“Go, Cassie,” Tara demanded. “Get down to the locker room. That’s where they’re taking him.”
Without a word I nodded, grabbed my things, and hurried toward the staircase that would take me underground. I flew down the last set of stairs to where anyone in the public could go before heading through a private door. Once inside, the air of the cold brick tunnels hit me. The tunnels ran the length of the stadium and unless you’d been under here before, you wouldn’t know they existed. I rounded the corner and jogged up toward the burly security guard.
“Hey, Jimmy, is he here? Did you see them bring Jack off the field?” I asked, my voice distraught.
His forehead creased as he answered, “Jack? No. What happened?”
I released a shaky breath. “He hurt his hand.”
“Really? Damn. I hope he’s okay.” He stepped aside, revealing a small clearing between the guardrails, and I rushed through, walking as fast as my nervous legs would allow.
I followed along with the bricks as they curved gently, noticing the Mets sign attached to the wall up ahead. My pace quickened as I ached to reach the double mahogany doors that read NEW YORK METS CLUBHOUSE.
Another security guard sat in a folding chair next to the entrance, his face pinched with concern. He stood upon my approach. “Cassie. He’s in there with the doc.” The sympathy in his sad eyes rattled me even further, and my mouth went completely dry.
“How did he look, Joe?”
“He was in a lot of pain,” he admitted grimly.
My throat constricted, making it hard to swallow. I realized in that moment that I’d never once considered the possibility of Jack getting hurt. He seemed invincible in a way … like his body was born to play this sport and it would never allow him to be hurt by it. It would never betray him like that.
But it did.
And I found myself scared to death about what this meant for him. Jack without baseball … well, that wasn’t Jack at all. I wouldn’t even know who that person was; I’d never known Jack when baseball wasn’t a huge part of his life. Worry shot through me and I couldn’t stop a nervous shiver.
“Cassie?” Joe’s voice echoed in the tunnel, followed by the sound of him hanging up the rotary phone. Unable to speak, I looked up at him helplessly. “No one else is in there,” he said gently. “You can go in.”
He opened one of the large doors for me and I walked through into the one place at the stadium I’d never been before. I eyed the oversized couch and the carpet patterned with the team’s logo, before my gaze fell on the lockers bearing each player’s name and jersey number, a soft spotlight highlighting each one as if they were museum exhibits. I laughed to myself that the guys called them “lockers” when they looked more like the thin oak closets you would find in hotel rooms.
I found myself longing to photograph the room as each individual detail called to me in ways that only new places can. Occupational habit, I supposed. Or denial, maybe.
“Kitten?” Jack’s voice rang out through the large space, an undertone of pain causing it to sound different somehow.
Snapped back to the present, I called out, “Jack? Where are you?”
“Walk to the back of the room and make a right.”
As I hurried past the row of lockers, number 23 grabbed my attention and I couldn’t resist the impulse to pause for just a second at Jack’s locker since I’d never seen it, and might never have the chance again. His travel bag and street clothes hung inside, waiting for him, and I ran my fingers down the fabric, moving them slightly. Taped against the back wall was a picture of the two of us on our wedding day, flanked by other candid shots of us. I loved how much this man displayed his love for me.
With a slight smile, I headed toward the back of the room and rounded the corner just as the team doctor injected a shot into Jack’s arm to help ease his pain. I noticed that he didn’t even wince.
“I think it’s shattered,” Jack admitted as soon as his dark brown eyes met mine.
SHATTERED.
And in that moment, that’s exactly how my heart felt. I rushed to his side, needing to be as physically close to him in that moment as I could.
“We don’t know that yet,” the doctor interjected. “I’m Dr. Evans.”
I extended my hand to his. “I’m Cassie.”
One look at Jack’s face and my chest ached with the need to protect and comfort him. I stroked his shoulder as I asked, my tone all business, “What do we know?”
“It’s definitely broken, but to what extent I’m not sure yet.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “But it will heal just fine, right? People break their hands all the time.”
Dr. Evans nodded. “True. But we need to make sure it won’t require surgery, or pins or metal plates.”
Pins or metal plates? Oh my God.
Jack swallowed audibly and I continued to prod the doctor, my growing concern overruling all levelheadedness. “And if it does, then what? People have surgery on their hands all the time too. They get better.”
“Yes, Mrs. Carter, they do,” he said with a frown. “But most of those people aren’t major league pitchers.”
My heart sank. “So, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying that I need to x-ray his hand first and then I’ll have more answers for you.”
Jack’s chin dropped to his chest and I watched his eyes close.