He smiles again.
“What about baseball?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the feeling I get every time I step on the mound. The rush of the water reminds me of the rush I feel when my adrenaline is pumping, and I know it’s just me and the batter. One of us will win and one of us will lose, and I never know until it happens. Even if the odds are in my favor, my opponent can always surprise me. And it is that unexpected rivalry that gets my blood going every time.”
“That sounds exciting.”
“It is.” He stops and stares at the waves again. “It makes me feel alive. Like I am a god on this earth. That sounds so arrogant, I know, but there’s no feeling quite like it.” He squeezes my handand I can’t help but lose myself in his joy. It seeps from his smile to his fingers, straight through my hand.
“Then why don’t you try and go back?”
His smile falters and it feels as though a wave has pulled me under. I worry that I’ve said the wrong thing. And maybe I have.
“It’s not that simple.”
“Nothing worth having ever is.”
“Sage, please.”
“What?”
“How can you stand there and say that when you won’t take a job that’s clearly perfect for you?”
“Because.”
“Because why?”
“I told you. I don’t want to leave Cedar Brook Falls.”
He scoffs and it irritates me. “Don’t change the subject. Are you scared you’ll get hit again? I told you, the chances of that happening again—”
“I get it. But what if it’s more than that? What if I go back and I can’t pitch? What if all this time off has set me back and I step on that mound and I suck? Then what? No, I can’t do it.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
He stares at me, his blue eyes as turbulent as the ocean behind him. “Why are you pushing this?”
“Because I think you want to play again.”
“Of course, I do! But didn’t you just hear me?”
“I heard, but I don’t understand it. If you suck, then you stop playing. You’re no worse off than you are now. What else are you scared of?”
He inhales sharply and looks up at the sky. “Let’s just leave it.”
I step in front of him and put my hand in his chest. “What are you afraid of, Casey?”
“I’m afraid of finding out what happens if I fail. Not only do I lose my career, but I lose the respect of my family, my friends, my teammates.”
“What? Why would you think that?”
“My whole life is baseball. It’s all I’ve ever done. It’s what people see when they look at me. I’m not the smart one, or the guy who fixes things. I’m not the sensitive one. I’m the star athlete from Cedar Brook High. The Cy Young-winning pitcher of the Los Angeles Jets. When I went back to Cedar Brook Falls, they didn’t give me a homecoming party because I’m a regular guy who happened to come back. They threw a homecoming party for the best pitcher in the league. That’s who they care about. No one cares about me. Without baseball, who am I, Sage? I’m nothing.”
The pain in his voice cuts me deeply. It digs its claws into my heart and tears it apart. I cannot fathom that he believes this to be true.
I shake my head. “Casey…”
“Please don’t try to say something like that’s not true. You haven’t been in my shoes. You haven’t seen the looks I’ve seen or have had the conversations I’ve had. So, please spare me the platitudes.”
