Up until AJ met Lara, it’d been suggested that he attend anger-management classes on more than one occasion. In some cases, it’d been mandatory after some of his worst explosive moments on the field. The classes were always lame. AJ never got anything out of them. Maybe if he had, he might’ve done so with more enthusiasm. He wanted to be able to conquer that part of him. It always felt like a weakness.
Lara, however, suggested other forms of mental training. He said lack of mental training was the number-one cause of underperformance, and he’d been right. AJ had attended and done all the training Lara had suggested.
After the first three years of AJ’s career in the big leagues, he was finally making some major progress, and it was even noted by the press. His first year he’d been a mess: bringing on the attention and reinforcing his nickname in the media, something that exasperated his brothers.
His teammates suggested he embrace the notoriety. His moments of rage on the field excited the fans.
“Hell, it’s part of the reason some of these people come out to watch you,” his good friend Sabian, the starting short stop and one of the other superstars of the team, had said. “They’re not just coming for the game; they’re waiting to see if they get to see a Rage show.”
AJ got how it could be exciting for the fans, but it made him feel like a fucking clown. He was there to impress them with his talents as a player, not amuse them with the show he put on when he lost his cool. Not to mention there were fines and time on the field he could lose, which, during those first years, happened a lot.
It was spring training of his fourth year in the big leagues, the year Lara had come into his life and with him his adorable six-year-old granddaughter, Clair. AJ had seen photos of her in the coach’s office before, but in most of them, she was still a baby. She looked nothing like the pictures he remembered seeing. While Coach Lara often spoke of her, AJ had never met her because she lived out of state.
“My daughter Addison and Clair are moving in with us for a few months while she gets situated here in San Diego,” the coach had explained previously. “But she has to make a few trips back to Chicago to get all her stuff moved out here. In the meantime, the Mrs. and I are on Clair duty. Clair started following the team pretty closely in the last year, so I promised to get her out here first chance I got. She’s been dying to meet with you guys, but especially you.”
The day Coach brought her over AJ had been lifting weights in the team’s gym at the stadium. AJ had eyed the coach walking around and introducing her to some of the other players. She was a tiny little thing, a bright-eyed brunette wearing glasses in a Padres jersey, who held her grandpa’s hand as he walked her around the gym.
“Meet my pride and joy, Clair,” he said with a big smile when he finally brought her over to AJ. “Clair, this is AJ, our superstar catcher.”
“Of course I know who he is, Papa.” She’d already been staring at him wide-eyed, but now her big brown eyes actually sparkled. “Nice to meet you, AJ. I’m a huge fan.”
“Nice to meet you too,” AJ said, surprised how well-spoken she was for such a little thing.
“My full name is Synclair McKayla Lara,” she said without hesitation. “I was named after my grandparents, only my first name is spelled with a “Y” not an “I” like Papa’s. I know your full name.”
“Do you?” he asked, surprised to hear it. Not that his full name was top secret or anything, but for someone that young to even know who he was—profess to be a big fan—had already impressed him.
She nodded with a smug but sweet smile. “Andrés Josiah Romero.”
AJ’s jaw dropped, not just because she’d nailed it, but because she’d rolled the r’s perfectly in all the appropriate places like he’d only ever heard his parents and the Spanish broadcasters do. “Wow,” he said, smiling big. “That’s very impressive.”
“My mom has your same initials, only no one has ever called her AJ.” Without waiting for him to respond, she continued just as quickly. “I read somewhere you don’t like the nickname Rage, but I do. It’s better than some of the other cheesy names your teammates have.” She glanced around subtly, making AJ chuckle, and then lowered her voice. “Like Double S,” she whispered. “How’s that cool for an athlete? At least you can say you bat or throw with raging force or something. It doesn’t have to be about your short temper.”
“I’d never thought of it that way,” he said, nodding. “I’ll run that by my brothers first chance I get. They’re actually the ones that dislike the nickname. I really don’t mind it so much.”
Her little brows pinched, and she brought a finger to her mouth. “I can’t remember where I read it, but maybe you were misquoted.”
AJ had laughed again. I can’t remember where I read it, but maybe you were misquoted. What six year-old said stuff like that? He later found out she’d skipped a grade already. She was also in a gifted program back in Chicago, one she was blowing through like a boss and impressing the hell out of her instructors, according to the coach. And he said she’d already been accepted into a similar program there in San Diego.
“She gets her brains from her mom,” Lara later told AJ when his granddaughter hadn’t been around. “I just hope she turns out to be smarter in matters of the heart than Addison is. Was anyway. We’ve never met Clair’s dad. The deadbeat’s never wanted anything to do with her, and I told Addison to leave well enough alone. She didn’t need to be going after him for child support. We could all take care of Clair ourselves without his help and always have. The last thing she wants is to give him is any entitlement over Clair and to risk his asking for custody. Making him pay would do just that, so I’ve never met the son of a bitch, and I hope I never do. A delicate child like Clair is a lot of responsibility. We trust very few people to know what it takes to deal with her, least of all a deadbeat dad.”
AJ hadn’t wanted to ask much more, but as time passed, he learned a little more about the situation and what the coach meant by delicate. Clair had never met her dad either. This made AJ as sad as it made him mad. Both his parents were gone now, but he’d had them there growing up with his older brothers and two sisters. There’d never been any shortage of love in his family, not that he thought Clair wasn’t loved. Clearly, her grandparents and mother loved her. But the more he got to know her, the more he couldn’t believe her asshole dad wouldn’t want to be a part of her life. She was the most brilliant little girl he’d ever met. And just as sweet.
As quickly as Clair had grown on him, he was almost afraid to ask why she was so delicate. Turns out it was just allergies. The poor kid had a slew of food allergies. The coach had mentioned it was why his family suite at the stadium, where his wife and now Clair and his daughter would watch every home game, was in the peanut-free section of the stadium.
Clair had started to come in on days she didn’t have school to watch the team work on drills and practice. She had a lot to say about the drills and stats and had advice to give AJ about certain players he should be looking out for more than others. Her grandpa wasn’t kidding when he said she was an old soul who followed the team closely. She knew more about the sport and AJ’s stats than his own full-grown sisters did. Within a few weeks, she’d declared AJ her best buddy.
Since they mostly talked baseball whenever she’d come around, the subject of her mom rarely came up. All AJ knew was that she worked for the government and she worked a lot. She’d yet to make any games. Clair had also told him her mother was a statistician. The most AJ could make out by the title was that it had something to do with statistics. It was almost embarrassing because at only six, Clair seemed to understand exactly what her mother did for a living. It made sense since, from what he knew so far about Clair, she was a math whiz. She was amazing with all the stats about baseball.