Playing for the Save (Men of Spring Baseball Book 3)

by Rachelle Ayala

  “My dad doesn’t know how it is in America,” Timmy says. “He thinks of Tina as a daughter and he says they’re friends, but Americans think everything’s about sex, and they’re going to believe he’s a dirty old man.”

  His expression is earnest, as if being called a dirty old man is the worst of all insults. Actually, I haven’t heard that terminology for what, thirty years at least.

  “Your dad seems like a gentleman,” I mollify him. “But if you want to introduce me, I’ll be glad to make his acquaintance.”

  We head over to the corner where they’re at, but before I can raise my voice to greet Timmy’s father, Doreen beats me to the punch.

  “How’s Blondie doing?” she asks Timmy’s father and they bump knuckles as if they’re best buddies.

  “She don’t like being left at home, so I gave her a pile of doggie biscuits.”

  “Same with Hershey,” Doreen says. “He’s excited with all the people around, especially the boys and Ryan, and now he’s probably in the backyard howling and annoying the neighbors.”

  “That’s Blondie for you.” Timmy’s dad chuckles. “Ready to see the opening pitch?”

  He puts his hand on his son. “You’re pitching a no hitter today, aren’t you? No pressure, but a no hitter means no one gets on base.”

  “Actually, that’s a perfect game,” Timmy corrects him. I notice he intentionally steers his father away from the young woman who pretends she doesn’t care that everyone’s ignoring her.

  “Hi, I’m Frances,” I greet her. “Last day of spring training’s a big day, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah.” She shrugs and slouches with her back against the wall, hands in pockets. Her upper lip is pierced all the way through and she has tattoos on her hands and up her arms as far as I can see.

  Timmy’s right. They do make an odd couple, but hey, I’m not judging. Besides, Doreen has steered Timmy’s father off to introduce him to the boys, Drew and Ben.

  Ryan comes up beside me and puts his arm around my shoulder. “This is where I belong. I’m going to be back to play this season and take this team to the playoffs, maybe even win the World Series.”

  “You have my complete support,” I reassure him. “I wish your dad could be here today.”

  “He is here.” Ryan waves up in the air. “Promise me, Mom, when I throw the first pitch, to talk to him. Let him know you know he’s always watching over me.”

  “I will, son.” I return his hug, as Jamie and the boys come to my side.

  “Time to go find our seats,” Jamie says. She turns to the boys. “Hold my hand and don’t get lost out there. Huge crowd today.”

  “Frances, can I hold your hand?” Drew asks me. His blue eyes are big and clear, reminding me of Ryan’s once he started talking again.

  “Why, of course. I’ll be happy to.” I take his precious little hand in mine. It’s a big step for an autistic child to hold hands with an adult, because generally, they don’t like being touched or controlled in any way.

  Jamie gives me an encouraging smile, and I realize at this very moment, that Drew’s gesture is my official welcome into this precious little family.

  Happily, we find our seats in a box reserved for family members. Timmy’s father is back paying attention to the young woman, while Doreen points things out to Ben.

  After we’re seated, Timmy’s father insists on buying hotdogs and food for everyone, so he takes off with Doreen and the young lady.

  I sit next to Drew, and he shows me a baseball. He traces his finger around the seam of the ball and says, “Ryan going to throw a knuckleball and this how you hold it.”

  He places his little fingers on the ball with his fingertips over the seams of the ball.

  “Why a knuckleball?” I ask to converse with him.

  “Because you never know where a knuckleball will go. It’s a surprise.”

  Again, a rare insight for an autistic child who thrives on predictability.

  “Do you like surprises?”

  “Only the good ones.” He smiles big, all gap-toothed, from losing his two front teeth recently.

  “Well then, let all surprises be good ones.” I put my hand up the way I see Ryan do, and he gives me a slap.

  “You’re a good surprise. My mommy says so.”

  I catch Jamie’s glance and a sudden onslaught of tears threaten to wet my carefully applied makeup.

  Jamie and I have a lot in common, and I have a feeling we’re going to be best of all friends—if not in-laws—not that I’m getting ahead of myself.

  We stand for the national anthem and salute our flag. I must be getting sentimental, because I feel Ryan’s father at my side with his hand over his heart, and I’m glad Ryan let me know that he watches over him.

  “Ryan’s on the mound!” Drew jumps up and points. He grips his baseball and makes a throwing motion but doesn’t let go of it.

  The announcer shouts out Ryan’s name for the ceremonial opening pitch. Pride swells inside my chest as the entire ballpark gives him a standing ovation. He jogs out to the mound, waving with his right hand. His left arm is still in a sling, but I know my boy. His arm is strong enough that he doesn’t need a full windup.

  It takes a while for the cheers to die down, and then all eyes are on my son, who only a few short weeks ago, was carted away on a stretcher.

  The pitch is so fast I mostly missed it, especially through my blurry eyes. It slaps into the catcher’s mitt and the game starts.

  I join everyone in clapping and cheering, but while others see an athlete in his prime swagger off the field, I close my eyes and see the little toddler walking toward me with his hands outstretched the last time he said, “Mama,” before going into the quiet zone.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  “Blow out your candles. All of them,” Jamie encouraged Drew as he stared at the six candles on his birthday cake.

  The Rattlers won their last game and they had a surprise for Drew. Somehow, Timmy, their host for the game, had gathered all of Drew’s classmates and teachers for a surprise birthday party at the clubhouse cafeteria.

  “But I like candles,” Drew said. He seemed mesmerized by the tiny flickering flames.

  “If you don’t blow them out, they’ll burn down into the cake.” I prodded him. “Let’s see you take a big breath and blow them all out.”

  “Okay, bye, bye, candles.” Drew inhaled and blew and blew and blew. One by one, the candles flickered out. The cake was a large sheet cake with a baseball diamond and candles at each base, as well as two on the pitcher’s mound. One for Ryan and the other for Drew.

  Everyone clapped and sang another round of ‘Happy Birthday’ for Drew.

  Jamie looked up at Ryan, who was always at her side, and he leaned over and gave her a kiss. That first day of spring training seemed so far away, and she never imagined she would be standing side by side with her very own baseball player—her lover and life partner—with her boys surrounded by friends.

  Marcia hooked an arm over her shoulder. “Want me to cut the cake or hand them out?”

  “Jamie can cut and you can hand them out,” Ryan said, interrupting. He handed the cake knife to Jamie.

  What was that all about? She hadn’t known him to be quite so bossy. But then again, the cake was a work of art, a baseball diamond complete with bases, the infield, outfield, and warning strip decorated with frosted baseballs.

  Jamie waved the cake knife around and asked Drew, “Which piece do you want? Home base or the frosted baseballs around the outfield?”

  “I want the pitcher’s mound. Me and Ryan.” He pointed to the two candles, one taller than the other.

  “Usually, we start from the side of the cake,” Jamie said. “Do you want one of these frosted baseballs?”

  “No.” Drew put on his stubborn face, jutting his lower lip. “I’m the birthday boy and I want the pitcher’s mound.”

  Some things weren’t worth fighting. If Jamie had her pick, she would have taken a frosted baseba
ll in the outfield, no doubt a sugar bomb.

  Carefully, she stabbed the cutter around the circle of the pitcher’s mound, including the white rectangle in the center which was a piece of white chocolate, which Drew usually didn’t like.

  She extracted the cake and placed it on his plate. “Here you go, birthday boy.”

  “Will you eat the white chocolate? I don’t like it.” Drew made a face.

  “Which is why I asked if you wanted the frosted baseballs,” Jamie said. “Save it for me later. I have to pass out cake to everyone else.”

  “No, I want you to eat it right now,” Drew insisted.

  Jamie looked at all her friends gathered around, some with children, and of course, Ben, who was staring at the cake saying he wanted a frosted baseball.

  “Later,” she whispered. “Put it on the side for me.”

  She started to cut a frosted baseball to put on another plate when she heard the familiar hissing sound Drew made when he was about to have a meltdown.

  Seriously?

  He’d been doing so well she’d almost forgotten that crowds and drastic changes to his routine would stress him so that anything could set him off.

  “It’s okay, eat the chocolate,” the people gathered around said. They all had experience with children on the spectrum, so she was on home turf here.

  Sheepishly, Jamie set the cake cutter down and picked up Drew’s plate. “Okay, Mommy will eat the pitcher’s rubber.”

  As soon as she said it, everyone laughed and she noticed phone cameras pointed at her.

  What was so special about eating a piece of white chocolate?

  Jamie picked off the white rectangle. Her jaw unhinged and her heart took a fly ball into the outfield.

  A glittering diamond ring sat in a cutout area underneath, surrounded by a ring of cardboard.

  She turned to Ryan and he was already on his knees. Had he worked this out with Drew, up to and including the fake meltdown?

  “Jamie Michele Rush.” Ryan took her hand, still holding the white chocolate. “The day I met you was the day I met my better half. They say each of us were created as two beings, joined together, with four legs, four arms, two heads, but one heart. We’re separated when we come into this world, and we spend our lives looking for our better half. I’m one of the lucky ones, because the first time I saw you, I knew you were the one.”

  Jamie swallowed and blinked at the multitude of emotions cresting through her. She felt the same way, too, but she had no words to describe what was going through her. Fortunately, a woman accepting a proposal had only one word to say, so she concentrated on taking in Ryan’s performance so she could play it back in the future. It would be nice to have photographic or videographic memory for special occasions like now.

  “Jamie, I promised you a big baseball diamond on your finger, and I bet you thought I would stick an entire ballpark on that sweet ring finger of yours.” He chuckled as he took her finger and placed it in the hole in the cake, trying to thread it through the ring.

  Instead, he got chocolate and frosting all over her knuckles. The people around them made comments about him licking the mess off her finger.

  “Well, this wasn’t exactly how I envisioned this,” Ryan said, bending and flexing her finger.

  She helped it along by bending her fingertip and pushing it against the cardboard collar until she’d hooked the ring.

  It came out upside down, but Ryan quickly twisted it around and righted it.

  “You did something wrong,” Timmy said. “You put the ring on her before you popped the question.”

  “I can’t believe I went out of order.” Ryan raised his eyebrows. He kissed her frosting smeared knuckles and gave her a wink. “My sweet Jamie, will you complete my life and join me for the rest of the journey? Will you marry me?”

  Jamie was nodding even before he finished asking. “Yes, yes, and yes from Ben and Drew, too.”

  Both boys also chimed in with their yeses.

  Ryan on his knees was the right height for Jamie to fully kiss him without craning her neck, so she let him have it, kissing him with the floods of love and joy he’d brought into her life.

  She didn’t have a speech, but she didn’t need one. The songs without words were the songs that came straight from the heart.

  EPILOGUE

  Heat sweltered well into the evening at Rattlers Stadium. Game seven of the World Series. Top of the ninth with the visiting team, the New York Minutemen, threatening a rally.

  The Rattlers were ahead by one run, but the third relief pitcher had given up two hits, and men were on first and third with two outs.

  It was time for the closer, and that meant the old fox, Ryan Hudson.

  The Minutemen called timeout and substituted in their most reliable hitter, Banger Gutierrez.

  Coach Thomas gave Ryan the nod. “Go in there, son, and clean out the inning.”

  His teammates reached out and patted him for good luck as he left the bullpen.

  “You’ve got it, big guy.”

  “One out and it’s the series.”

  “We’re counting on you, dude.”

  Kirk, the catcher, ambled up to the mound to give Ryan the lowdown since he used to play for the Minutemen.

  “This guy, Gutierrez, is going to wait for a pitch he likes. He’ll wait it out, not swinging even on a strike to see what you’ve got. Tempt him with a fastball, low and inside.”

  “Got it,” Ryan said. “How about the knuckleball?”

  “No, just follow my signs. I know this guy. He’s a sly cat. He won’t swing until he likes it.”

  “He’ll have to or he’ll be called out.” Ryan flipped the ball into his glove. “I’m going to get him swinging.”

  The batter approached the plate, and the crowd roared. Ryan knew Jamie was up there biting her nails while Drew would be trying to guess which pitch he’d throw and gripping the ball in his hand. Ben would be swinging his hands with an imaginary bat and yelling like an umpire, while his mother would have her hands clasped together, praying under her breath.

  Ryan bent low and peered at Kirk’s signals. It was what he’d expected. Fast, low and inside, a two-seamer.

  He put the ball inside his glove, turned it where no one could see, wound up, and let it wail.

  “Strike one.”

  Gutierrez hadn’t even blinked. Was he going to stand there like a practice dummy?

  Ryan checked first and third, feigned a pickoff and then got into position to deliver the second pitch, a slider.

  “Ball one,” the umpire yelped.

  He could afford to let Banger get bigheaded. The guy thought he was an old man, that he had no fastballs left. He was checking out his repertoire, and he also knew Kirk’s calls, having been teammates before.

  Ryan shook off Kirk’s call for a sinker. He shook off the changeup and tapped the brim of his hat, signaling that he was going to power a tempting fastball down the middle.

  Kirk didn’t like it one bit, shaking his head, but Banger expected another breaking pitch. It was what Kirk always called at 1-1. After checking the runners on base, Ryan reared back and shot the four-seam fastball so fast and hard, it was almost invisible.

  Swing and a miss. Banger was a split second too late.

  Ryan smiled to himself as he caught the return ball. He’d upset Banger’s timing and that hurt.

  By now, the entire stadium was in an uproar and the noise was so thick you couldn’t drive a Mack truck through it.

  Kirk signaled a change-up, the great pretender pitch. It looked like a fastball, but it was slower and messed with the batter’s head.

  With two strikes and men on base, the batter had to swing at anything that looked good, but at the same time, he didn’t want to give Banger a chance to hit it out of the park. That last fastball he’d thrown weighed heavily on Banger’s mind, letting him know the old fox wasn’t out of steam.

  He shook off Kirk’s call for the change-up and gave him the signal for the knu
ckleball.

  Knuckleballs were erratic creatures, free-spirited and defiant of all control. It was basically a pitch without a spin, and in the science of things, that caused turbulence, which generated unpredictability.

  It was also hard to catch. If Kirk missed and passed the ball, the runner on third would score the tying run, and the runner on first could make it to third.

  Nope. It was risky, which was precisely why Banger wouldn’t expect it.

  A knuckleball thrown wrong would be a big, fat gift and a homerun. But one thrown right?

  Hell yeah!

  Ryan stared down the batter, looking for all practical purposes like he was going to nail him with a fastball. It was a macho thing, and Banger knew it. Taunting him with the most hittable pitch and then taking it away—or maybe not.

  Maybe he’d throw the perfect homerun pitch just because he could get it past him. At least that was what he hoped Banger thought.

  A quick check at the baserunners and Ryan kicked back. As if in slow motion, his body recounted the thousands of times he’d thrown a pitch. Muscles and tendons clicked into place. He felt every seam, stitch and scratch on the leather ball tactilely, and he pushed, rather than threw the ball with little to no spin—a dead zone and then, on a wing of a prayer, he let chaos do its job.

  Banger swung hard, and Kirk’s glove twisted, almost losing the ball.

  “Strike three! You’re out!” The umpire danced a jig with a karate chop.

  Ryan lifted his face to the desert sky and closed his eyes for a few moments of peace before the celebration began.

  “Thank you, Dad. Thank you for always watching and not speaking. Thank you, Mom, my brightest guiding light. Thank you, Jamie, Ben, and Drew, my hidden treasures. And most of all, thank you, God, for giving me not a disability, but a specialbility.”

  The team swarmed the field, gathering around Ryan, jumping and throwing their gloves as they celebrated their World Series win. The fans were on their feet screaming and hollering while fireworks erupted over the stadium.

  Jamie was a mess of nerves as she and her boys, Frances, her mother, and her friends made their way from their box, escorted by the ushers.