The lot is full when he gets back to the complex, the mumble of the announcer sounding like it’s the middle of the third. As he weaves through the left-field lot, he is thinking about what he’ll tell Dorsey, trying to come up with an excuse, wondering about whether the clubhouse attendant has washed his sanis and cleaned his cleats and set out his uniform. It’s a special treatment he usually resents, because he is one of the guys, he can handle his own gear—but today he is hoping someone has done him the favor. He is thinking about who they put in left and what Dorsey will say and—

And then he sees him. Jason is passing between parked cars in the players’ lot and spots a little kid curled up on the back seat of a faded blue Toyota, slick as a seal pup, cheeks glowing red. His shaggy head is tucked into his knees, his back showing Jason’s name and number. Baseballs are scattered all around him.

Maybe Jason should’ve worried about glass shards, about what would happen if he cut up his hand. Maybe he should’ve thought about the sound it’d make and considered if that might scare the kid. But all he can think of at that moment is how damn hot it must be in there, it feeling like a furnace outside, and so he picks up a stone from the stadium’s nearest rock garden, fits it like a spear tip between his knuckles, and brings down his fist upon the glass, as hard as he can.

The glass shatters. Jason reaches in, opens the door, pulls out the kid. He is so small—young, but skinny, too—limp like a rag doll, and hot to the touch. Jason starts yelling for help, and someone from the grounds crew—the guy he paid off at the start of the season, the short one who gave him keys for the shed—is there in three seconds flat, cold water in hand. He pours it over Jason and the boy like champagne after a pennant win. He passes another bottle to Jason, who tips it to the boy’s lips.