A Girl Like Me

by Ginger Scott

  * * *

  “Are you sure you don’t want to make this about you and your hot best friend? I bet Girl Strong readers would really like a story about that,” Taryn says, swaying her hip into mine as we throw our backpacks over our shoulders and fall in step with the crowd that fills our main high school hallway.

  “You know, that was my first pitch, but funny…they weren’t interested,” I say.

  “Fools,” she says back fast.

  Taryn and I walk down the hill toward the boys, and I notice a few other people hanging out with them. My eyes dim the closer I get to them, and I decide to question Levi first. He’s always been the weakest of the bunch.

  “I know Wes told you guys, but who did you tell?” I say, giving him a sideways glance.

  “Dude, this was all your dad. Don’t even look at me,” Levi says.

  I take in the seven or eight guys standing and talking behind my friends and then glance out to the field where my dad is dragging the dirt, trying to make our field look better than the cheapest-per-ton spread of thin gravel and eight-year-old bases ripping at the corners. He’s almost manic in the way he’s working, rushing around in circles, the chains kicking up dust behind him.

  “He’s proud,” Wes says, his arm falling around me as his lips graze my cheek.

  “I know; I’m just not all about audiences is all,” I say.

  “Pretend they’re fans. You’re just taking infield and hitting. Shit, Cherry…showing off is your thing!” TK teases, laughing at himself.

  I roll my eyes, despite kind of agreeing with him, and I step in his direction.

  “We’re going to have words about this Cherry nickname thing. You know better,” I say, pointing at him and trying to hide my smile.

  “Yeah,” he says, waggling his head and sniffling confidently. “I do, but I wanted to piss you off so you’d get off your dad’s back. Worked, didn’t it?”

  “Oh, I’m pissed all right,” I say, turning around. I smile to myself as I keep going into the locker room, knowing that TK is several feet behind me now, not sure if I’m joking or not.

  I grab my things from the locker, where I stuffed them this morning, and I sit on the bench looking at my sliding pants, the socks I’ve cut and sewn to work with my leg, my favorite practice shirt.

  “Want me to braid your hair?” I smile hearing Bria’s voice.

  “For once, yes…yes, Bria…I want you to braid my hair,” I laugh, turning on the bench and letting her pull the band from the base of my neck.

  Bria and I haven’t talked much since the bus accident. I didn’t really see her over the summer, but she’s been spending a lot of time with Levi. They like each other, but they’re both being stupid about it.

  “Levi tell you about this photoshoot thing?” I say, my head jerking as she tugs my hair to make it smooth. “Yeah. Don’t be mad; he was excited.”

  “I’m not,” I say.

  Her hands work along the sides of my head, finger combing the loose ends into her hold, and she begins to weave and pull, making a braid.

  “I know you don’t like people staring at you, or whatever,” she says.

  “It’s okay. I figure if it has to be anywhere, at least it’s out there. I get lost when I’m playing,” I say, thinking about that part rather than the eyes that will be on me, watching me be the focus of something other than a rival team or a girl I’ve threatened just because she looked at me funny.

  We’re silent while Bria finishes working on my hair, wrapping the end with the same band she pulled from my hair and running her fingertips along the weave to make sure every piece is tucked in where it should be.

  “Is it one of those French kinds?” I ask.

  “Yeah,” Bria says, stepping back to admire it.

  My mom gave me a French braid once. She took a picture of it because she was proud of her work. There were times when she could be such a great mom.

  I turn and stand from the bench, taking a few steps to look into the mirror that stretches along the back wall.

  “Thanks,” I say, my mouth tugging up on one side.

  If I still had a mom, I think I’d wear my hair like this more often. I actually like it.

  “It’s really great that you’re doing this,” she says, her voice smaller behind me.

  I turn with my prepared smile plastered in place, but it isn’t necessary. She’s looking down.

  “My mom can’t make it out to our games, so you’ve probably never seen her, but she’s in a wheelchair. She was actually born without both of her legs. I can’t wait to tell her about what you’re doing and give her a copy of the magazine.”

  She looks up at me with a blink, breathing in deeply through her nose. She didn’t tell me that because she wants me to say I’m sorry about her mom. She told me because, while half of the people out there waiting for my photoshoot are interested in the celebrity idea that comes along with photographers and magazine stories, Bria is actually interested in my message.

  I have a message. That sunk in when Rebecca first brought this idea up for me, but it really cuts at my heart now.

  “I don’t know how I feel about being a role model,” I shrug, showing an honest side of myself to Bria.

  She shrugs back.

  “I know,” she says, standing from the bench and backing away slowly, stopping when her hand is on the door to go back outside. “But there’s pretty much nothing you can’t become the absolute best at—so I feel pretty good about you figuring this role-model thing out.”

  I chuckle as she laughs lightly on her way through the door, and the smile remains on my face when I’m standing in the locker room all alone. I look down again at my pile of clothes and my gear, and I inhale, readying myself to be the best, and to forget about the people watching.

  It takes me a little longer than usual to get dressed, mostly because I pay attention to things like how well my shirt is tucked in, how even my pants are below my knees, how straight the seams are on my socks. Covering the prosthetic is actually easier than my normal leg, mostly because it only wraps up the socket.

  I’ve gotten better at working with the blade leg. I’ve gotten faster, thanks to Rebecca. There’s a tinge in my chest, though, and I hate that I feel it. As good as I’m going to be, I’m still never going to be as good as I was. I’ve resolved myself to that, too. But right now, all I can think about is what the people out there are expecting to see. I’m afraid I’m going to disappoint them.

  My phone dings, so I push the rest of my things into my locker and grab my gear, palming my phone, reading the text as I walk past the crowd that’s now doubled outside. I refuse to acknowledge them, and I walk behind a few of the storage sheds on my way out to the field so people won’t follow me or want to talk.

  I slide open a message from Rebecca.

  Just got here with Seth, the photographer. Anita Welton is writing the story, so she came to ask you a few questions before Saturday’s studio shoot.

  I pause, still shaded by the shed where they store most of the track mats and hurdles. Anita Welton went to the Olympics. I watched her pitch for USC, and I watched her pitch for Team USA. I swallow hard and type back okay, on my way.

  It takes a few more seconds for me to regulate my breathing and continue out toward the field. Wes is helping my dad carry out his equipment bag, and he’s holding the catcher’s mask, pads that are too small wrapped around his legs. They’re pink; I think they’re Bria’s.

  “You look ridiculous,” I say when I’m close enough for him to hear me.

  He slides the pink mask on over his head, his hair poking through the sides and the straps on the top.

  “I look awesome,” he says, pounding his fist into his glove a few times.

  “Ha!” I laugh hard, and my voice reverberates off the dugout walls.

  “Who cares what I look like. Cameras are here for you, babe,” he says, walking slowly backward toward home plate.

  “Babe, huh?” I say, dropping my bag down into the
dust and pulling my batting gloves from my back pocket.

  “You prefer Cherry?” he chuckles.

  “You just keep that glove up, Stokes. I might need to foul something off and I wouldn’t want to hurt your pretty face,” I say, a little sway to my head for extra attitude.

  Now behind the plate, he lifts the mask up and smiles crookedly at me.

  “You love this pretty face,” he winks, sliding the mask back down and crouching.

  I watch my dad talk with Rebecca and a man and woman I am pretty sure are from the magazine. My dad’s nervous; I can tell by how much he’s laughing at everything the other three say. My dad doesn’t find people amusing, and I know that he’s like me with this—we won’t be comfortable until we’re in the zone, doing our thing.

  Rebecca calls me over, so I pick up my bat and jog to the mound. She introduces me and we all shake hands. Seth says something about lighting and his position, and what he’ll need from me, but the only takeaway that sticks is that he wants me to just do my thing as if he isn’t even here.

  I think I can manage to forget about him and his lens. But the bleachers have filled, most of the people in them have faces I’ve known since I was six. I’m not sure I can tune them out.

  We wait for a few minutes while Seth finishes setting up one of his lights, taking a few test shots from different angles to see how they turn out on his screen. Every picture he takes shows a preview on a laptop, and Rebecca waves me over to look. I call Wes to come look with me.

  “This is going to look amazing,” she says, and I gaze over her shoulder at the screen. The color reminds me of the prints from the old camera my dad used to use. He said he had gotten it from his parents.

  “You should have him show you some of his techniques,” Wes says, his arm brushing mine.

  I close my eyes and let a wave of nausea pass.

  “Maybe at the studio,” I say. “I’m trying not to pass out right now.”

  “You’ll be fine. Once he starts shooting and you’re working, it’s going to be great,” Rebecca says.

  I nod to her and walk back toward the plate. I feel Wes’s fingers brush against mine on the way, and I grip his hand hard.

  “Just pay attention to me and your dad. Pretend this is a game,” he says.

  “People don’t show up for our games,” I chuckle.

  “They will now,” he says, pounding his glove again and crouching behind the plate.

  A smile tugs at the corner of my lip and I look down to the spot where my bat bangs against the plate. I haven’t done that since I was a kid. I saw a baseball player do it once, and I thought it made him look tough. It somehow helps now.

  “We’ll take it like normal. Bunt a few, then I’ll throw you some fastballs to swing away at,” my dad says, already settling into his role as he waves a ball in his palm and points to Wes. “Let me find my rhythm.”

  I back away and adjust the Velcro on my gloves, watching as my dad’s arm windmills, delivering the ball to Wes with a snap. My dad’s always been a good softball pitcher, better than I ever was. He gets about seven or eight pitches in and rolls his shoulder a few times and points to me, then gives me a thumb up.

  “Swing away, Cherry,” Wes jokes, and I breathe out a laugh.

  “Foul tip, Pumpkin,” I sass back, soothed slightly at the sound of his laugh muffled by the mask.

  Someone in the crowd behind me whistles, and I hear a few people cheer my name.

  “Let’s go, Joss!”

  I dig my feet in, twisting the blade until I find a stance that feels right—my balance just like before the accident, and I nod to my dad.

  This is a game. The scouts are here. They will notice me.

  My eyes lock in on the threads of the ball as it flies from my dad’s hands, and I load my arms, my weight just right, my inner voice chanting with joy because my dad could not have started with a better pitch. I take a hard cut at it, missing the ball completely.

  My breath hitches and I grip the bat in front of me, my front teeth pressed together hard as I try to ignore the laughter behind me, the sarcasm and heckling from untalented assholes who think even though they bat ninth or ride the bench that they’re still better than me because I’m a girl.

  “Damn it,” I grunt out, loud enough for only Wes to hear.

  “You’re playing for them. Stop that,” he says, patting his glove against my leg. “You do this for you; like you always have.”

  I step back into the box and let my bat hover over the plate, feeling the weight of it.

  For me.

  I turn my head slowly, my vision narrowing on my dad, his eyes squinting from the sun, and I nod to him to throw again. This time, the background noise mutes. My dad tosses the ball in his hand a few times, clearing the distractions on his own, and he holds it up for me to see he’s ready to pitch.

  His arm winds the same, and this one is coming in a little higher. On a normal day, in a game, I’d let this pitch fly by, but today is too important. Failure is not an option. Through the rapid fire of camera clicks and the muffled chants and sneering behind me in the bleachers, I load my weight again, feeling the pressure on my thighs and quads, my blade digging into the loose dirt as I twist, my hips first, my hands last, the bat flying at the ball, catching it dead center.

  I send this one deep over the right-center fence, farther than I think maybe I’ve ever hit a ball here before, and my dad spends a few seconds with his back to me watching it.

  “Damn,” Wes says from his position below me.

  “Right?” I say, dangling my bat over the plate, readying myself to do it again. “I told you I was stronger now.”

  Wes’s only response is to pound his glove and ready himself for my dad to pitch the ball again.

  After about a hundred swings, including a few on the left, we move onto the field, and my dad hits me hard grounders, some that I have to dive for, before I can gun the ball to Wes at first base. Back in my element, I sometimes forget that I’m on a stage, and I let my mouth get ahead of me, dropping a few F-bombs when I don’t make a play, or when I want to razz my dad for not being able to get a ball behind me. Nobody stops me, though. They let me do my thing on this stage that I was built for—the one place that I have always owned.

  Exhausted, I pull my visor from my head and wipe the sweat off my brow with my arm as I walk toward the dugout from the dirt area around short and third. My eyes begin to focus on the people still sitting in the bleachers, and though it’s been more than an hour out here under the warm California sun, almost every single person who came, expecting a spectacle, has stayed.

  “I think you might be more popular now,” Wes whispers at my side.

  My brow furrows and I twist my lips.

  “Uh, I’m not expecting to win homecoming queen,” I joke, but mostly because I’m uncomfortable with the idea that people suddenly see me differently.

  “You shut people up,” he says, pulling my attention away from the slow exit in the stands. “It’s not a bad thing. And you’re going to make someone reading this magazine believe they can do something that looks really hard.”

  I squint a little at his words, but as I step into the dugout, I really think about them, and I start to smile.

  “Joss, that was amazing,” Rebecca says, pulling me into a sweat-filled hug.

  “Thanks,” I say, still a little out of breath. I flip open my water bottle and drink nearly a third of it down while my dad, the photographer, and the writer join us in the dugout.

  I glance to the side, toward the stands, and feel a little relief that everyone has finally left.

  “Joss, if you can hang out here for just a little bit, I’d like to ask you some questions about your training—everything you did out there. Mostly workout stuff today,” Anita asks.

  I stammer out a response that sounds sort of like, “Sure,” then insist that my dad and Rebecca stay with me, since they were such a huge part in my training. Then I spend the next five minutes rehashing every
key moment in Anita Welton’s career to her face. I’d feel guilty, but she engages me on every point and question I ask, and by the end of it, our interview turns into a conversation between two women who like to play in the dirt and rule the boys. We cover my training, my climb back mentally and physically, and when they need to, Rebecca and my dad both insert themselves to give Anita the details on my recovery, or as Rebecca likes to call it, rebuild.

  The sun is beginning to set by the time we quit talking, and I hug Anita before she leaves. My dad finishes picking up the gear and equipment on the field, and Rebecca makes a plan to meet with me tomorrow for our workout and to plan what we’ll bring for our joint photo session at the studio. With only a sliver of light left in the sky, Wes and I sit in the dugout, me between his legs, lying back against his chest in the corner.

  “You ever see a firefly?” he asks.

  My face scrunches and I laugh lightly.

  “No,” I respond, wondering why this is the first thing he says when we’re alone.

  “We had them in Nevada, near the water. They’d glow with this short and tiny flash of light that maybe lasted for two or three seconds. I would catch them in my hands and stare at them, trying to figure out how they were made,” he says.

  “Are you comparing me to a bug?” I tilt my head up, lifting my chin to see his face above me. He winces a little and smiles, biting his tongue.

  “You’re ruining this,” he says.

  “I’m pretty sure it was already ruined,” I say.

  I pretend to pout, but rest comfortably against his chest, loving the way it shakes with his laugh. His arms wrap around me tighter, and his lips dust the top of my head.

  “My point is, I could never figure out how they worked. I mean, I get the science, but it just seems like it’s more special than that,” he says, taking a small breath as he rubs his hands along my tired arms. “You defy science.”

  My head falls to the side against him and I think about his words, about where I was less than a year ago, even before my accident, and I think maybe he’s right. I’m sorta super, too.