room.

A few years ago, Larry had declared he was done with that, but Pops and I had continued. Until right now. Because I just couldn’t do it again. Certainly not with the extra media attention on me since I’d joined the Bobcats. And especially since team owner Joe Deluce had made a big deal about cleaning up the team’s image. Having a drunken parent at the league’s biggest event would not endear me to him.

I shook my head. “I can’t.”

Pops frowned, his bloodshot eyes confused. “They got you doing something else this year? Some Bobcat—”

“No,” I interrupted. “I’m taking Ellie.”

Then, knowing that I’d see him reach for a beer in response, I turned around and walked straight out of the house.