These Foolish Things (2 page)

“Millie, what say we dog it a bit in the first innings?”

“Are you serious?” Millie was aghast.

Liz nodded, “Yeah. Look, they’re going to be watching us
warm up and won’t be expecting much based on THEIR female players.”

Millie was intrigued. “Go on.”

“Okay, so you, Cassie, Rose, Nancy and I feed their
expectations for a bit, let our guys ‘cover’ for us, let them suck up a few
beers, then we lower the boom. You know, we get ‘em with a sucker punch.”

“I love it,” said Millie. She beckoned Corey over and
quickly filled him in on the plan. “Go tell Joe and the rest of the crew while
Liz and I, ahem, ‘warm up’.”

The Bad News Barristers watched the Gators’ pitcher and
catcher warm up. They saw the softball thrown in big, soft, slow arcs, usually
crossing the plate. They saw the catcher, in full gear, clumsily and weakly
throw the ball back to the mound, barely making it sometimes. They heard a lot
of giggling and “Oops! Sorry!” in girlish voices. The Barristers relaxed and
had another round of beers. The Gators abstained. Finally, the umpire called,
“Play ball!” and the Liti-Gators took the field.

The Barristers had placed their female members in the lineup
where their skills would do the least damage and the male players had the best
chance to move them around the bases. Whenever a Barrister girl came up to bat,
the Liti-Gators would move in from the field expecting weak hitting if any
contact was made at all. It proved to be a sound strategy.

The Barristers used the same tactic for the Gators’ female
players, coached into place by Hadley, who was the Barristers’ shortstop. He
was a powerful hitter and aggressive base runner. He’d smile, clap and yell,
“That’s okay, Honey” whenever a female Barrister struck, grounded or flied out.
As part of the sucker punch strategy, one of the male Gators would run in to
back up Liz for plays at home plate. She saw Hadley run full force into someone
blocking the plate. Her teammate got up, shook it off and yelled, “Are you
fucking crazy?” at Hadley, who shrugged and calmly replied, “That’s how the
game’s played.” He then accepted another beer from the Silicone Queen with a
kiss and an arm around her waist.

After the fourth inning and before taking the field for the
top of the fifth, Liz nodded to Joe who called the team into a huddle. Liz
looked around and said just one word.

“Boom.”

The Gators grinned and took their places. The fun was about
to begin.

Millie looked hard at Liz before heading to the mound. “Are
you sure, Liz? Did you see Hadley clobber our guy at home?”

Before putting her mask back on, Liz patted her chest
protector and looked evenly into Millie’s eyes. “Anything he can dish out, I
can take.” With that, she positioned her mask, squatting instead of standing
behind home for the first time in the game.

“Batter up!”

Millie Wentworth, software engineer, patent attorney and
member of the U.S. Women’s Olympic Softball Team (injured, reserved) struck out
the side, including a dumbfounded Tyrone Hadley.

First up for the Gators in the fifth inning was Elizabeth
Gardner, junior attorney, former catcher, team captain and batting champion for
the 1983 NCAA Women’s Softball Champions, Northeast Region. The Barristers
moved in, their male pitcher smiled (patronizingly, thought Liz) and waited
while Liz fidgeted in the batter’s box. When she had adjusted herself into her
usual stance, she smiled sweetly back at the mound. The Barrister pitcher threw
the ball in a slow, high arc that went into the wheelhouse. Liz smacked it into
a vicious line drive deliberately aimed inches over Tyrone Hadley’s head,
causing him to throw himself on the ground. Liz thought she had a stand-up
double until she rounded first and saw the ball beginning to come in from deep
left field. Liz ran faster and slid feet first under the tag Hadley tried to
put on her, having pushed his own second baseman out of the way.

“SAFE!”

The Gators cheered wildly and the rally was on. Liz dusted
herself off and made ready to run for third. She ignored Hadley staring at her.
Or tried to. Having the man’s undivided attention was unnerving. She kept her
eyes on home trying to ignore the fact that Hadley’s eyes were on her.

“Nice legs.”

Liz tried not to smile. “Thanks.” She glanced over to check
out his. “And may I return the compliment? I’ve played this game before.”

He chuckled and looked at her again. “That chest protector
was hiding something pretty nice, too,” he said.

Liz shot him a dirty look and said nothing. He was just
trying to distract her.

“You’re right, that was out of line. Sorry,” he said. “You
almost parted my hair with that hit.” Tyrone Hadley had a deep voice with a
subtle rough edge to it. The result was something akin to a growl.

“I didn’t notice. Should I apologize?” Liz didn’t make eye
contact, but she tried to keep her voice sounding innocent. She yelled to home,
“C’mon, Joey! Try not to hit any bocce players this time.” Joe grinned.

She heard Hadley chuckle at that and again the sound made
itself felt in her groin. “Bocce players?”

She nodded. “Yep. This season, we’ve hit two. Last year, we
got three, a bicyclist and an old dog.” She glanced at him. “Not on purpose, of
course.”

“Of course.” Their eyes met and Liz’s stomach did back
flips. She refocused on home plate and Joe DiNardo at the bat, but it required
a huge effort to block out the thought of Hadley.

Joey took the ball deep into center field and Liz was off
and running. She had thought that Hadley would try to block the base path, but
he was back in the outfield yelling, “Goddammit! Get me the ball!” Liz
increased her speed, legging it with all her might for home. Sensing rather
than seeing or hearing what was going on behind her, Liz closed on home and hit
the dirt, sliding in while the ball whistled past where her head had just been
and past an astonished (and inebriated) Barristers catcher. Liz scrambled out
of the way so Joe could cross the plate. Unfortunately, the catcher found the
ball and lobbed it to Hadley, who had run in to cover home when the ball got away
from the catcher. Before returning to his post at short, Hadley watched Liz
high five her teammates. His expression was unreadable.

“Yo! Ty! C’mon!” Hadley jogged back to short stop.

At the top of the ninth, the Gators held a two-run lead. Two
outs, a man on second and Tyrone Hadley was up for the Barristers. Liz called a
time out and a conference at the pitcher’s mound was underway.

“He’s gonna swing for the fences and run the bases like a
Pamplona bull,” Liz stated. “The play’s gonna be at home and on Hadley.” The
Gators nodded agreement.

Millie was offended. “You know, Gardner, I could strike him
out.”

Liz just looked at her. “Wentworth, I’ve been catching you
for 20 years. It’s late in the game and you’re giving up more hits than a porno
web site. You’re out of gas.” The Gators agreed again.

Joey spoke up. “Okay, Rocco, you run in and back up Liz at
home.” Rocco nodded. Liz looked at Joe scornfully, “Giuseppe, you insult me. NO
backup.” Joe started to protest. Liz overrode him. “Listen to me, Hadley’s been
playing full tilt all afternoon. He’s got to be as tired as we are. He’s been
drinking and drinking hard all that time. And, do I need to remind you that I’m
a girl and he seems to be a bit of a chauvinist? Joey, I can handle this. I
don’t need to be rescued.”

Joe looked skeptical. Liz finished emphatically, “Believe
me, he’s not getting past me.”

Joey capitulated, “Fine, Liz. It’s your ass.”

“And a very fine ass it is, Joe,” shot Liz in a fierce
whisper. “Besides, Rocco wouldn’t hold the line. He’s too chicken.”

“Hey!” Rocco protested. Liz gave him a hard look. “Yeah,
you’re right. Go get ‘im, Liz.”

Loudly, she said, “Let’s go, Gators!” and they returned to their
positions.

As Liz hunkered down behind the plate, Hadley casually asked
from just outside the batter’s box, “Got your strategy all set?”

Liz didn’t even glance at him. “Oh yeah. We decided to let
you
hit the spectator today.” A small group had wandered over from the bocce pitch
and gathered behind the third base line. Liz shook her head. These guys never
learned. Hadley chuckled and again, the sound went through Liz, making her
wonder how Hadley’s kisses were. She shook off the intruding thought,
muttering, “Like I’ll ever find out.”

“What?” Hadley had overheard the mutter.

“Nothing.” That was close.

Millie wound up and the first pitch was a ball. Hadley got a
piece of the second pitch and fouled it off behind third base, narrowly missing
the bocce players. They responded with a chorus of Italian and Anglo-Saxon
obscenities. Hadley smiled to himself, waved an apology to the old men and
chuckled again.

On the next pitch, Hadley really got hold and hit a
well-placed shot into deep left. Liz ripped her catcher’s mask off and moved
out for the ball to come in. The first runner scored and Hadley was running for
all he was worth. The ball got to the cutoff at second just as Hadley rounded
third. Rocco hurled the ball at Liz as Hadley began his charge towards home. A
heartbeat after Liz caught the ball, Tyrone Hadley crashed into Elizabeth
Gardner, sending them both to the ground in a heap.

Something deep in the pit of Liz’s stomach gave a lurch as
she felt his legs tangled in hers. His arms were on either side of her and his
forehead resting against her face where it had hit. She stifled the impulse to
rub her face against him and wrap her arms around his body.

After a brief pause, Hadley rolled off Liz, looking at her
and asking, “What the hell were you thinking?”

“Just doing my job.”

Through her pain, Liz noticed his hand was touching her
face, gently examining the spot where he’d hit, under where her right eye was
swelling shut. His face was near hers, too, eyes anxious and searching. What
the hell, thought Liz, who quickly sneaked a kiss before holding up the ball in
triumph.

“OUT!”

She didn’t dare look at Hadley, gingerly touch the left side
of her chest and squeezing her eyes shut. She could hear running feet and a
chorus of “Omigod! Liz! Are you okay?” “Hadley, you son of a bitch! What the
hell were you thinking?”

From the bocce pitch, she could hear some of the old men
yelling, “What are you thinking? You hit that little girl! Maybe I come over
there and hit you, you son of a bitch!”

Liz never really remembered the rest of the evening. There
was the trophy presentation and the usual post-game social hour at a nearby
bar. The Gators kept congratulating her and buying her drinks, but her mind
wasn’t really with the party. The Barristers joined the Gators and even
congratulated Liz on her play and tenacity. She held a makeshift ice pack to
her right eye the whole time, smiling and nodding at the people talking to her.
Her one open eye kept going to Hadley, who was always in the background. He,
too, was drinking, chatting, the Silicone Queen hovering at his side, holding
his arm.

It seemed that every time Liz looked at him, he was looking
intently back at her. At one point, he sent over a beer to her, raised his
glass of Scotch to her in a salute, smiling and nodding. Liz returned the
gesture and they drank. The Silicone Queen looked daggers at Liz, then turned
to Hadley, trying to pout prettily. For all the attention Hadley had paid to
her before the game, he seemed completely unaware of her now.

When she got to her darkened and quiet home that night, Liz
thought of her friends, all paired off and having someone with whom to share
this triumph. Not Liz. She grabbed a plastic bag from the cupboard and filled
it with ice. As she sat with the pack on her face, Liz wondered if she had just
imagined it or if Tyrone Hadley had kissed her back.

“So, Attorney Gardner, you were willing to take one for the
team. For risking life and limb for the glory of this law firm, I am grateful,”
Dan Dennis remarked from his perch on the corner of Liz’s desk.

She looked at him out of her one good eye. “I think that’s overstating
things a bit, Dan. We got your damned trophy for you so we don’t have to listen
to you bitch and whine until next season.” Liz went back to the papers on her
desk. Her eye was throbbing to a ragtime beat. It wasn’t as bad as it had been
over the weekend, but it hurt like hell and was still swollen shut.

“You know, Dan, one would think that as a lifelong Red Sox
fan, you’d have learned by now to handle disappointment with a little more
grace and fortitude. However, we won and with only minor casualties.” Liz
leaned back in her chair.

“What do you want, Dan?”

Dan looked at her with mock innocence. “What makes you think
I want something other than the opportunity to express my gratitude?”

“The named partners of a law firm do not drop in on
associates for a social chat – it cuts too far into billable hours. Plus, my
course of dealings with you leads me to believe that you’ve come here to hit me
up for something especially big, probably difficult and conflicting with a
potential golf game for you.” Liz continued to gaze at him. “Am I right?”

Dan didn’t even bother to look discomfited. He just
continued to sit on her desk and grin.

“Elizabeth, you are remarkably astute and perceptive…”

Liz cut him off. “What do you want, Dan?”

“The Randazzo case.”

Liz suddenly got a bad feeling. “What about it? I drafted
the pleadings and the memos.” She glanced at a calendar on her desk. “You’re
just scheduled to argue summary judgment today at 10:30… oh, no. No, Dan. You
can’t be serious.”

“Liz, you know this case inside out. You’re the one who came
up with the arguments and case law. You can do this in your sleep.” Dan had an
insincere smile plastered on his face. “Besides, I’m supposed to be playing
golf with two of the Bruins at that time. You wouldn’t want me to miss an
opportunity to sign a couple of great clients like that, would you?”