“So tell him yourself.”
“Tell who what?” Frannie asks, leaning across the aisle.
“Nothing,” I say.
We don’t say much after that, just pull out homework and headphones. Back at school, I get off the bus as fast as I can and catch a ride home with Frannie and Mo, since Rocky has to pick up Thomas from a baseball game.
Looking out the window like we’re being followed, I explain what happened on the bus. Only Mo understands the gravity of my situation.
“This is prom.” Mo shakes her head with worry. “This is a big deal.”
“But she’s going with Nate, not Sally. Sally will have to deal with it. Forget about her anyway. She’s going with that guy Froggy. Ella wins again.” Frannie cheers.
“Brad French? She’s going with him?” Mo sounds appalled.
“Who’s Brad French?” I ask.
“Some friend of Gwen’s boyfriend. Everyone’s called him Froggy since about third grade. He’s not a huge loser. But he’s not like that guy Randy she used to date last year.”
“What happened to him?” I ask again.
“He’s dating some ninth grader,” Frannie explains.
“I think Sally’s gonna be mad at Nate for not telling her and she’ll take it out on Ella, the way she has everything else,” Mo says.
Frannie looks at her, then at me in the backseat. “That’s right on, Mo,” Frannie says. She looks at me again. “Hang in there; we’ll think of something.”
Somehow that isn’t a huge comfort.
Two days come and go. It might be a miracle, but I’ve seen Sally twice in the halls since the bus incident, and she hasn’t even looked at me. Either Gwen didn’t tell her, or she’s waiting for the perfect moment to destroy my happiness.
I wish I could tell Nate what’s going on with me. In class today, we get an assignment (a major holiday with the in-laws), and look at each other because we know we’ll have to work on this one together. He watches me like he knows something’s different with me today. But how do you tell someone you don’t like his sister? Or that you’re actually afraid of her?
As we work, I can’t stop looking at Nate’s hand. He’s squeezing a pen in his fist, twirling it around, tapping it on the desk, twirling it again. “Okay, so, which holiday do we want to do?” he asks.
I hesitate. “Thanksgiving?”
“Good, good.” He writes down Thanksgiving. I’m the one who usually does all the recording of ideas. His writing is nearly illegible.
“How’s the play going?”
“Fine. We’re almost there.” He looks at me. “I know I’ve been busy lately. Are we still friends?”
The way he asks this, it’s like we dated and broke up already. “Yeah. Do you still want to go to prom?”
“Of course,” he says.
It’s so awkward, how we can barely talk to each other all of a sudden.
And I wish I knew what it was, a million years ago, that he said he wanted to explain to me.
On Wednesday, we’re standing on the field, Rocky at short, me at first, with Frannie and Mo cheering from the bench. The Peyton Plastics building shadows the field, closed up, no friendly faces calling down to us. At least the stands are full for our last game. After the top of the first inning, as Rocky and I jog in from the field, Frannie informs us, “He’s not here.”
“Who?” I say, wondering if she’s talking about Nate.
“Mack Elliot. It’s the first home game he’s missed.”
“What does that mean?” Mo asks the question we’re all wondering.
“Bad vibes,” Frannie concludes.
As we play, I look at the building only once, thinking about whether the construction crew will find out how we did in our last game, then I concentrate on the field. Holland Hall has a stronger defense than offense, so we’re able to hold them from scoring until the last inning. They get two runs off good hits, and suddenly we’re at bat, down by one run. We can’t seem to muster the same enthusiasm from that first game Rocky played a week ago. And although she and Kat get on base, we can’t do anything with it.
To say it’s a huge disappointment would be the understatement of the season. First, the construction workers aren’t there. Then Mack doesn’t show. We end up losing, and Coach doesn’t even yell at us.
Rocky and I walk slowly to the locker room. Frannie and Mo are ahead, jabbering away about something. We just don’t have the energy to join in.
“Losing sucks,” Rocky says.
“Totally.”
“Now that I’ve got my father into this,” Rocky says, “he keeps asking me every detail, even though he can’t make the games. I can’t tell if he really wants to know or if he’s trying to act as interested as he was with Anthony’s football.”
“I’d like to meet him,” I tell her. “Is he coming to the tournament on Saturday?”
She shrugs. “I don’t think so.”
“Oh.” We shuffle along. “I’m supposed to go shopping with my mom tonight. For a dress. For prom.”
“Oh, no.”
Just as we’re almost to the safety of the locker room, Sally shows up. Her uniform sparkles, which you’d think would be somewhat embarrassing since Rocky and I wear the dirt and sweat of the game. But she flaunts it.
Sally gives me this glare, this full-on mean glare. “For your information,” she begins, “Nate asked you to prom because he thought he should, since you’re doing the Marriage Project and because you’re new. If you want to get out of it, that’s fine with him. Let’s just say he wouldn’t have any problem finding another date.”
I should’ve seen it coming from a mile away.
Rocky takes a step toward Sally. She’s more intimidating, even off the field. “What I can’t figure out, Sally, is why you’re so threatened by Ella. Is it that your brother actually likes her because she’s sweet and kind and good-hearted and pretty and smart? Or is it because she walked onto the softball field and kicked your butt?”
Frannie and Mo come out the double doors with backpacks slung over their shoulders. Mo looks wary, but Frannie says, “Hey, gals. What’s shakin’?”
Sally says, “You.” And walks away with Gwen and Joy at her heels.
I look at Rocky. “I can’t do this anymore, and I don’t want you fighting my battles.”
“But you didn’t say anything.”
“I didn’t get the chance.” I’m embarrassed and mad and just plain exhausted by Sally’s unexplained cruelty. “I’m gonna shower and catch a ride with my parents,” I say.
“Good luck looking for a dress,” Rocky calls to me as I walk away, tears spilling down my face. I want to go back to Chicago, where none of this drama happened, where I lived my life pretty much unnoticed by everyone except my best friends.
In the car, my parents think I’m all torn up over the game.
“Nothing that a little shopping won’t cure,” my mother says, which makes me want to cry even more.
This is my first dance. My first real date. And nothing about it feels right. There are signs and decorations up all over school and girls talk about their dresses and dates in the bathroom, but I don’t feel nearly as excited as I did the day Nate asked me. And I’m not sure why.
My father drops us off and parks the car. We get a bite to eat and he goes to Barnes & Noble while my mother and I start at Nordstrom. The first dress we pull off the rack is sea foam, a lovely confusion of green and blue. Two narrow straps go over my shoulders, and the dress gathers in folds at my chest, not so far down so that my parents won’t approve, but far enough that it makes me feel pretty. It drops in layers down to the floor and rustles softly when I twirl.
There’s no question. This is the dress.
“But, honey,” my mother says. “Don’t you want to look around more?”
“You don’t think it’s perfect?”
“Oh, love. It’s beautiful. And so are you.” She stands back. I can tell she’s trying to keep it together and not overwhelm m
e when I’m already so emotional.
My father is even more surprised at the brevity of our shopping spree but certainly doesn’t complain.
After we get outside in the parking lot, in the light just before dusk, the dress takes on yet another shade of shells and stones, like a chameleon, and I love it even more for this.
I call Christine when I get home. I want to talk about this weirdness with Nate, especially in light of what Sally said to me. But Christine chatters on about Amy spending so much time with Jen lately, so I decide not to mention it.
Over the next few days, my Dallas friends notice my bad mood. I barely say a word to anyone.
I spend most of the week avoiding Nate, but he catches me before practice Friday to fill me in on prom plans: He’ll pick me up at seven, and we’ll go to dinner; he hopes I don’t mind we’re not going with his friends. I can’t seem to respond and he watches me carefully.
Am I trying to screw up my life before Sally gets to? Or am I distracted because I want to ask him if what she said was true, that he only asked me to prom because I’m new and we’re doing the Marriage Project together? Finally I just nod my okay on the plans, and he waves as I head down to the field.
That night after practice, my mother comes into my room when I’m showered and putting on my pajamas.
“Ella, Rocky’s here to see you.”
“Oh. Okay. Thanks.” I go down and she’s standing in the living room. “I’m sorry,” I blurt out. “About this week and how I’ve been acting.”
She looks relieved, lets out a sigh, and crosses the room to hug me. “I’m sorry, too. For trying to fight your battles.”
“No, you’re being a friend. I really appreciate it. But it’s like you said, I’ve got to deal with it myself.”
She follows me into the kitchen, and I pull a carton of coffee ice cream from the freezer and two spoons from a drawer. We sit down at the bar stools and dig straight from the carton.
“You know,” Rocky says. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since I started playing softball again. About my family and about how I ended up in this situation. My dad and Aunt Rita never really got along. They just sort of tolerated each other because of my mom. And the night my dad told her that we didn’t need her help anymore, they got in this huge fight. My dad was acting really ungrateful, and my aunt was crying. They were out in the street yelling, and Aunt Rita said something I’m sure the whole neighborhood will never forget. She said that he never knew what he had. That he didn’t deserve us kids, and he never deserved my mother.”
“God,” I say.
“I know. It was bad. I thought that would be the last I’d see of Aunt Rita. But she and Uncle Nick still came to all of Anthony’s games with us on Friday nights. We still celebrated the holidays together. Life pretty much went on as usual. But I don’t think my dad ever really thanked her for all that she did for us. I was thinking that if my mother was here, she wouldn’t want things to be left unresolved like that. And I don’t know, Ella. I guess I came over tonight because I wasn’t sure if we were fighting, and if we were, I wanted to thank you anyway. For having faith in me and helping me face my dad.”
“Wow,” I say. “I guess I’ll have to think of some way you can make it up to me.” And I flash her a devilish grin.
She slaps my arm and my spoon goes flying across the kitchen.
“Hey, that’s my throwing arm.”
“Oops. Sorry. So…” She smiles. “Do I get to see the dress before I go?”
We tiptoe upstairs, and she stops in the doorway of my room. The sea foam dress hangs inside the clear Nordstrom bag on the back of my closet door. Rocky crosses the room to inspect it up close, but doesn’t dare touch it. “It’s gorgeous.”
After we say good night, I lock up and go to bed. I need to get some sleep if I want to be ready for the tournament tomorrow. Everything else in my life will just have to find its place. I reach down for my glove on the floor, tuck it up by my pillow, and squeeze my eyes closed, memorizing the smell of leather and Spring Valley softball dirt.
We arrive at Fort Worth Country Day well before our nine o’clock game and hit the locker room. There are a ton of other teams milling around the cavernous, well-lit space.
“All right, Lady Peacocks,” Coach yells as she walks in, and we all cringe.
“We should tell her not to call us that in public, don’t you think?” Frannie says.
“Meet in the field house in five minutes,” Coach calls. “Bring everything with you, because we’ll be going straight to the fields from there.”
As we wander through multiple gyms and corridors on our way to the field house, Sally saunters in from another doorway with Gwen and Joy. And I feel nothing. Not fear, not anger—just distance. Like I can put her at arm’s length, at least for this moment. I feel so much better than I did yesterday. Rocky and I talked. I slept well. I’m gonna play softball all day. And tonight I’ll go to the prom, and even though I’m a little wary of Sally and unsure about Nate, I’m excited about getting dressed up and going to a dance.
As we sit down in front of Coach, she says, “We have one thing to do today.”
“Go to prom?” someone says.
And I blush immediately for having the same thought.
Coach is serious. “I’m talking about this other thing called softball. Think we can manage that?”
We stomp our feet and clap our hands in response.
“That’s right,” she says. “First things first!”
“Wooo!”
“That’s the spirit,” she says, getting us psyched. “We’ve got a few games to play today, and we’re gonna do it like we always do, one inning at a time. Right?”
“Right!” we yell back.
“Okay, quick review. Kinkaid has that pitcher with the double-jointed elbow. She was undefeated last year, but has been having problems, especially when teams start to hit away on her. So that’s what I want us to do. Swing those bats. Look at me for signs, and watch me on the bases. Talk to each other, and let’s hear a little chatter from the bench. Memorize the players and what they did at their last at bat. Think softball. Think smart. And blast the hell out of the ball. None of these games count against our record. But they count here.” She points to her head. “And here.” She points to her heart. “So let’s win. Let’s make this so much fun that we ride the wave all the way to SPC!”
That gets everybody riled up. We hoot and holler as loud as we can in the field house, and it echoes like we have legions of fans.
After a good warm-up, we’re at bat, and we come out guns blazing. By ten fifteen, the ump calls the game and we win 6–0. Parents are on their feet cheering. Coach is smiling. She finds us a shady spot under a tree and keeps her voice steady and low: “You did it. You threw off that pitcher’s game and that’s all they had. Brilliant. Way to go.”
We have an hour before our next game, and Coach forces us to come and watch the end of the Casady–St. John’s game. “We play the winner of this game, so watch closely. Study the fielding and batting, talk to each other about which players to be careful of. Notice their strengths and weaknesses.”
St. John’s wins, and we head off to the cafeteria to eat our bag lunches provided by Spring Valley’s cafeteria. Coach tells us not to fill up too much before the game.
“On school food?” Frannie says, pulling out snacks for the rest of us.
Forty minutes later, after warm-up and infield, Coach gathers us in the dugout and says, “I don’t have a lot to add. You’re on a roll. Hang on tight.”
Coach tells us she’s gonna be moving players around and putting people in. She says to be ready and I am. She reads Mo and Frannie into the starting lineup for the first time. Rocky and I cheer since neither of them have had much play this season. The four of us slap high fives before the first pitch and tap our knuckles together for good luck.
And Frannie, in her delirium at being on the field, yells, “Go, Lady Peacocks!”
We score th
ree runs in three innings before Coach pulls me and Mo. Julie Meyers goes in at first, and Sally Fontineau goes in at right field. We beat St. John’s 4–1 in a little over an hour. Frannie is walking on air after playing the whole game. My parents give me and Rocky big hugs. Then we run off to sit with the team.
“I don’t know what to say, except—” Coach pauses as we pass water bottles around, wipe our faces, pull off our dirty socks and cleats. “You’re looking good. We’re in the finals!”
“Yahoo!” we yell.
“Let me read the lineup for the Fort Worth Country Day game. Then we can go cool off in the air-conditioning, okay?”
Rocky and I are starting, along with some of the ninth graders who haven’t played all season. We’re feeling great. Everyone seems happy, confident but tired.
In one of the many gyms, we haul our stuff into a corner and relax. Everyone’s snacking and sharing music and talking about prom or finals, which are looming on the fringe of my radar screen. Frannie closes her eyes and leans back against the bag of balls. “This is the most uncomfortable pillow. So why does it feel so good?”
Coach comes in around three fifteen to tell us our game starts at four. We look at her blankly. She repeats herself, then says, “Softball. It’s a tournament, remember?”
I can feel our fatigue, our sunburns, dehydration, boredom. We put on our stiff, dirty socks; our cleats and caps; and drag the equipment back out to the field, squinting against the sun.
In the huddle, Coach says, “Hey, hey, let’s try to get excited! Come on, y’all. I know you’re tired. It’s been a long day, but you’re young. You’re strong. You’re the ‘fighting, fighting Lady’Cocks.’”
We put our hands together and yell a rousing, “Go ’Cocks!”
Since Fort Worth Country Day has the most runs accumulated today, they’re in the field first. As they trot out, they look as bright and fresh as they did this morning—their hair in place, their warm-up still fast and furious. Rocky and I exchange a quick look.
But we’re at bat, and there’s work to be done.
Throwing Like a Girl Page 15