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Language:
English
Series:
Part 2 of Later Rookie
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Published:
2016-10-26
Updated:
2016-11-07
Words:
8,297
Chapters:
6/?
Comments:
69
Kudos:
235
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28
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5,193

down but not out

Summary:

Ginny gets injured and causes a commotion, but what else is new?

Chapter Text

It was a tough game. Ginny had pitched three solid innings with no runs scored, but it was a close one every time. The Padres had only scored two. And now it was Ginny’s turn to bat.

She could feel the sweat dripping down between her breasts, felt it crawl down her spine.  It was a warm day, and getting warmer by the minute. The air was hot, heavy, made heavier by the tension in the stadium.  She tried to ignore it all, tried to just focus on the pitcher.  Giorgianno liked his fastballs. Ginny saw him wind up for it, knew what was coming.

She was still too slow.

“Dammit,” she swore, lowering the bat after her swing. She had been too slow. The ball had sailed straight into the catcher’s glove.

Standing up straight, she stretched a bit, rocked her neck from side to side to get the kinks out. She tried to release some of the tension she was feeling before getting back into her batting stance.

She scuffed her cleats against the ground before digging in.  Knees bent, she cocked her elbows, waited for the pitch.  Another fastball, and this time she caught it, but just barely. It went foul to a chorus of groans from her fans, and the dugout.

She looked back at the bench. Al and Buck just gestured to her to pay attention, get back in the game.

Lawson, leaning on the fence, met her gaze and nodded. She nodded back.

With a deep breath, she turned back to face the mound. This time would be different.

Well, she was right in a way.

 

The ball hit her in the side with a noise that had shrieks and gasps going up around the stadium.  Ginny dropped the bat, doubled over in pain, a roaring in her ears that she noticed was actually coming half from her teammates who had stormed the field.

One hand clutched her side, the other pressed urgently against her thigh as Ginny tried to keep herself upright.

“Baker! Baker!” It was Al, shoving his face in her field of vision. He and the team medics were surrounding her. She could see that Al was distracted, looking away from her every few seconds and then back at her, meeting her gaze to keep her with him. “Stay with me, focus on me.”

“I’m fine, Skip,” Ginny replied, her voice sounding distant even to her own ears. She turned her head, out of it, not really paying attention to what the medics were doing as they poked at her, asked her questions that went in one ear and out the other.

The two teams had clashed together at the pitcher’s mound. Ginny frowned, trying to make out what was going on. She was distracted when someone’s fingers managed to get her in just the right spot. 

“Arghhh!” Ginny screamed, caught by surprise and unable to keep it in.  When she opened her eyes again—she didn’t even remember closing them—it was Amelia’s face in front of her now. Amelia was crouching in the dirt in her white pants, hands hovering in front of Ginny as if she wanted to touch her but wasn’t sure she could.

“Amelia—” Ginny panted, “You’re going to get dirty.”

Amelia let out a laugh that was almost like a sob before she caught herself, pressing the back of her hand to her mouth.  Her other hand came to cup Ginny’s cheek, smoothing away tears that Ginny didn’t even know she was crying. “I think I can handle a little dirt, Ginny,” she smirked.

“It-it hurts, Amelia,” Ginny half whispered, half whimpered. Time seemed to be going so slowly. And it seemed hotter than before.

Amelia frowned at Ginny. “Come on, Baker,” she glared. “Toughen up. You’ve had worse than this. I can’t think of any right now, but that’s just because you scared the fucking daylights out of me.”

Ginny tried to laugh but it hurt to do that too.

Amelia frowned again, this time not in play, not to make Ginny feel better. Her concern was showing. “Can we get the damn stretcher out here already?” she hissed to the medics. “Clearly she needs to go to the hospital.”

Ginny’s eyes opened wide and she shook her head. “No, Amelia, no.”

Amelia looked back to Ginny in confusion. Ginny was distracted for a moment by the sun flashing in Amelia’s hair before she remembered she was scared.

“Gin, you gotta go to the hospital,” Amelia said.

Ginny shook her had, gritting her teeth against the dizziness. She hated hospitals. The hospital hadn’t saved her father. They couldn't have. And they had made her stay in one for days after the accident. Her physical injuries had been minimal, but her emotional and mental ones….Ginny was still dealing with the after effects of the accident to this day. She didn’t want to go back there. She was afraid they’d find out how much she had been hiding, how her emotional state was not always perfect. She was afraid that they’d keep her there again.  “You can’t let them take me away,” Ginny said urgently, gripping Amelia’s hands.  “You can’t let them keep me there.” She would regret this behaviour later, when her head was clear, but in the moment, Ginny was loopy from pain and sudden panic.

“Ginny, they have to check you out,” Amelia explained, her attention focused on Ginny. Her eyes searched the younger girl’s, trying to figure out what was up.

“I don’t want to go!” Ginny cried. “I’m fine! I just need to—” but Ginny didn’t finish her sentence. In her haste to prove that she was fine, she had stood up straight…and crumpled to the ground, unconscious at the flash of pain.

 

When Ginny came to, she was lying on a stretcher, straps across her chest and legs. Immediately, she began to thrash, heedless of the pain that it caused her side. “Let me off this thing!” she cried, panicked. “Someone come let me go!”

“Hey, hey, Rookie, settle down. What do I always say about the medics? Let them do their jobs.”  The familiar voice that pierced through Ginny’s panic was Lawson’s.  His face came into view as he hurried to her side, grasped her hand.

“Where’s Amelia?” she asked, eyes darting around.

“Went to see what’s taking the EMT’s so fucking long,” Mike said. “She probably went to hijack an ambulance herself.”

His amused tone stopped her eyes darting, his voice calming her. His appearance distracted her, at the same time that it soothed. Mike wouldn’t let anything bad happen to her. 

“What-what happened to you?”  Ginny reached up to gently touch Mike’s split lip.

Mike let her, his eyes watching her, though her gaze was running across the bruise blooming on his cheek, and across his lips. “Aw, you know, just defending your honour and all that.”

“Told you that having a girl on the team would be more trouble than it was worth,” Tommy Miller grinned, sauntering up.  He had scraped knuckles and a scratch on his neck. “Even put my pitching hand at risk for her.”

“She makes people do crazy things like that,” Blip agreed, stopping on Ginny’s other side.  He took her hand, squeezed it. “Gets in to trouble and then pulls everyone else in with her.”

Ginny blinked at the sudden tears in her eyes. She knew that the guys were just ribbing her to make her feel better about her own ribs. And it was their way of letting her know they cared.  They were all gathered around, watching her, checking on her.

“Skip’s off yelling at the umps and Cincinnati’s coach,” Lawson said, his voice low.

“And the game?” Ginny asked urgently.

“We’re just waiting for you to get your lazy ass off the field,” Miller quipped, causing the rest of the guys to chuckle, and Ginny to wince as the hint of her laugh hurt her.

Lawson frowned and shook his head. His hand tightened over Ginny’s, making her realize only then that she had clasped onto him after her examination of his split lip. “Give her some space, guys,” he ordered. “They’ll take her off soon.”

The team obeyed with cheerful comments directed at Ginny as they headed back to watch the show currently being put on by the two teams’ coaches. The shouting match would be replayed on ESPN several times over the next few days, as would the hit that took Ginny Baker down. 

“I don’t even want to go look at my phone,” Blip said before he left. “Evelyn’s probably left 20 texts and six voicemails already. Be prepared for worse.”

Ginny smiled at Blip, knowing that it was true. Evelyn was tough, but she had the tendency to freak out sometimes. Frankly Ginny was half surprised that Evelyn had not stormed the field to take on the pitcher herself.

 

“Guess you were just too much for them, Baker,” Lawson said, bringing her attention back to him. He was chewing his gum, looking down thoughtfully at her.

“What do you mean?” she asked, frowning. And then frowned again. She had turned her head to look at Mike, and was dizzy, but a different kind of dizzy than before. “Did they give me something?” she cried, outraged.

Mike chuckled. “I was wondering when that was going to kick in.”

“They fucking drugged me?” Ginny exclaimed, not willing to admit that the pounding that was her left side was starting to lessen. And she could hardly hear her heartbeat in her head anymore.

“Don’t act so upset, Baker. You got the good stuff,” Lawson reassured her, patting her hand.

“I didn’t want any stuff,” Ginny moaned. “And they’re going to take me to the hospital.”

“Uh, yeah, Baker, they are,” Lawson said, confirming the obvious. “That’s what happens when you get hit with a 90mph pitch and then faint.”

“I didn’t faint,” Ginny grumbled, glaring up at Mike. She had to squint, though, since her eyes weren’t quite focusing. They wanted to close too. “I passed out. There’s a difference.”

“Sure there is, Rookie,” Mike agreed, clearly placating her. 

Ginny glared at him, or tried to, but she was starting to feel warm and sleepy.

He laughed at the expressions crossing her face.  Leaning in, he gently brushed her hair from her face and pressed a kiss to her forehead, beard brushing her skin.

She turned her face towards him, into the crook of his neck, which made him pause for a moment to collect himself at the sucker punch of emotion her movement caused him, before straightening up.  Her eyes had closed, even though she had been fighting the drugs. It was good, because the EMTs were finally here to take her.

He saluted them and made to move away, but a sudden hand on his arm stopped him. Baker had a surprisingly firm grip for a woman who was supposed to be drugged and asleep.

“Don’t let them keep me in there, Mike,” she begged, voice higher than normal.

Mike nodded, seeing something in her eyes that he didn’t like. Fear.

“I’ll spring you out as soon as possible,” he promised. “Well, as soon as I can get around to it. You know, I do have a busy schedule, Baker.”

Ginny’s face relaxed into a more normal smile. “Jerk.” She gave him a gentle push with the hand that had moments ago been clutching at him so tightly.

He smiled down at her, relieved that the disturbing expression had left her face. He brushed a hand to her cheek as the EMT’s lifted her onto the ambulance that had been driven right onto the field.

“Later, Rookie,” he said softly.