The Pitcher

by William Hazelgrove

  Mom blinks twice, her eyebrows going up.

  “Really?”

  11

  THERE ARE THESE GUYS WHO come to every game. Mom and I call them the gang of three. They are guys who figure going to baseball games is better than doing anything else. They sit in their folding chairs and holler and drink from a thermos with plastic cups. SIT DOWN! HE CAN’T PITCH! HE SUCKS! They eat peanuts from a clear plastic bag and have big guts and goatees. Everyone tries to ignore them, but they can really mess up your game.

  I am on the mound, using what the Pitcher told me about picking a spot and following through. I look for him every time I take the ball from the catch. Mom says to forget about the Pitcher and just concentrate on the game, but I can’t help looking toward the outfield fence. Maybe worrying about the Pitcher is the reason things are starting to go bad—that and the gang of three.

  To pitch well you have to concentrate. It’s like the whole world has to go away and it’s just you and the batter. That’s what the Pitcher told me out in the street. I turn on the mound and wipe my brow and size up the batter. “HE CAN’T PITCH! HE AIN’T GOT NO ARM!” I stare at the three guys in their lawn chairs. The funny sounds that reach you on the mound always amaze me. Stop it, Johnny! Get him, Ricky! No more pizza, I told you! They can’t hit! It’s like a radio with all these different stations on at once. But the gang of three drowns out everybody else. I remember them from the last time we played the Yankees. They shouted every time one of our players came up to bat.

  “HE SUCKS. HE’S TAKING A DIVE. GO HOME!”

  We are tied with the Yankees in the sixth after Eric shut them down. I think Devin figured I could take some heat off their order with my speed. The Yankees’ batters just stand there because their coaches just give them the take sign. They must figure I’m wild so they’ll wait me out and get a walk. Not tonight. I mowed down the first batter with three fastballs. The second batter is when the gang of three started in on me. I could never quite get the balk thing straight in my head. Was it breaking your hands from the set position? Moving your foot off the rubber? Every umpire seemed to have a different interpretation.

  “BALK!”

  The gang of three yell it every time I start to move. Or they yell, “HE CAN’T PITCH!” or “HE’S GOT NO ARM!” It’s like the second I break my hands they start yelling. Even the umpire turns around and stares at them. Then I start throwing highfliers and some into the dirt. The gang of three goes crazy and start yelling, “HE SUCKS! HE SUCKS!” Then Blue calls me on a balk.

  “ Balk! Advance a base.”

  I have runners on first and second and the gang of three is laying it on. In baseball games it’s all about momentum and the crowd sniffs who has it. They figure they have me on the ropes now. A kid with an arm can destroy a team, but if they make that kid lose his mind, then he’s nothing.

  “HE CAN’T PITCH!”

  “HE DOESN’T KNOW HOW TO PITCH!”

  “GO SIT DOWN!”

  “THE PITCHER SUCKS!”

  I see Mom pacing back and forth and yelling something at these guys. They just smile and raise their cups. Once these guys get a coach to start arguing, they’ve succeeded. I can see Mom is really pissed. I take a deep breath and try to push it all away. I see the third base coach give a run of signals and feel a steal coming. But the gang of three isn’t going to let me off that easy.

  “C’MON, PITCH THE BALL … QUIT SLOWING THE GAME.”

  I set myself, turning my head slightly, and see the runner off second. Artie, the second baseman, starts to drift over. That’s when I move my foot off the rubber and break my hands and pivot.

  “YOU SUCK!” the gang of three scream as the runner bolts for third. I turn and overthrow Ronnie at third and the runner sprints for home. I run to the plate to back up the throw, but it’s too late. The Yankee scores and the three guys stand up and yell together, “SIT DOWN! ”

  And that’s when I hear it, man. Like something rotten in a cooler that nearly knocks you over. Right after SIT DOWN! the fat guy in the middle in the T-shirt with cutoff sleeves stands up and yells, “GO BACK TO MEXICO, YOU WETBACK!”

  The words are like someone just punched the air out of me. My face starts burning. Now I’m the Mexican on the mound because everyone heard him. Then my eyes tear up. I see Mom running toward these dudes. She is on fire. She runs with her hair flying back and the fat guy with the goatee stands up and lifts his arms. He yells out like a Viking, holding up his cup. Mom grabs a bat from the ground and the guy spreads his arms out.

  “Oh the beano mom is going to hit with me with a bat?” He laughs and looks at the other guys. “Why don’t you put that bat down, lady, before you hurt somebody.”

  Mom stares at him, then puts the Louisville Slugger down.

  “That’s right lady, you ain’t going to do anything,” he says, grinning, looking at the other guys.

  Mom walks up to the dude. The guy is in flip flops and I hear his voice the way you can hear someone talking at night.

  “What … you going to take a punch now?”

  “No,” Mom says.

  She then lifts her cleat and stomps down hard on his bare foot. The dude screams in this high-pitched voice and falls to the ground. I know it hurt, man. I’ve been spiked before and I wasn’t barefoot. He’s crying, holding his foot like a giant baby. Mom swings up the bat and the other two guys stand up out of their chairs.

  “Who else called my son a wetback?!” she shouts at them.

  Those guys stand there like statues, man, while the guy cries on the ground. Mom tells them to get the hell out of there and they do. And everybody is watching, man. That’s when I turn and see this big dude leaning on the outfield fence in sunglasses. He’s standing by himself with his long arms resting on the steel grey piping. He puts a cigarette to his mouth like he’s seen it all before.

  12

  I STRUGGLE TO GET THE batting equipment into our minivan. The sun has gone down behind the trees and the infields glow against the grass. We are the last to leave because Mom always makes sure the dugout is cleaned up and we throw away Gatorade bottles and empty packages of seeds and gum and baggies of peanut shells. We have to take the big black dusty equipment bag, which is really heavy. I have just gotten the bag of batting helmets and catcher gear in the back of our van when I feel someone behind me.

  I turn to the Pitcher standing in the parking lot with his glasses on. He smokes the way someone might waiting for a train.

  “You know where Roland Field is?”

  “Yeah.”

  “See you there at eight. ”

  And then he just walks off across the lot like a ghost. I feel like I have just made the Chicago Cubs. I run up to the front of the van.

  “He was here, Mom! He’s going to coach me!”

  She stares at me then tears out of the van. Mom looks around the empty parking lot, but there are just some kids playing catch by their car. Mom turns and stares at me.

  “I’m so happy for you, Ricky.”

  She starts to cry. Nothing new there. Mom cries over movies, television shows, even commercials. Mom says her nickname was “bawler” when she was a kid. Go figure.

  So now I’m walking through the dewy grass across the field by the Roland School. Mom is watching me like I’m a five-year-old going to kindergarten for the first time. I keep walking with my bat bag on my shoulder. The grass is sparkling wet and my cleats are swishing like skis. It’s my first lesson with the Pitcher and I’m jacked. I walk up to the baseball diamond Mom and I practiced on and hear this low rumbling. I see a cleat in the dugout and then a leg next to three cans of Good Times. The Pitcher snores on the bench like he’s going to throw up.

  Yeah, man, my coach. I stare at him with my bag on my shoulder. I mean, do you just wake a World Series pitcher up or do you let him sleep? He keeps snoring and rumbling like some kind of volcano. I barely slept all night and got up around five and sat in the kitchen with my bat bag. But now I feel like one of those
balloons that whip all over the room when the air runs out. I sit down on the bench and watch him for a while, his lips creating weird noises like some kind of sea creature.

  Finally, I lean over.

  “Mr. Langford?”

  He pauses, then keeps snoring, his lips smacking together. I watch his stomach and try to calculate how many Good Times beers have gone into that mountain. I sit for a few minutes. I either go home or wake him up and I don’t want to go back home. So I lean over and got pretty close to his ear.

  “MR. LANGFORD!”

  His eyes blink open like a dead guy. The Pitcher wipes the drool off his mouth and squints at me. He hacks into the dust, going, “ahhhhh,” like he just had a great nap.

  “You don’t gotta yell,” he grumbles, sitting up.

  “I didn’t think you’d wake up.”

  He kicks away his beer cans and spits globs in the dirt. The Pitcher fishes his cigarettes out and squints out to the infield.

  “Must have fallen asleep,” he mutters, pulling on his cigarette.

  I stare at my hands with my bat bag on my shoulder. The Pitcher stands up, then looks at me like he’s surprised I’m still here.

  “Why don’t you jog around the field a few times,” he says, motioning with his cigarette.

  “How many times?”

  “Four should be good.”

  I stare at the big field and frown.

  “You got a problem with that, rockhead?”

  I mumble, “No,” and then start off in a light jog.

  I have always hated running. I have long legs and arms and nothing seems to move the way it is supposed to. And it’s just stupid because there are lots of fat pitchers who can’t run. The grass is wet and my shoes are soaked after one lap. I finish and walk back across the infield and into the dugout. The Pitcher is lying down, snoring like he never stopped.

  “You got a baseball?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Get it.”

  I take a baseball out of my bag. The Pitcher holds up an old baseball and looks at me with lined red eyes.

  “You gotta always have a baseball. You gotta make your hands strong. You gotta get used to always having a ball in your hand all the time,” he says, talking to the old ball.

  I look at him.

  “Was that yours when you were a kid?”

  He snorts. “It ain’t that old! But ya gotta get used to carrying a ball with you all the time. You gotta be able to move your hand so the batter won’t see it.” The Pitcher moves the ball like it’s alive. “Ya gotta be able to change to a two-seam or a four-seam fastball in a second and not let anybody see what you’re doing.” He takes out his Skoal and hunks tobacco into his lip. “It’s your job to strike out the guy at the plate. He’s getting paid to hit and you’re getting paid to strike him out.”

  I move the ball in my hand and drop it.

  “That’s why you gotta start carrying the ball,” he says, nodding. “You gotta make your wrist and fingers strong. You gotta start now or you’ll never carry it with you. Pitching is about habits. You gotta get good habits. The rockheads have lousy habits.”

  “You say ‘gotta’ a lot.”

  He frowns.

  “I say a lot of goddamn things. But you gotta listen and not tell me ‘I say gotta a lot.’ ”

  “OK.”

  The Pitcher reaches into a blue cooler and pulls out a Good Times.

  “Another thing is …” He cracks open the beer and upends the can, “… don’t listen to anybody. When you are on the mound it is you. I had coaches always telling me what to pitch and they’d say, hey Jack, how come you didn’t throw that curve? And I’d say, aww, you know, coach, I didn’t see the signal.” He tips his can toward me. “They knew I was lying, but I figure they are going to hang me anyway if we lose, so I might as well pitch what the hell I want.”

  “Yeah. OK.”

  The Pitcher shuts one eye. “You especially don’t listen to some rockhead in the stands. Like that guy the other night who called you a wetback. You wanted to kill him, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah,” I mutter, feeling my face warm.

  “And your Mom almost did. But you can’t let a guy mess up your head like that.” He burps. “Don’t you think I been called everything from a bum to a pervert by some loudmouth who don’t know shit from shinola about baseball? I been called everything and worse by every rockhead son of a bitch there ever was. But here is the thing,” he continues, waving his can. “You don’t ever let them get to you. And if they do get to you, you never show it. Your mom can go stomp on that guy’s foot, but you can’t,” he says, pumping his finger. “You gotta pitch and I don’t care if they call you wetback or greaser or taco eater … you gotta stay cool and do your job. You got it?”

  “Yeah,” I answer, meeting his eyes.

  “Alright,” he says, nodding. “Now let’s see you move that ball around.”

  I move the ball in my fingers and drop it again in the dust. The Pitcher scratches his cheek and crooks a finger at the ground. “Pick it up. You gotta to do that every day, every hour, every minute. When I was your age I always had a baseball in my hand. I took it to the bathroom, to restaurants, to the Army … I took it everywhere.”

  The Pitcher sets his beer on the bench, then pulls out a dirty white bucket. It’s full of sand-colored rocks of different sizes and shapes. The rocks rumble up to the top and the Pitcher pulls one out from the center. He grabs the bucket and his beer and starts walking to the outfield like a man going to work. He stops and turns.

  “You coming or what?”

  “Oh … yeah,” I mumble, jumping up.

  I follow him to the far side of the field where he sets the pail down.

  “Damn, that’s heavy,” he mutters. The Pitcher fingers up a cigarette, then nods in the morning sun, clapping his lighter down. “Now … let me see you hit that gull.”

  I frown and stare at him. “What?”

  He points across the field.

  “Go ahead. Let me see you hit that goddamn gull.”

  I stare at the gull on the field.

  “Well … what the hell are you waiting for?”

  I turn to him. “Mom would kill me if I hit a gull with a rock.”’

  The Pitcher snorts and shakes his head.

  “Go ahead. You ain’t going to hurt him, because you can’t hit him.”

  I hesitate, then reach into the bucket and pull out a flat rock. I hold the rock in my hand and stare at the gull. I move the rock around and get a two-finger grip.

  “Go ahead,” he says. “That gull is perfectly safe with you throwing.”

  I move the rock again, shut one eye and draw back. The gull stays on one leg and doesn’t move. I had thrown high. The Pitcher shakes his head.

  “Don’t ever throw sidearm. Guys who can’t pitch throw sidearm.”

  I pick up another rock and throw it ten feet over the gull.

  “Do it again.”

  I pick out another rock and it flies high and to the right. I know there is no way I am going to hit that gull. The Pitcher drinks his beer and says, “Do it again.” I throw and throw and throw rocks until my arm feels like it is going to fall off. I go through half the bucket of rocks, then turn to him, hot and sore, and irritated.

  “I can’t hit the gull,” I admit.

  His grey eyes narrow in.

  “Yeah … well shut up and throw again.”

  I get down to these little rocks that go nowhere. The Pitcher makes me throw every rock, including some pebbles. I hate throwing the rocks already. He nods to me.

  “Your arm hurt?”

  “Yeah. It does.”

  “That’s because you keep trying to throw the rock into the next state.” He pokes his cigarette in the air. “An arm is worthless without a pilot and you don’t got no pilot.”

  “It’s impossible to hit that stupid gull.”

  The Pitcher stares at me.

  “Are you kidding me?” he cries out. “Anybody could hit t
hat gull. My grandmother could hit that goddamn gull, and she’s dead!”

  “Well I can’t.”

  The Pitcher puts the cigarette in his mouth and picks up a rock.

  “Watch, rockhead,” he mutters. He looks like the picture in his garage with his leg kicked up. The rock wings through the air and drills the gull with an explosion of feathers.

  “He’s dead,” I shout, watching the gull fall over.

  “No, he ain’t,” the Pitcher replies. “He’s just stunned.”

  Sure enough, the gull pops up and flies away.

  “How’d you know that gull wasn’t dead?”

  The Pitcher crunches his beer can.

  “Cuz I know how to pitch.”

  He hands me the empty bucket.

  “Now go get the rocks.”

  13

  PITCHER BILLY WAGNER WAS BORN right-handed and taught himself to pitch left. He broke his right arm twice when he was young and had no choice. He played in the majors and became a closer with a one-hundred-and-one-mile-an-hour fastball. I thought about Billy Wagner because the Pitcher hit that gull with his right arm. I mean, he’s a southpaw and pitched lefty all twenty-five years in the majors. Maybe I was mistaken, but every time I think about him hitting that gull, I see him throwing with his right arm.

  Anyway, I throw rocks all that first day. I hate those spinning rocks shooting out under the sun and landing everywhere but where he wants. He tells me to hit a tree. Hit home plate, hit second base, hit third base, throw one in the dugout, throw one at the backstop post. With a funny expression, he watches my squadron of rocks go flying. I won’t say it is a pleasurable expression, more like somebody remembering something. He smokes and watches me throw in the blazing heat that is Florida.

  Heat doesn’t seem to bother him. He never takes a drink of water that I see. He just keeps drinking Good Times beer like an athlete in training. He never gets drunk. He just watches me, making adjustments, telling me to follow through. I start cussing and he asks if my mom lets me talk that way.