“If you field a team, we’ll cream you,” said Laverna. “These two here are pretty much useless, but they don’t talk much, and I like that.”
“They are quiet,” admitted Reverend Foote. “I’ll give you that. But they are fiercely devoted and are valuable, hardworking members of our church.”
“And they have practice in two hours,” she said. “A scrimmage,” added Laverna, proudly. She called in her usual favors, and the Flood Girls were playing against an assortment of Little Leaguers, and maybe a few girls from T-ball.
“Wonderful,” pronounced Reverend Foote. “I know you are a well-respected member of this community, Miss Flood. May I call you Laverna?”
“No,” she said. “You’ve got to spend some money at my bar first.”
“Our congregation is too frightened to bring you the usual casseroles, and for that I apologize. I try to teach them to fear no one, to walk with God, but apparently you have a reputation.”
“No shit,” said Laverna. “What do you want?”
“Only to reach out a helping hand, if you should ever need it.” He leaned forward. “I trust you know Brother Bert Russell.”
“Bert? He’s in your church? He’s a useless piece of shit. And he owes me money.”
“And that’s why I’m here,” said Reverend Foote. “I understand that you employ his son.”
“That’s the league,” said Laverna. “I’ve got nothing to do with it.”
“Brother Bert is trying to become a better man. It would really help if he could provide for his family.”
“Send him into the woods with a fucking chain saw,” said Laverna. “That’s what real men do around here. I’m not a goddamn job service.”
Red Mabel burst through the door, stepping on the reverend’s loafers and the Sinclairs’ cheap white sneakers. She stood on top of the pile of shoes and stared at the couch.
“There’s three redheads in this house,” said Red Mabel. “That’s bad luck.”
“No shit,” said Laverna. “They were just leaving.” They stood, and Red Mabel moved from the pile of shoes. “The reverend here was asking if Bert could keep score.”
“We’ve already got the pansy,” said Red Mabel.
“Bert joined their church,” said Laverna. Red Mabel laughed at this, as Reverend Foote and the Sinclairs pulled on their shoes.
“Is it a church for morons?” Red Mabel opened the door for them, and shooed them out with a flick of her hand.
“It is not,” said Reverend Foote. He stood up straight, and Red Mabel puffed her chest until he had to take a step backward.
“You’re letting in all the cold air,” said Laverna.
“I had hoped you would be a reasonable woman,” said Reverend Foote.
“Keep praying,” said Red Mabel. She pointed at the Sinclairs, who had stepped out onto the porch, the wind whipping the jean skirts tight against their legs. “You two had better have your shit together today. We’ve got some holes in the outfield.”
“Amen,” shouted Laverna as Red Mabel shut the door behind them.
* * *
The Sinclairs made the mistake of arriving early. Laverna made them run laps around the chain-link fence, despite the cold wind. They would pay for bringing that terrible man to her house. Red Mabel warmed up where third base would be, jumping jacks, unencumbered by a bra.
Red Mabel’s breasts became problematic when the parents began to drop off their children. The mother of one Little Leaguer covered his eyes with her hands.
“Cut it out, Red,” shouted Laverna. She grasped the shoulder of the child, in full uniform, pinstriped, real baseball pants and cleats. Little League began in June, but he was ready. “Why don’t you go toss the ball around?” She shoved the kid at Red Mabel, and he spit in the dirt, stomped to third base. Red Mabel looked him up and down, and began throwing grounders.
The little girls arrived in one minivan. The driver barely slowed down; the van door rolled open and the girls leaped into the gravel, landed on their feet. They moved in a pack, into the away team dugout, whispered when they saw Bucky, who had materialized beside Laverna, silent as always. This had always unnerved her.
The Sinclairs rounded home plate, red-faced.
“Keep running!” Laverna leaned against the dugout, and the little girls stared at her casts and at Bucky. Boys continued to arrive, bedecked in team uniforms, avoiding the girls at all costs.
The remaining Flood Girls arrived in groups, Della carrying a wildly struggling dog.
“Found him on the street,” said Della proudly. “I aim to keep him.”
“That’s how you ended up married twice,” said Laverna. Della and Tabby tied the small brown dog to the bench of the dugout with the removed strings from their hooded sweatshirts. The young girls took the field, still traveling in a pack, giggling at the oblivious Bucky. Laverna could not believe the amount of makeup they were wearing, and considered saying something, until her own daughter entered the dugout with Jake. Rachel’s face was fully made up, the flesh around her eyebrows red from a fresh plucking. Laverna was certain that Jake had something to do with this.
“What are you staring at?” Rachel pulled on her borrowed mitt with trepidation, as if there might be spiders inside. She wore a black leather jacket over a black lingerie top, and ripped black jeans. And those cursed boots.
Jake carried a sketchpad, a case of colored pencils. He beamed at Laverna, and pointed to Rachel’s face. “Your daughter has the most incredible cheekbones!” Indeed, her cheeks were emblazoned with a maroon blush, and her eyes drooped from the weight of the mascara. “I was trying to make her look just like Melanie Griffith in Working Girl, but we decided that she couldn’t play softball in a blazer with shoulder pads. Plus, it’s really cold.”
“I’m glad you chose something practical,” said Laverna, noting the small silver spikes dotting the lapels of the leather jacket. “And she gets those cheekbones from me.”
“They all have uniforms,” said Jake, pointing at the children on the field. He sat down on the bench and flipped open his sketchpad. “How come the Flood Girls don’t have uniforms?”
“Shut up,” said Laverna.
The last child arrived, a roly-poly little girl, braids tucked under a low-slung cap. She carried a T-ball stand over one shoulder, and acknowledged Laverna grimly. Tammi, the T-ball coach, struggled to keep up with the girl.
“This is our most ferocious player,” said Tammi. “She really should be playing in an upper league.” Tammi patted the girl on top of her baseball cap. “Take care of her.”
Laverna called her players into the center of the field. Martha and Ronda held lit cigarettes.
“Put those out,” demanded Laverna. Her catcher and rover ground the butts into the dirt.
“Hey,” said Bucky. “Respect the field, ladies!”
“Yeah,” said one of the little girls. “Not cool.”
“This is a scrimmage,” continued Laverna. “The Flood Girls need to work on their fielding.” She pointed to the dugout, and the girl dragged her T-ball stand, the other children following her across the infield.
“Play ball,” said Bucky, halfheartedly.
The first little boy possessed a cowlick and a mean swing, leaned in to hit Ginger’s first pitch of the day. When it came back at her, Ginger jumped to avoid being drilled in the shins. Tabby tried to grab the ball, but it sped past second base, veered left, and into the land of the Sinclairs. Cowlick made it to third on what should have been an easy play. Red Mabel tried to intimidate the kid as he stood on her base, but he was not having any of her trash talk.
“Your mother is married to her second cousin,” said Red Mabel.
“Small town,” said the kid. “Shit happens.”
A slatternly girl stepped up to the plate. Even from twenty feet away, her eye shadow visibly matched the green of her uniform. Ginger threw a strike. The T-ball girl decided this was a bad call, yelled something at Bucky about his teeth. The next pitch was so
lid, and the girl swung, but the ball glanced off her bat, an infield pop fly. Cowlick waited to see if Della would catch it, but it fell out of Della’s mitt and tumbled to the ground, and he tagged up and ran home. Eye Shadow made it to first base.
“Hustle!” Laverna kicked at the chain link, and it rang out through the field, just as the wind picked up again. The dog snapped the string in half, and ran excitedly into the outfield, only to sit obediently at Rachel’s feet.
A Native American boy was next. Laverna suspected he was related to Ronda, and studied her rover for any sign of acknowledgment. Instead, Ronda was watching the dog, and would’ve missed a smoke signal burning in center field. Ginger was angry, and she pitched way outside the box. The Native American kid walked to first, and Ginger turned around on the mound to compose herself.
“All right,” shouted Laverna, and stalked over to the children’s dugout. “My outfield needs a workout. I need a real hitter.”
A boy stood up from the bench and pulled on his batting gloves. The T-ball girl pushed him down, and stomped out of the dugout, drawing a neat furrow in the dirt with her plastic stand. She nodded at Martha Man Hands, who crouched behind home plate. Martha groaned as she stood, and Laverna could hear her knees crack. They would not need a catcher. The girl arranged the stand in front of home plate and cleared her throat, glaring at Bucky, who was offering advice to Martha about deep stretches. Finally the girl snapped.
“Pay attention!” The girl pointed at the ball in Bucky’s hand, and he blushed as he offered it to her. She refused to take it. She tapped the top of the T-ball stand with her bat. Bucky rolled his eyes and carefully rested the ball into the hole. The little girl was barely as tall as his waist, and she squinted into the field, as if the sun was especially bright. She pointed her bat toward Rachel and tapped three times on the plate.
“BE READY!” Laverna screamed to the outfield, just as the little girl leveled the bat and smashed the ball into the air, as threatened.
The ball sailed toward Rachel, the wind picking it up as it flew past first base, shifting it slightly away from the foul line. As usual, Rachel panicked and covered her face with her mitt. The dog remained sitting at her feet. Ronda walked to the ball, just as the little girl rounded second and barreled toward Red Mabel, who might have met her match. Instead, the girl cruised past, and Red Mabel scorched the outfield with profanities. Her invectives were drowned out by the cheering of the children in the dugout.
“You,” said Laverna. The girl grabbed her stand, and spat in the dirt near Martha. Expressionless, even though her teammates screamed and rattled the cage. “What’s your name?”
“Klemp,” said the girl. “I ain’t telling you my first name. That’s my right. This is America.”
“Jesus,” said Laverna. “Klemp, I want you to keep hitting.” Klemp propped her stand back into place. Laverna turned to Jake. “Get me a dollar out of my purse.” Jake rooted around and pulled out a bill. “Go give it to Klemp.” Jake opened his mouth to protest, but Laverna had had enough sass from children for one day. “I can’t use my arms, for fuck’s sake!”
Klemp took the dollar, but didn’t have any pockets in her uniform. She tucked it into the inside of her sneaker.
“Keep hitting,” said Laverna. “Just like that.”
Klemp turned around and cleared her throat. This time, she pointed her bat at Bucky. She refused the ball, once again. “Do your job,” she said. Bucky made a wide berth around her as he rested it on top of the T-ball stand.
Klemp pointed her bat at the taller Sinclair. The taller Sinclair flinched, lowered herself into ready position, jean skirt dragging in the grass. She pushed up the sleeves of her sweater, and Laverna’s hopes rose. They came crashing back down when Klemp blasted the ball far into left field, and it grazed the mitt of the shorter Sinclair, kept on flying.
“I’m fucking with them,” said Klemp. Laverna decided not to give her any more money. This continued for the next ten minutes. Klemp gave Bucky the evil eye until he arranged the ball, and Klemp bashed it into the outfield, and the Flood Girls proved to be useless. Rachel especially. Once she saw an easy target, Klemp hit it to Rachel again and again, until Rachel just held the mitt up to her face permanently.
Laverna was disgusted. She forced Jake to fetch her an antianxiety pill, and he held up the can of beer to her mouth. She could no longer watch the carnage, and she sighed. She studied Klemp, her grimly determined face and firmly planted stance. Laverna had no doubt that Klemp would grow up to be a silver miner.
“You’re not even trying!” Laverna shouted to the outfield, her casts slammed against the chain link, and pain shot up her arms. The dog reached the ball before any of the outfielders, and pushed it with his nose, deeper into the grass. Ronda threw her mitt at the dog, missed by a good three feet. Finally, the taller Sinclair scooped up a ball and threw it to Diane, who had hustled out into the grass of the outfield. At least the Sinclair had hit the cutoff, thought Laverna. Of course, Diane had been wildly gesticulating with her hands, so she wasn’t hard to miss.
The Flood Girls did not need uniforms. Laverna would rather spend the money on something useful. She wondered how much it would cost to import a ringer from Cuba, a woman who could actually play ball. She didn’t give a shit about the language barrier, or the paperwork. Laverna calculated the cost of housing a foreigner, and the expense of finding plantains, or whatever Cubans ate. The hell with it, decided Laverna. She would figure out a way to draft Klemp, even though she was too young for the league.
Concealer
Jake found himself awake at three in the morning. This had been happening for a week. He would lie there, still as a corpse, for two hours, glancing out of the corner of his eye at the alarm clock until 5:00 a.m., when he would just give up and put on his headphones.
Jake didn’t dare turn on a lamp. When Krystal worked the night shift, he made himself as unobtrusive as possible. He didn’t want a lecture about Jesus, so he stayed in his room, in the dark. When he could see the glow of the kitchen light under the door, Jake knew that Bert was distracted with eating breakfast, part of the new righteous routine.
Yesterday, his English teacher had made a remark about the circles under his eyes, said that Jake looked like the mother of a newborn.
While he applied his hair wax, he studied his reflection in the mirror. This morning, he resembled someone who had barely survived being lost in the woods.
He stared in the mirror, and his teacher’s remarks made him determined. He opened the cupboard below the sink and fished around for his mother’s concealer.
He opened the tiny jar, and ever so carefully, began to dab a bit under his eyes. He made sure to rub it in as much as possible—he knew that he had to make it look natural.
Jake believed that he looked well rested, but just as he was applying a tiny bit more, Bert burst into the bathroom in his typically cloddish way.
Bert made a strange sound, almost a growl. He yanked Jake out of the bathroom and carried him to his bedroom.
Jake lay across his bedspread and listened as Bert yanked the drawer in the kitchen completely free. Jake could hear the clatter of cooking utensils as they spilled out on the linoleum, hear Bert cursing until he found the wooden spoon.
* * *
The sting of the spank had dissipated by the time he arrived at school, but his face was splotchy from scrubbing it with a washcloth. He didn’t care. His homeroom was taught by a woman who despised him and rarely looked at his face.
Ms. Bray was ostensibly a science teacher, but he had decided she was a complete idiot the first month of school and had stopped paying attention when he realized she lectured directly from the textbook. In October, she had declared war on Jake when she had caught him reading a paperback behind his science book. She couldn’t believe that he dared find a paperback more interesting than her lecture. She had ordered Jake to the front of the class to tell his classmates what his book was about, and why it was more important than ce
llular division.
Jake was flame-faced as he stood there, holding up his copy of Lady Boss. He showed the book to the class, careful to cover Jackie Collins’s name with one hand.
“I’m currently reading a book entitled Lady Boss, and it is about how hard it is for women in the workplace. I think it might also be about capitalism, but I’m not sure.”
He returned to his seat, and she had hated him ever since. He’d had teachers in the past who found his advanced reading skills precocious and worthy of praise. She was not one of them.
* * *
After school, Jake walked outside into the new snow that was slowly falling, back and forth like a feather. He knew of other places in America where they had things called snow days. These did not exist in Quinn.
It was only three o’clock, but already the sky outside darkened with the threat of another snowstorm. It took him fifteen minutes to descend the hill and cross the streets to the library, which was irritating, considering a person could walk through the entire town in under ten minutes during the summer. He slogged his way through the snowbanks, perspiring under his hat.
At the library, Peggy Davis pretended to roll the dates on her stamper. Upon closer inspection, her fingers were black with ink, so maybe she wasn’t pretending. She didn’t like Jake, either. He never turned in a book past the due date, but she remained suspicious, scandalized by his salacious choices in reading materials. Jake combed through the catalogs and filled out the forms to request books from the bigger cities in Montana, but he never got his books. He suspected that she threw away his requests, as if she were embarrassed to obtain Erica Jong’s Fear of Flying from Absarokee, the only library with a copy in the entire state. He hated Peggy Davis because she destroyed Quinn’s best chances for a feminist revolution. Plus, she once asked him to leave during a John Birch Society meeting in the back room, even though the library was open. Jake hoped that one day she would be replaced by a young woman with a mysterious past, who wore only black and had an active sex life, just like the librarians in the books he read.
The Flood Girls Page 14