The Heartbreaker

“No, you don’t.” I grin. Mav shakes his head.

“Let’s grab a beer. You know the Presidente’s are dressed like brides here, as Dad would say.” Mitch winks, switching from English to Spanish half-way through the sentence. My brother always turns up his Dominican slang when we’re around other Dominicans and I can’t help but to laugh as we make our way in the direction of Dr. Canó.

When we reach him, he sets the burger he’s grilling on a plate, along with the spatula. He opens his arms wide and grins at us. Henry Canó is a big man. He’s a former baseball player himself, who could have absolutely gone to the majors like Dad, but he tore a ligament early on in his minor league career and decided to hang up his cleats and pursue a degree in medicine. Dad respects him more than he respects anyone else in the world. He always says Henry knew what he was doing when he walked away from the game and that he’s the most successful person he knows, despite Dad making a lot more money than him. We grew up thinking of Henry as some sort of god, and him being all of our godfather meant we saw him pretty often before we settled in New York for good and the Canós settled down in the middle of North Carolina, something I never understood, as a city guy.

“Well, would you look at what the cat dragged in,” he boasts, brown eyes dancing. “My dudes. Damn you’re huge. When did this happen?”

“Mav just passed dad in height this summer and never leaves the gym.” I go in for a hug and pull away so my brothers can do the same.

“Wow.” He shakes his head, looking at the three of us with a chuckle. “This is wild.” He looks over at Mitch. “I didn’t expect you to be here.”

“My training starts next week.” Mitch smiles.

“Are you excited about it? I bet you are.”

“I think Dad’s more excited than I am,” Mitch says with a laugh. “But yeah, I mean, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity.”

“There’s a lot of talks about you going to the majors. How are you feeling about it?” Henry asks.

“I feel like I don’t want to jinx anything.” Mitch shrugs. “Carson signed this summer.”

“You could have signed as well,” I point out.

“Eh.” Mitch cocks his head as if he’s not so sure. Henry looks at me and shrugs a shoulder.

My brother doesn’t like talking about it much because as he says, he doesn’t want to jinx anything, but I get a feeling there’s a lot more to it. He’s had a few opportunities and passed on them for different reasons. I’m not one to judge, but it drives me crazy to see someone I know can succeed actually take a chance on it. Deep down, I think he’s constantly comparing himself to dad. I guess in a way we all are, but Mav and I don’t play baseball, so even though we live in our father, the man’s shadow, we don’t live in our father, the baseball god’s shadow. Mitch does.

“That’s the one you introduced me to during your last game last season?” Henry asks, taking the spotlight away from my obviously uncomfortable brother.

“Yep. The short stop. He’s going to play for the Astros now.”

“Amazing. You do you, Mitchell. Don’t worry about everyone else.” Henry smiles, then looks over at me and gets serious. “Why haven’t you come to see me? Your father said your shoulder is still acting up.”

“I was planning on going soon.” I glance down briefly because I hate being under his scrutinizing gaze. “Coach said—”

“I don’t care what your coach said. Tell him you’re coming to the practice to do physical therapy from now on, every week. If you want to see the field again, you need to stay on top of this.”

“Dad’s dying for him to switch to baseball. Coach Wallace said he’d put him straight on the roster, but you know these guys with their football and hockey dreams.” Mitch rolls his eyes with a chuckle. “I mean seriously, how many Dominicans that you know play hockey?”

“This is America, Mitch. That means we can do whatever the hell we want. The only reason dad played baseball was that it was the only sport available to him.” I reach for three beers in the cooler beside us and hand one to each of my brothers. “Besides, the adrenaline isn’t the same in baseball.”

“I think he’s fine right where he is.”

Henry takes a swig of his beer and looks around. “Have you met any of the people here? There are a lot of former players, not that you don’t meet great athletes all the time, but these people are from your alma mater.”

“We just got here,” Mav says. “I’m definitely looking forward to seeing some basketball players.”