Do Not Fall For The Baseball Captains novel Chapter 29

Ose Bad Night

One Bad Night

Elijah’s POV

The heavy dugout doors clicked shut behind me, the cool evening air hitting my neck as I finally escaped the stadium. I’d just wrapped up a grueling, two–hour meeting with Coach Miller.

As the team’s starting shortstop and the leading candidate for the captaincy, the coach had been drilling me on defensive alignments, leadership expectations, and the strategy for next weekend’s crucial scout game.

My mind was completely spent, focused entirely on baseball.

I was halfway across the gravel path leading toward the parking lot when my phone let out a loud, demanding ring from my pocket.

I pulled it out, ready to ignore it if it was a telemarketer, but the name on the screen made my muscles relax instantly.

Alex.

My eight–year–old brother’s face popped up on my screen for a video call. I swiped the screen, accepting the video incoming call, and hoisted the phone up to my face as I kept walking.

“Hey, buddy, what’s up?”

The screen lit up, but instead of my brother’s usual energetic greeting, I was met with a shaky, close–up shot of his face.

His red–rimmed eyes were swimming with tears, and his chest was heaving as he tucked himself into what looked like the dark corner of his bedroom closet.

He let out a harsh, ragged gasp, his little shoulders shaking as a high–pitched, terrified sob filled the quiet evening air.

The sight of him completely unraveled made my legs lock in place on the gravel.

“Alex? Buddy, look at the screen. What’s going on?”

“Eli…” he sniffled, his little voice completely hysterical, drowning in tears. “It’s Mom. She’s… she’s having one of those times again. She’s throwing things. I’m scared.”

My heart dropped straight into my stomach. A familiar, crushing ache bloomed behind my ribs.

One of those times. The phrase was a pleasant family euphemism for when the darkness completely swallowed my mother, turning her into a stranger who tore the house apart.

“Okay, okay, listen to me, Alex,” I said, my voice dropping into a forced, steady calm

Un Bad Night

despite the terror roaring in my own head. “Have you called Sofia? Call Sof right now

“I tried!” he wailed, a loud crash of breaking ceramic echoing clearly through the speaker, making me wince. “Her phone keeps going straight to voicemail. Eli, please, what do I do?”

I cursed under my breath, my mind racing. Sofia was in the middle of a massive federal court trial today–a high–stakes litigation she’d been prepping for all month.

Her phone would be completely off and locked away in the courtroom clerk’s cabinet until evening recess.

Hearing my little brother’s fragile, terrified whimpering, I knew I couldn’t afford to break, I had to be the anchor. His strength and guide.

“Hey, look at the screen, Alex. Keep your eyes on me, okay?” I commanded, already breaking into a fast stride toward my car, my keys jingling in my free hand.

“Where is Dad? Have you tried calling his office? What about Uncle Simon or Aunt Rachel? Can you run to the neighbors?”

I threw open the driver’s side door of my car, climbed in, and slammed it shut, proping the phone up against the dashboard display so he could still see me.

I stared at his trembling face on the screen, a wave of absolute helplessness washing

over me.

How the fuck was I supposed to help him from here? I was sitting in a parking lot in Chicago, and my little brother was thousands of miles away in our family home in Los Angeles.

I couldn’t just reach through the glass and pull him out of that house.

“Dad isn’t answering his work phone,” Alex sobbed, the camera tilting wildly as he pulled his knees closer to his chest.

“Mom is… she’s breaking the nice plates from Grandma. She’s screaming at the wall,

Eli.”

Another massive shatter rattled through the speaker, followed by the muffled, unrecognizable screeching of my mother’s voice in the background.

The sight and sound of it made my stomach turn. I knew exactly how she got when she reached this state. It was a terrifying, complete psychological fracture where she didn’t recognize her own children.

And then, a cold realization hit me. I glanced at the digital clock on my dashboard. May 20th.

Today was the anniversary. It was the trigger date, the one day of the year her mind completely broke under the grief, and we had all somehow been too wrapped up in our own routines to remember to stay home with her.

One Bad Night

“Alex, listen to me very carefully,” I said, reaching down to turn the ignition key. The engine flared to life, my knuckles turning white against the leather steering wheel “Do not try to go downstairs. Do not try to talk to her. I want you to slide out of the closet, go out the back door, and run straight to the neighbor’s house. Don’t worry about grabbing anything, just leave the house right now. Can you do that for me?” “I… I think so,” he whispered, the camera shaking as he stood up and opened the closet door.

“Keep the call active, Alex. Keep me in your hand. Just walk out the back door.”

I sat in the idling car, my eyes glued to the screen as the video feed whipped past the dark hallways of our house, showing a brief, terrifying glimpse of a broken vase in the corridor before the picture shifted to the bright moonlight of the backyard.

I heard the frantic pad of his socks hitting the concrete porch.

“I’m on the porch,” Alex gasped out a minute later, the camera finally stabilizing as he turned around to look at our neighbor’s house. The suffocating edge of immediate danger was finally gone from his voice.

“I’m at Madame Paris’s house.”

A second later, the phone shifted hands, the screen tilting upward until a familiar, elegant, older face filled the frame.

“Elijah? It’s Madame Paris.”

She was our elderly, incredibly wealthy neighbor whom we’d grown up treating like an adoptive grandmother.

“Madame Paris, thank God,” I breathed, the absolute terror in my chest easing just a fraction as I looked at her steady expression on the screen. “Is he okay? Is he hurt?”

“The boy is completely fine, just frightened out of his wits,” she replied, her tone crisp, authoritative, and completely devoid of panic.

“I have him right here with a glass of milk. Now, Elijah, I can see you are sitting in your car through the camera. Do not do anything irrational. Focus on your surroundings, calm your mind, and let me handle this. I am already having my personal security detail track down your father at his office. Alex is safe with me.”

“Thank you,” I choked out, a genuine wave of gratitude washing over me. “Thank you

so much.”

“Of course, dear. Drive safely.”

The screen went black as the line went dead.

I leaned my head back against the headrest, closing my eyes as I let out a long, shuddering breath.

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