Chapter 1 Olivia
cleanup batter - chapter one - olivia
“Coop! Come on! We’re going to be late.”
“I can’t find my glove!” My ten-year-old son yelled back downstairs. I slapped the glove against my hand in frustration and eyed the baseball cleats still caked in dried mud lying at the front door. Nope, he hadn’t realized he didn’t have those yet.
“I have it. And your cleats.” Thank God I had washed and set out his uniform for him last night. Otherwise, we’d never be ready to leave.
Being a mom is the most rewarding thing I have ever done.
I repeated the mantra I developed for whenever Cooper tried my patience and reminded myself that I wouldn’t trade being his mom for anything.
I waited at the bottom of the stairs with a granola bar and a bottle of Gatorade in hand and passed them off to him as he rushed to the door. When he flung it open, he was met with a wall of men.
My brother Austin stood there sheepishly with another man—was he even a man? He couldn’t be more than 18, if he was even out of high school.
“Um, hello?” It was then that I noticed the suitcases and boxes with clothing and other belongings spilling out of them. “What’s going on?”
“We left Ashley.” The kid spoke.
“We?” Austin smacked him on the back of the head.
“Woah! Are you Nate Reaves?” Cooper’s obsession with all things Minutemen had him identifying the stranger before my brother thought to introduce him.
“Yeah. What’s your name?”
Coop turned shy. “Cooper. Austin is my uncle.”
“Hey, as much as I want to make small talk, we’re going to be late for Cooper’s game. What’s going on?”
Austin cleared his throat, signaled to Cooper. “It’s a long story. But I left Ashley, and we need a place to stay until the dust settles.”
“We?” I asked.
Nate jumped in to explain. “The team set Austin up as my babysitter. We’re kind of a package deal.”
I looked him up and down. Nate was the rookie on the Minutemen, just signed this year. He was older than 18, but just barely. I briefly remembered Austin saying that he and Ashley had been put in charge of helping him settle.
Austin rolled his eyes. A brief flash of pain and annoyance mixed together in a flurry of emotion.
What the hell had happened between him and Ashley?
Personally, there was no love lost between the two of us.
I had never trusted her and always thought my twin brother could do better.
Austin had been distracted by her long legs, fake tits, and even faker smile.
“Well, this is your house.” Austin had bought this house for me and Cooper the minute his baseball contract allowed.
At the time, I had been living in a one-bedroom apartment in Lawrence with a landlord who liked to ignore calls and didn’t believe in pest control.
I tried to tell him that 5000 square feet in Lexington was overkill, but he guaranteed me that the investment was worth it.
“It’s your home, Liv. I swear I won’t stay longer than necessary.”
“And you won’t even know I’m here.” Nate flashed me a smile, and I caught him looking at me longer than necessary.
I stepped aside. “Coop, get in the car.”
“Uncle Austin, can you come to my game?”
“I’ll come.” Nate piped in.
Austin and I snapped our heads in his direction. Why the hell would he want to spend the afternoon at my kid’s Little League game?
“Don’t you need to get settled?” I asked.
“Nah. I’ve been living out of suitcases all year.”
“Fine, roll your stuff in, and you’ve got three minutes to get into the car.”
Austin reluctantly joined us. He always tried to make as many of Cooper’s games as possible, but realized that when he showed up on the field, he brought a spectacle.
The fathers on the team crowded around and tried to get autographs, and my brother looked defeated and in need of some time alone to decompress.
“You good?” I asked, earning a wince.
“I have to be. You haven’t been on any social media, have you?”
I shook my head.
“Okay. I’ll drive, so you spend some time on the internet. It’s not something I care to discuss in front of Coop.”
Austin drove my Tahoe, ahem, his Tahoe—another item he’d purchased for me as an “investment,” while I thumbed through the media stories.
Ashley had slept with one of his teammates.
While I was certain this wasn’t the first time she had strayed, this seemed to be the first time my brother was aware of her indiscretions.
Nate and Cooper chatted in the back seat, and I noted that he actually seemed interested in what my son was saying. Probably because he was only a few years out of Little League himself.