Chapter 7
SEVEN
Ping.
The ball made a sharp, high-pitched noise as it collided with my aluminum bat. It was a different sound than I was used to, but not unwelcome. After playing with a wooden bat for years, it felt appropriate, another echo of how my life has changed.
But luckily, some things hadn’t. The way my body moved, the way my arms swung, how the ball felt when it hit my bat, going 60 miles an hour. There was nothing else on my mind; everything was blank, and all I focused on was that little white ball colliding through space.
I swung the bat back over my shoulder, waiting for the next ball to roll through the machine. Thank God time hadn’t changed the old batting cages.
Pete’s Hideaway was another local legend, a pirate-themed adventure track tied into the mini-golf course across the street. It had definitely seen better days, but the owners were getting older and not putting as much money into maintenance as they used to. Technically, they were closed for the winter, but the owners knew me and let me come and hit a couple of balls whenever I felt restless, which had been happening more often than not lately.
Luckily, the temperatures had gotten a little warmer over the past few days. Even though it was barely fifty degrees, it was practically a heat wave after the long and draining winter. Almost everyone in town was out and about, taking full advantage of the warmer temperatures. In upstate New York, you never knew what the weather might be like during these transitional months. One week might be warm and sunny, and you could have a snowstorm the next. Mother Nature was a fickle bitch.
My ball slammed into the back mat of the batting cage, and I couldn’t help but smile. This was what I missed from Saint Stephen’s Lake: the memories of growing up, of days spent in the same cage, working on my swing before a big game. I came here almost every night in high school— nights where things were too much, too loud, too chaotic. It was the only place that could calm my racing thoughts. And now, on one of the most challenging days of my life, the most challenging period of my life , it was once again my quiet little hideaway.
From the cage next to me, Cole looked over, arching his brow at my last hit. When I called him earlier to say I needed to clear my head, he didn’t question me, didn’t even think twice about joining me, despite the dropping temperatures. Alex, Cole’s wife, offered to keep my mom and dad occupied while we were out. I was beyond grateful, knowing my mom could use the distraction. After our doctor’s appointment this morning, she was processing the best she could, probably knee-deep in flour, determined to help Alex conquer her fear of baking.
I wanted to be there for her, but I couldn’t, not while I was sorting out my own shit. It didn’t help that we weren’t seeing eye to eye on my dad’s treatment plan. It would be good for both of us to take some space before we tried to talk about it again.
A sharp curse came from the cage next to me, pulling me back into the present.
“You good over there?” I asked, smirking as I lined up my bat for another hit.
“Don’t know how the hell you do that,” Cole said, shaking his head. “Especially right now. My hands are shaking too much to connect.”
“Spent a lot of time in these cages,” I answered, keeping my eye on the ball.
Cole just chuckled, mimicking my stance. That was why I called Cole; he understood my need for quiet. When I first came back home, it was jarring to see new people in the house next to ours. My entire childhood, that house had sat empty, just waiting for someone to find it and bring it back to life. Now, it looked like a home, complete with sunflowers during the summer and a bright blue door. But Alex and Cole were good neighbors and had become even better friends over the past few months.
They were practically family at this point, especially Alex. My mom loved having a girl to spoil and teach her ways. My dad loved having someone else who he’d show around this toolbox.
While Alex and I were friendly, I was closer to her husband. Cole and I had formed an instant kinship, a way of understanding each other without so many words. We were both quiet, both considered grumpy, and both preferred silence over the noise of a crowd. It helped when I needed to just exist without someone asking me a million questions about how I was feeling or what I wanted.
“So,” Cole said between hits of his bat. “You gonna tell me why I’m freezing my balls off out here, or you gonna keep brooding over there all day?”
“Don’t know,” I said, shrugging my shoulders. “Kinda just felt like hitting something.”
Cole sighed and resumed his swing, letting go of his question. As much as I felt bad for shutting him out, Cole understood and knew that I was a fort when it came to tough topics. If I didn’t want to talk, I wasn’t going to—just another thing we had in common.
But after this morning’s doctor’s visit, which my mom and I have been dreading all week, I need to get the words off my chest. And maybe, for once, it wouldn’t be the worst idea to keep all my fears buried down deep.
“It’s my dad,” I finally said. In the corner of my eye, I saw Cole put down the bat and move over to the side of the cage. He stood there but didn’t say anything, allowing me to continue my thoughts. “He’s having a hard time. Doc says he’s got about six months until he’s going to need to have full-time help”, I finally admit. “Six months left until he’s probably going to have to live in an assisted living facility.”
“Shit,” Cole hissed. “I’m sorry, man. We had no idea it was progressing this quickly.” He ran his hand over his face. “What about having someone come out to the house? Live in nurse?”
I shook my head, “My mom’s not comfortable with that. But at the same time, the idea of putting him into a home makes her cry. So I’m kind of stuck. I don’t really know what to do. “
“I’m sorry, man,” Cole said, scuffing his feet along the turf. “I thought he was doing okay.”
“He is,” I said. “Most days. But the good days are becoming fewer and further between. And he’s having a harder time keeping his memories straight. Last night, he thought I was in high school, fully convinced that he missed one of my baseball games. The doctor wants us to consider our options but also urged us to think fast. There’s no telling what might happen when he declines more.”
“What do you mean?”
This part was the most difficult to say out loud, so I kept it to myself. Even though the doctor never said it outright, I could pick up his insinuations. He was afraid for my mom. My dad was a big man. Even as he got further into his sixties, he was well over 6 feet and over 250 pounds of packed muscle. My mom was a waif of a woman, barely reaching his chin. If something was to happen, there was no way she’d ever be able to get him to safety or, god forbid, subdue him.
In his right mind, we all knew that my father would rather harm himself than ever put my mother in danger. But that was the thing. When he woke up in the middle of the night, he didn’t recognize any of us. It was hard enough getting him to calm down when I was in the room, and I had him by a couple of inches. While I had to trust that my father would never hurt my mom, accidents happened every day.
Just the thought seemed ridiculous. And even though I knew it was wishful thinking, I couldn’t imagine that no disease, no matter how dangerous it might be, would ever come between them. At the same time, I wasn’t a doctor. I didn’t know about timelines or disease progressions, or anything other than what I’d read online. I could only speak for my own lived experiences.
But I keep all that to myself, not wanting to burden Cole with all of my anxieties. I’d already shared more with him than I had anyone else in my life.
There were only three people in town who really knew about my father’s sickness outside of our family. Well, six, if you counted their wives and girlfriends, because my friends could not keep any secrets from them.
Theo was the first one I told. It was the morning after Cole and Alex’s engagement party, the day after I found my dad wandering through town with no memory of who I was. He’d said he was going to the bathroom, and none of us thought anything of it. Not until twenty minutes later, when we still couldn’t find him. I spent hours driving down each road, fearing the worst. Eventually, I saw him sitting on a bench on Main Street. But the moment I approached, I knew something was horribly wrong.
After I drove him home and got him to bed, my mom broke down and told me about the diagnosis. She was trying to hide it from me until I had gone back home and was back in my routine. But from the moment I saw my father’s scared and frantic face, I knew that my life would never be the same. I knew that I could never walk away and live with myself. Could never live with the guilt if I left my dad when he needed me the most.
So, without thinking, without hesitation, I went to Theo, who had only been my agent for a handful of months at the time, and told him I needed out of my contract. If I had any doubts about the guy before, that moment silenced them. He didn’t ask questions, didn’t need to know why, and didn’t do anything other than be a sounding board for my fears and worries.
And all he said after I rambled on for an hour about my father and the treatment plans and everything else was that he would take care of it. That was all. But the next week, I was out of my contract, back in town, and living in the apartment above my parents’ garage. It's not where I saw myself on the cusp of 30, but it’s where I needed to be .
I glanced over my shoulder at Cole, making sure he was still there. He was there, a silent sentinel watching me, making sure I wasn’t going to fall.
“I don’t know what to do,” I said quietly.
“We’ll figure it out,” Cole said. “Whatever you guys need, you know we’ll all be there for you.”
I had no doubts about that. They’d all been there for my family since the moment I told all my friends about our deepest, darkest secret. I’d sworn them to secrecy because my mom wanted to deal with my father’s illness privately, and I knew that they would keep it safe. They were great, constantly checking in on my mom and making sure she was okay. They also went out of their way to spend time with my dad, making sure that they filled his days with as much love and laughter as possible. They were incredibly patient, especially Alex and Cole, even on the days when it took a while for him to recognize their faces.
Even though these people would never give my family by blood, that moment alone had cemented their role in my life. There was nothing more I wanted but to make my dad’s diagnosis disappear. Without that as a possibility, all I could ask for were good people in his corner, making sure he was supported for the rest of his days.
And my friends, my new family , had stepped up for that.
“Appreciate it,” I huffed, toying with the bat in my hands. “I’ve got to talk to my mom. See what she wants to do next.”
“But what do you think?” Cole said.
“I don’t want to give up yet. I know that there’s no cure, but there has to be something, anything, to give him more time. My dad’s a fighter, and he would never want us to sit back and watch him deteriorate.”
Cole scratched the back of his head, “What about one of those trial things?”
“Clinical trials?” He nodded. “There’s a couple for early onset Alzheimer’s. One of the most promising ones is down in New York, so I’ve been talking to some of the doctors down there. Problem is, it takes months to get an open spot. Some of them take even years.”
I sighed with annoyance, knowing how many hours of my life I’d wasted looking at different trials, hoping for a miracle. There were several that claimed they could heal him for a sizeable fee, but all of those weren’t linked to reputable hospitals.
His best bet was in New York City, a trial at one of the best hospitals in the country. But the selection process was complex, and it was hard to get into. Not only was it costly, which I had covered thanks to my baseball career, but it was very, very hard to even get into the doctors.
Maybe if I had an in at the hospital, I could manage to get him into the trial. Unfortunately, I didn’t know any of them. I was just nobody, a name in the crowd. And while most people might recognize my name from my baseball career, it didn’t help me with this. In the world of New York’s elite, people lived or died by their last names and their family connections. It was a hard club to break into and something as fickle as a sports career that would never open the doors I needed.
“Maybe,” I said. “We’re meeting with the doctor again next week to go over his latest scans, so maybe he’ll have some more options for us.”
As the machine wound down with a sad, whirring sound, I placed the bat back in my bag and left the cage. Cole met me on the other side, handing me back his bat as well. But as I stood up straighter, he clapped me on the back.
“You know, whatever you need, Alex and I are here with you. All of us. We’re all in your corner. “
“I know that,” I said quietly. “Means more than you know.”