Better Than Her

Chapter 2: Throwing Error

Chapter 2: Throwing Error

Rebecca Howard dreamed of one day going to a game at Fenway Park in Boston, but, for now, Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida, would do. Besides, since the Red Sox were visiting today to play the Tampa Bay Rays, this was a rare chance to be in the same place as the bullpen she worshipped. She winced at the bright yellow logo above the entrance to the stadium and at the words, “Welcome Rays Fans,” but figured she couldn’t be mistaken for one. Standing tall in her Koji Uehara jersey, Rebecca ignored the sideways scowls she got from people trumpeting support for Red Sox enemy, David Price.

Beside her, Nathan Ornelas squeezed her hand and grinned. His round, tan cheeks took on an appealing crinkle when he did that. “Excited?”

She smiled back. “Totally.”

Rebecca liked going out with Nathan. He understood that she wasn’t interested in being anybody’s girlfriend, didn’t ask creepy questions about her dates with girls, and knew how to chill out and have a good time. Unfortunately, she hadn’t met many other guys who could manage all three of those things.

She’d had a ton of fun geeking out with him about Major League Soccer stats during the long car ride to St. Petersburg, and she knew he’d curse David Price during this game with just as much gusto as she would—even if he’d chickened out on wearing his Dustin Pedroia jersey.

Impulsively, she pulled him into a kiss as they waited in line for the entrance. The friendly vibe between them extended to making out. His lips met hers with the casual affection of a high five. When they stepped away from each other, he nudged her arm playfully.

“You’re getting started early with that.”

Rebecca threw an arm around his waist. “I just like you.”

The pleasant heat of the day matched the warmth in her chest. School would be out for summer in a couple of weeks, and she felt like things were already off to a great start.

Considering that, the lurch in her stomach when she recognized Sydney Shieh in line ahead of them came as an unpleasant surprise. Sydney stood beside an excitable-looking blonde girl whose enthusiasm seemed to buffet the tall, whip-thin Seabirds pitcher like a strong wind. Sydney squinted as she talked to the blonde, moving her mouth as if the words on her tongue tasted unpleasant. Reaching up, Sydney tucked a piece of her short black hair behind her copiously pierced ear, then toyed with a section dyed red as the blonde replied to her. And, of course—of course—she was wearing a David Price jersey.

“You know that girl?” Nathan asked.

“Huh? Yeah, kind of. I pitched against her not too long ago.”

“You beat her, right? I notice she has terrible taste in role models.”

Rebecca laughed. Then, for reasons she couldn’t explain to herself, though she’d never said anything to Sydney Shieh besides good game, she added, “I’m going to go over real quick and say hi, okay?”

“No worries. I’ll hold our spot. See if you can get her to see the light.”

She sighed melodramatically. “I don’t know. Some people can’t be helped.” The bantering tone between them made this all seem very ordinary. No big deal at all. Still, Rebecca’s heart pounded as she walked toward Sydney and her girlfriend.

When she got close, she cleared her throat, but they didn’t notice her. She reached out to tap Sydney on the shoulder, then stopped herself, suddenly feeling weird about the idea of touching her. What did she normally do to get a person’s attention? For a moment, Rebecca couldn’t seem to remember.

Then the blonde noticed her hovering and nodded significantly in her direction. Rebecca read her name on the other girl’s lips, shaped with the exaggerated certainty of a thing that had been said many times between the two of them and carried many layers of meaning. She raised an eyebrow just as Sydney snapped to her full height and whirled to face her.

“Rebecca Howard?”

Rebecca smirked. “Just Rebecca. When you use both names, you make it sound like you know me from TV or something.”

“What are you doing here?”

Her eyebrow rose higher. “I’m pretty sure the Rays are desperate to sell tickets to anyone who will pay for them.”

The girlfriend folded her arms across her chest. “Even Red Sox fans, apparently.” The Rays jersey she wore declared her a disciple of third baseman Evan Longoria.

Rebecca ignored her, continuing to focus on Sydney. “Anyway, I wouldn’t normally spend time at the Trop, but there’s a real team playing here today.”

Sydney snorted. “Have you been following this season? The Red Sox might be the world champions, but they seem to have forgotten how to play the game since last fall.”

The line started moving, and the girlfriend grabbed Sydney’s elbow. “Come on. This is pointless.”

Rebecca was still rummaging through her mind for an appropriate comeback when Sydney gave her an apologetic shrug and walked away. Nathan whistled when Rebecca rejoined him.

“You’re lucky I’m not the jealous type.”

“Huh?”

“Longoria over there really didn’t appreciate you hitting on her girlfriend right in front of her.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You were playing it smooth, too. ‘I’m going to go over real quick and say hi.’ I thought you two were going to throw each other to the concrete and start making out right in front of everyone in line for this game.”

Rebecca rolled her eyes. “Nathan, you’re usually better about restraining your fantasies.”

“I’m just saying. I think Longoria had better watch her back.”

Luckily, Nathan had dropped the teasing by the time they took their seats. Something about the encounter with Sydney, however, had soured Rebecca’s mood. It didn’t help that Sydney had been right about the Sox. They really did seem to have forgotten how to play since last fall.

The first inning started strong, with the Sox scoring a bunch of runs off David Price. Then the Rays pitcher shook off the threat and retaliated by shutting out the Sox completely, inning after inning. The Sox offense fell apart under an onslaught from Price, gradually frittering away their lead.

It was ugly out there. David Price was owning them.

Even worse, Uehara was a closer. Red Sox Manager John Farrell only brought him out to clinch a win. Farrell never wasted Uehara on a losing bid. When Tampa Bay scored three runs in the bottom of the fifth, tying the game, Rebecca’s hope of seeing Uehara live in action faded. She didn’t think she’d get to say, It’s Koji time, after all.

“I’m going to get something to eat,” she told Nathan. “Want anything?”

He started. He’d been slumped in his seat, one hand covering his eyes, as if the disappointment on the field was too much for him to face directly. “I can get it for you.”

“Nah,” Rebecca said. “It’s an excuse so I can stop looking at David Price’s stupid face for a few minutes.”

Nathan sighed heavily. “I ought to come with you. I’m embarrassed for these guys.”

She shook her head. “I’m not going to be good company.”

“Ugh. Fair enough. You’re a torturer, you know that?”

She slapped his upper arm gently. “You can have your own break later.”

Adjusting her hat so it shaded her face almost entirely, Rebecca made her way back to the food area. Just her luck, she saw a familiar David Price jersey headed for the hot dog stand at the same time.

Spinning on her heel, Rebecca decided she wanted pizza instead.

Footsteps behind her told her Sydney had followed her. That weird tension returned to Rebecca’s body. The stadium food court transformed to a smaller, warmer space than it had been before. Rebecca’s palms began to sweat.

“Exciting game, huh?” Sydney said.

“Depressing game, more like.”

Sydney shrugged, stepping into line beside Rebecca. She was smiling, clearly high on the adrenaline of watching her team come back from a bad start. “David Price is a really good pitcher.”

“No, I can call it like it is. Every good batter on my team is on the DL. There’s nobody left to hit the ball.”

“He won the Cy Young award. You can’t pretend he doesn’t know what he’s doing.”

“Yes, I can,” Rebecca snapped, turning her back to Sydney. There was a pause between them, then Sydney burst out laughing. Rebecca couldn’t help joining her. She knew how ridiculous she sounded.

Sydney touched her shoulder. “You can pretend if you want, but deep down, you know the truth.”

Rebecca stopped laughing abruptly. That sounded way too much like something Nathan could tease her about, or something that would have pissed off Sydney’s girlfriend if she’d been there to see it.

Rebecca took a careful step to the side and wrinkled her forehead, trying to look deeply absorbed in deciding which combo was least overpriced. “What kind of pizza does the blonde like?” she asked, keeping her voice casual.

“The blonde? Oh. Kayla. She actually wants a hot dog.” Sydney cleared her throat. “I just came over here to offer my condolences. Sucks to watch your team lose.” She touched Rebecca’s arm again. Rebecca frowned at Sydney’s hand, and the other pitcher retreated. “I guess I should get back.”

“Yeah, you should.” Rebecca cracked a smile now that the weird moment seemed to have passed. “Because condolences are premature. The Sox are going to remember how to score. You’ll see.”

“Yeah, well, the Seabirds couldn’t figure out how to score once you got hold of them. Sometimes it’s just too late.”

Rebecca snorted. It was hard to know how to respond to that one—half a dig against the Sox, and half a compliment to her.

She watched Sydney disappear around the corner. The person behind her had to give her a nudge to pull her attention back to the window at the pizza counter, where the cashier was waiting to take her order.

Rebecca got a slice of pizza for herself and Cracker Jacks for Nathan as a joke. She returned to her seat, and they commiserated about the incredible ability of Sox outfielders to hit popup balls straight into the gloves of Rays defenders.

She caught herself a few times scanning the seats, trying to spot the Seabirds’ pitcher. She wondered if Sydney had an arm around the cute blonde girlfriend, and her stomach flipped over. Leaning against Nathan, she dragged his arm over her shoulders. He responded with a friendly squeeze, then frowned.

“You doing okay? I thought you didn’t like for me to distract you from the game.”

“The freaking Red Sox are distracting me from the game,” Rebecca retorted. “It’s hard to pay attention when they don’t seem to be.”

“Yeah. This thing might go into extra innings. Let me text my mom.”

Rebecca sighed. “Good idea.”

In the ninth inning, the score was still tied.

Nathan nodded toward the bullpen. “Your boy’s warming up. I think Farrell’s going to put him in.”

Exhilaration whooshed through Rebecca. She would see Koji Uehara play after all. She barely blinked through each of his precisely landed pitches, but as the game dragged on, minute by excruciating minute, neither team budged. Farrell relieved Uehara with the fifth Boston pitcher of the night.

“Well, at least I get to see a lot of them,” Rebecca said.

By the time the twelfth inning rolled around, she was gritting her teeth, bending the bones in Nathan’s hand out of position with an anxious death-grip.

Nathan’s phone buzzed, and he pulled away from her carefully, one eye still on the field. “My mom says, and I quote, Baseball games only have nine innings. Nice try.”

“Ha. Tell her to look this up online.”

“Nah. I’ve got to convince her to trust me, so I can tell her later that the game went to twenty innings.” He waggled his eyebrows at her and winked.

“Yeah, your mom is right. Nice try.”

Rebecca refused to crane her neck to see if Sydney and Kayla were still here. She refused. This became a physical effort as the Red Sox reached deep into the bullpen for an eighth pitcher.

Now Rebecca leaned against Nathan because she needed something to hold her up. She gave in and looked around. There Sydney and Kayla were, in the spot where she’d expected them to be. She must have found them subconsciously at some point.

Kayla was in Sydney’s lap, her face buried in her girlfriend’s neck. Rebecca remembered the way Kayla had run to Sydney after the Jaguars had defeated the Seabirds, jubilant where no one else on that side of the field was. Vikki Subramani, the purple-haired cutie who’d come to watch Rebecca own the Seabirds, had laughed about that. But Rebecca couldn’t help wondering what it was like to have that with somebody. Much as she liked Nathan—and Vikki, for that matter—she couldn’t imagine seeing either of them day after day, with no breaks in between.

“Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” Nathan was shouting about something. Everyone was shouting about something. The crowd surged to its feet. “Did you see that throwing error?” Nathan seemed to be on the verge of tearing out his hair.

Rebecca met his gaze and grimaced as if she had, but the truth was she’d been totally focused on Kayla and Sydney, to the point that she’d somehow missed the deciding moment of the evening, the fifteenth-inning throwing error that had lost her team the game.