Chapter 16
sixteen
MIKE
Sophie attacks each pitch with the focused intensity of someone working through demons.
I lean against the chain-link fence of the adjacent cage, my own bat forgotten as another fastball meets aluminum with a crack that echoes across the field.
Her form is surprisingly good—no, scratch that, it’s excellent—and I stare, transfixed, at the rotation of her hips, the follow-through, the way she plants her feet.
Whack . A grunt of effort, her gray eyes filled with fierce concentration.
Whack . Another grunt, jaw set.
The rhythm pulls me in, and I find myself breathing in time with her swings. There’s something raw and honest about watching her channel whatever’s eating at her into pure physical release, knowing that without it she might spontaneously combust.
God knows I understand the urge.
During my recovery, I’d pushed my body past every reasonable limit, convinced that if I just worked hard enough, I could outrun the injury and the fear that I’d never play again. My therapist had other ideas about healthy coping mechanisms, but this—what Sophie’s doing—this looks different.
Cathartic instead of punishing.
A strand of sandy blonde hair has escaped her ponytail, plastered to her flushed cheek with sweat. She doesn’t brush it away, too focused on the next pitch. The wet fabric of her T-shirt clings to her, outlining the curve of her chest, and those jeans…
Christ, I need to look somewhere else before she catches me staring.
But I can’t.
The poetry night floods back—the way her walls had come down as she’d shared those fragments of herself.
Her face had been so open afterward, eyes wide and vulnerable in the dim light.
Every instinct had screamed at me to kiss her, to close that small distance between us, but I’d forced myself to step back.
To press my lips to her cheek instead, and ask her to choose.
If she wanted.
After what we’d shared months ago at her apartment—after I’d watched her discover what she wanted when given the freedom to choose—I needed her to know this was different. That whatever happened next would be her decision, not based on my pushing.
Walking away that night might have been one of the hardest things I’ve done. My whole body had protested, skin still humming from our dance, from the way she’d felt pressed against me. But I wanted her to choose us, if there was an us, and whatever the hell it might become.
Finally, the machine sputters and dies, out of ammunition. Sophie lowers the bat slowly, shoulders rising and falling with deep breaths. She pulls off the helmet, and her ponytail tumbles free, damp strands framing her face. That’s when she notices me watching, her eyes widening slightly.
The flush on her cheeks deepens, though whether from exertion or embarrassment, I can’t tell. “Run out of balls of your own?” she says.
“Watching you is more entertaining than hitting my own balls—baseballs.” Jesus, Altman. Real smooth. “Where did you learn to hit like that?”
A hint of a smile plays at the corner of her mouth. “High school softball. I was on the travel team.”
“Well, now I feel like an ass for thinking I was introducing you to something new.”
The smile grows a fraction wider. “It’s been years. And I had some… energy to burn off.”
“I noticed.” I grin. “Those baseballs probably have trust issues now, and they’re considering a lawsuit for concussion.”
That earns me a genuine laugh, brief but bright, cutting through whatever storm clouds have been following her since I ran into her outside the rink. I gesture to the bat she’s still gripping.
“So do you want to talk about it, or keep going? I can find you more victims if you want?”
The laugh dies, replaced by something more guarded. But she doesn’t retreat, doesn’t make excuses to leave. Instead, she props the bat against the fence and mirrors my position, leaving a careful foot of space between us. Progress.
“You really want to know why I was upset?”
“Only if you want to tell me.” I shift slightly, making sure my body language stays open, non-threatening.
Silence stretches between us, broken only by the distant crack of balls from other cages, long enough that I wonder if she’s changed her mind. Then she draws in a breath that shakes slightly at the edges.
“My mom has MS. Multiple sclerosis.”
The words hang heavy in the air between us. I resist the urge to immediately respond, to fill the space with platitudes. I’d known she was sick, thanks to her poem and the vague references Coach had made to his wife’s health, but I didn’t know the specifics.
“That’s why we moved here from Michigan,” she continues, voice carefully controlled. “There’s this experimental treatment in New York she qualified for. Dad got the coaching job, I transferred my master’s program, Hazel switched schools.”
“Sophie…”
“It’s not terminal,” she says quickly. “Not like that. But it’s unpredictable. She can be fine for months, running marathons and working twelve-hour shifts, and then suddenly she’s…” She snaps her fingers, the sound sharp in the relative quiet. “Not.”
I watch her, suddenly conscious I’m deep inside her personal space, and I want to make sure I’m welcome there. “Sophie, you don’t need to tell me everything…”
“Today my dad told me I need to back off.” Her voice wavers, but she keeps on going, pushing past my offer to stop. “Like I’m being some kind of helicopter daughter. But he wasn’t there when she collapsed at Hazel’s soccer game and couldn’t get up.”
“Jesus.” The word escapes before I can stop it. “I’m so sorry you and your family are going through this, Sophie.”
“So yeah, maybe I text her too much. Maybe I call every morning to make sure she’s taken her meds.
Maybe I panic when she doesn’t answer right away.
” Her chin lifts, defensive and fierce. “But at least I’ll know.
If something happens, I’ll know, and she won’t be on the floor at home for hours until someone finds her. ”
“Makes perfect sense to me,” I say, meaning it. “I’d probably be worse.”
She turns to face me fully, surprise written across her features. “Really?”
“Are you kidding?” I smirk, trying desperately to help her. “I’d probably have her on GPS tracking by now. Maybe one of those Life Alert buttons.”
A watery laugh escapes her. “I actually suggested the Life Alert. She threatened to hang it from the rearview mirror in her car.”
“Sounds like your mom has a sense of humor about it.”
“She does. Which almost makes it worse sometimes, if that’s even possible.” Sophie’s voice drops. “She acts like it’s no big deal, like adapting to it is just another adventure. But I know she’s scared. I see it sometimes, when she thinks no one’s looking.”
We fall into silence again, standing apart but feeling close, and it’s different now. Heavier, but also somehow more comfortable. She’s trusted me with this, and I want to give her something back. The words form before I fully decide to say them.
“My parents would never do what yours did.”
She tilts her head, questioning.
“Uproot everything for one of us,” I clarify.
“They’re good people, but their careers come first. Always have.
” I shrug, trying to make it seem like old news, no big deal.
“If Andy or I developed something serious, they’d find the best treatment money could buy.
But physically relocating? Not a chance! ”
“Mike…”
“Last year, when I was injured, depressed as hell and convinced my life was over, you know what my dad sent me? Hockey memes. Like, the really bad ones your uncle shares on Facebook. That was his version of emotional support.” I attempt a laugh, then shake my head. “Sorry.”
She tilts her head a little. “What for?”
“For putting some sort of false equivalence on this.” I shrug. “I mean, your family literally?—”
“Stop.” Sophie’s hand touches my arm, brief but warm. “It’s not a competition. Different doesn’t mean less valid.”
Her touch lingers for a moment before she pulls back, and I have to focus on not chasing the contact.
Because, right now, in this moment, I know I want this as much as I want Sophie’s body and her laughter and her dancing and her everything.
I want this emotional connection, to help her and be helped.
“Can I suggest something?” I ask. “About the worry spiral it sounds like you get into?”
Her expression turns wary. “I’m not going to stop checking on her, Mike, so don’t?—”
“Not asking you to. But what if… next time you’re waiting for her to text back and your brain starts composing worst-case scenarios, you text me instead?”
“What would that accomplish?”
“Distraction. Redirection. My therapist called it ‘disrupting the loop.’” I lean back against the fence, metal cool through my shirt. “When I was spiraling about recovery, convinced I’d never play again, I’d text Andy a hockey puck emoji so she’d know I needed help getting out of my own head.”
“Did it work?”
“Better than I expected. She’d send me the weirdest shit she could find online. About a woman who trained squirrels to water-ski, or a guy who built a functional computer inside Minecraft.” I shrug. “It’s hard to catastrophize when you’re watching tiny rodents navigate an obstacle course.”
Sophie’s laughing now, real and unguarded. “Your sister sent you squirrel videos?”
“Among other things. The point is, sometimes you need someone to pull you out when you’re drowning in what-ifs. So the offer stands. Text me. I’ll find you the internet’s finest distractions.” I smile at her. “And it gives your mom the break it sounds like she needs.”
She studies me, gray eyes searching for something. “I’ll think about it.” A pause. “You talk about your therapist a lot.”