Chapter Six Dominic
Chapter Six
Dominic
I’ ve got an opportunity for you, and I’m going to tell you right now that you’re not turning this down,” Dominic’s manager said through the phone the moment Dominic answered.
“Good morning to you, too, Eric,” he replied with a healthy dose of sarcasm. “You do remember that you’re my manager, not my boss, right?”
Eric Minton had first signed with him when he was being recruited to the minor leagues and had stuck by his side for the last fifteen years. It was Eric who’d gotten him on the Detroit Tigers’ radar, and it was Eric who’d been the first person he’d seen when he’d woken up from surgery for a detached retina after his infamous hit. There was a brotherhood between them now that Dominic felt incredibly grateful for.
“I’m not your best man anymore, either, now that you’re single as hell,” Eric replied. “How’s Melinda doing, by the way? I saw about her new romance.”
“She called me yesterday and told me the news. I invited her up here later this summer to visit if she wanted,” he answered. “Everything is fine between us.”
Eric scoffed. “You’re being much cooler about all of this than I would be. Does ’til death do us part mean nothing to people anymore?”
“You literally have a new girlfriend with each season,” Dominic reminded him.
“Exactly! There are no vows in dating.” Eric laughed, and it was so high-pitched for a man who was generally very rugged in his appearance that it always made Dominic laugh, too.
“Nah, man,” Dominic finally said, his laughter subsiding. “I’m fine. I promise. The last year since we separated has been shit, but I feel like moving here is a new start. My head feels like it’s coming out of the clouds. I even have a new project to work on.”
“What new project? I didn’t vet anything,” Eric said.
Dominic shook his head. “I’m rebuilding a dock.”
“You’re rebuilding your dick? Well, damn, I don’t want to vet that. No wonder Melinda went the other direction.”
“ Dock . Like a wooden dock where boats tie up,” he corrected his friend, though he could already feel his face getting hot. “There is nothing wrong in the other department. Trust me.”
Not that the other department had seen much action lately either, though.
“Why don’t you just hire someone to do it?” Eric asked. “I’ve never seen you even pick up a hammer before.”
“I’m doing it,” he repeated. “You can find instructions for anything on YouTube.”
“You’re going to teach yourself how to build a dock off the internet?” Eric scoffed. “Okay, you are so lucky I called because I have something a thousand times better than that for you.”
Dominic suddenly remembered Eric’s opening line about an opportunity. “What do you have?”
“MLB Strike Zone is looking to fill a commentator position, and your name is in the hat.”
He could practically hear Eric smiling through the phone. “You got me a commentator position with them?”
“I got you an interview for it,” Eric clarified. “It’s not a done deal. You’re going to need to fly into Newark Airport and meet them at their offices in Secaucus next month. There are at least three other people that they are considering, but I think you could easily knock their socks off. There’s no way you’re not top pick.”
“New Jersey? As in, I’d have to move there for it?” Dominic had never been there before, but it was one of the most well-known baseball channels out there. “When would the position start if I got it?”
“Yeah, it’s an in-person position,” Eric confirmed. “You’d need to live nearby at least four to five days a week, but there are some really nice places in New Jersey, and I know a few realtors out there who’d help you get set up.”
“I just bought a house here,” Dominic reminded his friend. “I literally moved a week ago.”
“Yeah, and you’re building a dock. A dock, Dominic. At least in New Jersey you’d have an actual job back in the sports world.”
He had a point. The itch to get back into baseball any way he could was hardwired in his veins, and, admittedly, he couldn’t help but get excited at the possibility. He hadn’t even thought something like this would come along at all, let alone so soon after getting out of the league. Even then, though, he felt his mind race to all the reasons why he wouldn’t be able to do it… why he couldn’t do it.
“What about, um…” He paused for a moment, cleared his throat, and then just decided to be transparent. “What about reading a teleprompter?”
“Already told them about your vision, D.” Eric wasn’t one to mince words, and he didn’t treat him even the slightest bit different now that he was losing his vision. “They said that commentating is mostly you saying what you think to verbal prompts, so no teleprompter involved. If they need something specifically said, they’ll have someone else do it, give it to you up front to memorize, or they can even give you an earpiece and tell you what to say.”
“Really?” That all seemed very accommodating, and it made the pit in his stomach get a tiny bit smaller. It was hard to face the reality that his world was changing and would continue to change. The surgery to reattach his retina had not gone perfectly, and they hadn’t expected the level of damage they found. It was suspected that the fastball had just magnified a former injury or issue, maybe even something he’d been born with. Either way, it was getting a little darker every day, and, according to the doctors, it was very possible that there would eventually never be light again.
He wasn’t ready for that, and he felt this rush of needing to live his life as much as possible before that day. Although he still held out a lot of hope that he could avoid that diagnosis entirely, and he had another appointment with his ophthalmologist soon to discuss next steps.
“All right,” he finally agreed. “I’m in. Send me the details and I’ll book a flight.”
“Great,” Eric said. “I’ll meet you there. It’s been too long since I’ve last seen you, brother.”
“You, too,” Dominic replied. “I’ll see you in Secaucus.”
He hung up the phone and slid it back into his pocket, then focused his attention on the fallen willow tree in front of him. He looked behind him, but Amanda was long gone inside her little yellow cottage.
A nagging feeling began to accompany the pit, and he considered what it would be like to leave Heart Lake at the end of the summer—what it would be like to leave Amanda. Something about the thought felt uncomfortable, and he wasn’t sure why. He’d only just gotten here. But he didn’t even know if he’d get the commentator position, and if he did, he could always keep the house here and come back during the off-season or on vacations. Hell, he could even do long weekends here once a month or something.
Apparently, he was more like his grandfather than he thought.
Dominic laughed to himself and headed back to his house to grab his car keys so he could take a trip to the hardware store. If he was really going to build this dock, he was going to need tools, and he currently only had a Swiss Army knife that had a flip-out screwdriver head. And either way, he needed to get his neighbor out of his mind because he was in no position to be sneaking looks at her anytime she walked out onto her back porch.
Thirty-eight years old, and sometimes he still felt like a teenager.
Twenty minutes later, Dominic pulled his car into a parking space in front of Hammered and Screwed in the middle of Heart Lake’s downtown. There was a large sign on the window that just said “Come get screwed!” so he wasn’t entirely sure if this was a hardware store or something else, but this was where Google had led him.
“Good morning, sir!” An older man’s voice reached him the moment he opened the front door to the store. “We’re running a special on Phillips-heads this week! For every screwdriver you buy, you get a coupon for a free head of iceberg lettuce at Hobbes Grocery Store.”
What the hell?
Dominic made his way up to the counter to find a man in his sixties or seventies sitting on a counter stool and working on the crossword puzzle in the paper with a ballpoint pen. Ballsy to use ink instead of a pencil.
“Did you say lettuce? Like the greenery?” Dominic asked.
The man lifted his head. “Yup! I’m Jack Hobbes. My brother owns Hobbes Grocery, so we like to do promotions together sometimes.”
It really was a small town.
“Oh, well I don’t think I need a screwdriver.” Though he honestly wasn’t entirely sure. “What kind of tools would you recommend for building a dock?”
Jack surveyed him skeptically. “ You are building a dock?”
“Well, I’m rebuilding one. A tree fell on it,” he clarified. “I just moved to town. I’m… it’s a summer project of sorts.”
Jack snapped his fingers. “You bought Murphy’s place, right? We played canasta together before he moved down to the sunshine state. You ever play canasta? We have an open spot.”
Dominic shook his head. “Just looking for dock tools.”
“Suit yourself,” Jack replied as he stepped out from behind the counter and motioned for Dominic to follow him down one of the aisles. He began pulling items off the shelves and tossing them to Dominic, who started stacking them under one arm before finally needing to take a trip back to the counter to set the pile down.
Ten minutes later, the counter was full of everything Jack said he needed, and he had an order for new wood being delivered to the house tomorrow.
“Thanks, Jack,” he said as he handed over his black American Express card. “I appreciate all the help.”
Jack took the card and swiped it over the machine, then handed him back both the card and a receipt. “If you need a hand to show you the ropes, let me know. I close the shop around two o’clock most afternoons and can come on down to help after that.”
“I appreciate that,” Dominic replied, though he had no plans to ask anyone for help. And honestly, he wasn’t that keen on this now being the second person to doubt his ability to get this done. How hard could it possibly be to build a dock? “I’ll definitely keep it in mind.”
“It’s really no problem,” Jack continued. “I’m retired now, so I have the extra time and nothing good to do.”
“You don’t look retired,” Dominic countered, gesturing around him to the store.
Jack laughed. “Believe me—this is me retired. Used to have the place open dusk to dawn and worked out on field project sites at least two days a week. Now I’m here after breakfast and leave after lunch. I’d leave the place entirely if I could find someone to buy it from me, but real estate isn’t exactly flying off the shelves up here. Hell, Murphy’s place was empty for six months before you bought it.”
“Probably why I got such a good deal on it,” he commented, pushing the receipt Jack had handed him into one of the bags of tools. “It was a steal, to be honest, but I wasn’t very picky.”
“You been up here to Heart Lake before? Your face does look familiar,” Jack replied. “Let me guess—former tourist?”
“Caught me,” Dominic confirmed. “I came up here in the summers with my mother and grandfather a few times. Apparently, my grandfather made his way up here more than I realized, though, and he had some sort of dalliance with a woman here in town.”
Jack snapped his fingers. “That’s who you look like! You’re Carleton’s kid!”
“Grandkid,” he corrected. “But yeah. You met him, too?”
The old man nodded, his face taking on a nostalgic lilt that seemed like he was far away for a moment. “Never once beat that son of a bitch in canasta when he was sober, but get one or two old-fashioneds into him, and you could wipe the floor with him. He’s a good man. He coming around here to stay with you sometime?”
Dominic shook his head, feeling the familiar lump return to his throat. “No. Lost him a while back.”
Jack let out a sigh, his hand rubbing the back of his neck then dropping heavily to his side. “Damn. He was one of the good ones.”
“One of the best,” Dominic echoed. “But hey… thanks for the help picking out the tools. If you are free tomorrow after work, you’re welcome to come by and assist me get started. Happy to compensate you for your time, of course.”
He wasn’t sure why he was suddenly agreeing to this man’s help, but something about the connection to his grandfather through Jack felt like he didn’t want to let go.
And the way Jack’s face lit up like he’d just heard the best news helped, too.
“I’ll be there at two fifteen,” he confirmed. “Get all the tools laid out before I get there, and we can just get right to it.”
“Absolutely,” Dominic agreed, though he wasn’t entirely sure what the instructions meant outside of unpacking the bag of tools he’d just bought and taking them out of the plastic. But that was a problem to figure out tomorrow. “See you then.”
He waved goodbye, made his way back outside, and loaded the bag of goods into his trunk. As he was walking around to the driver’s side of the car, however, a flash of black ran past his feet and took up residence under his car right next to his front tire.
Dominic frowned and bent down to look more closely, only to find the smallest black kitten he’d ever seen. This little thing could barely be old enough to be away from its mom, and it looked petrified. With tiny white spots over each of its eyes, it looked like it had eyebrows. But the moment he made eye contact with it, the kitten hissed at him. It sounded more like a tiny puff of air rather than a scary hiss, but he admired the little punk’s bravery.
“Hey, buddy,” he spoke softly, getting down on one knee and scooping the kitten up with one hand. It tried to get away for a moment, but he kept it secured in his palm as he stood back up and cradled it against his chest. “Can’t have you underneath the car when it starts. Parking lots are way too dangerous for you. Let’s look around for your mama.”
Dominic walked a lap around the hardware store, checking any nooks and crannies he could find for a mother cat. There was a café next door and a small alleyway behind it, but despite spending several minutes looking around each box and dumpster, he didn’t find any signs of another cat or sibling kittens.
Meanwhile, the kitten in his hands had rolled up into his shirt and was kneading at the fabric with his little paws.
“You settling in, buddy?” Dominic grinned down at the kitten as he made his way back to where he’d parked the car. “I don’t know where you came from, but it looks like you don’t have anyone.”
The tiniest mewing sound came from the kitten as it looked up at him.
“I’ll let you in on a secret,” he said back in a whisper. “I don’t really have anyone here, either. So maybe we can have each other for now until we find where you belong.”
Something in his gut also wondered if he’d find where he belonged one day, but that feeling felt much further away.
He slid into the driver’s seat and placed the kitten on the passenger seat, where it immediately slid down into the crook of the seat. Dominic grabbed his jacket off the back seat and made a little bed for the kitten, placing him on that instead.
“There you go,” he said, pulling on his seat belt as he felt comfortable that the kitten wasn’t going to slide around on the drive home. “You’re safe now. Let’s see what we can do about getting you some milk or something to eat.”
Dominic remembered that Jack had pointed out his brother’s grocery store down the street, and he figured that would be a good place to stop next to find some cat food and other supplies. Something he’d never thought he’d be doing his second week in a new town, but things were changing at a pace he couldn’t keep up with.
Looks like he was a cat dad now, and, frankly, he didn’t hate it.