Pay Attention, Carter Jones

by Gary D. Schmidt

  · 11 ·

  An InnIngs

  During a one-day match, each team will have a single innings to bat, limited by the number of overs bowled—an over being six deliveries by the bowler.

  What happened next was sort of what happens in a dream, where you’re not sure what anything means, but you figure it all should mean something, but you have no idea what it’s supposed to mean, so you’re hoping you wake up quickly. The Butler came running toward me—​and it was sort of surprising how fast he was coming, because, you may remember, he’s sort of big around the belly. Then his arm went over his head, and he threw the ball, and it hit the ground, bounced up, came under my bat that still didn’t really feel like a bat but which I was holding straight, I think, and hit the wicket behind me so that the bails flew all over the place.

  “Young Master Carter,” said the Butler, “your principal task at this moment is to protect your wicket.”

  “Yeah,” said Coach Krosoczka.

  “To the death,” hollered Billy Colt.

  “This means that you are to bat the ball away from it,” said the Butler.

  “Away from it,” said Coach Krosoczka.

  “The ball hit the ground,” I said.

  “As promised,” said the Butler.

  “So it was, like, a ball or something.”

  The Butler looked at me. “It is a ball,” he said.

  “No, I mean like the opposite of a strike. A ball.”

  “You are confusing your sports, young Master Carter. This is cricket.”

  “Cricket, not baseball,” said Coach Krosoczka.

  “So the ball is supposed to hit the ground?”

  “Of course. Shall we try it again? Coach Krosoczka, if you will toss the ball back and reset the bails. Excellent. Young Master Carter, we are calling that first disaster a trial run. Now, are you ready?”

  “Pay attention, Jones,” said Carson Krebs.

  The sounds of high screeching.

  “Mr. Bowles-Fitzpatrick, is the ball going to hit the ground again?”

  “With precision and elegance,” said the Butler.

  “And it’s supposed to?”

  The Butler looked for a moment as if he were in pain. “Is there a need for excessive repetition?” he said.

  I swung the bat a couple of times. “Okay,” I said. “Okay, I get it. Let’s see that ball.”

  I did. Three more times. Once under my bat. Once over my bat. And once—​and I am not making this up—​around my bat. And every time, bails sent flying.

  “That last ball was a googly,” said the Butler. “Perhaps it was unfair to introduce it at this point.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “Your bat must be straight when striking the ball.”

  I made my bat straight.

  “And perhaps your knees slightly more bent. You should be ready to react quickly to the ball as it comes to you.”

  I made my knees slightly more bent.

  “Watch the ball into the bat.”

  I nodded.

  “Into the bat,” said Coach Krosoczka.

  Nodded again.

  “Into the bat,” said Carson Krebs.

  Nodded again.

  “So, once more into the breach,” said the Butler, and he came running at me with his hand looping over his head, and the ball sped out of his hand and it hit the ground and bounced and I kept my bat straight and my knees slightly more bent so I was ready to react quickly to the ball as it came to me and I watched the ball into the bat and I swung—​and you know what?

  You know what?

  I missed.

  “If you would throw it right, I could hit it,” I said.

  “Young Master Carter, since there are references to cricket in England in the mid-sixteenth century—​that is, when the largest English settlements on your American shores comprised two or three fishing hovels leaning together—​I believe I may have the advantage over you in terms of understanding how my bowling is judged to be ‘right.’”

  You see how sometimes the Butler could be a pain in the glutes?

  “Shall we see if young Master Krebs still has the knack of it?” said the Butler. “Do you mind, Mr. Barkus?”

  Barkus, who had watched this whole disaster, did not mind.

  Carson Krebs helped me take the pads off and he put them on. I handed him the bat. He took it like he knew what he was doing.

  “Young Master Carter, if you would take young Master Krebs’s position in the field as slip. Thank you.”

  “Yeah,” said Coach Krosoczka.

  Krebs stood at the wicket. He took a couple of practice swings. When he swung the bat, his forearm was straight and his knees slightly bent.

  “You are ready, then?” said the Butler.

  Krebs nodded.

  The Butler came running at Krebs, and Krebs waited, watched, and the ball came at him and bounced, and Krebs . . .

  Well, Krebs batted the ball way over the heads of all the slips.

  Actually, he batted the ball way over the heads of all the fielders from the eighth-grade varsity cross-country team and Billy Colt and me every single time he swung.

  Did you get that?

  Every time he swung.

  Even against the googly.

  “Well played, young Master Krebs. Balancing off the back foot and quite upright in your stance. One might almost think you had learned from Sachin Tendulkar himself.”

  Krebs grinned. “I saw him play once. He gave me his bat after the match.”

  “A noble gesture indeed! Thus the advantage of two years’ living in New Delhi. Perhaps you will be so good as to show young Master Barkus the proper hold on the bat, and we will proceed.”

  I guess you can figure out that the eighth-grade varsity cross-country team had a pretty late practice that morning. You might have thought that Coach Krosoczka was steamed about this, but he wasn’t. After Carson Krebs, he was the best batter by far. And when my turn came again, he even gave me a tip that worked out pretty well. “Keep your hands a little lower,” he said—​and it worked. Not against the googly, but I hit four in a row out from the wicket.

  “Not bad,” said Coach Krosoczka.

  “You’re getting your eye in,” said Krebs.

  “What?” I said.

  “You paid attention.”

  The Butler smiled.

  Me too.

  * * *

  The next Saturday morning, we were all back on the pitch—​me, Billy Colt, Coach Krosoczka, and every single member of the eighth-grade varsity cross-country team—​whose practice on Saturday was now an hour earlier so they could take cricket practice after they ran, and we could be off the field before Vice Principal DelBanco got on to holler at his football players when they screwed up.

  This time, we all tried bowling, and it turned out Billy wasn’t half bad—​or as the Butler said, “You have a promising career ahead, young Master William.” He even trapped Carson Krebs leg before wicket. No kidding. And by the end of the morning, he even bowled a googly.

  “Did you see that, young Master Carter?” said the Butler. “He pitched on leg stump, but did you follow what happened next?”

  I shrugged.

  “It was splendid,” said the Butler. “Splendid. It turned to off stump as sharply as you might wish. Absolutely splendid.”

  “Splendid,” I said.

  Simon Singh had the longest hits after Krebs, but he got caught in the deep twice. “Bad luck,” said the Butler. “But I would put you up first on any team.” Which he did when he divided us up and had us try a match, even though there weren’t quite enough of us to make up two sides. The Butler bowled and Coach Krosoczka was wicketkeeper for both teams. Simon Singh captained the red team, Carson Krebs the blue—​and Krebs put me as opener. He was keystone. We scored twenty-seven runs—​and not to brag or anything, but I scored three of them. And even though the red side won because the Butler bowled some that skipped below our bats and he even bowled a yorker once, we al
l said it was a splendid match.

  Really. We all said that.

  And you know how good scoring three runs feels when you’re playing with a team of eighth graders?

  So when the Butler told me that night that he was taking Annie and me to a J. M. W. Turner exhibition at the Marysville Public Library while my mother rested—​“a rare and wonderful opportunity”—​I didn’t say a thing. Not one complaint. Not one.

  Not after three runs.

  And not after the Butler let me drive the Eggplant to the library.

  And not even after we got there and Annie rolled her eyes at how many paintings we were going to have to look at, and I said, “It’s a rare and wonderful opportunity,” and she hit me.

  I never complained. And you know, it really wasn’t so bad—​for an art exhibition. I mean, there were a lot of ships, and a lot of landscapes, and a lot more ships, and a lot more landscapes, and Annie rolled her eyes a bunch more times, and by the end she was yawning kind of at everything.

  But you know what? All these paintings had these skies with swirling clouds that sort of streamed along like they were in high winds, and the winds seemed to push the paint around, like it might all come right out of the pictures and onto the frames. It kind of gave me chills. And there was one painting with an old ship being towed away, and somehow, it made me so sad, sad enough to hold the green marble in my pocket really tight.

  The Butler asked how I liked the Turners.

  “He doesn’t look like he’s following the rules,” I said.

  The Butler nodded.

  I looked again at the picture of the ship being towed out.

  “And like he . . .”

  “Yes?” said the Butler.

  “He wants to tell us . . .”

  A long moment.

  “He wants to tell us that everything has to leave us, sometime or other.”

  The Butler nodded again. “We are all mortal, and that is the way of it,” he said.

  I looked at him. “Yeah,” I said.

  I held the green marble really, really tight.

  Anyway, the art exhibit was a lot better—​a whole lot better—​than Sunday night, when the Butler announced that funds had been set aside in my grandfather’s bequest for an education in the arts, and so he was taking me and Emily and Charlie to a ballet exhibition in the brand-new Marysville Civic Auditorium, and so we went, and I won’t even tell you what people did up on their toes, on the stage, right in front of everybody. And I won’t even tell you what they were wearing.

  I especially won’t tell you what they were wearing—​which wasn’t much.

  Emily and Charlie loved it, and they hugged the Butler and then me when it was finally over.

  “Can we go again sometime?” said Charlie.

  “Certainly,” said the Butler.

  “I think Mom would really enjoy a turn,” I said.

  “That may be,” said the Butler.

  · 12 ·

  A Googly

  A googly is a deceptive pitch spun with the wrist, so that it seems as though it must angle one way, when in fact it unexpectedly angles exactly the opposite way.

  On monday morning, Krebs was waiting for me in the middle school lobby. No kidding. Carson Krebs.

  That’s Carson Krebs, you remember, who hasn’t talked to a sixth grader since he was a sixth grader.

  “Hey, Jones,” he said.

  I looked around. There had to be someone else named Jones.

  “Listen, I got an idea on Saturday and I want you to talk to Coach about it.”

  “Coach Krosoczka?”

  He looked at me like I was a stupid sixth grader.

  “Bowles-Fitzpatrick. I think he should coach our cricket team.”

  “He’s a butler,” I said.

  Carson Krebs waited.

  “Okay,” I said.

  “There’s a sign-up sheet in the gym. Krosoczka said he’d clear it with the administration and Bowles-Fitzpatrick would be the unofficial but kind of official assistant coach. The team’s open to eighth graders and anyone else by invitation. So go look at it—​then talk to Coach tonight. I’ll talk to him too. Okay?”

  “Okay,” I said.

  He started away, and then turned and called across the lobby. “And Jones!”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Remember: This is cricket. This is serious.”

  I felt myself shiver.

  On the way to the gym I saw Singh and Yang and Hopewell and Briggs and Chall and Barkus, and every single one stopped and kind of hit me on the shoulder and asked if I’d seen Krebs yet and wasn’t it great and I should go see the sign-up sheet, so by the time I reached the gym my shoulder was sort of sore—​but it didn’t matter once I got there. Here’s what it said on the sign-up sheet:

  Eighth-Grade Varsity Cricket Team

  Open to All Eighth Graders

  Others by Invitation Only

  So guess whose name was under “by Invitation Only”? Mine. And Billy Colt’s. We were the only sixth graders on the team. I mean, invited on the team.

  I saw Billy Colt in homeroom, and while Mrs. Harknet droned, he leaned over and said, “Are you going to do it?”

  “Side in,” I said.

  * * *

  I guess you can figure out what the rest of the day was like. I mean, how often does a sixth grader get invited onto an eighth-grade team? Never. And we heard about it in every class.

  In Language Arts, Mrs. Harknet said she was proud of us for expanding our repertoire beyond typically American sports. (We had to look up repertoire, which I think she meant for us to do. You know what language arts teachers are like.) In PE, Coach Krosoczka pretended to be a bowler and bowled a googly, and Billy Colt and I pretended to be batsmen belting it out past the covers—​but none of the other sixth graders knew what we were doing. In Math Skills, Mr. Barkus—​who I think was pretty proud of his son the cricketer—​wondered if he could use the scoring in a cricket match to make up word problems. I hoped not. In Physical Science, Mrs. Wrubell said she had once attended all five days of a test match between England and Australia—​“and I never understood a single thing that was going on.” Mr. Solaski said he had once seen a test match too. “I left after ten minutes.”

  But Principal Swieteck was excited. “My husband and I lived in England for two years while he was studying art,” she said. “He played cricket every chance he could. I’m so glad you brought the sport to Longfellow.” Then she said, “You didn’t really pound stakes into the football field, did you? No, don’t say anything. I don’t want to know if you did.” She looked at me. “Vice Principal DelBanco especially shouldn’t know if you did.”

  That’s how it was all day. Billy Colt and I were sixth graders on an eighth-grade team—​sort of like Olympic gods.

  Can you believe it?

  I mean, it was so perfect, I didn’t even mind when the Butler told me we were going with Annie to her robotics club open house—​my mother, the Butler said, might join us if she was able. But I guess she wasn’t able, even though the open house lasted a full hour and a half after school—​right through the reruns of Ace Robotroid and the Robotroid Rangers—​because she never showed. She would probably have been bored anyway. It was an open house with mostly little robots that moved forward three feet and stopped, and little robots that lifted boxes up in the air until the boxes fell from their little claws (or until the boxes made the little robots tip over), and little robots that waved their arms like they were directing a plane into its gate. But I clapped every time Annie’s robot made any sign of moving at all: a tread that inched forward, an arm that twitched, a head that turned, a light that flashed for half a second—​anything. I didn’t mind. That’s how perfect my day was.

  And when Annie said, “Thanks for coming, Carter,” I said, “Anytime,” and she said, “Really?” and I said, “Sure,” and I meant it.

  When we got home that afternoon, Annie went to tell Emily and Charlie about her
open house, and I went to find my mother because I was going to need some white pants and a white sweater and some other white stuff, even though we probably couldn’t afford it, but I thought I’d ask anyway. I walked through the kitchen and she wasn’t there, and then I walked down to the basement to see if she was doing laundry and she wasn’t, and then I walked upstairs and the door to her room was closed. I knocked and opened it. She was sitting on the side of the bed.

  She was holding Currier’s teddy bear.

  His name was Ba-Bear.

  She was holding Ba-Bear.

  “Carter,” she said.

  That’s all. Just “Carter.”

  I wish I could have said something. But it’s not like a play. It’s not like someone has written you a bunch of lines and you can just say the right stuff.

  I couldn’t say anything because I didn’t know what to say.

  But I could see, all right.

  That terrible, terrible day. Cold and wet. Putting Currier in—​

  “It’s your father,” she said. “I got an email.”

  Then I saw something else.

  I could see a thousand things at once.

  My father transferred back to Afghanistan, and him not telling us because we’d worry it was too dangerous.

  My father unconscious, the debris of an explosion still falling around him.

  My father lying alongside a road, covered with sand and stone and blood, holding his leg, his men screaming, “Medic! Medic!”

  My father in a ditch, shot, someone working over him with bandages, him grimacing.

  My father getting carried out in a stretcher, his face grayer than dirt.

  My father in a . . .

  “Carter,” said my mother, and she held out her arms. I sat next to her on the bed and she held me close to her.

  I froze.

  “Is he all right?” I said.

  She held me another minute. Then she sat back. She wiped her eyes. She looked at me. “Carter,” she said.