Plunked

by Michael Northrop

  “I have no idea how we won that game,” he continues. “But we won’t win another one with base-running like that. What we need is a dictionary. Does anyone have a dictionary so we can look up the word slide?”

  I know what’s coming. I have never, in all my time on a baseball field — in all my considerable time on a baseball field — been so happy to do the lawsuit drill.

  I’m going to have to bat today. I know that. I’m just glad I don’t have to start with it. I sprint over to get near the front of the line. I’m right behind Katie. I swear it’s a coincidence, mostly. I pull my hat down low so no one can see where my eyes are. There are all kinds of reasons to be glad I’m still on the team.

  Then I reach down and button the back pocket of my practice pants. I’m going to be sliding, and I wouldn’t want the card to come out, even if it is junk.

  So, to give you an idea of how I’m doing, I’m trying to make myself feel better by thinking about that recurring nightmare. At least you can move your feet this time, I tell myself. Then I look up and see Coach going into his windup.

  I take a deep breath, but that’s all the preparation I get done before the pitch is on the way. For a second, I think I’m freaking out again, just being paranoid and overreacting. But I’m not: Coach really is pitching me inside.

  I manage not to dive backward or anything like that, and I take the pitch. I tell myself that it was a ball, but that’s stupid because this is batting practice. The emphasis is on the first word.

  I take another breath. Of course he’s pitching me inside. Because that’s what I need to hit. That’s what I need to show him. I step back in. Fine, I think, pitch me inside. I’ll stick out my butt, and you can hit a former major leaguer in a protective practice sleeve. Chuck “The Wagon” Wagner isn’t mint condition anymore, anyway.

  That loosens me up a bit. The next pitch comes in, inside half, and I put a swing on it. I’m a little late and foul it down the first-base line. But it feels good, just that contact, the force of the bat hitting the ball going through my hands and up my arms. You can get so caught up with the idea of the ball hitting you that you forget that you’re supposed to hit it. I think that’s a little funny, too.

  I step out. I can see that Coach is ready to start that little mini windup that he uses to deliver his lollipop pitches, and I know I’ll probably get yelled at for this, but I hold up my hand.

  Coach looks at the stop sign, and I guess maybe he doesn’t know what to make of it. He doesn’t go into his windup, though. That’s important, because there’s something I have to do.

  First, I sort of dig my front foot in. I twist my toes into the dirt a few times, then I settle my weight onto my back foot. They always say: Sit down on the back leg. So that’s what I do. Next, I take four swings, two fast and two slow.

  “All right, Garciaparra!” Coach shouts. “Let’s go!”

  I intend to. I’m sick of this.

  The pitch comes in. I’m not surprised when it’s on the inside half of the plate. In fact, I’m counting on it. I start my swing early.

  My mind is screaming to get away from the ball, and I’m still thinking of that nightmare. But I don’t care. This is a meatball pitch on the inside half, and I know it’s coming. I turn on it like I’ve always turned on pitches like this.

  I feel the contact. The vibration shoots up my arms and goes right down to my feet. It’s not that bad, stinging contact, either. It’s the sweet, clean kind. I send a screamer down the third-base line that nearly takes Andy’s head off.

  “There you go!” shouts Coach. “Base hit!”

  Andy is looking in his glove to see if he has it, but he doesn’t.

  I dig in for the next pitch. I’d like to say it’s a homer, but it isn’t. It’s on the outside corner, and I get under it and lift a can of corn to right. I manage a few more liners before my turn is over, though. It’s just BP, but it’s something.

  Coach calls Geoff in for his turn at the plate, and I grab my glove and head out to left. I don’t read too much into it. Left field is still Geoff’s. A few line drives aren’t going to change that. It’s a start, though.

  “Tryin’ to kill me?” Andy says as I run past him.

  He’s talking about the line drive. I can’t think of anything clever to say, so I just smile. It’s a full smile, teeth and everything. It’s the first one in a long time, and it feels good.

  After school on Wednesday, Andy and I are riding our sixth-grade cars downtown. My sixth-grade car is a Huffy, and his is a Schwinn.

  “Wanna jump it?” Andy says, nodding toward a lump of dark brown dirt.

  We’re riding along the stretch of pavement behind the supermarket. It’s somewhere between a driveway, an alley, and an actual road. It’s where the delivery trucks pull up, but there are none here now. The market sells potted plants, and it looks like maybe someone dumped some out or ran some over or something.

  “OK,” I say. I start pumping harder and stand up in my seat to get more power. I sit down right before I hit the lump and lift up on the handlebars to help with the jump.

  It doesn’t matter. The dirt isn’t hard enough, and my wheels just cut ruts in it as they roll over. I fishtail a little at the end, but I don’t go down.

  “Lame,” says Andy.

  “Lame,” I say, and we pedal on into the parking lot.

  Andy dodges a car as it backs out of a parking space.

  “Jerk!” he yells. Then he turns to me: “They didn’t even signal.”

  You don’t have to signal when you back up. I mean, there is no backup signal on a car. “Jerk,” I say, anyway, because it’s not worth pointing that out.

  I feel like a dork with this helmet on, and I bet Andy does, too. But we have to wear them here. (A) It’s the dumb law, and (B) there are too many people downtown we know, and they’d tell our folks. So it’s like we’re legally obligated to look like dorks. All we can do about it is call people jerks and attempt to jump over anything in our way.

  We hop the curb onto the sidewalk and pedal on, looking for the next thing. Then we spend another half hour or so just tooling around downtown before we start hitting the same roads and alleys and sidewalks for the second and third time.

  Behold downtown Tall Pines! There’s just not that much to it.

  “Pharmacy?” I say.

  “Yeah, OK,” says Andy.

  We coast to a slow, thumping stop in the bike rack in front of the Tall Pines Family Pharmacy. Then we get off, take off our dorky helmets, and fasten our dorky bike locks.

  “Your hair is deeply disturbing,” I say to Andy.

  “You got a little helmet head going on yourself,” he says.

  I smooth mine down, and he pushes his up into a faux hawk.

  “Are you going in like that?” I say as we push through the door.

  “Why not?” he says, but when I look back I see him smashing it back down onto his head.

  We walk over to the magazine rack to check out the comic books and stuff. I realize I’m a little nervous, and it’s not because this month’s comics are in. I still haven’t really told Andy about, you know, everything. It’s something I have to do. He covered for me, and, I mean, I think he sort of knows anyway. Not telling him would make me a jerk, a real one, so I’ve got to bite the bullet and do it. If I don’t do it soon, he’ll go ahead and ask. And just him having to ask will make me at least half a jerk.

  He holds up Maxim magazine so I can see the woman on the cover.

  “So…” he says. “You heard anything about Campbeltown?”

  That’s who we’re playing next. Campbeltown is a section of Tall Pines, and definitely not the main section, either. They have their own little school and their own team, though. You’d think they wouldn’t be that good, because there aren’t as many kids. The ones they have are big, though, like big farm kids.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “They kind of took it to us last year.”

  “Yeah, but J.P. wasn’t pitching,” says And
y.

  “Yep, and I don’t know if those two really big kids are still on the team.”

  “At least one of them must be too old by now,” he says.

  “Yeah,” I say, “the bigger one.”

  “Can’t argue with that logic,” he says.

  “Hopefully they’re both gone.”

  “Yep. Why weren’t you at the game Saturday?” he says.

  I carefully put back the magazine I’m holding. I don’t say anything right away, and neither does he.

  “Because I’m a jerk.”

  “True,” he says. “Still doesn’t explain it.”

  “Well,” I say. “You remember the week before?”

  “Yep,” he says.

  We aren’t looking at each other. We just keep picking up magazines and comic books and putting them back.

  “When I got hit in the head?”

  “Not like it’s a vital organ for you, but yeah.”

  “And then I got drilled by jerk-butt?”

  “Yep.”

  “Well, I had enough of getting beat up with the stupid ball.”

  “I played four innings,” he says. “No one hit me.”

  “Yeah, well, thing is,” I say.

  “Yeah, what’s the thing?” he says.

  “I was scared. Like seriously scared. Like I’ve been having nightmares.”

  And now I’ve said it and I’m embarrassed and relieved and worried about what he’s going to say and whether he’s going to tell anyone. He doesn’t say anything right away, which doesn’t help. He picks up another magazine and flips it open. He looks at one picture, then closes it and puts it back.

  “Everyone’s a little scared of the ball sometimes,” he says. This time, he looks over.

  I look over, too. “Yeah, but I was, like, a lot afraid of the ball, all the time.”

  He looks back at the magazines and raises his hand to the rack. But then he reconsiders and drops it.

  “Well, get over it,” he says, at last.

  I just look at him.

  “What do you think I’ve been trying to do?” I say.

  “Don’t give me that,” he says, and now Andy is looking me right in the eyes, daring me to disagree.

  “What?” I say. “It’s true.”

  “You weren’t trying to get over it on Saturday,” he says.

  I start to say something, but I stop. He’s right. He’s just standing there, staring at me.

  “I was trying to get away from it,” I say.

  “Exactly,” he says. That’s check and mate, but Andy doesn’t even want to win this one. “Just … I don’t know…” he says. “GET OVER IT.”

  The cashier cranes his neck to look over at us.

  I want to say something. I want to say: Well, I’m trying now. But he knows that. At least I hope he does. I was at practice. I took my cuts. We’re both quiet for a little while. The cashier looks away.

  “Sour Patch?” Andy says. He is physically addicted to Sour Patch Kids.

  “Yeah,” I say. I want to say something else, something smart or funny, but I don’t. The kind of comeback I need can’t be made in a pharmacy.

  I’m at practice on Thursday. A few weeks ago, that would have been like saying, “The sun came up this morning,” but now it really means something. I feel like I’m sort of back in that rhythm, at least a little bit. One other thing: It’s my last chance to get my starting spot back before this week’s game.

  We start out in the field, throwing baseballs into the big garbage can. It’s a little awkward because there are too many of us in the field, and so, of course, Geoff and I both run straight out to left. There’s a younger kid out there between us, but we tell him to get lost, and he gets lost all the way to right.

  Then it’s just the two of us. Geoff is shaded toward center, and I’m over toward the line. We’re splitting the difference, ten feet apart. Neither of us says anything, but we know the deal. Anything hit to my right is mine, and anything hit to his left is his. Anything in between will be like three question marks in a row.

  Coach Liu starts hitting fungoes. First he hits some choppers to the infield. I just watch. You can really see the difference between our best players and the rest of the kids crowding the infield.

  Coach Liu hits one toward short, and two kids hesitate for a second and then charge toward it. They practically collide when they get there, but one of them manages to knock it down with his thigh. He picks it up and chucks it in the general direction of home plate. Coach Liu is standing off to the side of the barrel, but he still has to skip out of the way to avoid being hit in the shins.

  He hits the next one to the same place. Maybe he’s giving those two another chance to get it right. More likely, he wants them to see how it’s done. Katie does her part. The other two hesitate again, leaning back and trying to figure out where and how the ball will bounce. But Katie charges forward as soon as it’s hit. She cuts right between them, scoops it up on the short hop, and fires a one-hopper into the square plastic mouth of the can.

  She turns around and jogs back, her hat down low and her mouth working some gum. She doesn’t say anything to the other two, but her glove just said: What are you doing in my spot? One shades over toward second, the other takes a few steps closer to third.

  Then Coach Liu starts lifting fly balls to the outfield. The first few go to center. I reach up to adjust my cap and reach down to smack my glove once.

  The first shot to left isn’t to me. Almost as soon as it’s hit, I can tell it’s heading toward Geoff’s side of the field. The extra kid in center starts running for it, too.

  “I got it,” shouts Geoff. “Mine.”

  The other kid backs off, and Geoff makes a clean catch. It’s a little unusual, because normally the center fielder makes the call, but that kid isn’t really the center fielder. He’s just the other guy standing there. Manny doesn’t mind the company. His spot is secure, and he gets to do plenty of running out there in games. Geoff’s throw to the cutoff man is right on target.

  A little while later, one comes to my side. It’s high and short, an easy play all around. I glove it and then have a short throw to Andy, who has his arms up as the cutoff man. It’s almost short enough to try to make the throw home myself. But Andy is in a perfect position and has that accurate infielder’s arm.

  I make a quick short throw to him as Coach Liu is turning the mouth of the barrel down the third-base line. Andy spins and buries the ball in there on the fly.

  It was the right decision, but I jog back to my spot second-guessing myself anyway. It would’ve been more impressive if I’d delivered a long throw myself. I’m not the starter. I need to win the position. Then again, I don’t want another one of those dive-for-it moments.

  After that, and I swear Liu does this on purpose: He hits one right in between Geoff and me. And so of course we both end up calling each other off.

  “I got it.”

  “I got it!”

  “Got it.”

  “Got it!”

  “Mine.”

  “Mine!”

  But it’s a little closer to Geoff, and I let him have it. Again: right decision. Again: I second-guess it.

  We do some more drills, and I do OK. What can I do? They’re just drills. The best you can do is do them right. I do, and so does Geoff. So, basically, he wins.

  Malfoy is slinking around practice all day, but he doesn’t say anything to me, and I definitely don’t say anything to him.

  And then it’s time for live pitching. J.P. will probably face half a dozen of us, and there’s no guarantee that I’ll be one of them. I got a hit off of him last time, though. I’m hoping that will be reason enough to give me another shot. Man, I think back to that day. Everything was just good then. I had no idea I’d be standing out here now, desperately needing to cash in that single for one more shot.

  Instead, Coach calls Geoff in. I run out to take his spot in left before anyone else does. Then I stand there not really knowing w
hat to think. I don’t want to root against him. He’s my teammate and a good guy. None of this is his fault.

  I root against him anyway. What? J.P. is my teammate, too.

  At least I have enough class not to react when he strikes out. Coach gives him another shot, and he grounds out. He hits it sharply but right to Jackson. J.P. busts it off the mound to cover first, but Jackson takes it himself. He jogs over and easily beats Geoff to the bag.

  I’m still concentrating on not smiling when Coach shouts, “Mogens, get in here!”

  Yes! He remembered.

  It’s not till I’m in the on-deck circle timing J.P. that the flip side of that occurs to me. If Coach remembers my hit last time, you can bet J.P. does, too. The next fastball comes in crazy fast, and my pulse revs up another gear.

  Dustin is down to the last strike of his second at-bat. I take my right hand off the bat and shake it out to stay loose. I hold it flat and see what I already knew: It’s shaking. I put it back on the bat before anyone else can see.

  Then Dustin strikes out swinging, and I’m up. My hand is shaking and my pulse is racing. So, of course, J.P. buries the first pitch way inside. The ball doesn’t hit me, but an explosion goes off inside me anyway. All I can do is try to concentrate. The next one is inside, too. It’s borderline, but Coach gives it to him.

  I knew this would happen. Everyone will pitch me this way until I prove I can hit it. And one thing’s for sure: I won’t get a hit if I don’t swing. I make up my mind to swing at the next pitch, no matter what.

  I swing over a pitch in the dirt. J.P. is thinking right along with me. Just like that, I’m behind in the count, 1–2. Now I know how the guy in my back pocket must’ve felt, right before they rolled Chuck’s Wagon out of the big leagues.

  The next pitch is inside again. I don’t swing, and Coach gives me the call this time: 2–2.

  “Knock off the junk!” Andy shouts from third.

  J.P. looks over at him for a long second. Andy just pounds his glove and looks back at him.

  It’s so unusual to have the third baseman yell at his own pitcher that Coach makes a noise behind the plate. It’s the kind of noise Nax makes in his sleep. I take the opportunity to go through my routine, nice and slow, but I still have some time. J.P. shakes his head, looks in, and goes into his windup.