Chapter Forty-Two. Holden
FORTY-TWO
Holden
“What’s that?” Leo eyes the folder sitting beside me on the dugout bench.
“Just a few ideas I want you and your friends to take a look at. Give me opinions on.”
He narrows his eyes at me—goes to reach for the folder and then stops himself. “May I?”
“Go ahead.”
He opens the folder to see the various renderings I’ve had done of the baseball field. New nets. Updated dugouts. A scoreboard that works. A scorekeeper’s box. And on and on.
I watch the shock flicker over his features, see the excitement hit soon thereafter, and then watch him rein it back in almost as if he’s too afraid to hope.
“I don’t understand,” he says, and looks at me for a beat before going back to the renderings.
“Well, since there is no official organization that takes care of this field, it’s never going to get any better than this unless someone steps in and helps out.”
“Don’t be messing with me, Three-Piece,” he says, a smile flickering at the corners of his mouth.
“You think you and your friends can pick the best look for me?”
“You’re serious?” His voice is barely a whisper.
“I am. I know when League is in season, you play at the high school, but that gate’s locked otherwise.
This is the only place you have to work on your skills and get better.
To have a pickup game.” To stay off the fucking streets.
“So … I have some people who know some people who are going to make it a bit nicer.”
He studies me. “You know people who know people. Are you all those people?” he asks.
“Does it matter?”
His eyes meet mine. “To me it does.”
His words hit me in the chest in a way I didn’t expect. This fucking kid, man. “So can you ask the kids who play pickup games with you here? Get their opinions?”
“Yeah, but what if their opinion isn’t what I want?”
I grin. Smart kid. “I wouldn’t know the difference, would I?”
He slaps me on the shoulder and laughs that carefree laugh of his that you can’t help but smile at. “Nah, man, you wouldn’t.”
He sits down beside me and stares at the closed folder for a few moments. “You a bigwig, Three-Piece?” he asks.
“Does it matter?”
“No, but I’m pretty sure you are and I just don’t understand why you have anything to do with me. Why you keep coming back. I mean, what are you getting out of this?”
I lean back against the disfigured chain-link fence and blow out a breath. “You remind me of someone.”
“I’m hoping that’s a good reminder.”
“Yeah.” I look over at him and smile. “It’s a good reminder.”
“Who was he?”
“He was my little brother.”
Leo, no doubt, is a smart kid and catches the past tense used. Was. “What happened to him? Drugs?”
“Nah.”
“Guns?”
“Uh-uh.”
“Then what?”
I think of Chad. Of Rhett. Of Porter. All those corrupt fat cats using money to gain power.
Have I become what I hate?
“Doesn’t matter,” I say and sit up taller.
Never.
I will never be like them.
“He mattered though,” Leo says softly, sensing my discord.
“He did. A lot.” I reach over and ruffle his hair, a little surprised I said any of this. “He still does. He’s the why behind everything I do.”