Page 101 of Home Run

“Not a lot to ask, right?”

“Nope. Not a lot to ask.”

Ace and Parker were already munching on energy bars and downing water. Doctor Matthews and her team of scientists had been monitoring our blood pressure, oxygen, heart, and sweat rates—among other things—in real time throughout the game, and the coaches were handing out exactly what we needed based on the results they’d read.

I, for example, was given a bottle of electrolytes and a packet of Twizzlers along with the same energy bar everyone else was handed.

“Man, I can’t wait for a burger when we get on the plane,” Parker said, ripping open a Snickers he must have stashed earlier. “I’m starved.”

“Same. Not long to go, Lux has promised a big hit, so then all we have to do is hold themoff.”

“I didn’t promise,” Lux replied, tossing his bottle into the trash. “I said I’d see what I could do.”

“Pot-ay-to, pot-ah-to.”

He might not have promised, but he still lived up to his word.

Lux pulled out the big guns and powered a ball into the right field of Oracle Park and out into San Francisco Bay. Like at Lions Stadium sitting on the Hudson, groups of Giants fans sat in dinghies on the water waiting for a ball to appear.

Parker, Ace, and I were too busy cheering Lux to see if anyone caught it, watching him sprint around the bases one at a time before he reached us again.

Every single one of us jumped on him as he stepped in, knowing that he’d brought us that one step closer to winning the championship and, more importantly,going home.

It was enough. Somehow that ball injected a new-found energy inside all of us, and the Giants didn’t manage to get a ball past us the whole time they were at bat.

And then we reached the final Giants batter for this eleventh inning.

We’d all dug deep, until we ran close to empty.

Boomer Jones had made a couple of excellent catches.

Saint Velasquez, who wasn’t the fastest on the team by any stretch, had managed to sprint for a ball, snatch it up, and fire it over to Sawyer James on second base. Ace had reinvigorated the throwing streak, which gave him a perfect game last season, and by some miracle there had been no scoring from the Giants for this inning.

Ace raised his knee, pitching his arm back. The ballfired toward the final Giants batter, making contact with a loud crack.

I thought it would head out toward Lux, but instead, the ball bounced on the ground, bringing it into a trajectory between Jupiter on third base, and me. I dove forward, scooping it into my glove, then fired it over to Boomer, praying he’d make the save before the Giants batter reached him.

It all happened so quickly, my eyes may as well have been closed for how closely I was paying attention to his positioning, but between the two of us, we got it right. The cheers from the fans who’d traveled across the country to support us were everything I needed to hear.

We’d won the final game in San Francisco. We were 3–2 up in the championship series. One more win from us and we’d be heading into the World Series.

Lux threw his arm around my shoulder. “Great work, bud, now let’s get the hell out of here and head home.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Forty minutes later we were boarding the plane.

“Hey, anyone know the Yankees score?” someone shouted behind them.

“They won. We’ll play them in the World Series.”

Notif.There was no doubt we were going to win our next game. We were heading back to New York to finish this on home ground in front of a home crowd.

And more importantly, in front of Millie.

Aweek ago we were in front of our fans, throwing the game away.

Now we were on the precipice of making history.

---