Defending Champ

by Mike Lupica

  Gabe said that Chase still wouldn’t commit to playing on game day. Just to practicing again by Tuesday. Wednesday at the latest.

  “Fact is,” Gabe said, “he wants to get back on that field as much as anyone. If for no other reason than that he misses playing. He doesn’t want to give up one game, even if it isn’t a league game.”

  “Now he knows how we feel,” Alex said.

  Alex reminded Gabe that payment was due for the T-shirts and hats, and they needed to get the program copy to the printer tomorrow.

  “You can go ahead,” Gabe said. “He may not have confirmed it, but he’s going to play.”

  Alex bumped him some fist.

  “Chase said one last thing before he left,” Gabe said. “It was some chirp, actually.”

  “Directed at me?”

  “Who else?”

  Alex waited to hear what words of wisdom Chase had decided to grace her with today.

  “He said to tell you that now he wants to bury you guys.”

  “Ha!” Alex laughed.

  Then she said, “Bring it.”

  40

  As the excitement for The Game was building, word around school was that Chase would return to practice on Wednesday. But he was out there on Tuesday instead.

  Coincidentally, Tuesday was the same day the hats were delivered. The programs were scheduled to arrive that Thursday, and the plan was to set up a table outside the cafeteria with shirts and hats for sale. They were also holding back enough inventory to sell at The Game on Saturday.

  So the good news for the moment wasn’t just that Chase was back on the field and The Game was officially on, but also that the money was starting to come in from sales of the merchandise. The town came through, and small businesses had generously bought up ads for the program. Orville’s main grocery store had agreed to provide drinks for the concession stands and said the profit would go straight to the girls. Rocky’s Hardware had stepped up and written them a very nice check to secure the one-day-only naming rights for the soccer field at Orville High.

  Adding up what they’d made so far through ads and presales, they estimated they’d have to sell $5,000 worth of shirts and hats between now and Saturday to make their number.

  That’s what Coach told them before practice on Wednesday afternoon.

  “Let me worry about the bottom line for the rest of the week,” Coach said. “I want you guys to focus on The Game.”

  “But the money is the most important thing about our game,” Lindsey said.

  Coach shook her head.

  “You can’t put a price tag on a game you’re going to remember for the rest of your lives,” she said.

  “They think we don’t stand a chance,” Roisin said.

  “That’s what the boys have been saying all over school,” Annie said. “That they’re going to clobber us worse than they did during our scrimmage.”

  “Perfect,” Alex said. “That’s just what we want them to think.”

  * * *

  • • •

  They were scrimmaging every day now in preparation for the weekend. On Wednesday, Annie finally won for her side with the prettiest goal Alex had seen from her since they’d started practicing. It was with her left foot, which by now was almost as good as her right, and the shot was from at least twenty yards away from Carly. Didn’t matter. The ball ended up in the upper corner, and there was nothing Carly, as athletic as she was, could do about it. A bomb. Everybody on the field stopped and applauded.

  Without anybody having to say a word, there was a universal feeling permeating the group. Each of them could feel it. They were as ready as they were going to be for Saturday’s game.

  Now all they had to do was wait until Saturday afternoon.

  The girls had secured the soccer field first on Wednesday, and Gabe had practiced early with the baseball team, so his mom picked him and Alex up and drove them over to Alex’s house for one last game of catch before he pitched against the Seneca Bears on Friday at an away game. The girls’ soccer team planned to have a light workout that afternoon so they could reserve their energy for The Game on Saturday.

  But for now, in her backyard, Gabe told Alex he wanted to have what the big-league pitchers called a “side session” to loosen up before playing the Bears in two days. He was confident his arm was ready for Seneca, and ready for the season.

  Boy, is it ready, Alex thought after a few minutes of throwing. She could feel it every time he buried another fastball in the pocket of her catcher’s mitt.

  By the end of their session, having limited himself to just thirty throws, Gabe was feeling so good about himself that he started showing off different arm angles. When he called his last pitch, he told Alex to stay loose, because he was coming at her sidearm.

  The ball flew toward Alex from where third base would have been if she had a real baseball diamond in her yard. But the pitch was wild, forcing her to do a pretty amazing split to come up with the ball, stretching out her arm and catcher’s mitt as far as it would go.

  “You just saved me from my first wild pitch of the season!” Gabe said, laughing.

  “You’re welcome!” Alex yelled back, seated in the grass by now.

  “You know,” Gabe said, coming over to help her up, “you looked like a goalie there. Maybe you’ve been playing out of position.”

  “Yeah, right,” Alex said. “I’ll be happy playing midfield on Saturday.”

  “Mixing it up on the soccer pitch with Chase Gwinn,” Gabe said. “And doing it in front of a big crowd. You ready for that?”

  “So ready,” Alex said as they walked back into her house.

  “Did you ever think when we were playing football that you’d end up here?”

  Alex guffawed. “I didn’t even know I was going to be playing soccer again!”

  They shut the back door and headed into the living room, plopping down on the cushy sofa in front of the TV.

  “Hey,” Gabe said before Alex clicked on the screen, “a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t even know I’d be pitching in our first game.”

  Alex smiled at her friend. “But you know something?” she said. “We’re both in a pretty good place right now.”

  “Totally,” Gabe said. “First big games we’ve had since football.”

  41

  Gabe left to go home around five thirty, and Alex’s mom came over for dinner an hour later.

  She sat right down at the kitchen table and dug into the Thai food her dad had ordered from Lemongrass. Alex sat down with her while Jack washed his hands at the sink.

  “I found out something today,” Liza said out loud.

  Technically, she was addressing them both, but it was Alex to whom she gave her full attention. Alex knew her mom well enough by now to know that whatever she was about to say wasn’t good.

  Alex waited for her to continue.

  “I have to go back to San Francisco,” she said.

  Alex’s heart skipped a beat.

  “When?” she asked, even though she was pretty sure she already knew the answer.

  “Tomorrow,” her mom said apologetically.

  That’s when Alex knew for sure.

  “You’re going to miss our game,” she said.

  It wasn’t a question. If her mom was leaving tomorrow, Thursday, she’d be away on Saturday.

  “One of Richard’s patients requires an hours-long surgery,” she said. “From what he tells me, it’s a complicated procedure, and he’ll need to be at the hospital most of the day Saturday.”

  There had to be more to the story, Alex thought. Richard’s job was just as demanding as her mom’s. This wasn’t exactly new information.

  “He’s going to be at the hospital all day,” Alex’s mom went on, “and your brother has his first T-ball game on Saturday. I can’t have him there without either
one of his parents.”

  At first, Alex felt a little angry. A T-ball game? For five-year-olds? It would probably last a total of twenty minutes, and anyway, kids that age could hardly make contact with the ball. To fly six hours for such a short, insignificant event seemed a little silly to Alex.

  But then she thought about it harder. The truth was, there was no difference between a five-year-old’s T-ball game and the World Series. Not when it came to having your loved ones there to support you. Alex remembered her own T-ball games as a kid. Her dad cheering her on from behind the gate. Nothing could replace those memories or the feeling of someone you love backing you up.

  In fact, maybe it was even more important for Connor, Alex thought. Having that kind of encouragement from an early age could affect how he viewed sports for the rest of his life.

  It finally clicked, and as disappointed as Alex was that her mom would be missing The Game, she knew Connor needed her more this time.

  “I’m so sorry, honey,” her mom said now. “If there were any possible way to be in two places at once, you know I’d find it.”

  “I know, Mom,” Alex said. “You’re Wonder Woman.”

  “Hardly,” Liza said. “Not trying to be a superhero. Just a super mom.”

  Alex’s dad jumped in. “I told your mom I’d get somebody to tape The Game if I have to,” he said. “There’s even some talk that the school might find a way to livestream it, so that people can purchase digital tickets and watch from home.”

  “And I told your dad,” her mom said, “that it won’t be the same.”

  Alex could see how conflicted her mom felt, as if she were choosing one child over the other. But Alex knew that wasn’t the case. She was doing the right thing, and Alex believed it was her job right now not to make her feel worse than she already did.

  “Mom, I get it,” Alex said. “I know how I would have felt if Dad hadn’t been there for my first soccer game all those years ago.”

  Liza cracked a half smile.

  “I’m just sad to be losing part of our team . . .” Alex said jokingly.

  “No kidding,” her mom said. “Your star page-layer-outer.”

  Then she turned to Alex’s dad and said, “Can you hold off on dessert for a few minutes?”

  Jack pressed a hand to his heart in mock horror. “I’ll do my best, but you don’t know what you’re asking.”

  Liza turned to face Alex then. “Let’s you and me have a chat in your room.”

  “Mom, I’m fine,” Alex said. “Really.”

  “Now, you know neither one of us really is,” her mom said. “And you should know that mothers are practically obligated to talk things to death.”

  * * *

  • • •

  They sat facing each other on Alex’s bed, her mom perched at the end, Alex with her back to the headboard, lying among her many pillows.

  “I’m flying back as soon as everything’s all squared away with Richard’s patient,” she said. “And if there’s a season—scratch that, when there’s a season—I’ll get to see a bunch of games before I’m back home for good.”

  As great as it had been having her here, it wasn’t permanent. No matter how much Alex had tried to pretend, the reality was that this wasn’t her mother’s home. Not this house. Not Orville. Not anymore.

  Home for her was San Francisco.

  Home was there.

  It was always going to be there.

  “I wish there were another way,” Alex said to her. “But we both know there isn’t.”

  Her mom reached over and took both her hands.

  “The last time you had a big game,” she said, “I was flying east. Coming to the game. This time I’m going the other way.”

  And then Alex told her mom how much it had meant to her to have her around for this long. How they’d made up for lost time, and that even just the dinners the three of them shared made them feel like a real family, at least for a little while.

  “Honey,” her mom said. “We are a real family. And always will be. Just maybe not exactly the way I’d imagined things when I had you.”

  Alex nodded. “I know I said it like a joke before,” she said, “but I meant it when I said you were part of the team.”

  Liza patted Alex’s knee and gave it a little shake. “And I mean it when I say I feel the same way.”

  Alex got up off the bed and grabbed her phone from her desk. She opened up Spotify and started up her Taylor Swift playlist. During her mom’s stay, one of many things they’d discovered was how much they both loved Taylor Swift.

  A song started playing through Alex’s Bluetooth speakers: “The Best Day.”

  How ironic, Alex thought. But when she stopped to listen to the lyrics, she realized Taylor was describing her mother. And how she’d been there for her during tough times. Alex’s mom might not be there for The Game, but she’d supported Alex her whole life. Even from afar.

  “Hey,” Alex’s mom said now. “You did this, you know? You and the other girls on the team. You turned a good idea into something glorious.”

  “That’s what Coach says.”

  “Another reason to love that Coach Cross.”

  “But no matter how great a day it is,” Alex said, “how great can it be if we don’t end up raising enough money?”

  “You will,” Liza said. “I have faith.”

  “But what if we don’t, Mom?”

  “Then it will still be a day to remember,” she said. “Your dad’s right. There really are all sorts of ways to keep score in sports.”

  It was quiet between them for a few seconds. Not an awkward quiet. Peaceful, really.

  “Since it is just us,” Alex said, “can I tell you something?”

  “Anything.”

  “I know Saturday is about more than winning The Game,” she said. “But I want to beat those guys so bad.”

  Liza let out a belly laugh that shook the mattress. “That’s my girl,” she said.

  Then her mom got up and threw her arms around Alex. They stayed that way, in a standing hug, neither one moving for a long time, just listening to the music.

  42

  The forecast predicted that Saturday would be one of the warmest days of the year so far. Even though they hadn’t reached the official first day of spring, the temperature was supposed to be in the midsixties.

  But today was Friday, and winter was still very much alive and well. Alex sat on the cold bleachers in Seneca with her dad, the two of them bundled under their thick Steelers football blanket. They were ready to watch Gabe’s first baseball game of the season on a chilly, sunless afternoon.

  Spring training had begun in Florida and Arizona for big-league teams. But this was western Pennsylvania, which meant just-above-freezing temperatures and gray skies.

  The game took place at a cool baseball park near the center of town, with an outfield fence covered in advertisements from local businesses. Alex looked at them with a tinge of regret for not setting their sights wider by approaching stores in neighboring towns for their program, but at this point, it didn’t matter. They had been able to fill up the program just fine from Orville businesses alone.

  As cold as she was, even underneath the black-and-yellow knit blanket she and her dad used for Steelers games in December and January, she was glad to be at Gabe’s game today, seeing her friend preparing to throw his first pitches of the season in the bottom of the first.

  And yet, right at this very moment, her mom was boarding a flight from Pittsburgh’s airport to San Francisco International.

  The only other people in the stands on the third-base side were parents of the Orville players. Before the Owls had batted in the top of the first, Gabe had come over to where they were sitting.

  “You came,” he said to Alex.

  “A promise is a promise,” she reminded
him, “even if I feel like I’m going to be watching you from inside a refrigerator.”

  “Thanks for coming anyway,” Gabe said.

  “I tell you all the time,” Alex said, “you’d do the same for me.”

  “Now I just need to throw as well to Cal as I do in your backyard,” Gabe said.

  Cal was Cal Calabrese, Dr. Calabrese’s son. He played on the Owls football team and was also Gabe’s catcher.

  “You bring home a W today,” Alex said, “and then our team will get one tomorrow.”

  “Thinking positive?” Gabe asked.

  “Yeah,” Alex said. “Me and the girls are like the Little Engine That Could.”

  Gabe laughed. “You think you can. You think you can.”

  “Exactly.” Then Alex pulled her hand out from underneath the blanket and high-fived him. “And today, I know you can.”

  The Owls jumped off to a lead in their first at-bat, thanks to three of Alex’s football teammates. Tariq Connolly, a centerfielder, hit a double that rolled all the way to the outfield fence, right in front of a sign for Cold Stone. Gabe was next up, batting third because he was their best hitter, and he singled home Tariq. It was 1–0, just like that. Then big Perry Moses, who’d been a clutch tight end for Alex, doubled home Gabe, and by the time the half inning was over, the Owls led, 2–0.

  Then it was time for Gabe to take the mound and pitch a real game for the first time since he played for the sixth-grade team last spring. Alex studied his face and body language for signs of nerves but couldn’t spot any, though she was positive he had to be feeling something.

  And he promptly proved it by walking the Bears’ leadoff batter on four straight pitches, not one of them close to being a strike.

  He slipped on his first pitch to their second batter and went down.

  Alex gasped, a little too loudly, and her father gently placed a hand on her arm to calm her.

  “Relax, kid,” he said. “I think he just stepped in a hole the other pitcher made with his landing foot. It rained yesterday, remember? That dirt in front of the mound looks pretty soft to me.”