In Game 5 of the 2025 NLDS against the Milwaukee Brewers, Seiya Suzuki steps up to the batter’s box down 1-0 in the second inning. The Los Angeles Dodgers are waiting to take on whoever wins this game in the NLCS with a ticket to the World Series on the line. After watching the first ball fly just right of the strike zone, Suzuki swings on the second pitch to send the ball 390 feet, well into the crowd to tie the game.

My grandfather sits in a chair to my left, expressing a quiet but adamant excitement. He’s been a Cubs fan since he was a boy seventy years ago, having watched both the long drought of success and the magnum opus of their 2016 World Series title. My mom is to my left, only half paying attention to the game while scrolling through her phone; however, she too celebrates, maybe because she simply likes action rather than caring for what the action indicates. My grandmother is also in the Airbnb, having gone to bed a few hours ago for a level of sickness that deeply worries me. But right now, my focus is not on whether or not the Cubs win. I am not thinking about my grandmother. Neither my grandfather’s excitement nor my mother’s indifference has any influence on me.

My mind is in the closet of my apartment, where a jersey for Seiya Suzuki sits. He was my favorite Cubs player at the time, and growing up in the proximity of Chicago gave me a partiality to the Cubs, but I didn’t get that jersey for either of those reasons. I had received the jersey as a gift three days prior.

For years, I had been an avid fan of the Seattle Mariners. Just one night before Suzuki’s tying home run, the Mariners had won their own winner-take-all game against the Detroit Tigers. I had stayed up until 2 a.m. on my phone to watch all 15 innings of the game, one where excitement and anxiety stemmed from years of involvement rather than the basis of adrenaline. I will be a Mariners fan for the rest of my life, even if they have never won; yet this Cubs Suzuki jersey is the only baseball jersey I own.

A week after a breakup, I was asked by the same girl I had broken up with to drive her to the airport so she could travel home. Seeking lasting friendship and an overarching sense of morality above all else, I obliged. She was heading back home to Chicago and asked if I wanted any “souvenirs” while she was there. Hesitant at first and not wanting to financially burden her or her family in any way, I declined. She kept digging and found out that my favorite player was Suzuki and that I would appreciate a jersey, one which I was given as soon as she was back from Chicago.

There’s a strange mental phenomenon in owning something that so expressly claims the name of one person and tying the same object so inherently to another. Suzuki’s nameplate is clearly printed in bold lettering across the back, but it was always her name. The jersey sits at the top of my closet, folded neatly over and never worn.

When the ball hit off of the bat of Seiya Suzuki and deep into right center field, the score didn’t matter. My grandfather’s excitement stayed in my periphery, and my grandmother’s sickness left my mind. A realization came across me. One day, if I see the Cubs play in the World Series, that jersey will still sit at the top of my closet, neatly folded and unworn with the price tag still attached. Some Cubs player will step up to the plate and launch the ball deep into the stands of Chicago and, for a brief moment, I will see a face that looks like her in the blur of the crowd. I will remember the jersey and I will remember that it was never Suzuki’s; it was hers.