ONE
LEE
“This is hopeless,” Adrian, my distressed patient and starting pitcher for tomorrow, said while groaning into the face pillow on my chiropractic table.
“Everything seems fine,” I said, feeling around his spine. “Sit up.” I gave a little nudge as he rolled onto his side to sit up.
We both turned to a tiny gasp at the side of my table.
“I think Daddy cracked all your bones,” Bennie, my seven-year-old daughter, said in a loud whisper as her hand flew to her mouth.
“I didn’t crack them. I just made sure they were all in the right place,” I told her, her eyes still wide while they roamed over Adrian’s body. “I promise, Adrian is fine. You trust Daddy, right?”
She nodded, her eyes narrowed as if she weren’t totally sure.
I was the team chiropractor for the Brooklyn Bats, the new—or newest,now that the franchise had just turned four—Major League Baseball team in New York. Bennie usually stayed with my sister and brother-in-law while I wasat work, but she loved to come to practice with me when she could.
Being close to home was a big reason I’d transferred to the Bats from my old team in Washington state. We had enough home games for me to see my daughter a few times a month during the season since my family lived in Brooklyn, but the nice arrangement we’d had was about to end, even if I couldn’t cross the bridge from denial to full-on panic over it.
“Does it hurt?” Bennie asked Adrian, resting her tiny hand on his massive pitching arm.
“No, Bennie,” he said, managing a tight smile for her. “It’s all in my neck.”
I had him lean forward and extended his neck with a slow, gentle push, trying to uncoil the knot of muscles under my fingertips. I studied the agony in his profile and the way he white-knuckled the table, the paper crinkling under him even as I held him in place.
“Do I need to get the scraper?” I joked after he let out another low groan, either from frustration or pain. “Is this an injury you haven’t told Coach about? If you don’t think you can pitch tomorrow, tell us now.”
“No,” he grumbled. “I don’t have an injury. I’m just…” He trailed off as he turned his head toward me, kneading the back of his neck as a deep crease dented his forehead.
“What’s this? I didn’t know my girl was here.”
Bennie gasped again, this time with delight when she scampered toward the door and into Nate Becker’s open arms.
Nate was our shortstop and had been the star player for the Bats since their inception and the main spotlight until they’d hired a famous new manager. He’d been full of arrogant swagger until tearing his rotator cuff. We’dworked with him over the past year until he’d been cleared to come back this season.
He’d had a good start and had acquired a little bit of humility during recovery, but he was still mostly the same smug pain in the ass now that he’d returned.
And my daughter was completely in love with him.
Adrian’s popping bones and sore neck were long forgotten now that she’d heard Nate’s voice.
“Adrian has a neck hurt, and Daddy has to scrape him,” Bennie told Nate, looping her arm around his neck after he scooped her off the floor. My daughter seemed even tinier in Nate’s arms, her feet dangling only at his hips.
“Nate, could you take Bennie into the hallway for a minute while I work on Adrian?” I asked, nodding outside. Whatever was wrong with Adrian wasn’t physical from what I could tell, but I wouldn’t be able to find out what it was until we were alone.
“I sure can. How about we go into the dugout and wait until they’re done? I have a surprise for Bennie anyway.”
Before I could ask him what it was, my daughter’s squeal barreled down the hallway. Whatever he had for her, I hoped it would distract her until I could get to the bottom of why our star pitcher was tied up in knots.
“Are you worried about the game tomorrow?”
“Yes. No. I mean…I don’t know.”
“The Bay City Blazers are good, but I think we can still?—”
“It’s not them. Or not that. Not really.”
“Okay, so I’m out of guesses. What’s got you so knotted up for tomorrow? Do you have a girl coming to see you or something?” I joked, stepping back from the table.
