Epilogue

The Battery ended up winning their last game to secure a Wild Card spot in dramatic fashion, featuring a Randy Caminero grand slam and Chris making an incredible bare-handed line drive catch at third, then he'd tagged the other base runner out in an unassisted double play. The celebration had been intense, and even months later Daphne sometimes felt like she could still smell the champagne on her from when it had been sprayed all over the clubhouse. Chris had been very diligent later that night in licking every last trace of it off her skin.

But then the Battery ended up losing in the Wild Card in the opposite of dramatic fashion, in a game that stayed tied at zero through fifteen innings until the Mariners hit a walk-off homer to move on to the next round. That was baseball.

They'd spent a few lazy months just hanging out, splitting their time between Chris' place and hers. His was without a doubt nicer, but hers had Milo in it, and he seemed to like spending time there. He filled her small apartment with his body, crouching down in front of her short bookcase of books, tilting his head to read the spines, crowding her in the kitchen when she was trying to fix them some tea, reaching up to get the extra jar of honey she'd stashed at the back of a top cabinet. He told her he didn't mind staying quiet at her place, as long as they could make up for it at his.

Her lease was up in March, right around when he was supposed to leave for Spring Training, and it made sense for her to just move in with him, so…that's what she did. He had a whole list of stuff he was hoping to get done before he had to fly out to Florida, including moving the last of her things in and helping his dad install a sprinkler system at his house. And she was hoping to get settled enough that she could join him down there in the next few weeks.

"Aren't there always those commercials about the official movers of the Battery?" Daphne asked, collapsing on the couch after they'd brought the final boxes in from the car. It had been chilly outside, but she felt overheated in her sweatshirt and leggings, so she pulled the sweatshirt over her head, depositing it on the cushion next to her. Chris had picked up Milo, and was giving him scratches under his chin the way he liked. Somehow Chris had the ability to hold Milo like a baby and get the cat to stretch out his front paws in a display of submission that Daphne had never been able to achieve. She mostly thought it was adorable, until she sometimes called Milo a traitor. "Where were they today? Could've really used their help with those boxes of books."

Chris could've pointed out that he'd mostly carried those, or that the fact that the company bought ad space during the games didn't mean that they just magically knew to show up when a player was moving. But his gaze had dipped to her chest, where the loose neckline of her shirt had shifted to show part of her bra. She almost thought he hadn't heard her at all, until his gaze snapped back to hers.

"Speaking of books," he said, letting Milo jump back to the floor. "I have something to show you."

He reached out his hand to pull her up off the couch, leading her toward the closed door of the spare room.

"Okay," he said. "So this is a work in progress, but…"

When he opened the door, the first thing she saw was a bunch of the artwork she'd had in her apartment hanging on one wall, arranged in a gallery display with all her mismatched frames. There were some new things mixed in there, too—a couple pictures of Milo that she recognized as ones she'd texted him, a picture of her holding her nephew, a lineup card from a Battery game. There was a desk in one corner with a bright yellow chair and a vase with a single gerbera daisy stuck in it, her laptop plugged in and charging from a power strip resting on the floor.

And when she turned, there was a whole wall of bookshelves. Just plain white shelves, waiting to be filled.

Except they weren't completely empty. There was a stack of books already on one shelf, which she recognized as some of Chris'. The library copy of the baseball book he'd retrieved from his dad's house. That sports biography, that book The Tender Land, a copy of Catch-22, his copy of Mandy, which they'd finished together, her reading parts of it aloud to him in bed. And on top of the stack, a little rubber duck, just like in her old profile picture.

"Chris, I—" She didn't even know what to say. She was overcome. She blurted the first thing that popped into her head. "I don't even own this many books."

"But you will," he said. "And you'll need space to work from home. You can rearrange anything you need to, or change it completely. It's yours."

Daphne was officially heading up Books with the Battery, a charitable initiative by the team to promote literacy by offering incentives for reading like free tickets to games, scheduling players to visit schools for story time events, and generally working to put more books of all types into the hands of kids and teens in the Charleston area. It was still the early days of getting it off the ground, but she loved that it combined her love of reading with a bit of the marketing and public-facing parts of her previous job she'd actually liked. Plus, it would make it a lot easier to spend more time with Chris during the busy baseball season, since he'd been re-signed to the team.

She crossed over to the art wall, taking it all in. The lineup card was from April 28, the fateful game where she'd heckled Chris. There he was, listed in the number seven spot.

"It's incredible," she said, turning to face him. "I don't even know how…but are you sure you won't want this room for something else? Like your workout room or whatever it was before?"

"Oh, you mean my sad little bike and a stack of dumbbells? No. Besides, there's a gym downstairs, and training facilities at the ballpark. I can always use those."

"A guest room, then," she said.

He glanced around, as if taking in the room's dimensions. "We can get an air mattress in here if we really needed to."

She didn't know why she was having such a hard time accepting this. It just seemed like so much. She'd been excited to move in with Chris, she really had—it would be nice not to constantly be going back and forth, she wanted the domesticity of sharing a bathroom sink and having their laundry mixed up together, and of course, she loved spending time with him. But she had to admit that a tiny part of her had mourned the loss of this space that solely belonged to her. She'd really made that apartment her own, however small it had been. And now here was Chris, giving her a piece of that here. It meant more than she could say. She almost couldn't believe it was real, had to keep poking at it to make sure it was.

"A man cave," she said. "A crafting room. A craft beer brewing room."

He laughed. "No, no, and I wouldn't even know where to start, so no."

"A trophy room," she said. Surely professional athletes needed space to display all their memorabilia from over the years. Old college jerseys, signed baseball cards from players he admired, she had no idea. Chris had been featured in the latest issue of Sports Illustrated, part of a cover story about mental health in baseball that had included him talking about grief, together with other interviews from an outfielder who'd missed a whole season due to anxiety and a top minor league prospect who'd walked away to focus on life outside of baseball and the love he'd found with a teammate. Daphne had bought ten copies, so if she kept that up they'd need a whole room for that alone.

"My dad has all that stuff," he said. "And I don't think he'd give it up."

She had one more idea, but almost didn't want to say it, in case she was getting way ahead of herself. But once it was in her brain it took root, and she couldn't help but blurt it out. "A nursery?"

Chris froze, his face going very still for a moment before he lifted his gaze to hers. There was a shine in his eyes, like he'd been suddenly lit from something within. "Are you…?"

Daphne realized her mistake and rushed to correct it. "No, no," she said. "I'm still on the pill, and obviously I would've talked to you before—and I know it can happen, but—I mean, no. I'm not."

"Ah," he said, leaning against the doorframe, like he needed something to take a bit of his weight. "Sorry. I guess I thought—"

He thought she'd been hinting at something. That made total sense, and she was embarrassed that it hadn't occurred to her. "Is that…something you want?" she asked.

"Do you?"

She could've pointed out that she'd asked him first, but she could already figure out his answer based on that one split second when he'd thought for a moment that she was telling him she was pregnant. It hadn't even been joy—that was too simplistic. It had been deeper, more profound than that.

"I would love to have a baby with you," she said. "Not necessarily right now—I like having it just be us. But in a year or two? Sure. I could see it."

He reached over to tug on her shirt, bringing her flush up against his body. She was definitely feeling overheated. "I like us, too."

"We're probably going to want to practice," she said. "To make sure we know how to do it when the time comes."

His hand was already under her shirt, pushing up her bra so he could palm her bare breast. "I'm a big believer in practice."

She twined her arms around his neck as he nuzzled against her, pressing an openmouthed kiss to the dip of skin where her shirt had slid off her shoulder. "I've heard it makes perfect," she said, the words coming out a little breathy as he continued his path to her jaw.

"Mmm. That probably takes a lot of practice, though."

"Well," she said. "What are we waiting for?"