Asked For (2 page)

“Okay, Jimmy, it’s okay to take the first one. We got a man on every base and only one out, so pick your pitch and put one over the fence.” Coach clapped his hands a couple of times and then leaned forward, propping himself with his hands on his knees like he expected to field the ball.

James looked around the diamond. Sure enough the bases were loaded. He’d spent so much time watching for Pop he’d lost track of the game. He gave the bat a tug, enough to lift it off his shoulder and get his mind back on what he was supposed to do. He leaned forward, his hands stretched as far around the bat’s handle as he could get them. A pitch whizzed by.

“Ball one!”

James backed out of the batter’s box. He could hear his coach, hear his teammates. He looked at the bleachers, even though he tried not to. His mother nodded and clapped. Andy’s parents sat below her. They cheered for him, too. Pop must be busy. He had several guys working for him, all of them worthless, he said.

He stepped back to the plate and strained his fingers for a better grip on the bat. The pitcher bent forward, eyeing the zone he was going to send the ball. James read the pitcher’s mind; he knew where the pitch was headed. The pitcher straightened, leaned back to cock his body for the pitch, and then launched forward, the ball rocketing toward home plate. James tugged at the bat, he knew just where to place it. It felt like lead, and he had to throw himself into the swing, dragging the bat through the air. It connected. It was late and the ball trickled along the first base line as the bat slipped from his fingers and skidded through the dirt.

“Fair ball!” the umpire shouted.

James jumped and raced toward first base. The pitcher came his direction, hurtling toward the ball. They reached the ball at the same time, and the pitcher’s long arm whisked downward like a tentacle and snatched the ball up. He swung it at James’ back, then fired it to home plate.

“Out! Out!” The umpire called.

James raced to first base and wheeled to the right. It had been an awful hit, but he’d made it. A grin gurgled deep inside as he circled back to first, glancing at the bleachers.

“Hey, you’re out,” the first baseman nudged him.

“I am not,” James glared upward and looked the boy in the eye. He glanced at the first base umpire. The man nodded and jerked his thumb toward the dugout.

“But he didn’t tag me! He missed!”

“He got both of you,” the first baseman chided. “You and the kid who ran to home. Game’s over, and we won.”

“But he missed me…”

James’ coach was waving everyone toward the dugout. The other team was cheering, jumping against each other, and slapping their hands high in the air.

James glanced at his mother. She was watching him, and now he was glad she was alone. She’d believe he wasn’t out. He’d ask her not to say anything about the game to Pop. Pop would take the umpire’s side and tell James to try harder next time. Or quit trying to play altogether.

His teammates gathered their equipment to go home while the coach said a few strained words. They filed out of the dugout, leaving James alone. He dropped to the bench and stared at the empty diamond as he spun the glove handed down from his brothers. He glanced at the baby bat, the one he should have used.

“Choke up when you use a big bat,” a man said from behind him.

His heart jumped. Pop? James wheeled around. Tan fingers jutted through the fence’s slats where his had been earlier. Mr. Morgan stared down at him, a black cowboy hat tipped back on his head. His hair was black, too. James couldn’t tell where the hat started and where the hair stopped. “You grip a big bat a little higher than normal so you can control the weight better. You won’t hit as far, but your control will be good.”

James eyed the owner of Glen’s Restaurant. What did Mr. Morgan know about baseball? He didn’t even have a son. He’d opened his mouth to tell Mr. Morgan to leave him alone when his mother caught his eye. She was watching from the bleachers, her slender form in the background, just beyond Mr. Morgan’s left shoulder. She was listening to what she was too far away to hear, and talking with her eyes the way mothers could.

James turned back to Mr. Morgan. What he had to say would have to be done carefully, without Mama knowing, but when he looked to Mr. Morgan, the man wasn’t listening. He had turned away, his gaze on Mama. Mr. Morgan held there while Mama stared back at him, the two of them saying or thinking something, and James was afraid it was about him. Mama glanced away, finally, and Mr. Morgan turned back to James. Mr. Morgan’s eyes were different then; they looked too much like James felt: like he’d just lost a game and the one person who mattered wasn’t there.

James spun his glove in his hands. He would keep the nasty things he’d wanted to say to himself, but he still wished Mr. Morgan would go away. James wanted to be alone, he didn’t want advice, and he didn’t want to think about baseball now or maybe ever again. He glanced up at Mr. Morgan, into eyes as dark as his own. Dark and familiar. He thought he saw himself in there for a moment, but it wasn’t him, it was Mama, and she was telling James to be patient, be kind, and fight above the hurt.

“Mr. Morgan, I appreciate your advice, but I’m okay. Thank you anyway.”

“I imagine with a couple of older brothers and a father, you probably get lots of suggestions.” Mr. Morgan kept his fingers around the slats.

A
ha
kicked up inside of James. He drew in a deep breath, one that felt like a scream again. Suggestions weren’t real help, and they didn’t make up for how small he was. That’s why Pop never came to his games, why Pop was so angry at him all the time. He was small, he was sissy, and baseball was a waste of his time. If Mr. Morgan would go away, James would talk himself through Pop’s list, tell himself just the way Pop would why he was no good at ball, and then he’d quit and be done with it. Just like Pop wanted.

“I realize your father used to play ball, and he was pretty good. I was younger than him and never played with him, or as good as he did, either, but I still know a thing or two about it.”

Pop played baseball? James frowned. Why hadn’t he ever said so? Why hadn’t anyone said so? Maybe that was the real reason he never came to James’ games. He’d been good when he was young, and James wasn’t. Pop was old now. Too old to play or care about the game. Too old to be having little kids like James around, something he’d said more than once. He was lots older than Mama, and older than Mr. Morgan, too.

“He missed me,” James said, looking at Mr. Morgan.

“Your father? He missed you?” Mr. Morgan’s brows furrowed.

“No, I mean the pitcher. I wasn’t out. He missed me.” He saw it again in Mr. Morgan’s eyes, the near reflection of himself and the reason Mama was there telling him to fight above the hurt.
Pop missed me, too. He missed my game, he missed my stupid hit, he missed seeing me lose the game for the whole team.

Mr. Morgan’s brows leveled out. “How about I show you how to choke up on a bat?”

James didn’t feel like fighting or trying harder; it was easier to just hurt. There were things sissies could do; baseball just wasn’t one of them.

“No, thank you.” James turned away and stared at the empty diamond. Pop was probably a lot like that pitcher today. Long, lanky, a hero, arms as quick as snakes. Mr. Morgan didn’t say anything, but he was still there behind the dugout. James could hear Mama in his presence. James sighed, dragged to his feet, grabbed his bat, and stepped out of the dugout.

Mr. Morgan stood back and waited until James came in front of him. “First off, that bat’s too small for you,” Mr. Morgan nodded at James’ bat. “You were right to try a bigger one, but work your way up. Try one that’s only somewhat larger next time.”

James twisted the end of his bat in the dirt, waiting for Mr. Morgan to add “because you’re so small.”

“Now take a nice, slow, even swing with that bat. Feel the drag of the weight at its far end through the air.”

James looked up. Mr. Morgan nodded at the bat. James dropped his glove and lifted the bat until it was level with his shoulders, then moved it in a semicircle.

“Now grip your hands a little higher on the handle, just above where they are now, and swing again.”

James did as Mr. Morgan said. He felt the difference.

“I get it!” James wobbled the bat in the air with his hands near the end and then farther up. “I see what you mean.”

“Come on, James!”

James glanced toward the bleachers. His oldest sister, Magdalena, stood next to their mother. She was seventeen, wearing too much makeup, and drawing on a cigarette.

“Pop will kill her if he sees her that way,” James said, more to himself than Mr. Morgan, as he lowered the bat. Maybe it was good Pop hadn’t shown up for the game, for Magdalena’s sake. James shuddered as he thought what Pop would have said right there in front of everyone. Mr. Morgan moved alongside him. He wasn’t big, but he felt steady, steady enough to absorb James’ shudders. “Pop never lets Mama or my sisters wear makeup. He says makeup’s for ugly hags, and cigarettes are for men and whores.” He looked up at Mr. Morgan, wondering if he understood what Pop meant.

Mr. Morgan didn’t say anything. Just like Mama never did. No one ever explained, nor did Mama ever complain at her oldest daughter or tattle to Pop how Magdalena looked or behaved in public. Mama protected her, just like she watched out for James. It was the way she loved them, her special way.

Mama said something to Magdalena. Magdalena looked straight at James. Whatever Mama said made Magdalena draw on her cigarette until the end flared bright orange.

James picked up his glove and slid its strap over the bat’s end and rested the bat on his shoulder. “Thank you, Mr. Morgan. I need to go. Magdalena’s here to walk home with us. We gotta get there before Pop does so Magdalena can wash that stuff off her face.”

Mr. Morgan glanced at James’ glove, touched it, and looked it over. “That yours?” he asked.

“My brothers, Harold and Alex, used it before me. It’s mine now.”

Mr. Morgan nodded, let go of the glove, and looked James in the eye. “Your pop was a good ballplayer, so when he gives you advice how to play better, take it. And you can tell your sister that what your pop really means about her is that beautiful women don’t need makeup. Hags have nothing to do with her.”

“You think Magdalena’s beautiful?” James frowned at Mr. Morgan.

Mr. Morgan placed a hand on James’ shoulder. “She’s your sister, so you probably don’t think so. But I can tell you one thing, she’s your mama’s daughter, and your mama sure doesn’t need any makeup. I know.”

James looked for his mama again in Mr. Morgan’s dark eyes. Did Mr. Morgan see her the same way Pop did, and that’s why makeup was forbidden? Mama would probably laugh at all this talk about beauty, she with her faded dresses and unpinned hair. James wanted to laugh like she would, but something in Mr. Morgan’s eyes stopped him.

“Your mama’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known,” Mr. Morgan said. That was different from saying she wasn’t an old hag. Just like saying choke up on the bat was different from saying James was small and sissy.

Cigarette smoke broke into their conversation. James turned and saw Magdalena near his side. He hadn’t heard her approach, hadn’t even noticed she’d moved. When he looked toward the bleachers, Mama was gone. Probably out near the road, waiting.

“Time to go, James.” Magdalena seemed a little less brazen as she blew smoke into the air. She dropped the cigarette and rubbed it out in the dirt.

“Goodbye, Mr. Morgan,” James said. “And thanks.” There were chores waiting for him at home, and if they weren’t done, he’d get a thrashing. Magdalena had to scrub her face, and Mama had to get a meal on the table. They’d all be hurrying, getting everything in place before Pop got there.

“Goodbye, Glen.” Magdalena’s familiarity shocked James. He looked up at Mr. Morgan, wondering if the man was as surprised as he was. Mr. Morgan nodded. There was a question in his eyes, something he chose not to ask. Mr. Morgan turned and walked away.

“Let’s go,” Magdalena said, and James ran ahead of her to the road, where Mama was waiting. Beautiful Mama. He glanced back over his shoulder. Mr. Morgan was far away, but he was watching them. There was something in his stance like there had been in his eyes. James waved, then turned and walked with his sister and mother. They had to hurry. They had to get home.

Chapter 2

Lana 1929

“Lana, get back over here!” The way Grandma chopped her words, the way she barked rather than spoke, finally drew Lana away from the window. She left a smudge where she’d rubbed it all morning, watching, waiting for her parents to come. The window was clean enough, but she wanted to see her father when she looked out, see him coming up to the door and smiling, waving the way she’d imagined he would. He’d written…well, her mother had…promising they’d come…he’d come. Lana’d rubbed the window, over and over, trying to make him appear. “Get over here and stay put. We have to hurry,” Grandma called again. She was impatient, her bark getting worse.

Lana moved near the cots she and Grandma slept on. Grandma lowered herself to the floor beside her, one bony knee at a time, grimacing as she knelt.

“He said he’d be here. Well, Mom said they would.” Lana looked down at her grandma. She was too thin, not enough meat on her to be comfortable down there, too old to be crouching that way.

Grandma snorted, hanging onto the straight pins clenched between her lips. Lana watched her bunch the dress’ extra fabric in her weathered fist and pin it at Lana’s waist so she could baste it in place. It was Grandma’s best dress, the one she wore to church, and it was a little too loose for Lana, a little too straight, and a little too long. That’s the way Grandma wore her dresses, especially her best dress, best but still old like the rest of them.

Lana strained to see herself in the cracked mirror that leaned against the wall near Grandma’s cot. “You think your dress works good for a bride?” Lana eyed the dress her grandmother was giving her, faded gray fabric with only a hint of white where tiny daisies had once been. Lana’s dresses were old and faded too, different colors than Grandma’s, but so washed out they looked almost the same. If she squinted, Grandma’s dress looked almost white all over. Lana knew nothing about being a bride other than what her best friend, Jeanie, had told her, and Jeanie had been firm that brides were supposed to wear white.