“Wouldn’t miss it, brother.” Jeff peeked at his watch. “We better get a move on.”
Just as Bucky and Lisa were climbing into the back seat, he thought of something. “I ought to call Dan.”
Fifteen minutes later they pulled into the parking lot of Christ Our Redeemer Church. Pastor Jensen’s car was already in the reserved staff slot, and Bucky could see Dan’s Camaro just pulling in from the other side. “Looks like the gang’s all here,” he murmured to Lisa, squeezing her hand.
The silver - haired pastor climbed out of his car, adjusting his rumpled sweatshirt. “Hi, folks.” He squinted through his glasses at Lisa. “You look awfully familiar, young lady.”
“Pastor Jensen, this is Lisa Nichols. You remember her from a couple of years ago.”
“Of course!” He pumped her hand enthusiastically and then enfolded her in a welcoming hug. “Bucky had told me you were back in town. What a delight to see you again!”
“And this is Jeff. He goes to Calvary Church up in Sacramento, and we’re friends from baseball.”
“Hey, Jeff.” Pastor Jensen shook his hand as well. “Listen, please give my regards to your associate pastor. Mike Corvallis, right? I attended a Holy Spirit training seminar he put on about a year ago.”
“Sure.” Jeff grinned.
“Well, let’s go inside and you can dispel the mystery.” The pastor greeted Dan and Julie as well. “We may as well have a Young Adults meeting here. Looks like we’ve got a quorum.”
He disarmed the alarm system and turned on some lights as the five teenagers filed into the back of the church. “Not bad,” Jeff commented, surveying the sanctuary.
“OK then.” Pastor Jensen sat down a row ahead of the students and turned in the pew to face them. “Like I told you, Bucky, this better be good.”
“Well, I think it is,” he responded. “We’re here for a baptism.”
The pastor thought a moment, then grinned. “I guess that must be you . . . or you . . . or you.” He glanced from Lisa to Julie to Jeff. “‘Cause I’ve already got Dan and Bucky.” They all laughed.
“It’s me.” Lisa, a bit embarrassed, raised her hand. “I want to be baptized.”
“Tonight,” Jeff put in.
“Tonight?” The pastor’s eyes widened in surprise.
“Uh huh.”
“Tonight?” he repeated.
“Like that Ethiopian guy,” Jeff interjected. “Like he said to Philip, ‘What’s to prevent us from going for it?’”
Pastor Jensen scratched at his stubbly chin. “Well, Lisa, of course I’m thrilled. Some of us have been praying for you the whole last two and a half years.”
“I know,” she said softly. “I got your Christmas cards.”
“And you’re sure you know what you’re doing?”
“Yes.” It was a simple statement. “I’ve given my heart to God, and I want to have the same kind of experience that Bucky’s had.”
His voice softened. “Do you fully understand what you’re getting into? What it means to be a disciple of Jesus? And to be obedient to his will? Like these men are?”
“Pastor J, she knows all that stuff,” Bucky cut in. “When I studied with Dan, she listened to a whole lot of it. Plus she did the lessons herself, which I didn’t know until tonight. She’s totally ready.”
He shook his head, pleased. “It’s wonderful how God works.” Then he turned to Lisa. “But I want to hear it from you. I’m not going to quiz you here in front of your friends, but let me ask you in a very straightforward way: do you understand and accept the gospel message? That Jesus is our only hope of salvation?”
Her face glowed. “Yes, I do.”
“And you’ve accepted Jesus as your own personal Saviour?”
She nodded.
“And you have confidence in the church’s convictions and perspectives on the key truths of the Christian faith?”
“Uh huh.”
The pastor’s voice seemed almost a bit choked as he responded. “Well, Lisa, it would be my great honor to baptize you into the family of God.”
A thrill shot through Bucky, and he put an arm around his girlfriend. “All right!” Jeff, on the other side, gave her a thumbs - up gesture.
“But now, folks, let me just do a bit of campaigning myself.” The older man put both hands on the back of the pew. “Two things. First of all, you caught me by surprise . . . and the baptistery isn’t filled. So a baptism right now, this very minute, would be kind of hard.”
“We don’t mind waiting,” Dan said.
“Well, sure. And if you want to do that, that’s fine.” He nodded in agreement. “But here’s something else. Lisa wants to be baptized into this church. This church family. To me, it would be even more special if she could wait and do it when the whole family’s here.”
A bit of the excitement began to fade in Bucky’s heart. “But . . . man, we don’t want to wait. Do we?” He looked over at Lisa.
“No.” She gulped. “Can’t we do it now?”
“Well, I’m talking about this weekend,” Pastor Jensen told her. “Believe me, I don’t want to dampen this beautiful enthusiasm. We could just come right back here at our usual worship hour, with your families and friends and the whole congregation. And Bucky, of course, you know your mom would give her right arm to be here for Lisa.” He gave the pretty girl a smile. “I still remember that she was just so impressed with you and cared a lot about you.”
Lisa thought for a moment. “What do you think, Bucky?”
He shook his head. “Babe, it’s totally up to you. Whatever you want. But he’s right about my mom; that’s for sure.”
“Jeff?”
The tall senior chewed on a fingernail, thinking. “I agree with what your pastor said. It’s great to have the body of Christ here. But . . . it’s kind of special just all us kids too, I gotta admit.”
“Why don’t you wait?” Dan suggested to Lisa. “I mean, that gives you a chance to tell your mom and stuff. Who knows, maybe she’ll come.”
That seemed to make sense. At last Lisa gave a little nod. “What about you, Hilliard?” Bucky interjected. “Man, we want you here. You make sure you drive back down.” He grinned. “I’ll pay for the gas.”
“Is it a deal then?” The white - haired pastor climbed to his feet. “I better give our head deacon a call and get the water flowing around here.” He laughed. “This is the kind of emergency we just love.”
• • • • •
A festive mood hung in the air around the breakfast table. Bucky, almost beside himself with pure happiness, could hardly come down to earth long enough to enjoy the strawberry blintzes and waffles Mom had prepared.
The church seemed especially full that morning as Bucky glanced around. Dan and Julie were both there, along with Miss Cochran. Lisa, of course, with her mom, who glanced around at the unfamiliar surroundings with a look of quizzical nervousness written on her face. And about halfway through the Bible study, Sam walked in and sat down on the other side of Rachel Marie.
“Man, how’d you get here?” Bucky grinned his approval.
“Dan called me early this morning. So I borrowed my roommate’s car.”
“That’s awesome.”
At the appointed moment, Pastor Jensen slowly entered the baptismal tank and held out his hand for Lisa. Bucky felt something tighten in his throat. The senior girt had never looked as beautiful as she did right at that moment in her plain white robe.
“Folks,” the pastor began, “I have to open my heart to you right here. This is one of the happiest days I can remember in my ministry.” Briefly he related how the five young people had come to him in the darkness of a Friday night. “But they decided to wait until today, so that you could all join us.”
“And Bucky,” he went on, “we’re starting to lose count of how many precious people have come to know Jesus through your witness.” He glanced down at Lisa. “But I know Dan and Sam won’t mind if I make a guess that this is probably your fa
vorite one.” He looked over at the tall athlete. “Come on up here, Bucky. I know Lisa wants you close.” He smiled. “In fact, Dan, you come up here too. Julie? Jeff? Sam? Sheila? You’re their teacher. And Mrs. Nichols, you come too. What a wonderful thing to have good parents support their children.”
As the group grew larger around the baptismal tank, the pastor suddenly laughed. “You know, folks, it’s such a crowd here, why don’t you all come up? We’ve been waiting three years for this moment, and I don’t think the fire marshal will mind. Please, if you join us in celebrating with heaven today, just come forward and stand as close as you can.”
Even though the platform was filled with people, Bucky still managed to catch Lisa’s glance just before Pastor Jensen immersed her beneath the surface. Tears filled his eyes as he remembered all the prayers, the times of doubt. He’d waited so long for this moment . . . and now God had come through. Jeff noticed Bucky’s emotion and put an arm around his friend.
Someone in the back of the group spontaneously began to sing the old gospel hymn, “Blest Be the Tie That Binds” as Lisa came out of the water. Bucky tried to sing, but it was too much for him. Lisa gave the pastor a quick hug, and then began to climb the steps. Still dripping wet, she came to Bucky and threw her arms around his neck.
“I love you so much,” she whispered. “Thanks, babe, for waiting all this time for me.” He held her tight, the sudden dampness of his clothes mingling with something close to pure joy.
“I assume the whole world is coming over for lunch,” Mom murmured in his ear as she gave Lisa a kiss.
“Yeah.” He couldn’t help but grin. “However many we can fit in.”
After church and the best sermon Pastor J had ever preached, Mrs. Nichols excused herself, but everyone else did come over, including Jeff. It was a great afternoon, just lounging on the thick carpeting in the Stones’ living room. Lisa kept snuggling up next to Bucky, rapturously gazing at him until Dan threw a sofa pillow at both of them.
“And you, Hilliard,” he announced, “can just count on one thing. Stone and me are going to kick your tail clear over into Nevada the next time we meet on the ball diamond. I’m going to personally raise your ERA about forty-five points all by myself.”
“That’s right,” Bucky agreed, giving Lisa another squeeze. “He’s making it a matter of personal prayer.”
Chapter Twelve: The New Ace
Jeff was true to his word. The following day, after classes were out, Bucky drove up to Dixon, and the older hurler spent a good ninety minutes teaching his young charge the finer points of varsity pitching.
“It’s partly your catcher’s job,” he admitted, “but you’ve got to always think about setting a hitter up. You push him back a little bit with a couple of pitches on the inside half. Make one of them low, so he can’t jump on it. Then maybe a slider on the outside half of the plate. If he’s back on his heels, man, he can’t even touch it sometimes. You want to always put the ball where you’re going to get a grounder or an easy fly ball. Keep the batter off-balance all the time.”
He examined Bucky’s stance and delivery when trying to throw a curve ball, and immediately spotted a couple of little things that helped. Lugging a whole bucket of cast-off balls out to the mound, he watched as the young athlete hurled one change-up after another. “Now you’re getting it,” he commended, as a sweeping curve dipped into the strike zone after starting out at chin level. “There’s no way a hitter can adjust quick enough to make contact with that one. Or if he does get the bat on the ball, it’d just be a dribbler out to the second baseman.”
The Panthers bounced right back and won a tight thriller with Nunez, the squad’s second - tier pitcher, turning in a rare gem, allowing only two runs. Returning to his usual spot in center field, Bucky found himself trying to think like an ace varsity hurler, plotting ways to fool a hitter, to gain the key mental advantage that separated champions from journeymen athletes.
“Great job!” He clapped the weary pitcher on the back as they headed into the locker room. “Man, you went the whole seven innings.”
The older boy managed a grateful smile. “Hey, if Dennis can’t come back, Stone, it might be you and me the rest of the way.”
Bucky gulped. That weekend, he motored up the interstate to Dixon again, eager to improve his game. Twilight was casting long shadows over the city park as the two high school athletes worked tirelessly to improve their craft. “You’ve got amazing velocity,” Jeff conceded. “I figure you got me beat by three or four miles per hour. And your control is right up there.”
“My slider still doesn’t jump much,” Bucky grimaced.
“I know.” Jeff picked up the last baseball from the basket. “Try moving your index finger right over to . . . here. Just on the side of that seam. And of course, you want less break than on a straight-up curve.”
Bucky drove home after the long tutorial, feeling an increased level of confidence. He didn’t know if Coach would ever send him to the mound again, but it felt good to be honing his craft as an athlete. Even though he and Dan would be at a Christian college in the fall, where sports were a low-key affair, it was incumbent upon him to do his best in all things. To strive for excellence in every area of life.
The very next afternoon, Coach buttonholed him in the parking lot. “I got bad news,” he blurted out. “The doctor just did x-rays on Dennis, and he’s out for the rest of the year. Which I was afraid of. He’s got some severe damage to his elbow – not all from baseball, but that didn’t help.”
Bucky winced. “So . . . what does that mean?”
The older man chewed on his lip. “We got two games a week the rest of the way,” he said simply. “I’ve got to have two quality pitchers. Like I said, I could bring up Arnie from the JV squad. But he’s been wild lately, lost his last two starts. Or we can try you again.” He gave the tall ballplayer a hard look. “That night against Concord wasn’t too good, Stone. You think you can start getting your curve ball over the plate once in a while? And keep track of outs?”
He said the last jibe gently, but the words still cut deep. Bucky flushed. “I got together with a guy from another school and we’ve been working on it,” he told the coach. “I think . . . I’m at least somewhat better.”
There was a long pause. All coaches lived for victories, Bucky knew. Good seasons and busted ones followed one another like beads on a necklace, and athletic personnel got used to losing hard games. But all things considered, they’d just as soon get a trophy rather than watch some rival walk up to the platform and receive it instead. And he could only imagine how badly Coach Demerest wanted to notch a championship – or at least a spot in the playoff round – in his first year at Hampton Beach High.
“All I can say is, I’ll give it my best,” he promised the gray-haired coach. “And for sure, there won’t be any more forgetting how many outs we’ve got.”
Demerest managed a tight smile. “Okay, then. You and Nunez will trade off.” He reached out and offered a clumsy, out-of-character fist bump. “You take the mound against Danville tomorrow afternoon.”
Both Lisa and Julie were in the stands as the Panthers took the field for their eighth contest. Bucky’s teammates seemed a bit subdued as he walked nervously to the hill, remembering the carnage of his last outing. “Let’s do it, Stone,” Brian called out from his spot at first, but there wasn’t much conviction in his voice. “We need this win, bro.”
From the first pitch, though, it was clear that Jeff’s tutorials had paid off handsomely. Bucky’s fastball whistled in with even more determined velocity, and his curveball looked like it was falling off a table. Two of the first three hitters struck out, and Danville’s third hitter almost lunged out of the box trying to reach a heater that was five inches off the plate. The baseball hopped lazily right to the first baseman, who smirked as he scooped it up and jumped on the bag.
“Way to start us off, Stone!” Anthony slapped his battery mate on the back as they headed into the dugou
t. “And jeez, man. That curve of yours – I’m glad you’re pitching at those guys, not us. I wouldn’t be able to get wood on your hook at all; no way.”
With one out, the shortstop squibbed a single past his opposing counterpart; Bucky stepped into the batter’s box, eager to help his own cause. And the second pitch he saw was perfect: just below the waist and right in his power groove. He jumped on it, driving the ball deep into the right-center alley. By the time the fielder had tracked it down, Panthers had a run on the board and he was comfortably on third base with a triple.
“Yes!” Coach Demerest pumped a fist, demonstrating his approval. “We got us a pitcher than can hit. Take that, Danville!”
Dan, almost laughing, smacked the first pitch up the middle and Bucky trotted home with a satisfied grin.
He felt his confidence soaring as the innings fell into place. Between each batter, he mentally reviewed. Who’s up next? Got a runner on first – so take the play to second if you can. Start the D.P. Two outs? Everything goes directly to first. Grounder to the right side? Cover the bag! Pop-up? Take charge; call out which infielder’s got it. Being a pitcher involved directing traffic sometimes, and he resolved to not make mental mistakes.
“Good sequence,” the coach murmured quietly after Bucky and Anthony teamed up to whiff the opposing clean-up hitter and snuff out a potential rally. “That guy could have really hurt us with a long ball, but you kept it in on him.” He peered at the scoreboard, beaming at the 6-1 tally. “Think you can finish the game, Stone?”
“Sure.”
He felt himself tiring a bit in the seventh and final frame, but he bore down and made sure to throw strikes. The Danville catcher did connect with a two-out single to right field, but Bucky broke off a dazzling slider that left the final batter frozen at the plate, the bat glued to his shoulder. The umpire shot his right hand in the air with a dramatic final call. Strike three!
The Panthers gathered on the mound, cuffing their pitcher around good-naturedly. “Sweet! A complete game, Stone! You’re too much, dude.” Anthony was effusive in his praise. “Plus a single and an RBI triple.”
Bucky Stone: The Complete Adventure (Volumes 1-10) Page 101
