Chapter 10
Two weeks had passed and Kirstin Green had stopped pretending.
She hadn't made a formal announcement. She hadn't changed her relationship status on anything. She'd just stopped fighting the thing that had been true since she sat on a deck under tiki torches and told a man it was okay to be sad.
Beck was at the facility every morning. He was at the bar most evenings. Hudson split his time between the two, though his preference was clear. The bar had a floor he liked and a woman who kept treats behind the register.
Nate had started the kitchen. The old tile was gone. The cabinets were measured. The countertops were ordered. Every morning Kirstin walked through the demolition on her way to coffee and felt something she hadn't felt in that house in a long time. Movement.
The box in the closet was still taped shut. But the tape was looser than it used to be.
"We gotta do something," Addison said.
The Riley/Banks office was quiet. Friday. Noon. Addison was at her desk with a salad. Morgan was on the couch with her feet up. Kirstin was in the chair by the window with a sandwich she'd brought from Jon's.
"I know, right," Morgan said.
"What?" Kirstin said.
They both turned to her. She was genuinely confused.
"She's in love," Morgan said. "She doesn't see it."
"I'm not in love."
"Oh," Addison said. "You're in love. You may not be saying it out loud yet, but skip the pretense with us."
"I'm not?—"
Morgan stood. Her planning posture. Feet planted. Hands on her hips. The same stance she took before the shrimp festival, the tent rental negotiation, and the Pit Stop extraction.
"These men are at a baseball facility on a Friday afternoon," she said. "That's the problem." She turned to Kirstin. "You're excused from this critique because you've been attached to Beck every day for two weeks, but that's irrelevant to my point."
"It's not irrelevant?—"
"It's irrelevant to my point, which is that our husbands and your boyfriend are at a baseball facility on a Friday afternoon when they should be with us."
"He's not my?—"
"Kirstin."
Kirstin ate her sandwich.
"Here's what we're doing," Morgan said. "Wiffle ball. Boys versus girls. Luke and Addison's backyard. The dunes are the outfield wall. We're building a field. We're going all out."
"All out how?" Kirstin asked.
"Jerseys."
Addison's salad fork stopped midway to her mouth.
"Custom jerseys," Morgan said. "Banks, Johnson, Beck. Their numbers. Red Sox for us." She pointed at herself and Addison. "Braves for you."
Kirstin set her sandwich down. "I'm not wearing a Braves jersey."
"You're wearing a Braves jersey."
"The Braves just released him, Morgan."
"Which is exactly why you're wearing it. You're taking his name and his number and putting it on your back and showing him that the Braves can do whatever they want but Kirstin Green is still his team."
"Don't get me wrong, I love the idea. But what if it hits him wrong?"
"Honey," Addison said. "When he sees you in that jersey, the last thing that man is going to be thinking about is baseball."
Kirstin picked her sandwich back up. She took a bite. She chewed. She swallowed.
"What number?" she said.
"Nine," Morgan said.
"Eye black?"
"Obviously."
"Hats?"
"Backwards."
"Fine."
Morgan clapped once. "Target run. Now."
Three hours later the backyard at Luke and Addison's was a wiffle ball diamond.
Throw-down bases at regulation distance, or close enough.
Flour lines chalked from home to first and home to third, white against the green grass.
The dunes beyond the outfield, sea grass and sand, a ten-foot natural wall that was going to eat fly balls.
A cooler on the first base side with beer and wine.
A second cooler on the third base side with water and Dos Equis because Kirstin had thought of Beck without thinking of Beck. That was becoming a problem.
They went inside and got dressed.
Morgan came out of the bathroom in the Johnson 24 Red Sox jersey, cutoffs, cap backwards, eye black in two stripes under each eye. She checked the hall mirror and nodded once with the satisfaction of a woman who had executed a plan flawlessly.
Addison came out in Banks 12. Same cutoffs. Same cap. Same eye black. She adjusted the jersey in the mirror with the precision she brought to everything.
Kirstin stood in the bedroom holding the Braves jersey. White with the red and navy trim. BECK across the back. Number 9.
She put it on. Buttoned it halfway. Turned to the mirror.
Morgan appeared in the doorway.
"Well?" Kirstin said.
"I hate you," Morgan said. "And I mean that as the highest compliment I can give."
Kirstin put the cap on backwards. She drew the eye black with two fingers and checked the mirror one more time.
"Let's go," she said.
Addison took out her phone.
We know you're at the facility. We also know whatever you're doing can wait until Monday. Get your asses to our house. Now.
Morgan added: All three of you.
Kirstin added: That means you too Beck.
Luke: Yes ma'am.
Brady: Coming.
Beck: We're headed out.
They waited in the backyard. The sun was dropping toward the water. The field was perfect. The flour lines were bright. The bases were down. The coolers were stocked.
Fifteen minutes later the front door opened and closed. Footsteps through the house. The back door opened.
Luke came out first. Then Brady. Then Beck.
They stopped.
Three women stood on the wiffle ball diamond. Addison pounding a wiffle ball into a child-size glove. Morgan with the yellow bat on her shoulder, stone-faced. Kirstin tossing a ball up and down.
Jerseys. Eye black. Caps backwards. Cutoffs. Looking like they'd been preparing for this game their entire lives.
Luke stared. Brady stared. Beck stared at Kirstin in a Braves jersey with his number on the back and his brain left his body.
"You sure you want to go back to Atlanta?" Luke said.
"Why would I want to go to Alabama," Beck said.
Luke turned to him. "Alabama?"
"What?"
"You said Alabama."
"I said Atlanta."
"You said Alabama."
Brady, behind them: "He said Alabama."
"I—" Beck was still looking at Kirstin. "Can we just play?"
The game was chaos.
Nobody kept score because nobody could agree on the rules.
Morgan insisted on a designated hitter rule.
Addison insisted on no bunting. Luke insisted that Brady wasn't allowed to squat behind the plate because "it's wiffle ball, you're not catching a knuckleball.
" Brady squatted behind the plate anyway because Brady would catch a knuckleball in a hurricane if someone threw one.
Kirstin couldn't hit a wiffle ball. The thing moved in ways she wasn't prepared for.
She swung through three straight pitches from Luke, who was throwing underhanded and still striking her out, and she pointed the bat at him and said "You're enjoying this way too much" and Luke said "Immensely" and Addison yelled "Throw her something she can hit or you're sleeping on the couch" and Luke grooved the next one and Kirstin hit it past Morgan on the mound and into the outfield and ran the bases in cutoffs and a Braves jersey while Beck watched from center field with his hands on his knees, laughing.
Hudson was the all-time outfielder. He stationed himself in center field with his ears forward and every time someone hit the ball he sprinted after it and brought it back wet and dropped it at the pitcher's feet.
He didn't discriminate between teams. He retrieved for everyone.
He was the most impartial player on the field.
Morgan pitched to Brady in the fourth inning, if innings was the right word, and threw the wiffle ball directly at his head.
Brady ducked. The ball curved back over the plate because wiffle balls do what they want, and Beck called "Strike" from center field, and Brady turned and stared at him and Beck shrugged and Morgan pumped her fist.
The next pitch went behind Brady's back. He set the bat down on the plate. He took three steps toward the mound. Morgan held the ball and didn't move.
"You're not going to throw at me and act like it was an accident," Brady said.
"That wasn't an accident," Morgan said.
Brady charged the mound. Morgan screamed and ran.
He caught her at the shortstop position and picked her up and she was hitting him with the glove and laughing and kicking and Brady held her there while Luke stood at first base with his arms out saying "Do we have a game or not" and Addison sat down on the ground at second base because she couldn't stand up anymore.
Kirstin was near the dunes. Beck jogged in from center. The game had stopped because Morgan and Brady were wrestling on the infield and nobody was going to separate them.
He stopped in front of her. The late sun was behind them. The dunes and the sea grass and Luke and Addison's house up the hill.
"You wore my jersey," he said.
"Morgan's idea."
"You wore my jersey."
"It was a group decision."
"Kirstin."
"Fine. I wore your jersey."
He put his hand on her shoulder. She was looking up at him and he was looking down at her and the jersey was between them and the cap was backwards on her head and she forgot about the game and the wiffle ball and the dunes and everyone behind them.
he kissed her. His hand moved from her shoulder to the jersey fabric at her waist and she felt the warmth of his palm through the cotton.
Somewhere behind them, a phone camera clicked. Addison.
Neither of them heard it.
The bonfire started at nine.
Luke built it like he built everything. Efficiently, without fuss, bigger than it needed to be. The fire pit was on the beach below the dunes. The wood caught and the flames went up and the three couples settled into chairs.
Morgan fell asleep on Brady's shoulder before midnight. Brady didn't move her. Luke and Addison went inside shortly after.
"Take your time," Addison said from the back door. "Lock up when you come in."
Beck and Kirstin stayed by the fire. Hudson was asleep between them in the sand, the firelight on his gold coat. The ocean was steady and close. Neither of them talked. She had her head tilted back, watching the stars. He was watching the fire.
It burned down to embers. Beck stood. Offered her his hand. She took it and he pulled her up and they walked through the sea grass to the back door. He locked it behind them.
The house was dark. Brady and Morgan's door was closed. Luke and Addison's door was closed. The third bedroom was at the end of the hall.
He walked her to the door. She stopped with her hand on the frame.
"Tuck me in?" she said.
He followed her in. She climbed into bed and pulled the blanket up and he sat on the edge. She looked up at him. He leaned down and kissed her forehead.
"Goodnight," he said.
"Goodnight."
He stood. Closed the door behind him. She heard him walk down the hall. She heard Hudson's tags jingle once as the dog settled on the floor beside the couch. Then the house went quiet.
She lay there. The pillow smelled like Addison's detergent. The room was dark except for the light from her phone on the nightstand.
It buzzed.
Addison.
A photo. No text. Just the image.
Beck and Kirstin by the dunes. His hand on her shoulder. Her chin tilted up. The Braves jersey between them. The cap backwards on her head. The sunset behind them. His mouth on hers.
She hadn't known it was being taken. She hadn't known anyone was watching. The woman in the photo wasn't posing. She was just there, in a jersey with his name on it, being kissed by a man she'd met a month ago at her father's bar.
She stared at it until the screen dimmed. She tapped it back to life and stared at it again.
Then she opened a new text.
We needed that tonight.
His response came back in ten seconds.
Yes we did. It was fun. Goodnight Kirstin.
She looked at the photo one more time. The woman in the Braves jersey. The woman who looked like she'd been found.
Goodnight baby.
She put the phone on the nightstand. She pulled the blanket up. She closed her eyes.
On the other side of the wall, she heard nothing. But she knew he was reading it.