Max Swings for the Fences (2 page)

“You go to watch baseball practice?”

Jenny exhaled. And the glow in Molly's eyes turned into something else entirely.

“I'm the pitcher,” Molly said, each word an ice cube slipped down the back of Max's pants.

Jenny rolled her eyes. “The best one in the city,” she added, and then sighed epically and stalked away. Molly glared at Max for another two beats, and then tossed her hair and got up and turned to go. Max's heart leaped out of his throat, followed by some words he didn't even know were there.

“He's my dad!” Max said.

Max froze. The words floated in the air. He blinked at Molly. Maybe she hadn't heard.

“Who's your dad?” she said, taking a step closer.

She'd heard.

Now, if you were sitting on the outside of this situation, you would recognize this as the point where things could have been saved. But if you were inside it, you would see nothing at all to do but open your mouth and say:

“Beau Fletcher. Beau Fletcher's my dad.”

Molly stared. And Max, Max stared too. Max's dad was not in any way, shape, or form Beau Fletcher. Max's dad lived in Poughkeepsie and franchised tanning salons.

Molly tilted her head and considered Max for one moment. Two. Max did not move. Inside, he could feel his intestines begin to unravel.

“You expect me to believe that?” she asked. But her voice didn't sound hostile. Just curious.

“I know,” said Max. “It's really weird.”

“But”—Molly's brow contorted—“Beau Fletcher's not married. He never has been. He's married to the game!”

Max nodded solemnly. “I know.”

Molly's eyes widened, and then she too nodded, because she was a girl of the world. She sat down next to him. Max exhaled.

“So, why don't you have the same last name?” she whispered, leaning in to him so close Max could touch her hair. She smelled like cupcakes.

“Oh,” said Max. “Well, you know, my mom raised me. He wasn't really around till I was a little older.”

She gasped. “Does the school know?”

“Oh, you know.” Max could not decide whether to nod or shake his head, so he jerked his head in a direction that could best be called diagonal.

“Wow,” breathed Molly.

“So,” Max said, blinking spasmodically. “Don't tell anyone, okay? It's really important.” He cleared his throat. “It would be weird, you know?”

“Right,” said Molly. “You don't want people to like you just because you're Beau Fletcher's son!”

“Right,” said Max.
Just you
, he thought.

Molly stared at him as if expecting him to say more, and when he didn't, she just nodded as if she understood. His intestines curled back in place. Molly would never betray him. And her Catwoman eyes were fixed on him as if he himself had invented soup. Maybe the gods of middle school were finally smiling at him.

It was a little lie, that's all.

 

That night, Max went straight up to his room. He had work to do. He was no longer a boy-ape body-switch victim. He was a liar now, and that changed everything. Liars had information. They stuck as closely to the facts as possible. Liars kept in control of their words. And they did not ever ever ever babble.

This was going to be a challenge.

So he spent the evening reading up on Beau Fletcher. Nobody could talk about him without gushing over his stats: one jillion home runs, and a bazillion hits, and some crazy-high OPS, whatever the heck that was. It was like Beau was so amazing they had to make up a statistic for it. Most of the biographical stuff Max knew, of course—in New Hartford they taught Beau Fletcher history sometime between the alphabet and scissors. But buried in interviews were some interesting bits of information, things that brought out the picture of Beau Fletcher the man, the sort of thing you might know if he were your dad. Like he was scared of spiders. And he ate a pastrami sandwich before every game. And he was allergic to strawberries. And his favorite movie was
Wall-E
. In Minnesota, he was a spokesperson for milk, and even had his own ice cream flavor, which might be the coolest thing that could happen to a person ever. He could probably get it for free whenever he wanted, too, because they can't possibly charge you for your own ice cream flavor.

In short, Beau Fletcher was the sort of guy who, if you were going to have a famous guy for a dad, would be a great dad to have. Max was pleased.

 

He strode into school the next morning armed with everything there was to know about the life and times of Beau Fletcher, in case Molly decided to quiz him on the finer points of his dad's food allergies. But it wasn't Molly who accosted him as he walked to first period. The hand that grabbed his arm was Jenny's, her blond ponytail bobbing determinedly behind her.

“Molly told me,” she whispered, voice electric.

Max froze. “She did?” He turned slowly to look at her.

“I can't
believe
it!” Jenny said.

“You can't?”

Her blue eyes were sparkling. “No, I mean. It's
amazing
! But you know”—she tilted her head—“you look like him a little. Especially in the ears.”

“Oh,” said Max. “Look, Jenny …”

“I know, I know. I can't tell anyone. You don't want kids to like you just because you're Beau Fletcher's son, right?”

“You promise?”

“Swear!” Jenny said, holding her hands up.

She disappeared into the stream of students then, and Max tried to slow down his heart. Jenny believed him. And, more importantly, Molly believed him. That's what mattered.

He finally saw Molly at third-period English. She was waiting outside the classroom. For him.

“Hey,” he said, because that is the sort of thing sons of baseball players say.

“Hi,” Molly said. She looked around and then whispered, “I got a present for your dad.”

“What?” His ribs abruptly cinched together.

“Yeah!” She reached into her bag and pulled out a little Wall-E pin. “I thought it could be, like, a good-luck charm, you know?”

“His favorite movie! How did you know?”

“I know everything about him! He's my favorite player of all time. Maybe he could wear it in the dugout someday so I could see? You could ask him that, right?”

“Right,” Max said. “Sure!”

“Amazing,” Molly said. “Oh, hey”—a look of regret crossed her face—“did Jenny talk to you?”

“Um.” Max shifted. “Yes.”

She tilted her head. “I'm sorry I told her. It just came up, you know? She's my best friend. I don't want to
lie
to her!” Her nose wrinkled up at the very thought.

“No, of course not!” Max said, wrinkling up his nose even more. “Just, um, don't tell anyone else, okay?”

“Oh, you don't have to worry about me,” she said.

Max smiled. Of course she wouldn't tell. And if Molly told Jenny, Jenny was trustworthy too. And anyway, Molly wanted to hang out with him now. And that was worth anything.

 

Something changed in Max that day. For the first time in his life he was someone who was Someone, the sort of kid people noticed. In a Good Way. After all, if a girl like Molly believed he was the sort of kid who might have a baseball player for a dad, well, maybe that's who he was.

It would be something to have a major-league baseball player for a dad. And not just any major-league baseball player. Beau Fletcher, one of the best alive. It would have been the best thing ever. When Max was little, TC Bear would've come to all his birthday parties, and all the kids would think the Twins' mascot was his best friend. Beau would have taken Max to the ballpark all the time. Max would run around on the field, take grounders from the other players, drink Gatorade in the clubhouse, and tell all the kids in school about it the next day. Sometimes Max would bring his friends, too—but only sometimes. And his dad would go to his tennis matches whenever he could and cheer louder than all the other dads combined. And everyone would point and say, “That's Beau Fletcher! Cheering for his son! Tennis
is
a real sport!” But they'd still play baseball sometimes. Beau would pick Max up from school sometimes, and they'd stay afterward on the fields in the back of the school and have a catch as dusk slowly fell—father and son, night after night, just like it was supposed to be.

As Max walked through the hallways that day, he could feel himself standing taller, walking assuredly like Logan and all the other kids who mattered. And the funny thing was, it worked. By the end of the day he could feel the crackle in the air as the kids around him noticed him, sense them make way as he walked past, hear the staccato whispers and see the fingers pointing—

Uh-oh.

“Hey!” A boy from his English class grabbed him on the shoulder. “Do you think your dad could come to school sometime to autograph? I have baseballs like you wouldn't believe!”

“Um—” said Max.

“Man!” A girl with a unicorn on her shirt sidled alongside Max. “Your dad is, like, my favorite player of all time. I named all my gerbils after him. Do you think I could meet him sometime? I won't be weird!”

“Uh—” said Max.

“Serena!” Logan was standing in front of him, grinning. “You were kidding when you said you couldn't play, right? You gotta come to practice. Hey, think your dad might come? Give us some tips?”

And that's what it was like as Max made his way through the throngs of adoring Beau Fletcher fans to his locker. He grabbed his jacket, then looked inside his locker as if it might be a very nice place to stay for a while.

“Hey!” Molly appeared behind him, looking very happy.

He stared at her, pale and shaking. “Everybody
knows
!” he whispered.

Molly let out an exasperated sigh. “Oh, Jenny! Gosh, she always does this! You can't tell that girl anything!”

Max blinked at Molly. Everything inside him was blank, a pocket of nothingness floating in endless space.

“Don't worry about it. Listen.” She leaned her head toward him, voice thick with excitement. “I want to meet him.”

“You do?”

“Please?” She put her small, pale hand on his arm. Max almost gasped. “He could help me with my changeup! We could just meet. You can do that, right?”

Max's stomach was a pit of boiling tar, and all his innards were slowly descending into it. “Molly, he wants it to be a secret—”

“I know, but it's just me. Tell him I'm the only female baseball pitcher in the sixth-grade tournament. Won't he think that's cool? Anyway, he must want to meet your friends. Doesn't he?”

“Molly, um, he's so busy, and—”

She looked at him, her eyes not exactly losing their glow but shifting a bit. “You mean you can't set up a dinner with your own dad?” She blinked. “Why not?”

Max froze.

“Molly!” The word exploded out of his mouth. One breath. Two. Oh, god. “I lied,” he said finally.

She drew up. “What? What do you mean?”

This was it. This was his chance to come clean, to end this. And then he'd just be normal Max again, the kind of kid guys like Logan step on in the cafeteria, that girls like Molly never even think twice about. And this look she was giving him now—a little confused, a little hesitant, a little hurt, all because of something he'd done—no one would ever look at him this way again. He could write a poem about this look, if only he knew how to write a poem.

“I mean,” he said, “I let you think something that wasn't true. Beau … my dad … he doesn't know about me. That's why we don't have the same last name.”

Molly gaped. “Wow,” she finally breathed.

“I know,” he said, shaking his head with as much sincerity as he could muster. His lungs felt like they were about to crack into bits and puncture various vital organs. “They dated one summer. My mom was a lifeguard at the pool in college, you see. I guess they'd broken up by the time she found out she was pregnant. And by then he'd been drafted into the minors, and … my mom never told him. She raised me on her own.” His breath slowed a little. This was good. This sounded plausible. Max was pretty sure he'd seen something like it on CBS once.

“I'm sorry I lied to you,” he said, making his face as sincere as possible.

“It's okay,” she said. “What matters is that you're telling the truth now.”

Max could do nothing but nod.

“Does
anyone
know?” she whispered.

“No,” he said. “Mom told everyone my dad was some guy in Poughkeepsie. I believed it most of my life.”

“I can't believe it!” Molly bit her lip. “Don't you think he'd want … to know? I mean, if I had a son—”

Max just shrugged, as if this was the stuff of grown-ups and he could only wonder at it.

“I bet,” Molly said, her face so close her hair brushed against his arm, “if Beau Fletcher met you, he'd just know. He'd look in your eyes and see something. He'd
know
.”

There was something buzzing in Max's ears now, and Molly sounded very faint. “Yeah. Maybe,” he said. That would be something, wouldn't it? To look into your long-lost dad's eyes and see recognition there.

“Oh, Max,” Molly said. She stared up at him. “Your story is incredible.” And with that, she slipped into his arms and gave him a squeeze, as quick and magical as a fairy blink. And then she was gone. But Max, he did not move, not for a long time.

 

Max went home and planned on spending the weekend in quiet contemplation. There was a chance that it was over—that Molly, out of the goodness of her heart, would tell everyone to stop talking about it so Max would not have to feel bad about the dad he never knew. It was the sort of thing she would do. Eventually, it would all die down—and if not, he'd just stay under his bed until college.