Split Decision (7 page)

Then it was Chop’s turn to wilt under the coach’s intense glare. “Tough, Mr. Porter, is going facemask to facemask with guys older and bigger than you in varsity football. Tough is stacking hay bales on your family farm, under a mean summer-afternoon sun.”

Next, Coach Clayton took two steps back, giving his pupils a little space before he spoke again. “Here’s what’s not tough—warring with your own teammate—all over ego and pride. That’s just plain selfish—and stupid! Mr. Porter, I can tell by the way your right paw is hanging loose at your side that you’ve probably busted it. Maybe separated a shoulder, to boot. How you gonna toss the shot and disc in that sorry state?

“And you, Mr. Alston, that left eye is nigh-on swole shut. You’re a right-handed batter, son. How do you expect to see a fastball blazing toward you? And good luck tracking high fly balls in the outfield.”

Coach Clayton sighed sadly. “Okay,” he said, “I’m just about done talkin’. You need to call a parent and get yourselves checked out by a doc. Besides, I’m sick of lookin’ at the both of you. I’m ashamed for you. You’re both busted up so bad that your teams are gonna suffer. And what have you proved? What’s been decided?

“All this,” he said, spreading his arms in a wide, sweeping motion, “for nothin’. Nothin’.”

Then he walked away, shoulders slumped, head wagging slowly.

Coach Clayton’s on-the-spot medical diagnoses proved mostly correct. Pork Chop had broken his thumb. And his shoulder wasn’t separated, but he had strained ligaments and muscles. “I’m done, little brother,” Chop mumbled to Cody over the phone later that night. “I’m cooked.”

Alston showed up for school two days later, his left eye open only a slit. The swelling above and around his eye had taken on the purplish hue of eggplant skin. Through the grapevine, Cody learned that Alston had also suffered a mild concussion. His season was probably over, too. At the lunch table, he talked about switching to track, but Cody doubted that Coach Clayton would take him.

Meanwhile, the Eagles’ frosh baseball team stumbled into the season. Mill Creek lit up Bart for eleven runs, and Holy Family punished Brett for ten. Grant managed only two and three runs, respectively, in the contests.

In the Holy Family game, Cody got his first hit of the season. Facing a three and two count, he chopped down on a high heater, sending the ball bouncing happily to third base. The Saint manning the hot corner was slow reacting to the hit, and Cody legged out an infield single.

He also made a stellar play in right field, bare-handing a seeing-eye grounder that scooted past Matt Slaven at first base, then throwing out a Holy Family runner trying to stretch a single into a double.

Cody also got a late break on a bloop hit off the bat of Keenan Jones, Holy Family’s premier pitcher, and the ball dropped between him and Slaven. Two runs scored.

After the loss to the Saints, the baseball bus arrived back at Grant High only minutes before the track bus. Craig Ward, finally healthy after injury-filled football and basketball seasons, was first off the latter vehicle, two gold medals dangling from his neck. When Drew emerged a few moments later, he wasn’t flashing any hardware.
But that doesn’t mean anything
, Cody thought, studying him.
Phelps isn’t the kind of guy to show off. If he won medals, they’re probably tucked into the pocket of his sweats.

“Hey, Phelps,” Cody called, walking toward the track bus. He was surprised by the lifeless tone of his own voice. “How did you run today?”

Drew yawned. “As a team, we got third. As for me, I didn’t run well enough. Fifth in the mile. Sixth in the two.”

“Times?”

“Four forty-nine and ten thirty-eight. Not exactly world-class.”

Cody whistled through his teeth. “But pretty darn quick early-season times for a freshman—which you are, just in case you forgot.”

“I should be a sophomore; you know that. I should be faster. This isn’t middle school anymore.”

“Drew, you were sick for a whole school year. It’s not like you went to private school for a year, just so you could be a year older and stronger than everybody else. If anything, that lost year put you behind everybody else. You need to give yourself a break. And remember, it’s only March; there’s a lot of track ahead of you.”

Cody paused a moment. “Did Gerber win?”

“Nah,” Drew said. “He took second in the mile, with a four fourty-one. Third in the half, in two-oh-three. Not bad for mid-March.”

Cody crinkled his forehead. “So, he beat you in the mile?”

Drew huffed. “Uh, it’s pretty simple math, Cody. Why did you even ask the question? You just want to hear me say I got whupped? Okay, I got whupped.”

Cody bowed his head. “Sorry, Phelps. It was a stupid question. It’s just hard for me to picture anyone from Grant beating you. It’s hard to picture anyone from anywhere beating you.”

“Well, like I said, this isn’t middle school anymore. I’m a varsity track man now. Anyway, I gotta get a shower. I’m starting to stank out myself. But, Cody—”

Cody arched his eyebrows. “Yeah?”

“I wish you were out there running with us. It felt weird not hanging with you between races. And I’m not the only one who missed ya out there.”

Cody cocked his head. “Huh?” he said.

“Don’t even pretend to be puzzled. You know I’m talking about Robyn.”

Cody felt the back of his neck tingling, and his heart started to rev. But he fought to keep his voice even and measured. “Robyn? Really? What did she say—exactly?”

“How about I just summarize for you,” Drew said with a wink. “Save us both some time.”

Cody exhaled like a leaky inner tube. “C’mon, dude. ‘Blessed are the merciful,’ remember? How about showing me a little mercy?”

“Okay, Code. Robyn said, and I quote, ‘I so wish Cody were here. I can’t believe he’s not running track. He’s such a strong runner.’”

Cody felt his eyes widen. “She said that? For real?”

“You know me, Cody. I always keep it real.”

Cody exchanged fist pounds with Drew, then lingered near the track bus, watching the sprinters, jumpers, distance runners, and weight throwers trickle off—comparing medals, swapping jokes. He caught enough of one conversation to learn that Brendan Clark had won the pole vault with an effort of thirteen feet, six inches—only three inches off his own school record.
One cool thing about track
, Cody thought,
is that there’s always plenty to be happy about, no matter what. At a major invitational, even if the team places fourth or fifth, that’s a big achievement against all those huge schools. And even if the boy’s team stumbles, the girl’s might do great. Or vice versa. Or, you might have some great individual achievements— gold medals, meet records, an exciting relay victory— that the whole team can celebrate, even if our overall score leaves us in the middle of the pack. But even if I’d gone four for four today and hit two homers, I couldn’t be happy, because we lost. I mean, look at Gannon. He had a great game at the plate and at second base, but he sulked the whole ride home.

Beth must have read his mood the instant he entered the house, Cody surmised, because she gave him uncharacteristic space, didn’t ask him, “How’d ya do today? You tear ’em up out there?” and so on, the way she had typically done ever since she and his dad started dating seriously—and especially since they married on December 2.

However, when he emerged from his bedroom twenty minutes later, Cody almost stepped in a plate of homemade chocolate chip cookies, topped with a note penned in Beth’s large, loopy cursive hand: “Hey, Cody, I take it that baseball didn’t go so well today. From my own athletic career, I know how that feels. But I’ve found that, sometimes, a few simple cookies can ease the pain. Especially when they’re still warm.”

Cody smiled and stooped to pluck a cookie from the plate. He took a large, horseshoe-shaped bite. “Not bad,” he judged, a few crumbs tumbling from his mouth. “Not as good as Mom’s, but definitely better than store-bought.”

At dinner later that night, Cody kept looking suspiciously at his dad, who had a wide smile frozen on his face. If Pork Chop had been there, he would have said, “Co, what’s up with your pops? He’s grinnin’ like a butcher’s dog.”

Finally, just before dessert, Beth elbowed her husband in the ribs, the way Pork Chop sometimes nudged a hoops opponent while jockeying for position under the basket.

Cody’s dad blotted the corners of his mouth with a napkin, then coughed softly. “Son,” he began, “I don’t know how to say this—except just to, um, say it. Beth is with child. You’re going to have a sibling. Sometime in late September or early October.”

Cody fought to swallow a mouthful of orange juice—and not spew it like a geyser in Beth’s face.

“I’m going to have a brother … or a sister?” he finally managed to say.

“Those are pretty much the two options, dude,” Beth laughed.

“Whoa!” Cody said.

“Yeah,” his dad said with an emphatic nod. “Whoa, baby!”

Cody felt Beth’s eyes on him, sizing up his reaction. “You okay with this news, young man?” she asked cautiously. “You up to being a big brother?”

“I’m not sure,” Cody began. He sensed that words were about to start pouring out of his mouth like stallions escaping from a corral. He wasn’t going to be able to rope them all; he could only hope he could control the orneriest ones. “I’ve never thought about being a big brother,” he said. “Before, it was never really in the realm of possibility, because of, uh, Mom’s health. So, for the longest time, I believed I’d be an only child. That’s been my, you know, reality. So, this is trippy. Real trippy.”

“Trippy?” his dad said, with a perplexed frown.

“I’ll explain it later,” Beth said, giving Cody a knowing wink.

The members of the Martin family, Version 2.0, sat silently for a while. Cody held both hands over his stomach. He was sure his food had stopped digesting the moment he heard the news.

“Don’t you have anything else to say?” his dad asked finally.

“Uh, congratulations?” Cody offered.

“Thank you, Cody,” Beth said, with lots of emphasis on the word “thank.”

“You’re welcome,” Cody said, and immediately began to regret it.
Not every “thank you” is followed by “you’re welcome,” ya bonehead
, he scolded himself.
Better say something else quick before Dad thinks you were being a wise guy just now.

“Uh,” he said, “can I tell Pork Chop the news?”

“Ha!” Beth answered. “That’s like asking, ‘Can I broadcast the news to the entire town of Grant and all the surrounding little Colorado burgs?’ Sheesh, that Pork Chop has more connections than the mayor!”

“To your question, son,” Cody’s dad said, “we’d prefer that you keep the news quiet until the end of the month, when Beth is through her first trimester.”

“You know what a trimester is, right dude?” Beth queried.

Cody couldn’t tell if Beth wanted a genuine answer or if she was just teasing him.

“Sure,” he said. “A trimester is like, uh … three …
mesters!”

Beth wadded up her napkin and bounced it off Cody’s forehead. “I so hope you’re joking, big-bro-to-be!”

Then she turned to her husband. “Luke, did you ever have ‘the talk’ with this young man?”

Cody saw genuine panic in his dad’s eyes. “I was planning to do it … soon,” came the tentative answer.

Beth rolled her eyes. “Yeah, you follow through on that plan,” she scolded. “Maybe sometime before he leaves the nest and gets married would be good!”

With that, Beth smacked her lips together and pushed her chair back from the table. “You two have fun clearing the dishes,” she said cheerily. “I do believe the baby wants to lie down. And he or she would like some hot chocolate in a few minutes as well.”