Chasing Fireflies

by Charles Martin

  Mandy laughed, and Sketch pulled both feet up on his seat, watching us with a mixture of curiosity, odd amusement, and maybe a little bit of shock. Unc and I raised our caps and sang louder.

  The seventh-inning stretch is almost as entrenched in baseball as the baseball itself. Several theories about its origin exist, but truth be known, we have no idea where and when the custom began. One suggestion involves President William Howard Taft, another a Brother Jasper of Manhattan College. While Unc gave Sketch this lecture, I climbed the steps and went to the restroom.

  Everywhere I looked, I saw Tommye. Little girls clutching pink cotton candy, their faces painted with tomahawks, floated around like ballerinas high on the clouds where their fathers placed them. I could hear Tommye’s straight-faced commentary, watch her laughter, soak in her little-girl-ness—and yet the woman at home, draped in shame and bad decisions, walked beneath a rain cloud rather than floating atop one. When I reached the walkway overlooking the parking lot, I dialed my loft apartment. It was nearly nine thirty, and chances were good she was asleep under the snowfall of my window unit.

  The phone rang seven times, but she never answered.

  The Braves were down by two in the bottom of the ninth. Things were not looking good for Sketch’s first game. Unc looked worried. The Braves’ batter was down in the count and inched in to guard the plate. With two men on, the pitcher came from the stretch and sent a wicked slider at about ninety-four miles an hour. The batter took a wide swing, tagged it poorly, and sent it arcing high and to the right. The first baseman ran back, and the right fielder ran up, both in foul territory, but the ball spun further foul, dropping in the stands some twenty rows below us. It landed smack in the middle of the steps, bounced hard, spinning sideways, and climbing further foul.

  Every boy enters a baseball game wanting a souvenir. A pennant, a cap, a program. These mark the moment; they’re proof that we went, we watched, we were a part of the greatest game in the world. And once we leave, we hold them like brittle eggs, guard them, brag about them. For with them, we are the envy of every other boy who’s ever thrown a baseball. But in all the history of baseball, there’s really only been one souvenir that mattered. And to us who worship the winds of baseball, it’s the Holy Grail.

  Every boy and man around us was trained on that ball. The noise of it spinning sounded like a miniature tornado or drill bit, and it was radar-locked on Sketch’s head. I knew it was coming fast, but I reached too slowly. The ball nipped my fingertip just a few feet from him. The speed of it froze him. His eyes crossed, and the veins in his neck popped out. Inches from his face, Unc’s huge, knotty hand spread across the space in front of his nose. The ball struck Unc’s hand square in the palm with a loud smack and his fingers wrapped around the ball like a vise. Men and boys around us let out a collective, deflated breath of air. Unc slowly opened his hand, palm up, and held the ball in front of Sketch like the Hope Diamond.

  Unc’s eyes were as round as Oreos. He shook his head, his smile wide. “In one day, I got a Hank Aaron baseball card and a foul ball.” He looked out over the crowd. “When we leave here, I’m buying a lottery ticket.”

  Next, the pitcher sent a blistering fastball, high and slightly inside, which is about where the batter struck it. The ball took off like it was attached to the back end of a plane. It passed over the center field wall maybe seventy feet in the air, clearing the bases, winning the game, and clinching the pennant race. Unc sat back like he’d just eaten a really great meal. He took off his hat, wiped his brow, and looked out over the center field fence. “Yep, I’m definitely buying a lottery ticket.”

  I looked at the ball. “You know, it’s customary, as you get older—being the patriarch and all—”

  Unc flashed me an Oh boy, here it comes look.

  “—to give . . . you know . . . your fishing buddy . . . any foul balls that you catch at a pennant race game.”

  He stood up and hefted the ball. “Why don’t you spit in one hand and wish in the other.”

  Mandy laughed while Sketch held out both hands, palms up, eyeing one and then the other trying to figure out which one would get fuller the quickest.

  We drove out of the parking lot with the kid still looking at his hands. His face was the closest thing to a smile I’d seen since his birth-day. That’s not to say the ends of his lips were turned up, but his eyes looked amused and excited.

  ’Course it didn’t compare to the stretcher pasted across Unc’s face. With Bones sitting in his lap, helping him steer, we hopped on I-75 North, pulled off at Tenth Street, and rolled into The Varsity a few blocks later. Unc pulled into one of the full-service parking spaces and rolled the window down. Driving a hearse always raises a few eye-brows. Now was no exception. People kept looking in the back to see if we were carrying a casket.

  Sketch looked out the window and stared up at the buildings climbing into the night sky all around us. A minute later, he sat up on his heels and corkscrewed his face sideways, trying to frame what he saw through the rear window of the car. Finally he lay down across the seat on his back and stared through the top corner of the window. His calves were resting on my thighs, and he kept pushing against the door to get a better view.

  “Sketch”—I tapped him—“you okay?”

  Not satisfied, he unlocked the door and began jogging across the Tenth Street bridge. Unc was in the process of saying, “You better go with him” as Mandy and I hopped out of the car. He would jog a few steps, look over his shoulder, then turn and jog some more. We followed close enough, but not so close that we hampered whatever he was doing.

  We jogged two blocks through the Georgia Tech campus up along the side of the football field to the top of a hill, where he stopped and took another compass reading with whatever coordinates he was using in his head. He was sweating and breathing heavily, but wasn’t tired. Mandy ran alongside me, but I think I was in the worst shape of all because I’m not real good at running in flip-flops.

  Mandy pulled up alongside him and said, “Buddy? You looking for something?”

  He eyed both of us, then sat down on a curb and sketched on his notepad the picture in his mind. He was looking through a window frame at a city skyline. The buildings looked further away than we were now, but in the right-hand corner was one unmistakable building. It was that blue, mushroom-like building with the rotating restaurant on top that looks like it came straight out of a Jetsons episode. He tore out the page, handed it to me, and then started jogging again.

  I turned to Mandy. “He’s trying to match the picture in his head with what he’s looking at now.”

  “Well, let’s follow him.”

  Unc followed along behind us, spotlighting us with the head-lights, while Bones stood up on his hind legs and leaned against the dash. We jogged another three blocks, but Sketch seemed to be getting more frustrated with every block. Two more, and the trees began to obstruct our view of the skyline. He found a magnolia tree and started climbing, so I shimmied up after him. Thirty feet in the air, he sat on a limb and pulled back a branch. He shook his head and started to climb back down.

  “Sketch? Do we need to be closer or further away?”

  He pointed over my shoulder, away from the city, in a westerly direction. We climbed down, and he started off on foot again.

  I said, “Sketch, let’s do this in the car. You can sit up front, and we’ll cover more ground. Okay?”

  He looked at the oozing blister on my right foot and nodded.

  We zigzagged a few blocks toward the highest ground we could find, then stopped the car and lifted the kid onto the hood. He stared at the city, then back over his shoulder and pointed again. This continued until after midnight, while we drove a Pacman route around town. By one o’clock he’d drawn two more pictures. The first showed an elderly lady sitting in a La-Z-Boy chair, looking out her window. She was dressed in a long gown and slippers, and the room looked rather plain. Not real homely, but also not a hospital. On the table next to her sat a
picture of a man in military dress uniform and a tattered Bible.

  I held up the picture. “Do you know this lady?”

  He shrugged and nodded.

  “You sort of know her?”

  He nodded again.

  “Is she in her home? In a house?”

  He shook his head.

  Mandy knelt down next to him. “Buddy, are there other old people with this lady?”

  He nodded.

  “Lots of them?”

  He shrugged and then nodded again. Mandy dialed 411 and asked for the address of any retirement homes near us. The operator gave her two: Sherwood Villas and Cedar Lakes Community. Sketch read the names and shrugged. Unc studied his road atlas and located Sherwood Villas two miles away.

  We pulled into the poorly lit parking lot and let Sketch out of the car. He looked around, bit his lip, and shook his head. Unc handed him the atlas, and they navigated another ten or twelve blocks to Cedar Lakes. We pulled onto a long driveway with green ryegrass, lined with magnolia trees, and the kid’s legs started bouncing like the puppeteer had awakened. We reached the parking lot of an upscale retirement home with several buildings—some even looked like condominiums—a parking garage, and bright lights everywhere.

  Unc hadn’t even come to a stop before Sketch was jumping out of the car. He ran across the parking lot toward the front door, but before he got three car lengths away he skidded to a stop, ran back to the car, grabbed his chess set, and tucked it under his arm like a foot-ball, and then went running back across the parking lot. We followed a few feet behind.

  He ran up to the front door, but it was locked. A security guard stood up from behind a desk just beyond the door. He punched a but-ton and waved us in. Sketch ran past the desk and headed down a long carpeted hallway to his left. The guard came around the desk and hollered, “Hey, you’re not allowed on the hall at night.”

  The three of us chased him down the hallway, which was lined with doors like a dormitory. The guard hustled along, his large ring of keys clanking against the radio clipped to his belt. The only thing louder was his squeaky shoes. Sketch jogged right, then left, up a flight of stairs and down another long hallway.

  The guard began wheezing and slowed to a stop. He mashed the transmit button on his radio and said, “Greg . . . Bert here. I’ve got a crazy kid running down Seattle West.”

  Mandy and I left him in the stairwell and followed Sketch onto the second floor. He was sprinting now. At the end of the long hall-way he stopped, turned the knob on the last door on the right, and pushed it open. I walked in right behind him. In front of me sat a large chair looking out through an enormous window that over-looked the city skyline.

  Sketch flicked on the light and walked over to the bed. The fluorescent light flashed once, then lit the room and a tall figure in bed whose feet were sticking out from the covers on the other end. An elderly man with thin gray hair, bushy eyebrows, and big ears stared at us through eyes the size of saucers. The kid studied the man, who was studying us. Not satisfied, he lifted the corner of the sheet and looked beneath.

  The guard rushed in behind us, coughing, and shined a flashlight in our faces. He was trying to speak, but couldn’t catch his breath. Sketch turned around, walked to the window, then sat down in the chair and looked down at the floor. The old man sat up in bed and took a deep drag on an inhaler.

  The guard finally caught his breath. “You people can’t be in here. Everybody out, now.”

  I held out the picture of the old lady sitting at the window and whispered to Sketch. “Is this the room?”

  He nodded and looked back at the floor, chewing on his lip.

  I turned to the guard. “Sir, I’ll explain in a minute.” I turned to the old man, who was looking at each of us but had yet to formulate any words. “Sir? Have you been in this room very long?”

  He stuttered, “’B-b-b-b-out a year.”

  I turned to the guard. “Do you know if there used to be a woman in this room?”

  He shook his head and began mother-henning us out of the room. He spoke to the man in the bed. “Mr. Tuttles, I’m real sorry . . .” He pushed us out into the hall, where we were met by another guard along with Unc. “You people are in trouble.”

  “Please, sir, just give me a minute and I’ll explain.”

  For the first time, he really looked at Sketch. He studied him a minute, then said, “Ain’t seen you in a while.”

  “You know him?” I asked.

  “Sure, he used to come see Mrs. Hampton all the time when he lived down yonder at Sparks.”

  “Sparks?”

  “Uh-huh. Boys’ home few blocks down the road.”

  “Is Mrs. Hampton still around?”

  Bert looked at Greg and raised his eyebrows.

  The second guard shrugged. “It’s not like she’s sleeping.”

  Bert, looking empowered, walked past and waved for us to follow. We took the elevator down to the first floor, then walked to a second building that required a key-card for entrance. This wing looked more like a hospital. Nurses sat at a station when we walked in, watching fifteen or so monitors along the desk above them.

  “This is San Antonio,” Bert said. “Name don’t mean anything other than it’s the Alzheimer’s wing.” He pointed back behind us. “When they get too sick to live on their own in Seattle, we bring ’em to San Anton’.” He held up the key-card that was tethered to his waist via a miniature plastic slinky. “You can’t get in or out without a key. Some of these folks like to wander, but they’re not too good at getting back.”

  He looked down at Sketch. “You’ve grown a bit. What’s it been? Two years?”

  He shrugged and shifted his chess set from one arm to another.

  Bert pointed. “Looks like you’re still playing. She doesn’t play anymore.”

  Sketch’s eyes narrowed, and he followed Bert down the hall.

  The guard stopped at the nurses’ station and said, “Gretta, how’s Mrs. Hampton?”

  She pointed to a monitor. “She ain’t sleeping.”

  We walked down the hall to room 108, and Bert stepped aside. Sketch pushed open the door and walked in. An elderly woman was sitting up in bed. Her hair was thin, and most of it had fallen out. She was chewing on a fingernail, and her eyes seemed glossed over. When she saw Sketch, she smiled and patted the side of the bed. He pulled up a chair next to the bed and climbed up. He sat down, Indian style, facing her. She reached for his hand and sat looking at him. She tried to speak, but no words came out.

  The nurse whispered behind Mandy and me, “Missus Hampton’s been in here ’bout a year. She hasn’t spoken the whole time.”

  Sketch opened his chess set and set up the pieces. Mrs. Hampton stared at the board, then slowly moved a pawn one space forward.

  Bert nodded. “He used to come see her most every day. She taught him how to play.”

  “Who is she?”

  “She’s a true Southern belle. Must be close to a hundred. Lived in an antebellum home downtown, not far from the Margaret Mitchell house. Used to tell some of the best stories.” He pointed to the picture beside her bed. “That’s her husband, Colonel Hampton. He died some twenty years ago now, but she keeps that picture and—”

  As he was talking her left hand would move the chess pieces while her right hand came up just above her gown and began searching her neck for something that wasn’t there.

  “Oh . . . there she goes again. She’s looking for it now.”

  Mandy whispered, “Looking for what?”

  Sketch had yet to move. When Mrs. Hampton’s hand began searching her neck, he pulled on one of the drawers of his chess set and dug his fingers into the back of it. He pulled out a piece of tissue paper and began unrolling it. Mandy and I stepped close enough to see. Sensing us over his shoulder, he looked up at us.

  “It’s okay,” I said, “go ahead.”

  Sketch unrolled the tissue and spread it out across his hand.

  Bert eyed the chain lying
across the kid’s palm and said, “That.”

  Sketch picked up a long silver necklace. Held it up with two hands and offered to slip it over the lady’s head. She saw it, eyed the diamond at the bottom, and leaned forward. He slipped it over her hair net and hung it gently around her neck where the diamond fell between her lonely fingers. He slid his sketch pad from beneath the chess set and quickly wrote, MRS. HAMPTON, I’M SORRY ABOUT YOUR DIAMOND. I DIDN’T TAKE IT. I KNOW YOU’VE BEEN MISSING IT. SORRY I DIDN’T GET IT BACK SOONER.

  He laid the note on her lap and turned it around so she could read it. The nurse slipped between us and said, “Child, she can’t really read anymore.” She held the note and read it quietly to Mrs. Hampton, who was looking out the window, her fingers reading the facets of her diamond.

  “Shook this place up pretty good when that thing got stolen. We all had to take lie-detector tests. Then Sonya didn’t show up for work, and that’s about when everybody started pointing fingers at every-body else.”

  Mandy and I looked at him in amazement. He liked knowing something we didn’t, so he didn’t mind talking.

  “Yeah, reporters, news crews. Lots of people.” Bert pointed. “The Colonel gave her that diamond after he returned from his North African campaign. He was shot down over there.”

  Buddy and Mrs. Hampton sat in silence, understanding each other perfectly.

  Unc stepped up to the bed and said, “Buddy, let’s let this sweet lady get some sleep. We’ll come back tomorrow. Okay?”

  Mandy pulled Bert aside. “Don’t you have some sort of policy where you encourage family members to remove a resident’s jewelry when they come here?”

  Bert nodded. “We do, and we tried with Mrs. Hampton. Only we ran into two problems—she didn’t have any kin, and even if she did, she wouldn’t willingly take that necklace off.”

  I opened my wallet, pulled out Sketch’s torn page, and walked around to the corner table and the picture of the colonel. I tried to open the Bible to the fifth chapter of Matthew, but it wasn’t there. I spread the binding, found the tattered edge, and placed the single page up against it. It fit perfectly.