Page 28 of Wild Catch
Anyone who hears this conversation would think, first, that I’m an asshole brother. And second, that Lewis is the youngest sibling by how his voice is all jovial and wholesome, whereas mine radiates hostility.
But that’s because they don’t know him—or what he’s capable of.
“I heard that you may be considering a return to the Eagles.”
I freeze and say absolutely nothing. Not even a peep.
What I really want to do is roar like a freaking lion. Did Kaplan approach the Eagles? Did my trade intentions leak? Does anyone in the Wild, other than Beau, already know?
Or… this could be my brother’s blatant attempt to suss me out.
See, we don’t love or support each other in the Kim-Lindberg clan—we don’t console, teach, guide or any of the other shit I assume functional families do.
We play mind games. We fight to win, no matter what.
It’s not a secret that I’ve changed teams every two or three years and that my time is coming up. A couple of sports blogs have even commented on it. My keener teammates may be wondering it. Certainly my sociopathic brother would’ve picked on it.
Since he knows that I know his shtick, and he knows that I won’t give him an inch, he carries on all by himself. “Because we would absolutely love to have you back. Water under the bridge and all that. I would even put in a good word for you.”
As if he wasn’t the reason I left in the first place.
“Are you done fantasizing?” I ask in a flat tone of voice that gives nothing. The last thing I should do is show that anything he says or does can affect me—even if it does. I learned this lesson before I was even ten years old.
“Think about it,” he says with a chuckle. “We can go back to being the best battery in modern baseball history. In fact, I think with our current skill we might even become the bestever. We’re definitely a shoo-in for the All Star game?—”
“I’m hanging up?—”
“Logan, c’mon. Our parents would love to see us play together again.”
We both know that he doesn’t give a flying turd about what our parents think.
“Do us both a favor and go watch that documentary they filmed about your life. Bye.” I end the call before he can keep nagging. The jerk calls back right away and I tap over to his contact and mute him.
I sit back on my haunches as the audiobook picks up where it left off, but there’s no hiding the rapid heartbeat in my chest from myself.
I’m a twenty eight year old man. I even found a gray hair on my head this morning. I haven’t lived with my parents or my brother in ten years. I’m not financially dependent on any of them, and could even cut them out of my life like my therapist has suggested multiple times.
But every time I hear Lewis’s voice, I get transported to my seven-year-old self when he locked me up in a closet for an entire weekend.
Mom’s voice takes me back to the night she screamed at Dad so much, she decided that smashing a vase would be a more effective way of getting across how pissed off she was, and the shards that sliced into my skin.
Dad’s voice reminds me of my right hand’s middle finger, crooked because he kept shouting at me to throw forkballs with aSPORTYhardball—even though I was just eleven and already knew I wanted to be a catcher—until my finger broke.
Shit, my breathing’s getting short.
Fortunately, the league’s getting wiser about player mental health and my medication is on the list of allowed substances. I spring to my feet and eat up the floor in a few strides toward the kitchen.
As I’m washing the little pill down the guzzler, my door bell rings and for a wild second, I fear Lewis is behind it. But I shake my head, remembering that he should be in New York right now or maybe somewhere on the road, I don’t know. I know for a fact that we don’t play them for a while.
The door camera system shows a different familiar face. One that is also annoying, but at least not terrifying.
I open the door and greet him just the same way, though. “What do you want?”
Rivera, who also happens to be my neighbor, sweeps his eyes from my bare chest, to my black sweats, and my toes. “Excuse me, sir. This is a residential building. Families live here. You need to consider their tender eyes.”
He’s lucky I’m not buck ass naked.
Folding my arms, I fire back, “Is there anything about you that is tender?”
