by E. C. Bell
By the time he finally stopped, I was missing more balls than I was catching, and I felt like my cleats weighed fifty pounds each.
I staggered up to him and dropped my glove. Grabbed the second bottle of water and downed it in one go.
“You trying to kill me?” I asked.
He laughed. Said no. “I’m just trying to make up for lost time,” he said. “The season’s going by, after all. You free tomorrow?”
“For another practice?” I gasped.
“Yeah.”
“But we have a game,” I said weakly. “Remember?”
“That’s right,” he said. “The day after, then.”
I glanced at James, and he shrugged, grinning. Up to me.
“All right,” I said. “Same time?”
“Yeah,” he said. “We’ll work on different scenarios. So you can be prepared.”
Sounded like fresh hell to me, but I nodded. “Thanks,” I said.
He looked at me like he was surprised. “You’re welcome,” he finally said. “That was fun.”
He and James packed up the bases and balls and bats in the back of his crappy little car in the time it took me to take off my cleats. He waved good-bye and drove away while James helped me to my feet.
“That was a pretty good practice,” he said. “How you feeling?”
“Like I’ve been to hell and back again.” I looked at my watch, remembered it didn’t work and turned to James. “What time is it?”
“Nearly eight o’clock,” he said.
“We won’t have time for dinner.” I groaned. I was starving.
“There’s Tim’s,” he said. “We can grab a soup and sandwich. Right?”
“Right.” I sighed, wishing we could go somewhere better. Then I looked down at myself, covered in sweat and dirt. “Tim’s is perfect,” I said.
I WAS ABLE to scrape most of the sweat and dirt off in the Tim’s bathroom and the soup and sandwich tasted great. By the time I got back to Diamond Two, I felt good. A little achy, but good.
Maybe better than good, if I was going to be honest.
“Text me when you’re done,” James said, and pecked me on the cheek. “I’ve got a great movie picked out.”
“If I stay awake,” I said. “I feel like I could sleep for a week.”
He looked thoughtful. “That’s good,” he said. “That’s real good.”
Before I could respond sarcastically or something, he drove away. So, I walked to Diamond Two.
I saw I was going to catch the end of the living game. Maybe if I found Karen, we could talk before the game, not after. Maybe I’d be able to get James to pick me up earlier than planned. Maybe I’d even be able to watch the whole movie with him. Finish our almost date like a real person, instead of falling into unconsciousness, like some sleep deprived zombie.
Of course, that didn’t happen. I don’t have that kind of luck.
THE LIVING GAME was in the final inning, and the dead were already warming up. I tried, half-heartedly, to get Karen’s attention, so I could call her over. When she finally noticed me, she waved, but kept warming up. I wasn’t going to be able to talk to her before. I’d have to wait, and catch her after.
Their game was good, all things considered. Karen made a couple of nice plays at second, and I noticed the position of her bare feet, of her ungloved hands, as she made the plays. Her glow made her easy to follow. Made them all easy to follow. Even the ball glowed.
I realized she was playing second base just the way Greg was teaching me. And it all seemed to work. Nice.
WHEN THE GAME was over, I went to talk to Karen. She was with her team. They’d finished their after game meeting, and now were just sitting on the grass kibitzing. A couple of the dead had already drifted away, disappearing when they reached the fence that surrounded John Fry. But Karen was in no hurry. After all, she’d just be walking to second base and then waiting for the next game.
For a moment, I felt a tinge of unease—it had not been very long ago that these ghosts had tried to run me off—but no-one even gave me a second look as I sidled up to Karen.
“Is it okay if I sit here?” I asked.
Karen stared at me for a long moment. “You’re not going to interrogate me again, are you?”
I felt my face heat and shook my head.
“Good,” she said, and glanced at the rest of the ghosts. “Should be all right. Joanne’s not here, so you should be safe.”
“Joanne?”
“She still has a bee in her bonnet about you,” Karen said. “She’ll get over it.” She patted the grass beside her. “Sit.”
“Good game,” I said, and dropped down beside her. The muscles in my legs screamed, and I wondered if I’d be able to get up again.
“Thanks,” she said. “You look like hell.”
“Thanks,” I replied, sarcastically. Then I laughed at myself. She was probably right. “I took your advice and asked Greg for some help. The first practice was tonight. I think he was trying to kill me.”
“Try to talk some of the other girls from your team into coming,” she said. “He won’t be quite so focussed on you, then.”
“It’s actually not that bad,” I said. “He really knows his stuff.”
“Told you,” she said. “Is he grooming you for second base?”
“Grooming me? That sounds kind of creepy,” I said, and laughed. “But yeah, I guess he is.”
“That’s good,” she said. “You should be playing that position.”
I noticed that the chatting around us had stopped. Looked at the rest of her team, and realized they were all unabashedly eavesdropping on our conversation.
“Do you mind?” Karen said.
“Sorry,” one of the women—I think it was Jane—said. Then they all moved away a couple of steps, and began talking among themselves again.
“That’s better,” Karen said. “Now, tell me. Have you seen that Rory guy again?”
I smiled. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I have.” Then I told her all about moving Rory on and dealing with Sylvia. Even about having trouble with the pink invoice. When I finally shut my mouth, I realized one of the ghosts had hitched her way closer and closer to us. It was Jane, and she was hanging on my every word.
I stopped talking and stared at her. She looked embarrassed and tittered guilty laughter. “Caught me,” she said. “I just wanted to know a bit more about that thing you did to that Rory guy.”
“What about it?”
“He’s dead, right?”
“Yes.”
“And you helped him . . . uncouple from this world, or whatever. Right?”
“I helped him move on to the next plane of existence,” I said. “That’s right.”
“Cool.” Jane nodded her head, and I realized she was nervous.
“Is that what you want to know about? How I moved him on?”
“Not really,” she said. She looked around at the rest of her team, who were all studiously acting like they were ignoring us and our conversation, and then back at me. “I wondered if you could do that for anyone.”
“Yes, if you want to, I can help you.” I turned to Karen. “You don’t mind if I talk to Jane about this, do you?”
She shook her head, her face stiff. “I don’t mind at all,” she said. But she was lying. I could tell.
Karen:
Blowing Up
I COULDN’T BELIEVE Jane wanted to talk to Marie at all, much less about getting moved on. But when Marie asked me if I minded, I said, “No. Doesn’t bother me at all.”
It did, of course. Jane played third base and if she did decide to let Marie move her on what would the team do for the rest of the season? We’d be screwed.
“I don’t have to talk to her if you don’t want me to,” Marie said. “You look upset.”
I tried to wave her off. Tried to smile. “I’m fine,” I said. “Go ahead. Talk. I won’t bother you.”
I don’t think she bought it, but I was as good as my word. I sat ther
e silently and listened as Marie explained, in excruciating detail, what Jane would need to do before she would be properly ready to move on.
Jane looked afraid, at first. But as Marie walked her through the process she calmed down. Started asking questions—many of them the same questions I’d thought about asking Marie myself.
“Will it hurt?” Jane asked. “’Cause I don’t want to be hurt. Not anymore.”
“No,” Marie said. “It won’t hurt. But take your time. Think about things before you make your decision, because once you move on, it’s final.”
“And maybe wait until the end of the season before you bail on the team,” I said.
“I wouldn’t bail on the team, Karen,” Jane said. “You know that.”
“I don’t know anything,” I said. The anger bubbled to the surface then. I was surprised at how supremely angry I was. “Just know that if you decide to be selfish, you’ll wreck the season for everyone.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” Jane said again. She stood and backed away from both of us. “I’m sorry, Karen,” she said. “I didn’t mean to make you mad.”
“Don’t leave,” Marie said. “We’re not done yet. I need to know where your body is—” But Jane shook her head, still staring at me. At my anger. My rage.
“We can talk another time,” she said to Marie. “I—I gotta go.” To me, she whispered, “I’m sorry,” once more, then disappeared.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” Marie hissed at me. “You didn’t need to chase her away like that. We were just talking.”
“Yes,” I said. “You were talking about her leaving the team. In the middle of the frigging season. I mean, how could you?”
“How could I what?” Marie asked.
I realized the rest of the team had stopped talking again. They were all silent, watching Marie. Watching me as I basically had a complete and total melt down.
“Talk her into leaving us,” I said. “The games will be no good without her. You have to understand that.”
Marie frowned. “I wasn’t trying to talk her into doing anything,” she said. “I was just—”
“Telling her to leave,” I cried. I tried to stop my verbal diarrhea, but couldn’t. It just kept spilling out of me in sickening waves. “She’ll leave, and the rest of them will leave, and then I’ll be alone.”
“But—”
“I can’t be alone!” I yelled.
And then, all was silent. I couldn’t tell if it was because I’d somehow been struck deaf, or because the world had suddenly grown still. I gasped in the cold night air. Heard my gasp, and knew that it was the world, not me.
“I can’t be alone,” I whispered. “You can understand that, can’t you?”
“Yes,” Marie said. “I understand.”
I looked at her and shuddered again. Because she did look like she understood me. All of me. Everything about me, even the stuff I’d never told her.
“Go,” I said. “Please go. I don’t feel well.”
“All right.”
Marie nodded and stood. Looked over at the other players on my team. “Make sure somebody stays with her for a while,” she said. And then she was gone.
“Nobody needs to stay with me,” I said. “I’m fine.”
Then, dammit, I started to cry. Charlotte put up her hand.
“I’ll stay,” she said, and walked over to me. She stood closer to me than she ever had before, and I could see the marks on her arms where she’d cut herself when she was alive. I hadn’t noticed them before.
Her light, her strength, washed over me. Calmed me, so I could finally stop crying.
“You don’t have to stay,” I said. “I’ll be all right.”
“I don’t mind,” she said. She even smiled at me a little. “We’ve never talked. Not really. I figure we can do it now. You know?”
She was right. We had never talked past discussing a play or a booted ball.
And then, I tried to remember when I’d last had a real talk with any of them. About anything that did not involve softball or Marie.
I couldn’t think of one time. Not one.
AFTER THE REST of the dead dispersed we sat in the dark for a long time without saying anything. Charlotte turned and looked at me, her dead eyes staring, it seemed, right into my soul.
“So, what was with the breakdown?” she said. “I’ve never seen you lose it like that before.”
I blinked in surprise. “Right to the point, huh?”
“I figure we might as well really talk,” Charlotte said. “Good a time as any, don’t you think?”
“I guess,” I said. “But I—I don’t even know where to start.”
“Tell me what set you off,” Charlotte said. “And we can go from there.”
I sighed. “It was Marie. She was talking to Jane about moving on. She’s not supposed to do that. I told her to leave us alone.” I chuckled, miserably. “I think I was wrong about getting rid of her. She’s going to wreck everything.”
Charlotte shook her head, and I stared at her. “What?” I said. “You don’t think she’s going to be a problem? What if she talks everybody into leaving?”
“People leave,” Charlotte said. “New people come in and take their places, and we adjust. We’ve lost people before.”
“Not in a long time,” I muttered, but she was right, of course. People had left over the years. They’d get tired of the games, tell us they were done, and never come back. And we had adjusted. But we’d never had to deal with someone who could cause a wholesale desertion like Marie could. “I think she’s dangerous.”
“Pfft!” Charlotte cried. “You were right, before. She’s not going to wreck anything and I think you know it.”
“But—what if she convinces everyone to leave?” I said.
“She isn’t convincing anyone to do anything. She’s just talking to them. If they decide to go, then they go. And we adjust.” She smiled. “Besides, I think you might miss her if she leaves. You two have gotten pretty tight over the season.”
“I guess,” I said. “She is easy to talk to, most of the time. It’s just I don’t think I could stand it if I was alone.”
With Andrew.
I looked down at my hands and realized that they weren’t glowing the way they usually did. “Do I look darker to you?” I asked.
“Yes, you do,” Charlotte said. “Tell me what you’re thinking about right now.”
“I—I can’t,” I whispered.
Her face sharpened, and she frowned. “You better. Unless you want to be one of the ones to disappear. Lose all your light, so we can’t see you anymore.” She shook her head. “You don’t want to be a ghost to us ghosts, do you?”
“Do you think that could happen?” I asked.
“I’ve never seen it, but some of the girls have,” Charlotte said and pointed. “Out there, in the world. It really shook them up. All of a sudden, somebody’s gone. With no forwarding address or anything, if you know what I mean.”
I knew exactly what she meant. After all, that was the way I left the world of the living. I didn’t want to do it again.
But that meant telling her—telling them all—about Andrew. What he’d done to me. And worse, what I’d done to get myself in that situation. I looked down at my hands and was horrified to see how dark they were. I was losing light by the bucketful. If I didn’t say something, I could be gone before the night was out.
“All right,” I said. “But you have to promise me that you won’t hate me.”
She frowned. “Why would I hate you?”
“Just because,” I said. I tasted metal in my mouth, as though it was suddenly full of blood. And my hands were almost dark. “Promise.”
“I promise,” she said, impatiently. “Now talk.”
So, I did. I told her the whole sordid story while I stared out over the darkened softball diamond, so I didn’t have to look at her. At first, I was just going to talk about Andrew but once I started everything came out in a fetid ru
sh.
“It was all right, before,” I said. “Having him show up here every season. I could stand it, you know? But now, I’ve started having the nightmares again—and I don’t think I can take it anymore.” I laughed, but it sounded miserable, even to me. “If all of you leave, it would mean that I’d have to face him alone. And I can’t. Not anymore. You know?”
“I understand,” she said. I glanced at her, and she looked furious. Absolutely furious.
“I knew it,” I whispered. “I knew if I told anyone that I’d gone to bed with a married man, that you’d hate me—”
“Oh!” Charlotte’s eyes snapped wide, and then, she laughed. It wasn’t a happy sound. “I don’t hate you for sleeping with him. Jesus, we’ve all done something. No. It’s not you.”
“Why do you look so angry, then?”
“It’s what that son of a bitch did to you,” she said. “Of course.”
Her words brought me to a full stop. I couldn’t think of anything to say, and knew I probably looked like a fish, my mouth open and gaping.
“He can’t get away with this,” Charlotte said. “You know that, don’t you?”
“But he did get away with it,” I whispered. “I’m dead and he got away with it.”
“What if you tell Marie?” Charlotte asked. “I know you’re hating her right now and everything, but what if you tell her what he did? She could tell the police and he could finally answer for his crime.”
I shook my head. “If I do, she’ll want to know where I’m buried. The police will need my body, to prove the murder.”
“And?” Charlotte asked. “That’d be a good thing. Right?”
“No,” I said. “If the police move my body I’ll follow it. And I won’t be able to find my way back.”
“Oh,” Charlotte frowned and pursed her lips. Thought for a moment, then nodded. “Probably better that you don’t tell Marie, then,” she said. “So that means it’s up to us.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“We need to tell the others,” she said. “And I think it’s very important that we have a couple of conversations with the tea cup girl.”
