“Because Miller was five years old, and she had just lost her mom.”
My eyes dart to the framed picture on his desk. A pre-teen Miller in her yellow softball shirt with a giant number fourteen on her uniform. Knowing what I know of the woman now, my chest aches at what she went through at such a young age.
Taking off my hat, my thumb dusts the photo of Max I keep tucked in there.
Monty sighs with resignation. “She was in kindergarten and had lost the only parent she had ever known. She needed me.”
“Do you regret quitting? Is that why you don’t want me to do the same?”
“Not for a second. I needed her as much as she needed me, but it was different for Miller and me than it is for you and Max. I was looking for direction at that point in my life, and I’m a much better coach than I ever was a player.”
My eyes stay glued to her photo.
“You have the help I never had. You and Max have so many people behind you. Your brother, me, this entire team.”
Miller, I silently add.
I can see it from the weeks she’s been here how protective she is of Max, how much she cares for him already, but I won’t say that out loud for her father to hear.
“What is quitting going to do? Keep you home to make sure Max is happy? You know what makes a kid happy? Watching their parent fulfill their dreams. Baseball is still your dream, I know it is. Stop viewing it as the enemy and let yourself enjoy it. All of it—the team, the travel, the fans. Once it’s gone, it’s gone.”
Keeping my eyes on Miller’s photo, her words ring through my mind. How she doesn’t want Max to feel the guilt she does, how she wants to help me find a balance between the two loves in my life.
“Kai, look at me.”
I do so, finding Monty across the desk.
“I love both you and your son. You know that. You’re the best pitcher I’ve ever had on my roster, but I wouldn’t ask you to stay if I didn’t think it was the right thing for you both. I want you to have the opportunity I never had. You’ve got a hell of a lot of people in your corner.”
For someone who has always felt alone in my responsibilities, never having anyone else to rely on, it’s not easy for me to see the help around me. But it’s there. There’s not a single soul on this team or staff who wouldn’t go out of their way for me or my son. I tend to wallow in self-pity, telling myself I’m alone in this, but I’m not.
I nod. “Sometimes I forget to look.”
“Well, you spent a lot of years looking and coming up empty, so I don’t blame you, but that’s not the case anymore.”
Silence lingers between us.
“You good?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
He gestures towards the field. “Good. Go get your ass in the bullpen.”
Chuckling, I stand as he does the same. When he takes my hand to shake, he tugs on it, pulling me across the desk to throw his arms around me in a hug, but as I leave, he stops me.
“Ace, what was that hug for when you first came in?”
I hold his eye contact, making sure he hears my words. “For taking care of Miller when she needed it. You’re a good man, Monty.”
“Ah fuck,” he breathes out, chuckling under his breath. “You’re getting soft on me.”
“I can’t help it. Something weird happens to your emotions when you have a kid.”
“Tell me about it.” Monty shakes his head, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, trying to be discreet about it. “Get out of here. I need to get my shit together so I can go out there and pretend I’m a lot tougher than I actually am.”
“It’s hotter than Satan’s asshole,” my brother complains as he warms up his arm next to me, throwing down the foul line to Cody.
I do the same, stretching out my shoulder and throwing at twenty-five percent speed to one of the other starting pitchers who will be hanging out with me in the bullpen tonight.
“I don’t miss Texas for a lot of reasons,” I say. “But these bullshit temperatures are pretty high up there if not the number-one reason.”
Isaiah catches the ball, holding on to it as he turns to me. “Do you ever feel weird coming back here?”
I couldn’t care less about being back in my home state. Both Seattle and Chicago feel more like home than this place does. I spent my teen years grinding while I was here, trying to get my brother into college on a scholarship, figuring out a way for us to get to practice and school all while hoping to make him feel the love and support our dad couldn’t provide.
I keep my ball in my glove, facing him. “Nah. Do you?”
“Not weird, but I kind of miss it. I have some good memories growing up and playing ball here.”
I swear it’s that dad thing I was talking about, getting me all emotional, but there’s a flood of relief that flows through me knowing my little brother can look back at that time in our lives with nostalgia. I thought it would fuck him up. I thought me raising him would fuck him up, but he seems to be doing all right.
Leaving my spot, I throw an arm over his shoulder and palm the back of his head. “Yeah, man. We did have some good times here, huh?”
“Hey, Rhodes!” someone yells from the quickly-filling stands. “Your ass looks good in those baseball pants!”
Isaiah’s smile grows as he investigates the crowd behind me. Following his line of sight, I find the owner of that raspy voice wearing those cut-off overalls, sunglasses, and holding my son.
God, she looks good. In a sea of royal blue and red, she’s all denim and earth tones.
But what is she doing here? The game is about to start and she’s got Max situated in her overalls like some kind of kangaroo. When I look a bit closer I can see him wearing the mini version of my jersey the team bought for him with his arms and legs slathered in sunscreen.
My brother turns around to show off his butt, looking back at it. “This old thing?”
“Not you,” she shouts back, nodding in my direction. “I’m talking about the hot single dad over there! Number twenty-one.”
“Him?” Isaiah asks, throwing a thumb towards me. “He’s old as hell.”
“I’m two years older than you, you dick.”
“What can I say?” Miller yells to the field. “I’ve got a thing for older guys!” She punctuates that with an admiring whistle of her lips.
My smile is painfully big as it covers my face, partly because Miller calling me hot in front of my brother does something stupid to my ego, but mostly because Max is here and he’s never been to one of my games.
I jog over to them as they stand in the first row behind the barrier between the field and the fans.
“What are you guys doing here?” Max turns to look down as he sits in Miller’s overalls, his cute, chubby-cheeked smile finding me. “Hi, Bug!”
“I thought you might want to have Max nearby seeing as you’re in the bullpen today.”
My eyes dart to hers. “Where are you sitting?”
She points to a seat off the foul line, the first one on the side of the bullpen. A spot where I’d be able to see them both all game.
“How the hell did you score that seat?”
“I know somebody who works for the team.”
My head jerks to the field where Monty stands in front of the dugout, but he stares straight ahead, wearing his sunglasses and chewing his gum as if he wasn’t just looking over here.
Max reaches back for me. “Dadda!”
“Hi, little man! I missed you this morning.”
Miller unhooks one of her overall straps and pulls him out.
“You look like a kangaroo wearing him like that.”
“But like a hot kangaroo, yeah?”
She passes Max to me over the barrier as I stay silent, not answering her question that’ll get me in trouble. Because yes, her carrying my son around, even if she’s doing it in a weird Miller way, is one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen.
“There’s my guy.” I pop a couple kisses on his cheek. “Are you my little kangaroo?”
He giggles.