Mudville

by Kurtis Scaletta

  Yeah, I've heard the stories before about my granddad, even if I never met him. He did landscaping and odd jobs, painted houses, and worked on farms, patching things together to get by. My dad says he worked fourteen-to-sixteen-hour days, sometimes all summer. In the winters, if there was nothing to do, he'd get cabin fever. He'd either hang around the house, drinking and smoking way too much, or go off on road trips and disappear for days. He was a good man when he was busy, my dad says. He just didn't like to be inside and couldn't stand to be idle.

  When the rains came, he got really restless. He hated the rain. He liked sunshine and hot days. So after a few months of rain, he took one of his impromptu road trips and never came back. He died in a hotel fire, someplace around St. Louis. He fell asleep with a lit cigarette, probably three sheets to the wind.

  As soon as he was old enough, my father dropped out of school and started working full-time, selling and installing the Rain Redirection Systems. He sometimes says he learned a lot more working than he ever did at school.

  School must mean something to him, though, because eventually he earned his degree at a night school in Sutton. That diploma is in his office, dated just a few weeks before I was born. My dad tells me he went into overdrive when my mom was pregnant, driving into Sutton just about every night and going days at a time without sleep, so he could finish up before I was born. He didn't want his son to have a dropout for a dad.

  “I thought a job would do you good, like it did for me,” he says now. “At first, I thought it would be lonely work, but when Sturgis came, well, it worked out great. You could work and have company. I just didn't expect your lesson to last, what, a few days?”

  “Five and a half.”

  “That's a pretty short lesson,” he says. “But it's better than nothing.”

  “What lesson was I supposed to learn?” I ask. I'm not a big fan of character-building exercises, to be honest.

  “Well, you know I want you to be as big a star as you can be,” says my dad. “I think you can be a major leaguer, an all-star, even a Hall of Famer. I think you have it in you, and I'll do whatever I can to help.”

  “I don't know about that.” Parents always think their kids can do anything. You can't hit a major-league fastball with your parents’ love, though.

  “I just don't want you to become a jerk in the process,” my dad says. “I knew a guy in high school who went into the majors. Well, he was a jerk anyway, but once he got in the big leagues, he just got worse. When he came back, he thought he was better than the rest of us. Better than guys like me who worked for a living instead of playing a kids’ game.”

  He's never mentioned knowing a major leaguer before. Maybe he's making it up, just to drive his point home.

  “Don't be like that, Roy. I knew you were in over your head when you talked about fixing up the old ball field, but I wanted you to find out for yourself. I want you to appreciate the work that goes into getting the field ready. I want you to thank the groundskeepers and sign autographs for their children. Those guys could be your own grandfather. Heck, they could be me. When fans turn out, think about how hard you worked this week and remember they worked that hard all week to take their family to a ball game. Maybe you play a hundred fifty games in a season, but they only get to see the one. Make it worth their while, every time.”

  “I will, Dad.”

  He's driving toward home, but he suddenly changes lanes and turns right, toward downtown.

  “You're not done learning yet,” my dad says.

  He pulls over and parks in front of the baseball field. There are a couple of other trucks already parked. I look out onto the field and see Sturgis and Peter working with hoes, spreading fresh soil around, Sturgis working in his quiet way while Peter talks up a storm. The other truck is a flatbed, loaded with fresh sod.

  Two guys are unloading the sod onto a big cart, to roll it out into the field. One of them is Frank, although it takes a second to recognize him without his raincoat. The other one is a kid I recognize but can't place right away.

  “I sent Frank out yesterday to get soil and sod,” my dad explains. “I couldn't wait another year to see a baseball game in Moundville. I've been waiting too long as it is.”

  I realize who the kid is. I know him from Sutton Little League. Not my team, unfortunately. His real name is Peter Labatte, but most kids in Little League call him the Bat. The Bat gets on base just about every time he comes to the plate, slapping balls all over the field like a junior Ichiro Suzuki, even swinging at balls way out of the zone and hitting them to the gap. He can hit for average, and he has a little power, too. Not necessarily out-of-the-ballpark power but definitely bouncing-it-off-the-fence power. I never called a pitch he didn't hit. I don't know they've invented a pitch he can't hit. I guess that Peter Labatte is Peter's kid. I kind of see the resemblance, now that I know to look for it. Was my dad able to hire him after all? More importantly, will he play for our team?

  “We'll need to get this all done today.” My dad's voice gets my attention back to the task at hand. “We need to get it all laid down and watered before we go home.”

  “Dad, how much did this all cost?”

  “You don't want to know,” he says. “You can pay me back when you're a millionaire ballplayer. Anyway, it's not just for you. It's for my new business.”

  He points at a huge banner hanging over the outfield fence.

  “Field by Moundville Landscaping and Home Improvements,” it reads. “Lawns. Pools. Decks. Hot Tubs. Etc.” “What Will You Do When the Sun Shines?” it says at the bottom, along with Dad's cell phone number.

  “Great idea, Dad.”

  “Let's get to work!” he says, waving at the piles of fresh-cut sod.

  Even with the six of us working, it's a long day. It turns out resodding is even harder than digging. It's all bending and crawling around.

  Peter is kind of in charge because he's done this before.

  “I set up Little League fields, even a couple of semipro fields,” he tells me. “I've been a groundskeeper, batboy, clubhouse manager, umpire…. I've done it all. Except play.” He holds up his disfigured hand to remind me why.

  “That's cool.” Maybe I misjudged him. I thought he was a bit weird, but anybody who likes baseball that much has to be okay.

  “I'm glad my dad was able to hire your son after all,” I tell him, embarrassed because I never actually asked him if he could.

  “Technically, he works for me,” Peter says. “I'm an independent contractor now.”

  Peter Junior is all over the place, raking the field, dragging out flats of sod, and planting them. It looks like he's done it before, too. He barely talks to anyone as he cuts back and forth, all business.

  “I've seen you play,” I tell him as we put down the last square of sod. “I've played against you, even.”

  “You were with the Reds, right?”

  “Yeah.” His team was the Pirates. They won the play-offs in Sutton and went on to the state championship. They were good. “I was thinking, you should come back and play with us when the field is ready.”

  “I might,” he says, but the way he says it sounds more like a no. We've got the sod in place, and he stalks off before I can ask him any more questions.

  I can barely eat one plate of ham and pickle casserole before I drag myself off to my room and collapse on the bed.

  Sturgis sacks out, too.

  “I never knew it was so much work to have a ballpark.”

  “Me neither.”

  “You must have gone to a lot of big-league ballparks when you were a kid.”

  He shrugs. “Just the one in Baltimore, when I was like two years old.”

  “I've never been to a big-league park,” I admit. “Must be nice. You get to sit up close, see the players? Cal Ripken, maybe?”

  “I was more interested in the trains back then. The ballpark in Baltimore is right by the train tracks.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “I'd get a
ll excited when the trains went by. I'd clap and holler. That's about all I remember.”

  “Yeah, trains are pretty cool,” I agree.

  We're up early the next morning. We're aching from the hard work but too excited to stay in bed. We have a quick breakfast of graham cereal and run down to the ballpark. Sturgis is actually just jogging, but I have a hard time keeping up. It's because he has those long legs, like an ostrich or something.

  I stop short when we get there. The new grass glistens in the sun, and I want to cry. It's beautiful. There's no mound, no bases, and no batter's box. The bleachers are falling apart. But the outfield is beautiful.

  “My dad hates indoor baseball,” Sturgis says. “He says Minnesota and Toronto are the worst ballparks in the world. I can see why.”

  “I like the grass myself,” I tell him. “It's all about the grass.”

  We drop our gear and sprawl out on the new grass, feeling its cool bristles beneath us and squinting against the sun-light. Neither of us says anything more. There's nothing to talk about. For the moment, I'm completely happy. I don't need St. James Academy or Rita or anything else. I drift off into easy sleep, blissful between new grass and a dry sky, with nothing left to dream about.

  “This is fantastic!” says Steve. He's come with Tim, Miggy, David, and Kazuo. I wonder where they were yesterday, when we needed their help. Sturgis and I have awoken from our reveries and are casually tossing a ball high into the air, just to watch it fall and bounce on the grass.

  David starts running around in circles, his arms out, like a little kid playing airplane. Kazuo just drops to his knees and fans his hand through the grass, then looks up at me with a mixture of disbelief and joy.

  “Can we play on it?” he asks.

  “In a couple of days,” I tell him. “Maybe even tomorrow. Just take it easy on the grass today.”

  “We need to get a team together and play baseball,” says Steve.

  “Well, we need a mound,” I remind him. “We need to put down a better surface in the infield, and we need bases.”

  “Ah, we can get all that,” he says with a wave of his hand, as if it's nothing. I remember how he said the turf was “a little grass and some dirt.” Steve takes all that stuff for granted.

  “Let's get a team together and get one of those traveling teams to come play us,” says Miggy. “It would be beautiful, man.”

  “Oh yeah,” says Steve. “Bring it on!”

  “We should replay that one game,” says Sturgis.

  “You mean against Sinister Bend? They don't really exist anymore,” I remind him.

  “There's always a they,” he says. “It's a fact of life.”

  “I don't know,” I say. I like the idea in theory, but you can't play baseball against a bunch of ghosts unless you're Kevin Costner.

  “Maybe Moundville could finally win that way,” Steve offers. “Sinister Bend will have to forfeit because they don't exist.”

  “Yeah!” Miggy and some of the other kids laugh.

  “Never mind Sinister Bend. If I could get someone to play us,” asks Sturgis, “would you guys all play? Hypothetically, I mean.”

  “Sure,” says Steve.

  “Of course,” I agree.

  Kazuo looks less sure. “It sounds like fun, but we barely know how to play.”

  “These guys will teach you,” says Sturgis, waving his hand at me and Steve. “They know the game inside and out.”

  I think aloud, wondering what our chances are against an average team. “Sturgis has a great arm. We won't need to score a lot of runs to win.” Sturgis pretends to be humble, but I catch a look in Steve's eye. “Steve's a great player, too,” I add. “He's got a lot of power for a middle infielder.” That perks him up.

  “I've always wanted to play in a real game,” says Kazuo. “Can I play shortstop?”

  That's Steve's favorite position, but he doesn't object. “I'll play second,” he says.

  Kazuo runs out to a spot between first and second base, pretending to field balls and pivot.

  “That's second,” I call out.

  “What?”

  “You're supposed to be over there.” I point between second and third base.

  “Really?” He looks confused.

  “Why don't you play there, and I'll play over here,” says Steve, trotting out to his usual shortstop position.

  “But I'm still the shortstop, right?” Kazuo asks.

  “Sure,” says Steve. “We'll just play it this way.”

  “Excellent,” says Kazuo. So we have an ambidextrous switch-hitting shortstop who doesn't know left from right playing second base. He looks happy, though, so who am I to complain?

  “What about me?” asks David.

  “You'll be our left fielder,” I decide. He's a runty kid, and I don't put much faith in his fielding. He'll do the least dam-age in left field, especially if I shade the center fielder that way. Once I find a center fielder, that is.

  Sturgis stands where the mound ought to be, and I trot back behind where the plate ought to be. I scan the field and think about kids I know, mentally filling in the gaps.

  “I think we can do it,” I say to Sturgis. “Just get us a them.”

  Our first real practice is scheduled for Thursday, giving the grass time to get its roots down deep. I'm so excited I head out about an hour early. As I'm walking to the ballpark, a fat raindrop splashes down in front of me. I stop and look up, hoping it's just my imagination. A second drop plops in my eye, and a third smacks my forehead.

  A moment later, I'm in the middle of an all-out down-pour. I run on ahead to the ballpark, seeking refuge in the dugout. My dad has re-covered the overhang with surplus plastic, of which he has plenty, so it's pretty dry in there.

  When I duck in, I see that Kazuo is already there, waiting. He nods at me solemnly.

  “It's just a regular rain,” he says.

  “I hope you're right.” I try to figure out the percentages, but there are too many variables to think about.

  “Why are you here so early?” he asks. “Practice isn't for another hour.”

  “I just like the empty ballpark.”

  “Me too.”

  We sit in silence for a while and watch the rain.

  “You can sort of make pictures out of the raindrops,” Kazuo says at last.

  “Yeah, like I never played that game before,” I tell him. We both laugh. Kids in Moundville have all done their share of rain watching.

  The rain lightens up after about a half hour. We step out of the dugout, onto the silvery grass, and look at the sky as the clouds hurry away to ruin someone else's day.

  “I told you,” he says. “It was just a regular rain.”

  “I believed you.”

  “I believed me, too, but I'm still relieved.”

  The next one to arrive is Peter Junior. He just drifts in, like he didn't really mean to wind up here, in particular, but just sort of found himself here. He's been caught in the rain but doesn't seem to care that he's soaked.

  “Hey, Peter.”

  “You can call me P.J.,” he says. “My dad is doing an odd job in town. Garage door. I thought I'd come see how the field was doing.”

  “You want to play?” I toss him the ball. He catches it easily but doesn't toss it back right away.

  “I'm already on a baseball team,” he says apologetically. “The Pirates, remember?”

  “I'm just talking about practice.”

  “I guess I can hang around for a while.”

  Steve brings a couple of new players with him: Anthony and Miggy's kid brother Carlos. They even bring gloves, so we're able to fill in the infield and run some drills. We just take turns at the plate, the rest of us trying different spots in the field.

  We hardly even need anyone in the outfield with Sturgis pitching. He smokes those balls in there, and he has scary control. He puts the ball wherever I put my glove. It's the best anyone can do just to tap the ball back into the infield. Except for P.J., that
is.

  P.J. doesn't spend too much time in the infield. He'd rather bat and keeps sneaking back into the box, way out of turn. He grounds out the first couple of times, but once he figures out Sturgis's fastball, he starts lining base hits left and right.

  I think he should show the rest of us how he does it, but his dad drives up and beeps the horn to go home.

  “See you around,” I tell him as he sprints off.

  “Maybe,” he calls back.

  Without P.J., Sturgis is able to cruise past us. It would probably be better to have someone else pitch for a while and let the guys work on their swings, but I'm too stunned by Sturgis to make him stop. It's just fascinating to watch. He proves to be as tireless as he is effective, striking out one batter after another without slowing down.

  A pitcher is only as good as his defense, though, and our defense is terrible. For instance, when Tim grounds a ball to short, Miggy charges it from his spot at third base and fights Steve over it.

  “It's not a contest,” I yell at him. “Know your territory and field it.”

  A few seconds later, David is playing third and Miggy is batting. He squibs it to Sturgis, who picks it up and tosses it to … well, to nobody. There's nobody there. Anthony is playing first base, but he's nowhere near the base.

  “Can I get a little help here?” Sturgis asks.

  “I thought you had it,” says Anthony with a shrug.

  “I guess I'll just have to strike everyone out,” Sturgis grumbles.

  Anthony takes a turn at catcher while I bat. Sturgis does strike me out, but Anthony lets strike three skip off his glove, and I run safely to first.

  Sturgis throws his glove to the ground. “Can you guys maybe get an out once in a while?” he asks.

  “Hey, we're just practicing,” says David. “Take it easy, Scarface.”

  Sturgis makes a move at him, but Steve stops him.

  “Why don't you take your turn at the plate,” says Sturgis to David, trying to pull away from Steve. “I'll throw the base-ball right through your chest, you little maggot.”

  “Chill!” says Anthony.

  “Team meeting,” I holler, coming off first and waving everybody in.