The Cactus League: A Novel by Emily Nemens

Author:Emily Nemens [Emily Nemens]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780374720490
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Published: 2020-02-04T05:00:00+00:00

FIFTH

There were no glaciers in Arizona, save for the tips of a few tall peaks, ball caps you’d barely notice above the bulk of the rest of them. Nothing like the thick kind of ice that showed up in Washington: at one point the Mariners, the whole team, the stadium and the fans and all of Puget Sound, were under three thousand feet. Picture five Space Needles standing tip to toe, frozen into one big ice cube, and then imagine that kind of glacier suddenly sluicing. That’ll change your outlook for the game, your prospects for the weekend series.

But fourteen thousand years ago, North America’s glaciers began dissolving in earnest. When the half-mile-deep daub of cool vanilla cream melted from its perch on the Colorado Plateau, it sent water south by southwest, a great gusher that must’ve looked like the rush onto the field that happens when you give the rookie squad the green light to warm up.

These profound floods meant added vegetation in the region—ferns and bogs and big, leafy trees took root in Arizona—and all of a sudden the landscape was verdant. The land was covered in bushes with base-size waxy emerald leaves, was blanketed with soft-palmed ferns as big around as the pitching mound. That kind of green seems unlikely now, about as probable as a National League pitcher hitting an inside-the-park home run. But it happened, a brief spell of lush life that arrived with a big, splashing wall of water.

The Lions ride their own wall of water, and surge forward through the spring. The fielders who went butterfingered over the winter regain their touch; the bats, under Coach Mike’s grouchy supervision, grow as strong and thick as banyan trees. The pitchers find their arms, their heat and precision fed by the newly fertile soil that is a team coming together. And the team is aligning, starting to look like a cohesive unit, like a contender for the division—the bullish among us suggest the pennant.

“Among us”—how easy it is to insert myself back into the booth, to recall the smells of burned coffee and comped hot dogs and that neon-green relish, the anticipation of getting your stat sheet from some zitty media ops intern. How natural to put myself back in the postgame press conferences, Dorsey Paine bloviating in his charming way, Jimmy Cardozo cracking jokes, Jason, with his normal reticence, refusing to talk about anything but on-the-field action. He won’t talk about the Townsend trade or how he feels about that old-timer Monterrey starting again in center field. Won’t talk about the divorce or rumors that Nike is making him a shoe or anything at all about Frank Lloyd Wright. If I’d been granted access, if I’d been in the room, I’d’ve asked: Is it true you lost half a million on Thursday night after Dorsey dropped you off at the stadium to “get your car”? And another $500K on Friday, not even caring if people were watching you getting mopped? Sara’s not the only

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