There are only two people on the field, a guy at home plate with a baseball bat and a big bucket of balls and a guy at first base swinging his arms around like he’s a windmill. Alex recognizes the batter as Lions shortstop Ray Putney, but he doesn’t know who’s on first. He looks young, like he’s maybe the same age as Michelle. When Putney hits a ball bouncing up toward first base the guy bends down to scoop it up and Alex can see the name on his back: GOSLIN.

It is so quiet in the stadium he can hear the players talking. “Don’t insult me, Putt.” That’s the fielder saying that.

“Just getting warmed up, Willy. Don’t you worry.” Putney tosses another ball up in the air then swings around and hits it, harder this time. It zooms so fast Goslin has to put up his glove to protect his face and then the ball is in his glove, whap. “That’s it, Goose. Nice catch.”

The first baseman throws the ball back toward home and it hits the bucket of balls and makes them rattle and they almost tip over but they don’t. “I told you, never call me Goose, got it?”

“Okay, okay. Gos-lin. Got it.” Putney pulls another ball out of the bucket. “Pop up?”

“Sure.” Goslin punches the leather of his glove and looks up at the sky. But the ball leaves the bat charging along the ground in fast, mean bounces and it goes right by him into the right field. Alex laughs.

“Fuck you, Putt!”

Putney smiles. “You got another left-handed batter willing to practice this JV shit with you?”

Goslin is quiet and gets back into his crouch, his glove on his knee. “Gimme another.”

“That’s what I thought.”

The two players go through the whole bucket of balls and then collect them and go back into the dugout and there is no one on the field. Alex counts the number of times he sees the word Lions around the stadium and is up to twenty-two when some other players come out, and an old guy that looks like the grandpa from the Grandpa House. Someone else wheels out a big machine that looks like a vacuum on stilts. The old man stands behind a metal screen and feeds balls into the machine and they get spit out and fly at the batter. The first guy misses five balls and then goes to the back of the line. The second guy hits three, misses two. The third guy hits the first one up real high, straight up, and it comes falling back into the seats with a loud clatter. It’s just a few rows away! Momma says that Alex is not supposed to leave this seat no matter what, but he can see the ball rolling around and he figures it’ll be fine if he goes and gets it.