Page 12 of Heavy Hitter

A pause then, maybe twenty or thirty seconds. Jimmy can feel his pulse ticking. He’s got the mostly empty Heineken balanced on his chest, one hand holding it loosely, and the thud of his heart makes the beer slosh a little inside.

Like, my phone number? she finally asks.

Jimmy lets a breath out. No, your body count, he types, then deletes it letter by careful letter. Yes, princess, he replies instead. Your phone number.

Are you going to call me?

Well, I don’t usually send nudes until the third date, he tells her, but just this once, I guess. Since you asked so nicely.

Oh, you’re hilarious, Lacey says, which is neither a yes nor a no, but a moment later a number comes through, an area code Jimmy doesn’t recognize.

That your burner? he asks, only half kidding.

Google Voice, baby.

Is it really?

No, she admits. It’s my real number, which means I’m trusting you not to fuck me. Then, before Jimmy can even begin to decide how to respond to that particular declaration, she continues: I can’t actually talk tonight, though. I’ve got three shows in a row every weekend on this tour, so I do strict vocal rest those days.

Same, he tells her, then closes out of the Instagram app and texts her number instead. There, he says. Now you’ve got me too.

Another heart, quick and decisive. Now I’ve got you, Lacey agrees.

***

THEY WIN THEIR FIRST GAME AGAINST THE TWINS ON FRIDAY, the Minnesota night cool and green-smelling, a breeze in the air that tempts fall. This is Jimmy’s favorite time of the whole season, the middle-end of August, the team broken in like a well-oiled mitt and the playoffs still far enough away that he can ignore the faint sound of his own mortality tapping softly at the window of his hotel room. It’s—not easy, exactly; it’s professional fucking sports, it’s not supposed to be easy—but easier than it’s been feeling lately. It’s nice.

Then his alarm goes off on Saturday morning, and he can’t bend either one of his knees.

Jimmy swears out loud, wincing with every step as he eases himself out of bed and hobbles slowly to the bathroom. This happens a decent amount now, him waking up in the body of a person twice his age, every single one of his joints on white-hot fire. He needs cortisone shots, probably. He needs a peaceful retirement surrounded by fruit trees and beautiful women, but cortisone shots will get him through his fucking game.

He calls over to the clubhouse and spends the better part of the afternoon with one of the team doctors, a middle-aged orthopedist named Moira with a scratchy voice and the bedside manner of Attila the Hun. “Pain level?” she asks, rolling her stool back a few inches to peer at him curiously, her red-brown hair frizzy around her face.

It’s a nine in his back, easily. A seven in his hands and knees. “Two?” he tries with a shrug. “Three? I dunno. I’m fine to play.”

“Uh-huh.” Moira does not look impressed. The average catcher in the major leagues has a career that lasts a little over five seasons. Jimmy has stuck it out for more than twice that, and his body has kept the dutiful score: tendinitis in both knees and nerve damage in his catching hand, a wonky shoulder left over from six years ago when a runner from the Marlins took a flying leap directly into his left side and tore his labrum basically in half. His lower back aches so much and so constantly he barely even notices it anymore, which is all to say: it’s manageable, just like he told her. It’s fine.

In the end Moira gives him the shots and writes him a prescription for a different kind of anti-inflammatory, telling him to text her if he has any weird side effects. “What kind of side effects?” Jimmy asks, a little suspicious, but Moira is already out of the room.

He makes it through all nine innings, if barely, collapsing onto his bed back at the Westin later that night and fishing his phone out of his jeans. Lacey had texted him again this morning, a picture of the embossed certificate they gave her to commemorate her brief foray into Canadian politics.

Congrats, he replied. Planning to issue any proclamations?

Thinking about it, she told him. Open to ideas.

Oh, I’ve got ideas, he typed back, then deleted it and suggested National Old Fucking Catchers Day instead. Considering he’s already had his mouth between her legs, Jimmy finds he’s weirdly afraid to come on too strong with her, to be caught wanting anything in particular from these little chats. It feels not-impossible he’s misreading whatever the fuck is happening here. She’s texting so much because she’s bored and got nothing better to do, in all likelihood. She’s stuck in a hotel room. She’s literally not allowed to talk.

Well, he realizes now, still lying prone on his own hotel mattress late Saturday night: she couldn’t talk. Three shows at a time, she said, and if the third one was tonight then conceivably now she—

Jimmy taps her name in his contacts before he can talk himself out of it. It’s a lark, that’s all, he tells himself, listening to the crackle of the line as it connects. She’s probably out drinking fountain Cokes with her dancers or driving around in a red convertible wearing a sash and crown. It’s not like she’s going to pick up.

“Hi.”

Jesus Christ, on the second ring. “Uh,” Jimmy says, clearing his throat and feeling distinctly like she just called his bluff. “Hi yourself.”

“How was your game?” she asks. “Did you win?”

“We did,” he admits, warmly pleased in spite of himself. Just for a moment, his knees don’t hurt at all.

---