Curveball: The Year I Lost My Grip

by Jordan Sonnenblick

  But anyway, my thoughts shifted from worrying about my grandfather to wondering what Angelika was up to. Sleeping, probably. But maybe not. Maybe she was sitting in her own room, in front of her computer screen, looking at pictures of me. Maybe she was, at that very moment, hoping I’d get over my stomach problem and come back to school in the morning. Possibly, she was even thinking about what I’d be wearing, what we would talk about, whether we would get to work together in class.

  Because I was wondering all those things about her. I even found myself wondering whether she would have her hair down in front of her glasses, or tucked behind one ear. I liked it both ways.

  It hit me, at 1:23 A.M.: I am in testosterone with Angelika.

  Yeah, I know. Duh. But it really, really hit me. This wasn’t just flirting, or playing around, or wanting a girlfriend. This was Peter Friedman wanting Angelika Stone. In pretty much every sense of the word. I wanted to know her. I wanted to be with her. I wanted to tell her everything about me, and still have her want to hear more. I wanted to introduce her to Ray Charles and hope she liked him.

  My second-to-last thought before I finally nodded off was I need to find a way to be alone with Angelika. That was immediately followed by But how? There’s never a good bar mitzvah around when you need one.

  As you might expect, I got teased for days about the bio lab fiasco, until finally I was saved when some other kid slipped in the lunch line and dumped a tray of chicken pot pie all over a cafeteria lady. But things got back to normal, and life was swimming along again until the day we started our next photography project. Mr. Marsh got so pumped up by San’s Henri Cartier-Bresson project that he decided the whole class’s next assignment would be to walk around the school taking candids for the yearbook — with no flash, no zoom, and nothing but a 50mm lens.

  A couple of the seniors squawked about this, because apparently, the usual method of getting the so-called candids was for the upperclassmen to run around shooting posed pictures of huge groups of their friends. But Mr. Marsh stood firm: Each of us had exactly one week to take ten really good unposed pictures, and as he put it, “They bettuh not be pick-chuhs a’ yer friends. ’Cause ya better believe I’m gonna know.”

  Angelika and I were cruising down the hall to class the next day, with our school-issued cameras around our necks — because there was no way I would expose Grampa’s equipment to the war zone of my school’s hallways — when it happened. I stopped to snap a shot of a teacher yelling at some couple that had just been displaying what our student handbook refers to as “undue physical affection.” Just as we started walking again, Linnie Vaughn came up to me.

  Linnie Vaughn! Came up to me!

  Ahem. Anyway, she came up to me and said, “Hey, you’re the kid who took the picture of me for the paper.”

  I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I just swallowed and nodded.

  She reached out and punched me in the right shoulder. Apparently, swimmers are strong, because it hurt: I was just lucky she hadn’t nailed my bad arm. Then she said, “Great job!”

  I swallowed and nodded some more. Linnie turned to Angelika and said, “He’s so cute! Does he talk?”

  Angelika said, “Uh, once in a while. But a lot of times he just stands in one place and drools like this.”

  Linnie Vaughn chuckled. “Well,” she said, “when he recovers, can you ask if he’s going to take pictures at regionals this Saturday night? There’s going to be a victory party afterward at my house, and it would be so cool to have a photographer there!”

  I stood in one place. And probably drooled a little.

  Angelika said, “What if you don’t win?”

  “Funny girl,” Linnie replied. “We’ll win.”

  “Great!” Angelika said. “Can I come, too? Usually we don’t let this kid go out in public without a mute-to-English translator.”

  Linnie said, “Sure. Just make sure he makes me look good, OK?”

  I think I managed a nod and a squeak. Linnie turned sharply and walked away, as Angelika bumped me with her hip. I didn’t know exactly what had happened, but it felt kind of like I had just witnessed two lionesses marking their territory. “Pete, are you going to say something? Ever again?”

  I thought, Be cool. Be cool! What would AJ say in this situation? “Uh,” I blurted in what I hoped was a slightly suave manner. “Do you have a date for Linnie’s party?”

  “Nope,” she said. “Why? Are you asking me?”

  I nodded. After its brief interlude of functionality, my throat had locked up again.

  Angelika smiled, put her hand on my elbow, and started guiding me toward the photo lab. “Absolutely, Pete,” she said. “I’d love to be your date!”

  We turned a corner into a much noisier hallway, which cut off the conversation for a moment. But I could have sworn I heard Angelika mutter, “Like I was going to let you go alone …”

  I walked home with AJ that day, and he was bouncing around the sidewalk like a man possessed. “Buddy boy,” he said, “this party is going to be the sickest party ever.”

  As he ran across a street against the red light, I muttered, “You said ‘party’ twice in that sentence.”

  Somehow he heard, because when he got to the far side of the street, he said, “Party! Party! Party! It bears repeating, my friend. Think upon this: Linnie Vaughn invited you to a party, a fest, a fiesta, a soiree. Wait, a soiree is a kind of party, right? I, uh, just kind of threw that one in. But I’m getting a sixty-eight in French, so …”

  “Yeah, AJ, it’s a kind of party. But —”

  “Soiree! Soiree! Soiree! So, are you going to, like, get all busy with Angelika? Because she’s your date and all … but then again, Linnie Vaughn is Linnie Vaughn.”

  “Which means?”

  “She’s the Queen of Hotness. And she invited you to her party specifically. AND she has a thing for younger guys.”

  “What are you talking about? Who in the world told you that?”

  “Dude, it’s known.”

  Him and his It’s known. “Well, it doesn’t matter. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I definitely think I like Angelika.”

  AJ punched me in the shoulder, exactly where Linnie Vaughn had. It occurred to me that maybe he should go after her if she really liked younger guys. I mean, they shared the same taste in punching bags, anyway. That had to be worth something. “That’s what I’m talkin’ about!” he yelled in my ear as he jumped over a garbage can in the middle of the sidewalk. “Go get her, little tiger! Rrrawr! Oh, this is going to be sick, sick, sick! And don’t worry if you get nervous at the party about, uh, seduction procedures. Fortunately for you, my friend, I have also been invited to this shindig.”

  Whoa. It was strange enough that one of us had been invited to Linnie’s party, but what were the chances that both of us had been? Admittedly, AJ was a popular jock, but this was Linnie Vaughn’s party — the pinnacle of cool happening-ness. I looked at AJ blankly.

  “What?” he said. “Isn’t ‘shindig’ another word for party? Because if not, my eighth-birthday invitations made no sense whatsoever.”

  I sighed. AJ could just be so tiring. It was like having a puppy that followed you to school. A huge, overly friendly, hyper puppy that could talk. And talk. And talk. “Yes, a shindig is a party. I’m just trying to figure out how you got yourself invited.”

  “Well, the whole team is going to be there.”

  “What whole team?”

  “The JV basketball team. This is going to be an excellent networking opportunity for you. I mean, four of those guys are baseball players, too. I’ve been telling them how cool you are and everything, but they really need to hang out with you so the team can start to gel before the season gets going. There’s Ray, the shortstop; DJ, the right fielder; Tommy — you remember Tommy? From two years ago in All-Star Baseball Academy? Hey, are you even listening? Here I am, trying to get you back on the path to awesomeness, and you’re staring into space like I’m not even making an
y sense.”

  “AJ, tryouts are still three months away.”

  “Ah, but it’s never too early to work on team chemistry. Speaking of chemistry, I can’t wait to hang out with Angelika and you at the same time. I need to observe your interactions in detail.”

  “Why?”

  “Duh. Because, as your wingman and personal hormonal advisor, I have to analyze your moves, her countermoves, your counter-countermoves, her counter-counter-countermoves…. Wow, this is really complicated stuff. Maybe we should stop by Staples on the way home so I can buy a clipboard and some graph paper.”

  “AJ, I appreciate all of this,” I said. “But isn’t there a chance I might actually have things under control on my own?”

  He looked at me for a second, and then busted out laughing. I took that as a “NO!”

  I don’t know what other people like to do to get psyched up for a big party night, but my approach was to have brunch with my grandfather. We had a long-standing Saturday-morning tradition of going to a diner together once in a while, and it had definitely been a while. Plus, there’s nothing like checking my favorite person for signs of dementia to get me in the mood to rock and roll. Actually, smacking my head repeatedly with a heavy shovel would have been just about as much fun. But at least with this option, I got hash browns.

  He picked me up right on time, and when I got in the car, he seemed to be in a great mood. I told him about my sports shooting progress, the party that night, and our Henri Cartier-Bresson assignment. “Sounds like this Mr. Marsh really knows his stuff,” Grampa said.

  “Yeah, I’m learning a ton in his class,” I said.

  “Good. Are you going to shoot at the party tonight?”

  “Nah.”

  “Why not? You’re going to have your camera on you anyway, right? You’re going there straight from the meet.”

  “But —”

  “You could get some great candids there. And people love getting their pictures taken at parties.”

  I thought about what I had heard about high school parties. Somehow, I didn’t think people would necessarily be overjoyed if some freshman was getting up in their faces and recording their lusty, potentially illegal escapades. Plus, I didn’t want to be thinking about a school project at the party — I wanted to concentrate on getting closer with Angelika. Besides, I would probably need to focus some of my energy on keeping AJ from embarrassing me too much. “I’ll think about it, OK?” I said.

  He nodded, and then we didn’t talk anymore until we had gotten to the diner and slid into our favorite booth. I ordered the Big Man Breakfast, which was a gigantic platter of eggs, pancakes, and every variety of greasy meat you can jam onto an oversize plate. Grampa grunted, “Guess your stomach is better,” then put in his order for a bagel with lox and a cup of coffee.

  Our food came out pretty quickly, and it all tasted excellent. Everything was going great until a beautiful, blonde-haired, youngish lady came over and got Grampa’s attention. “Hey, you’re Paul Goldberg, aren’t you?”

  He looked up from his bagel, nodded, and smiled, but I could tell he didn’t know who this woman was.

  “I’m Anna McGuire. You were my wedding photographer. Two years ago? At the Lehigh Country Club? You did a fabulous job! We love our photos — we look at them all the time! Anyway, I just wanted to stop by and, uh, say hi.”

  Grampa kept smiling and nodding for a beat too long without saying anything. Then, finally, he said, “It’s nice to meet you!” Anna McGuire didn’t know what to say to that, so she just kind of stammered and stutter-stepped backward, away from our table and out the door.

  This was bad. It was so, so bad. Remember how I mentioned that his number one motto had always been “Get the shot”? Well, his number two motto was “Never, EVER forget a bride’s name.” When you’ve spent forty years as a wedding photographer in one little valley, you meet brides all the time whose weddings you’ve shot. I mean, this happened to Grampa at least every other time he went out in public. And in my entire life, I had never seen him blank out on a bride. This time, not only had he blanked out on the bride’s name — he had pretty much forgotten how to interact completely.

  “Gramp,” I said. “Are you all right?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” he asked, taking a huge bite of bagel.

  “Well, that lady that just came to the table. You didn’t seem to know who she —”

  “Peter, what are you talking about? We were just sitting here having a little conversation about … about … about things. And now you’ve gotten yourself all in an uproar. Everything’s fine. Eat your food.”

  “But —”

  “It’ll get cold.” He looked away from me, and spent the next few minutes elaborately refilling, creaming, and sugaring his coffee. He seemed totally calm, as though he had already forgotten all about his failed conversation with the woman. But I didn’t see how that could be possible.

  “Hey, Grampa,” I said. “Have you ever forgotten a bride?”

  “No,” he said, “never! I’ve made some big mistakes in my career … like this one time, I forgot to bring extra film for my cameras and had to run out to a drugstore between the ceremony and the reception. I thought the groom’s father was going to have a coronary! And another time, I showed up at Our Lady of Mercy when the wedding was supposed to be at Our Lady of Infinite Mercy. But I can still remember every single bride I ever shot.”

  “Every single one?”

  “Sure. Watch this! December 3, 1972: Bethany Winmoor. October 5, 1987: LeeAnn Dalrymple. March 6, 1994: Erin Kopesky.”

  “How about Anna McGuire? Did you ever shoot a wedding for someone named Anna McGuire?”

  He took a sip of his coffee, then said, “Blonde? Pretty?” I nodded. “Sure, I remember her. My main Nikon was in the shop, and I shot her whole wedding with one of my backups. That was back in … I think it was in … June, maybe? Two, three years ago? I don’t know — something like that. Hmm, I wonder how she’s doing. Funny that I’ve never seen her around. Why do you ask?”

  The hair stood up on the back of my neck: Grampa had just completely missed several minutes of his life. “Oh, nothing,” I said. “More coffee?”

  I spent the rest of the afternoon obsessing about Alzheimer’s disease, and looking again at all the websites I’d found about it. Was my grandfather losing his memory? Deep down, I just freaking knew he had to be, but that didn’t mean I knew what to do about it. One of the sites I found was all about how an elderly person’s children are supposed to step in and make the decisions about care. My mom was his only child, and she didn’t want to listen to what I’d already said. Plus, Grampa didn’t want me to tell her anything more, and besides, Grampa had never let anybody make any decisions about his life.

  I remembered this one time, maybe a year after my grandmother’s death, Mom had suggested that maybe it was time for Grampa to think about going out on dates with other women. He responded by throwing the only cursing fit I had ever seen from him, kicking our whole family out of his house, and then sitting down to cry at his kitchen table while I watched through the little window in his front door. Mom never brought it up again, and Grampa never went out on any dates.

  One thing was for sure: Even if Mom did start to believe, helping Grampa wasn’t going to be easy.

  Eventually, it was time to leave for the swim meet, so Mom and I got in the car. When we were something like half a mile from home, I realized I had forgotten to bring my best indoor-sports lens, so I asked her to turn around and go back for it. Then, of course, I started arguing with myself for the millionth time:

  So, Grampa forgot one bride’s face. One bride out of hundreds. Thousands, probably. So what? I just forgot to bring the single most important item for a shoot. Does that make me senile? And Mom forgets the title of every song she’s ever heard — it drives Dad and me nuts. But I’m not building a case for shipping her off to a home. Plus, Samantha drove all the way back to college last month without her cell phone. He
r cell phone! That’s like me forgetting to bring my left arm or something. But I didn’t think she was losing it.

  On the other hand, none of us had given away our prize possessions because we knew we couldn’t use them correctly anymore. I mean, geez, I still had my favorite Stealth baseball bat hanging in its bag in the garage, even though I knew I would never be able to play ball again. That was what made me feel the worst for Grampa: If he had given away his cameras, he must have known what was going on. What was it like for him, spending most of his time alone, and working frantically to hide the whole problem whenever anybody was around?

  By the time I got done agonizing over all of this, Mom had pulled up to the school. I thought about asking her to park and then telling her about Grampa’s fall, the spacing-out times he was having — everything. But I was running late because of the lens issue, and I was kind of dying to see Angelika, and the meet was about to start.

  What would Grampa have done in this situation? Would he have made himself late to the meet in order to tell Mom about all this stuff? I heard his voice the way I always did when I was unsure, and it told me what he had always said: “Get the shot. You’ve gotta get the shot!” Maybe that was just me giving myself permission to do what I wanted to do anyway, but I went with it. I kissed Mom on the cheek, grabbed my camera bag, and jumped out of the car.

  Angelika was already set up by the side of the pool. She didn’t even look up from her light meter when I came in, but I think I did get a “hey” out of her. Wow, this is going to be some rockin’ date, I thought. I knelt down next to her and started taking out my stuff. “OK,” Angelika said, “I have a game plan. I copied the swim team roster, and crossed out all the girls we got shots of last time. Here’s a list of who’s left.” She looked up and smiled at me then. Aha, I thought. Guess I won’t be focusing on Linnie Vaughn this evening.