The Youngest Hero (3 page)

Elgin badgered me into taking him to Neal’s baseball games, but he was an obnoxious fan. He combined play-by-play with desperate
coaching from the stands, trying to urge on his dad’s awful Zephyrs. They won about half their games.

“Full count and two outs,” Elgin would holler. “Runners will be going! Runners should be going! Runners aren’t going! There’s
the hit! C’mon, Shaw! Move with the pitch and you score on that play!”

After each game, Elgin would debrief with Neal.

“Outfield was too deep for their shortstop in the sixth, weren’t they?”

Neal nodded.

“Would you have taken Crawford out so soon in the seventh, Dad? Why not let him walk the hitter to load the bases and give
Mehlis a little more time in the bull pen? Mehlis wasn’t ready. He got behind on the first guy and then had to come in with
that candy pitch.”

I could see Neal was impressed. “You saw that too, huh?” he
said. “You also see that I’ve lost a step to first and that my arm has no pop anymore?”

“You’ve lost two steps, Dad. But your arm is as good as ever. Ask Ernie.”

Ernie was the Zephyr catcher who had taken a throw from Neal to cut down a runner. Ernie had made the tag and come up shaking
his hand.

At the park in town, Neal hit Elgin harder and harder grounders and line drives. He pitched faster and faster until we were
forced to save our money and get Elgin a batting helmet.

The helmet gave me a feeling I can’t describe. Dad told me to open my stance and make sure I was getting both eyes on the
pitch. Now I could do that without worrying about getting beaned. It made Dad laugh, though, the way I stuck my face right
into the pitch before trying to drive it somewhere.

I loved to hit!

M
y family and my church taught me God hated divorce. Well, I didn’t believe in divorce either, but I knew something about hate.
It was what I felt for Neal. As for biblical grounds, I happened to know I had those too, but that was nobody’s business but
mine.

I lived with the pain and the embarrassment as long as I could. Neal quit trying to get me back. I guess I convinced him I
was through with him, and I hoped he was grateful he still had some contact with Elgin.

A bad marriage was good gossip in Hattiesburg. I saw scorn on faces, heard it in tones of voice. I was a failure, pitiable,
wife of that violent drunk who washed out as a professional baseball player and was now just a good ol’ boy, racing cars,
bagging groceries, and playing a little ball on the side.

I guess there was irony in my choice of a lawyer, but I didn’t know anybody else. Billy Ray Thatcher was an old friend of
Neal’s family and had been his agent. He had worked on Neal’s contract with the Pirates, a five-figure deal that let Neal
live like a king until he drank his talent away and the money ran out.

Billy Ray’s claim to fame was that he had represented Bernie Pincham, a poor rural basketball player who became a six-time
NBA all-star and was now worth millions. The newspaper said
the agent’s commission on Pincham’s salary and endorsement deals alone more than doubled Thatcher’s firm’s gross receipts
for several years. Billy Ray had also advised Bernie on investments. Pincham was worth many times in retirement what he had
made playing basketball. The Woodells had assumed the same would be true for Neal.

Mr. Thatcher had done his best, but unlike Bernie Pincham, Neal had not listened. He had not heard Billy Ray when he insisted
that “everything, all of this—the bonus, the salary, the deals—hinges on what kind of a steward you are of your talent. If
it doesn’t happen on the field, it doesn’t happen in the bank.

“The bonus is yours. You can pay your bills and put the rest away. You know as well as I do that the odds are one hundred
to one against a rookie-league player making a living as a big leaguer.”

“I’ll make it,” Neal had told Billy Ray and me as we sat in his office so many years before.

“I believe you very well could,” Mr. Thatcher said. “But you want to be smart with this little nest egg. It looks like a lot
to you now, and if we’re careful with it, it can be a cushion for you if anything happens to your career.”

“Do I get it in cash or like, what?”

I saw Billy Ray Thatcher’s eyes roll.

“It comes to me in the form of a check, Neal. I recommend that you allow me to subtract my commission, pay your debts, put
a quarter of it in a savings account, put a few thousand in your checking account, and invest the rest in some safe, conservative
stocks.”

Not only did Neal refuse, but it was like he was insulted.

“No way, Jose! Huh-uh! We agreed on your percentage. You take that and you give me the rest. And you can tell me one more
thing: how to get a check that size cashed. I tried to cash a big check at the bank one time, and they said they needed a
couple of days’ notice.”

“They would require a week’s notice on a check this size, Neal, but surely you don’t intend to—”

“You’re gettin your cut, so just let me know when I get the cash.”

“I’d be doing you a disservice if I allowed you to—”

“You’ll be fired if you don’t. Now stick with me, Billy, because we gonna make lots more money together.”

Neal was up and out of Mr. Thatcher’s office that day without even waiting for me. Billy Ray stood when I did and touched
my elbow as he held the door for me. “Miriam, if he squanders that money, he’ll ruin his career.”

I just nodded. If I’d tried to say anything I would have burst into tears. It seemed like Mr. Thatcher was putting the responsibility
on me to keep Neal from messing up. No one else knew yet that Neal beat me when he was drunk and that he was drinking during
the week for the first time. Nobody could tell him anything. I had quit bringing up even minor things. We lived in the same
house. That was it.

I watched Neal slide from the frittering away of his signing bonus to borrowing ahead on his small, minor-league paycheck,
and finally to where he began asking the ball club for his daily meal money in advance.

The day after the Pirates first warned him his career was in jeopardy, he hit four home runs in a rookie-league double-header.
That had to be why they stuck with him as long as they did, that and what they had invested in him. Neal rose to triple-A
but soon dropped back to double-A and then A, and finally the Pirates told him they weren’t going to make room for him again
with the eighteen- to twenty-year-olds in the rookie league.

I was amazed he could come back to Hattiesburg with his head high, admitting,
admitting
that drinking had done him in. I finally figured out that the last thing Neal wanted anyone to think was that he hadn’t had
the talent to make the majors. The saddest thing was that he was right. Someone less gifted became that one in a hundred from
the rookie league to make the big leagues.

After years of beatings, drinking, lost jobs, and bankruptcy, I could hardly recognize the person I had been so attracted
to in the first place. He had been the best-looking boy in high school,
a star in three sports, homecoming king. He was my dream from the day I first tutored him in algebra. I didn’t help him as
much as I distracted him. He said he couldn’t take his eyes off my red hair, my freckles, and my figure. His algebra grade
went from an F to a D. I felt like a failure.

He was charming and funny, and he claimed he believed in Jesus, but he was not bright. In the end, Neal Woodell was only physical.
And when alcohol had left him just a better than average local jock, and me a struggling young mother with no more sympathy
or patience, I got an appointment with Billy Ray Thatcher.

“How long since you threw him out, Miriam?”

“More’n two years, plus his jail time.”

“He sendin you any money?”

I snorted.

“Can I talk you out of this?” Mr. Thatcher said. “Tell you he’s worth the effort, that you don’t wanna be a divorced, single
parent in this town?”

“I’m not going to be in this town much longer, Mr. Thatcher. Soon as I can get some money saved, I’m sellin that trailer,
and Elgin and I are going to Chicago.”

“Why there?”

“I had an aunt who moved to Chicago with her husband when I was little. She wrote the most beautiful letters about it. The
culture and all.” I sat with my hands folded, eyes focused on the floor where my tears puddled. “I just want to get as far
away from here as I can,” I managed. “My family knows what I’m doin, and they don’t like me for it. Well, they can just hate
me long-distance.”

Mr. Thatcher sat with his legs crossed, fingers entwined. “Can he accuse you of adultery?”

“No, sir,” I said. “He accused me of a lot of stuff when he was drunk, but he knows better.”

“Could
you
use adultery as grounds?”

“I wouldn’t, but I probably could. You know that girl at the grocery with the blonde hair and—“ I caught myself. “Mr. Thatcher,
I don’t want any more mess.”

“But he beat you, didn’t he? Isn’t that what he did time for?”

“I don’t want charges and countercharges. I don’t want anything but to be out of this for as little money as possible.”

“Miriam, I could never charge you.”

“I didn’t come to you for any deal.”

“I know, but please, let me do this for you. I would be hurt if you insisted on trying to pay. Don’t give it another thought.
I’ll throw a little stationery at Neal and follow through with the paperwork. It shouldn’t take long.”

“Stationery?”

“I send him a letter on my office letterhead and use lots of legal jargon designed to convince him he has nothing to gain
and everything to lose by contesting this. Now what do you want from him? At least child support.”

I shook my head. “He has nothing.”

“You’re too generous.”

“But he really doesn’t. If he gave up drinkin he’d have a little extra, but I really want to be done with him.”

“Just the same, I’m going to get a list of his assets. You can decide then if there’s anything you want.”

I couldn’t imagine anything of Neal’s I would want. Everything would remind me of the horror years. I didn’t even want his
money to help raise Elgin. I thought of Elgin as mine alone.

The letter from Mr. Thatcher sent Neal into a spin. He said he was offended that his former agent would take my side. He pleaded
for the chance to make our marriage work, hired a local public defender, and threatened to sue for custody of Elgin.

“I’ve talked to his representative,” Mr. Thatcher told me. “You’re right that he has little to offer, but I can tell from
his lawyer’s language that at least he knows they have no hope. Here’s a list of assets and debts.”

I hated even looking at the sad list of junk and obligations. I had no interest in his eight-year-old car. I wouldn’t need
that in Chicago, and I had already promised my beater to my little sister. Neither was I interested in his Harley, which he
had bought
off a junk dealer and never had the money to get into running condition.

“So, he’s still got that old pitchin machine,” I said, studying the sheet. “Wonder where he keeps that.”

Mr. Thatcher studied his own copy. “At a community college in Mobile. Friend of his coaches there and borrowed it. It’s in
storage, not being used, but probably still worth a thousand dollars, so it’s listed.”

“You got him that thing,” I said, “didn’t you?”

Thatcher leaned back in his chair and smiled. “I was rather proud of that,” he said. “Got it thrown in with his signing bonus.
Helped Neal a lot, at least for a while. He’d forgotten about it, though. I had to tell his lawyer I knew Neal had it somewhere.
It’s of no worth except to the team that borrowed it.”

“I want it,” I said.

Mr. Thatcher shot me a double take. “Whatever for?”

“For Elgin.”

“Oh, Miriam,” he said, “Elgin’s a lot of years from being able to use that. This isn’t one of those toys they use in batting
cages. It’s a monster. Where would you put it?”

“Wonder if that coach would store it for me.”

“Maybe, but do you really want me to go after it? It’s gonna look a little silly in the divorce action. And won’t it remind
you of Neal anyway?”

“I don’t want money, not even child support. I just want Neal to admit the trailer is mine, give me that pitchin thing, and
let me have this divorce.”

“I could get you more.”

“I don’t want anything more.”

When the divorce was final, Neal left town without a word. I was insulted. When his career blew apart because of his drinking,
he had come back home without a second thought. When I had kicked him out of the trailer, he found a cheap room and stayed
in town, working at a grocery where everyone knew him. Most knew he had beat me. Some even knew I believed he had killed my
unborn girl. But now, after his year-plus in jail and a couple
more years living apart, I finally divorce him, and he gives one hour’s notice at the grocery and leaves town.

I began planning my own escape to Chicago. I slowly paid my debts and started salting a little away each month.

Neal visited one more time and played catch with Elgin, not even telling his son he had moved away. I heard nothing more of
him until Mr. Thatcher drove out one night with the news. The rest of Neal Lofert Woodell’s sorry life would be spent in the
Alabama State Penitentiary. That news would get around soon enough. It was time to move on before time passed us by.