13. Maggie

Linda and I worked side by side as we cleaned the plates after dinner. She asked me questions about my job and my family, interjecting to comment when I told her that my mom was an artist. She asked me to pull up some of her work and gushed at how talented she was. When she looked at some of the shots I had taken, she told me that she wanted the shot I had gotten of Tommy after his homer on Opening Day to be framed and hung in their home. I could tell why Tommy loved his mom so fiercely. She was full of so much love and sincerity that it was impossible not to like her.

But after a while, the two of us grew quiet as we worked together in silence.

"He's a good man."

"I'm sorry?" I paused with the dish towel in my hand as I was drying one of the plates.

"Tommy." Linda dropped the sponge into the sink and turned to face me. "He means well. I know he made some poor decisions in his past, but that boy doesn't have a mean or disrespectful bone in his body. He was lost." The look Linda gave me made me want to crawl into myself because it was one that I didn't deserve. "I see the way he looks at you."

I averted my eyes, wanting to forget the way Linda talked to me, like there was hope for her son yet and I was exactly what he needed. His parents were good people, and we were stringing them along all because of a contract and our own selfish reasons. Tommy must have been really selling this fake relationship over dinner because I hadn't noticed a single thing different about how he looked at me.

"You do have a nice son," I told her after a minute before going back to drying the dishes. It was true and felt like something safe to say. Linda nodded, reading my distant response and not pushing the topic any further. I was extremely grateful for that woman. The two of us continued to clean and dry the dishes in silence.

After a few moments, Linda sighed as she watched out the window. Tommy stood out there, hitting golf balls into the ocean from his parents' walkway to the beach. His swing was violent as he sent golf balls sailing away.

"Scott must have said something to him," Linda said after a moment. My eyebrows drew together in concern at the tenseness in his shoulders. I glanced between Linda and Tommy before setting the dish towel down.

"I'll go talk to him." She gave me a grateful look before taking the dish towel from me.

I closed the door to the house quietly behind me as I watched Tommy send another golf ball into the ocean with a thwack. The muscles on his arms flexed as he pulled the club back and sent it flying down toward the ball again. Thwack.

"You've got a good swing," I told him. He stopped, club at the top of his swing. He dropped his arms and pushed away the golf ball he was about to hit.

"They disintegrate when they hit the water," he told me, like I had yelled at him for littering in the ocean instead.

"Okay," I replied, taking a few steps closer to him. "I'll add that you love the environment to the list."

A smile actually broke across his face then, and my knees felt weak at the sight. It was like a little part of me was proud that I could cheer him up.

"Want to talk about it?"

"It was the same old argument with my dad. Nothing new." Tommy threw the golf club aside and started off down the walkway to the beach. He didn't look over his shoulder to see if I'd follow, but I did anyway.

"About what?" I asked softly after I had caught up to him. He had stopped a few feet from where the waves were and had taken a seat in the sand.

He patted the sand next to him, and I let him take my hand to help me sit. "About my career. He thinks I'm throwing it away."

"What do you think?"

"I think I've screwed up enough that what he said isn't that far from the truth." Tommy stared off toward the ocean, lost in thought.

"You're one of the highest-paid players in the league. How could your career be done?"

"You heard Monica. The Cougars are my last chance." He didn't have to say it, but I could read between the lines that I was the reason his last chance was at risk right now.

"Then we'll sell this relationship so hard, every woman will fall in love with you and nobody will think you're a ladies' man. They'll just think you're one lady's man."

"I'm not really sure that's how this is supposed to work . . ." Tommy raised a brow at me skeptically.

"Don't worry, Mikals. You're in the right hands." I knocked my knees into his as I gave him a cheeky smile. "But seriously, Tommy. You haven't screwed anything up. You're still doing what you dreamed of as a little kid. When that's taken away from you, come talk to me."

I could feel Tommy's eyes on my face, studying me again. "Where'd you learn to do that?"

"Do what?" I asked.

"Be so optimistic."

The waves filled the silence that stretched out between us as I thought about what he said. I knew exactly where my optimism had come from. Four years ago, I had learned quite intimately what people meant when they said not to take something for granted. In the blink of an eye, the thing you never thought could happen does, and your life is forever changed. I knew I wasn't ready to tell him where exactly I had learned it, so instead I returned the focus on Tommy.

"No matter what happens, Tommy," I finally replied, "you are more than the player."

Tommy stared out at the waves as he thought about what I had said before he spoke again. This time, barely a whisper.

"I don't know how to be anything other than a baseball player." When he looked at me, his eyes seemed tortured. It was like he had spent many nights thinking about who he would be the last time he stepped off a baseball field, and he had yet to come up with an answer.

"You don't have to be anyone else, Tommy." My hand found his in the sand and covered it. "You just have to be you."

The look on Tommy's face after I spoke was one of curiosity and admiration. It was a look that made me want to run away as fast as I could. Only because it was the same look I remembered Luke giving me on our first date as I rambled on about why I loved photography. It was like a slice of reality had broken through this day to remind me that the last thing I needed was for my relationship with Tommy to get complicated with feelings. There was a contract that still legally bound the two of us together.

"You've got a game tomorrow," I announced to break up the tension within me. "We should probably get you back to the hotel so you can be well rested."

Tommy nodded, completely oblivious to the panic that was finding a home within my chest.

We were down by three runs going into the bottom of the seventh. Our bullpen was nearly exhausted and our hitting had stalled. Tommy had struck out twice and walked once so far in this game, and I watched as he sat at the end of the dugout by himself. Olivia was in the designated media section, leaving me to handle the dugout once again. I knew that Tommy's family was in the stands somewhere, watching him play for the Cougars for the first time in person. This game probably held a lot of weight in his mind, and he was clearly cracking under the pressure of it.

Without trying to draw any attention to myself, I slowly walked toward the opposite end of the dugout where he was sitting. He was due up to bat soon, and based on how he was holding himself, I doubted the outcome would be much different than the first few times. It was like I could practically see inside his mind and hear all of the horrible things he was saying to himself about his ability to achieve.

"Hey." I kept the camera up to my face as I snapped some photos, trying not to draw anyone's attention in the dugout toward me and Tommy. Tommy glanced up at me in surprise that I was talking to him during the game. I had made it known that we were to avoid each other until the last out was made. As I stayed silent for a few more seconds, he continued to stare at me expectantly.

"Remember what I said?" I took the camera away from my face long enough to take a good look at him. He was staring at me like I had said something in a different language. "You just have to be you, Tommy. You've got nothing to prove."

There was a determination that slowly leaked back into the set of his shoulders and the look in his eyes after he took in what I had to say. It was like my words had breathed a new life into him and released some of the worries he had been carrying on his shoulders. With his newfound confidence, Tommy grabbed his helmet and bat before walking out to home plate.

This time when he set up to wait for the pitch, it was like a completely different version of himself had appeared at the batter's box. Gone were the nervous twitches or the uneasiness in the way he moved his hands as he waited for the pitch. His confident demeanor, the one I had seen on that very first day of practice, had returned. The runner on second signaled to Tommy the side of the plate he thought the pitch would be delivered. The pitcher started his windup, and then it was like everything was in slow motion. The ball sailed slowly toward Tommy as he tracked it closer to the plate. His hands started moving as he lined his swing up with the pitch and then made contact. The ball was sent sailing out to right-center, deep toward the fence. The crowd's roar grew louder the closer it got to the fence before becoming deafening as it sailed over it.

Tommy threw his arms up as he rounded second and the ball landed outside the park, a home run. I captured the shot before pulling the camera down so I could watch the moment with my own eyes and not through the lens of a camera. He had cut San Diego's lead down to one and stirred up some new energy in his teammates and the fans. A piece of me couldn't help but soar at the idea that Tommy had used what I had said, giving him the confidence to be himself. My eyes tracked him as he stepped on home plate and pointed up toward the sky.

When he reentered the dugout to high fives and cheers from his teammates, Tommy's eyes found mine. His lips moved, mouthing the words thank you in my direction. I gave him a small nod in return, not wanting to take away from his moment and trying to ignore the way my heart had leaped when he looked at me coming down the dugout stairs. It was like my heart was hoping, and hope was a dangerous thing. It could make you do and say things you wouldn't normally. It could make someone foolish, and the last thing I wanted to be was a fool in all of this. The fool didn't come out on top. The fool was taken by surprise, used, and left in the trash after a person was done with them. I wouldn't be the fool.