Paige made Trevor tell her the story over and over again. How he’d watched their empty seats. Abandoned his at-bat. How Dwight and the other Catfish had followed right behind once they knew what was up.
“It was because of you,” he told her. “You’ve helped just about every one of those guys and they care about you. That’s fine, as long as they know that you belong to me.”
“I think they know,” said Paige wryly. “You’ve barely even let go of my hand since it happened.”
“Not until I have to.” He lifted their clasped hands to his lips. “For, like, baseball stuff.”
Crush, of course, ate up the publicity. Even though the Wades were going to escape charges by testifying against the Wachowskis, there was no way they’d be permitted to buy the team. But Crush wasn’t taking any chances. He still wanted to keep his vow and win the championship.
“If you win, it will be thanks to Trevor,” Paige told Crush, cornering him on the field before an interview with ESPN. She’d insisted on dragging Trevor along for this confrontation. In every corner of the field, players were stretching, working out, tossing the ball around. The buzz of the upcoming game generated a low simmer of excitement. “He’s done so much already. How about helping him out now?”
“I’m already paying his damn salary,” Crush grumbled. “What else does he want from me?”
Trevor stiffened. “I don’t need your charity, Crush. I can make my way just fine.”
Paige gave him a “shush” sign. “Dad, you said if Trevor played well, the Friars might call him up. He’s played more than well.”
“Yes, well, they probably will, then.” The camera operator approached with a body mic, which he attached to Crush’s Catfish shirt.
“Make them,” Paige insisted. “They’ll listen to you.”
“There’s only one person who can make them pay attention.” Crush jerked his head toward Trevor. “Him. And the Friars are burnt out on Trevor Stark. He’s got to do something spectacular. Something they can’t ignore.”
“Like what?”
“He’s a slugger. He’ll figure it out.” At a gesture from the cameraman, he tapped the mic with a murmured “Testing, testing.” Paige bit her lip, frustration rolling off her in waves. “Tell you what,” Crush said when the audio check was done. “Trevor, if you accept my challenge, I promise to do my part with the Friars.”
Challenge? Trevor wasn’t sure exactly what he was talking about, but he wasn’t going to back down from a challenge. He tilted his head in agreement. “I’m in, whatever it is. And whatever it is, you’re going to lose.”
“I might. I just might. But—are you sure it’ll be a loss?” With a cryptic wink, Crush turned to the waiting camera crew. As they began their countdown, Paige tugged Trevor out of camera range.
“What challenge?” she asked, looking perplexed. “Do you know what he’s talking about?”
“Nope.” He guided her away from the crew. “But I intend to win it.”
“Game Five. Give me something spectacular,” Crush called after them.
Game Five took place on a muggy, leaden evening under a sky filled with sullen clouds. The flags hung limp on the flagpoles, moisture heavy in the air. Low scoring weather, the commentators agreed. Look for ground balls, as the batters will try to tire out the fielders. And don’t expect home runs. With that amount of humidity, the balls just wouldn’t get enough lift.
Trevor had never felt so ready for a game. It all came down to this moment. For the first time in his adult life he was able to fully focus on a game without a whisper of worry about the Wachowskis.
Paige was right where she ought to be, in that seat in the owner’s box, her brilliant smile scattering sunshine wherever she looked. Crush sat next to her. He realized, as the stirring tones of the National Anthem rolled through the stadium, that he actually wanted to win for Crush. He cared about the man. The revelation that Crush was largely responsible for his baseball career had really thrown him for a loop. All this time he’d thought the owner despised him. But really, Crush just wanted him to be the best he could be.
Which was exactly what Trevor wanted.
The need to prove himself, to show everyone some spectacular play, consumed him. At batting practice, the power flowing through his body had actually unnerved him. He’d held back, focusing on control and precision. During his pregame visualization routine, his usual crystal clear imagery had taken on a different appearance. Intense, rimmed with fire, as if formed from flame instead of ice.
As he walked onto the field for his first at-bat, it seemed surprising that the grass under his feet didn’t burst into flames. He nodded to the umpire and the catcher, whose eyes widened at Trevor’s intensity. Settling into his stance, he used the dirt of the batter’s box to ground himself. Plant his feet. Become aware of his thighs, his body, his connection with the ground. Focus.
Too much adrenaline. To work some of it off, he purposely overswung on the first pitch, a fastball. The pitcher’s shoulders relaxed as he received the ball back from the catcher. Good, let him get overconfident. Trevor made a show of getting down on himself, stepping out of the batter’s box, muttering to himself. He didn’t look over at Paige, but he felt her presence filling him with light and warmth. Something spectacular. He needed something spectacular.
When he stepped back into the box, one word described how he felt. Invincible. The next pitch came to him like a message from destiny, a fat, juicy ball drawn inevitably to the middle of plate, where it met a perfect lethal blur of a swing. He crushed that pitch. Obliterated it. Every head whipped around to watch the ball fly. An awed roar lifted him and sent him cruising around the bases. Kids scrambled all the way to the top seat of the bleachers to find the ball. Had anyone ever seen a home run hit that far in Catfish Stadium? He doubted it.
In the dugout, the electrified Catfish surged to their feet, exchanging high fives.
As he rounded third, Trevor stole a glance at Paige. One look into her eyes and he got fired up all over again.
Sure, an extra-long home run was spectacular, but he was just getting started.
In his next at-bat, he hit another home run. Another in his third. Three home runs in four innings. In his fourth at-bat, with a man on second, the Storm Chasers walked him. Despite the pregame predictions, it was a high-scoring game, with several pitchers brought in on both sides. The Omaha team beat up on poor Dan Farrio, who gave up seven runs in one inning. But Trevor kept the Catfish in the game. By the sixth inning he was personally responsible for five runs batted in. And he felt stronger than ever.
In his fifth at-bat, he reached for a curveball that dipped low and outside and muscled it into a long drive that slipped over the right field fence, just over the wildly gyrating Storm Chaser trying to stop it. Home run number four. Number five should have been a foul, but even the winds were blowing in his favor today. At the last second the ball wafted two inches to the right of the left field foul pole.
Then, in the eighth inning, he made minor league history. He hit his sixth home run of the game, a floating butterfly of a ball that landed at Brian the peanut vendor’s feet. With a huge grin, the kid brandished the ball high in the air, then handed out all the peanuts on his tray for free. The crowd and the radio commentators went absolutely wild. “No one has hit six home runs in a game since 1902, when Jay Clarke hit eight home runs in one game. But that game was played on a temporary field with a right field wall only 210 yards from home plate. That puts an asterisk next to that record, if you will. It’s considered unbreakable. No one’s come closer than five until today. You’re witnessing history, folks. Absolutely phenomenal. Can Trevor Stark keep this going and become the only guy to hit seven?”
In the owner’s box, Paige was jumping up and down, shrieking, but Crush sat back, arms folded, a slight smirk on his arrogant face.
Instead of celebrating with the rest of the Catfish, Trevor set his jaw and kept his focus on the field. The game wasn’t over. If Crush wasn�
�t impressed, the Friars wouldn’t be.
And now that the brakes were off, Trevor wanted to be on the Friars postseason roster the way he wanted air in his lungs.
In the ninth inning, with the Catfish down two runs, the bottom of the batting order came up to bat. Shizuko, Backman, and T.J. Gates combined for a beautiful rally that tied the game.
In the top of the tenth inning, “Killer” Garrett, the new reliever just called up from the Double A team, put a lid on the Storm Chasers except for one slip, a wild pitch that allowed in one run.
The Catfish went to the bottom of the tenth inning down one, with Trevor scheduled to bat second. Leiberman struck out. Trevor strode to the plate, glared at Crush Taylor, and slammed the first pitch so hard it knocked a light out of the scoreboard, sending a spray of sparks into the velvety night air.
Home run number seven. Tie game.
The crowd sat in awed silence for a long moment, suspended in disbelief at what they were witnessing. Trevor jogged around the bases, not cracking a smile. Even the Storm Chasers offered tips of the cap as he passed. At third base, he held up, just for a moment, to look at Paige. Tears streamed down her face.
Crush had finally come to his feet, clapping slowly while the rest of the crowd exploded into an ovation.
Trevor put his hand to his heart, held Paige’s misty blue gaze, then dove into the dugout.
“The display of power and consistency we’ve seen tonight is unlike anything I’ve seen in this game,” the play-by-play guy raved from a radio within Trevor’s hearing. “We always knew Trevor Stark possessed the sheer strength and ability to hit homers. But what we have here isn’t about strength. It’s about focus and will and consistency. If the Friars don’t call him up to San Diego, stat, they’ll have a fan rebellion on their hands.” Someone’s radio was turned to maximum volume. In baseball, when something historic happened, everyone gathered around their radios or TVs or streaming feeds, whatever they had available. It was a shared experience, and it humbled Trevor to have inspired this moment.
He put his elbows on his knees, leaned forward and stared at the dugout floor, which was littered with sunflower seeds and infield dirt from people’s cleats. The weight of what he’d done pressed onto him. He’d just grabbed a piece of history. Forevermore, he’d be in the baseball annals. Never again would he be able to hide.
He looked right and caught the eye of Benny, the equipment assistant who traveled with the team. He’d gotten to know Benny at the Boys and Girls Club, and got him the job with the team. Even though Benny had slow speech from being abused as a kid, he was the most dedicated equipment assistant the Catfish ever had. Right now, he was staring in awe at Trevor, blinking back tears, as if he was witnessing an angel.
Trevor tried to smile back but his face felt frozen. It was too much. That wasn’t him, that guy Benny looked up to. He turned his head away and caught Dwight’s eye. Dwight winked and made a “shaka” sign—hang loose, dude. It’s all good.
When the Catfish took the field for the top of the eleventh, Trevor had found his calm again. With a strong inning, the Storm Chasers could put things out of reach. Trevor might get more at-bats, or he might not. That was baseball. You took what it gave you and gave it everything you had.
A two-run homer put the Storm Chasers in the lead, but “Killer” Garrett shut them down for the rest of the inning; 13-11, Storm Chasers.
The home team Catfish came to bat in the bottom half of the eleventh, which turned into a grind-it-out battle for every out, every base. Trevor watched with his heart in his mouth, just like everyone else in the stands. With every particle of his being, he rooted for his teammates, every swing and miss feeling like it was his. He screamed encouragement until his throat was raw. Three times the Catfish were one strike from losing, but each time they fended off defeat. They got one run back when Ramirez hit a home run. T.J. hit a pop fly for out number two. Leiberman beat out a dribbler to first. Dwight walked, sending Leiberman to second. The Catfish now had two men on base with one out left.
And then it was Trevor’s turn. If he made an out, Omaha would win. If he hit a single, Leiberman would score, tying the game. Anything more than a single would score both Leiberman and Dwight and win the series for the Catfish.
Trevor’s hands shook as he stepped into the batter’s box. He looked over his shoulder at Paige. She deserved to be with the best. She deserved a major leaguer. She deserved whatever he could lay at her feet. She’d put herself on the line for him, and then again for his sister. Paige was all heart and light and she deserved something spectacular.
Barely aware of what the pitch was, he put his entire heart into his swing. The ball rose off his bat and traced an arc as graceful as a rainbow, a towering parabola. Was it too high? Would it come down short of the outfield wall? The whole stadium went quiet as the ball reached the height of its rainbow arch and headed toward its pot of gold. Amid a breathless hush, it touched down just past the right center wall.
Home run number eight.
As Trevor rounded the bases, he heard people crying in the stands—and not just Paige, who was sobbing openly.
Record-tying number eight—a walk-off homer—wasn’t a home run so much as a love letter.
His yelling, exuberant teammates poured onto the field. As they gathered him in a mass embrace, he felt tears soaking his face. Where had so much unleashed power and drive come from? It felt almost mystical, as if it came from someplace beyond him. From love, perhaps. Who knew? All he knew was that whoever said there was no crying in baseball would have to eat their words.
Chapter 30
TWO DAYS LATER Trevor took a break from the deluge of interview requests for something even more important. While Paige chatted with the director of the Boys and Girls Club about the fund-raiser, set to take place right after the championship game, he faced the group of teenagers gathered in the common room. It was a bigger than normal group, which made him a little nervous because of what he had to say.
“I owe you guys an apology,” he told them. The kids stopped messing with their cell phones and fixed their eyes on him in fascination. “I’ve been coming in here talking to you like some kind of big shot, but I haven’t been telling you the truth. The truth is, I spent the last three years of high school in juvenile detention. I was scared shitless most of the time. I got into trouble, I fought, I learned some bad habits. You guys know the kind of thing I mean.”
“Did you do drugs?” one kid asked.
“No.” Keep it real, no matter what. “My father was a drug addict. I know what that’s like, and I hated it. Besides, I had baseball and I had a coach who would have kicked my ass.”
Snickers and eye-rolls all down the line.
“What’s it like in juvie?”
“Sometimes it’s boring. Sometimes it’s scary. You have no freedom. You don’t know who to trust. I kept to myself a lot. The food sucks.”
The kids laughed, but they were hanging on every word.
“I was ashamed, and I started feeling real bad about myself. Like I’d never be or do anything good.” He scanned the room, meeting each teen’s gaze. This was the key point, for him. The one thing he wanted to get across.
“That might have been what happened, if it weren’t for my coach. He didn’t let me get too far down. He’d always bring me back and make me work even harder. So that’s what I’m here for. Even if you don’t play baseball, I want to be your coach. If you start feeling down, or like you aren’t worth anything, I want you to call me. I’m going to give all of you my phone number.”
A goth kid wearing black lipstick snickered. “You’re getting out of this hell pit, unlike us. They said on the Internet you’re going to California. What do you care about us?”
Trevor hooked his thumbs in his jean pockets. “Yeah, you’re right, I am going to San Diego. I finally got the call. But phones work in San Diego, don’t they? That’s why I’m giving you my number, so you can call me wherever I am. You think I don’t care? Do
you get a lot of major league baseball players in here giving out their cell numbers?”
The kids, even the goth skeptic, shook their heads and laughed.
“Besides, I fell in love with a Kilby girl. I’ll be back.”
That statement really broke the ice, and Trevor spent the next hour talking with the kids, answering questions and handing out signed baseballs.
On their way out of the Boys and Girls Club, Trevor pulled Paige right up against his side so he could bury his nose in her hair.
“Why do you always smell so good?” he murmured. “Like apples and raspberries. Drives me wild.”
“You know what drives me wild?”
“I have a few ideas.” He let his hand dangle perilously close to her breast.
She swatted it lightly. “You’re impossible.”
“Impossible is my middle name. I did just tie the unbreakable record.” He grinned, still amazed by how everything in his life had changed. “Okay, tell me, what is it that drives you wild?”
“When you play, you’re so stoic. I know people say you’re ice cold on the baseball field, but I don’t see it that way. I always knew that all sorts of stuff was going on inside you. So when you look over at me during a game, and just for a flash I see the real Trevor, the one I know, the one you are with me, it makes me want to run onto the field and jump your bones. Drives me absolutely wild.”
He smiled with the softness only Paige could bring out in him. “I hope you don’t mind if we keep that Trevor your private, personal secret. No one in baseball needs to know about him.”
“It might be too late for that. Your teammates have your number. So do all the batboys and vendors and the kids here. I just wish Crush would get on board. Do you know what he admitted? After I had all those margaritas and announced to him and my mother that I loved you, he was the one who told the Friars they should release you. How dare he interfere like that?”
Drive You Wild: A Love Between the Bases Novel Page 30
