Switch Pitchers

by Norman German

  “You smoke?” Bobby asked as he touched the flame to the cigarette. Irene quickly shook her head no. “You should.”

  “Why?”

  “It makes you look sophisticated.”

  “I don’t look sophisticated?”

  Bobby laughed. “Trapped,” he said.

  “Claude and I smoked some straw behind the barn once and Deddy smelled it and tore us up.”

  Bobby moved his head away from her. “Louis and Fay. Now Claude. How many brothers and sisters you got?”

  “Seven, counting one we lost in the war.”

  Bobby raised his head in half a nod.

  “Here.” Bobby offered Irene the cigarette. She held it awkwardly and looked at it, then tried a small puff and started coughing.

  Bobby laughed. “Well, maybe some other time.”

  The Ferris wheel made a few more revolutions. When it came time to debark, Bobby paid again. Rising, they watched Louis and Marlene disappear down the midway.

  While the Wheel is turning, turning, turning,

  I’ll be yearning, yearning, for love’s precious flame.

  The wheel spun for several rounds, then stopped to load more passengers. Bobby looked above and below him to see if anyone was watching, then put his arm around Irene. As the wheel lurched into motion, his hand drifted down.

  “Say,” Irene finally said, calling him on the maneuver.

  “What?” Bobby said innocently.

  “I thought you said pitching deadened your arm. It looks pretty lively to me.”

  Bobby smiled. “I pitch with my left. That’s my right arm you’re not moving.”

  “What comes down,” Irene said, moving his arm, “must go up.”

  Oh, Wheel of Fortune, I’m hoping somehow,

  If you ever smile on me, please let it be now.

  Bobby leaned over and kissed Irene. Each time the wheel paused, Bobby kissed her again. When the ride ended, Bobby asked Irene if she wanted to go another round.

  “Not if you put it like that.”

  They both laughed while waiting their turn to step down. Bobby stole one last quick kiss and looked into Irene’s green eyes.

  “Those were great kisses, Irene, especially the odd and even numbered ones.”

  * * *

  For his third strike on the bridge, Bobby decided to use his regular windup. He remembered how his hand and arm—everything he was and should have become—had been taken from him in an instant. He twirled the ball in his hand until he felt the seams align for his fastball grip. He held the ball loose, near the ends of his fingers. He toed an imaginary rubber, took the signal, rocked back, then high-kicked for power and delivered.

  The ball left his fingers with the angry-hornet hum that only the fastest of fastballs makes, the one that causes batters to twitch back even at one thrown down the throat of the strike zone.

  * * *

  Bobby and Irene walked hand in hand down the midway, searching for Louis and Marlene.

  Irene said, “I wonder where Fay disappeared to.”

  Bobby saw Louis up ahead laughing in front of the dunking booth and reached up to point him out to Irene. A man stepped in front of Bobby and grabbed his shirt. Bobby reached out, gripped the attacker’s collar with his right hand, and cocked back his left.

  Looking fiercely into Bobby’s eyes, the man said to Irene, “So this is what it’s all about.”

  “Earl, don’t!” Irene said.

  Bobby knew he would hit the man if he had to, but he didn’t want to. He wasn’t thinking of Irene. He wasn’t worried about protecting her dignity or showing his courage. He was thinking that if he hit this fool, he could break his pitching hand.

  Everything happened in a matter of seconds. Louis, bigger than both, stepped in and pried the two apart, wedging his forearm against Earl’s throat and pushing him away from Bobby. Louis herded Earl away from the group. They exchanged words the others couldn’t hear. Louis pointed and said something final and Earl skulked away, looking back at Irene, then at Bobby as if to lock his face in memory.

  “That should be the end of that,” Louis said, whisking his palms together.

  “Thanks,” Bobby said. “I didn’t need it, but I appreciate it.”

  Thumbing back at Earl, Louis asked Irene, “What’s with him?”

  Irene shook her head sadly. “I’ve been telling him for months it wasn’t working out, so I didn’t think he’d flip his lid when it finally happened.” She looked at Bobby. “I know you won’t believe this, but he really is a nice guy. He just wasn’t going anywhere.”

  The foursome tried to put the confrontation behind them by visiting a concession stand under a yellow-and-green striped pavilion. The girls forgot the incident as they talked over their strawberry floats. Moths flitted around the bright bulbs strung around the tent. When a wing brushed a cheek or an arm, the girls squealed and swatted the air and laughed. Bobby and Louis checked around for trouble in a way the girls wouldn’t notice.

  Louis liked Bobby and fed him a line to turn the conversation toward something he knew. “How’d you get to be a pitcher, Bobby?”

  Bobby stirred his soda with a straw and smiled. The three looked at him. They already knew he was the quiet sort and would need some time to warm up.

  “When I was in third grade—however old you are, seven or eight. Bill and I—that’s my brother—we used to cross a field to get to a golf course.” Bobby looked at Louis, then Irene. “What do you think? Does a golf ball sink or float?”

  They looked at each other, then spoke at the same time. “Sinks.” “Floats?”

  Bobby nodded. “You’d think they’d float, but they sink. The rich men gave us money to retrieve golf balls from the water traps. Some were deep, almost over my head. The water wasn’t always clear, either, so we’d have to strip to our shorts and wade and dive down to feel around on the mushy bottom.”

  The girls made unpleasant sounds to show their disgust.

  “Our only competition was a little gang of colored boys who’d stand around till someone sliced a ball into the water. When the golfer came walking up and asked them to retrieve it, they’d smile big and say, ‘Foa lady dime’—‘For a lady dime,’ you see.”

  The girls giggled.

  “Bill and I would ask for a nickel a ball and usually steal their business and get a dime or a quarter anyway. One day I was out there by myself and they came up just as I was leaving.

  “The biggest one said, ‘Wha’d you get today, Whitey?’ The two little ones were probably ten and I could handle them, or at least run from them, but the big one was thirteen or fourteen.

  “‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘Weren’t no balls hit in the water today.’

  “‘You a liar,’ the biggest one said, and he commenced to run me down and tackle me. When he turned me upside down, nickels and dimes and quarters rained out of my pockets like he’d hit three cherries on a slot machine.”

  Everyone laughed and Bobby smiled to see he was telling the story so they liked it.

  “I ran home just a-bawling and Bill heard me hollering a block away. He was working on his bike when I reached home. He had it tumped over in the yard, tightening the chain, and he jumped up fightin’ mad, ready to tear someone up for hurting me. He asked me what was wrong and I said ‘Them spear-chunkers done robbed me!’ and I figured he was gonna set things right.

  “‘Aw, Bobby,’ he said, going back to his bike. ‘Cain’t you see I got bigger things to worry about than that? Pick up a rock and hit that big one in the head. That should fix his black ass.’

  “Right then I went back to the golf course and hunted around in the weeds till I found three golf balls.”

  Marlene shrieked and swished at a moth hovering in front of her until she batted it away. Irene put a hand over the top of her strawberry float.

  “I waited by the fence line for them to come off the course. When they did, the little one said, ‘Truck, it look like that cracker boy ain’t learnt his lesson.’ Then they all sta
rted walking towards me. I had one golf ball in my left hand and two in my right, and when they got close I wound up and let loose.” Bobby looked at his audience. “Hit that big black buck right in the forehead. Dropped him like an anchor.”

  Louis laughed and the girls clapped and cheered.

  “When ol’ Truck came up, he was covered with yellow dust and red blood and in a second all I saw was the white bottoms of six feet running away.”

  Bobby waited till his audience calmed down. “They were done with me, but I wasn’t done with them, so I reared back and threw the second ball and hit the smallest one in the back of the head. He fell and rolled in the dirt, holding his head, but he didn’t stay there long. I ran after them and when I closed the gap to throwing distance, I reached back and threw the last ball and hit that third pickaninny in the same spot on the back of the head.

  “I knew right then I was gonna be a pitcher. I swear, it felt like a calling from above.”

  Chapter 13

  “OKAY, men,” Chozen said in the clubhouse. “Let’s see if we can sweep this double-header. We need some wins behind us before the cattle drive to Laredo.”

  He clapped his hands once and the men started hustling out the door to the field.

  “Roberto!” Chozen called. “Ricardo!” Approaching their manager, the brothers got as close to each other as they had been since Hemingway transported them to Key West on the Pilar. “I want you two,” Chozen said, locking his eyes on one, then the other, “to sit on opposite ends of the bench. Don’t talk to each other. Don’t even look at each other. Understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Chozen, sir.”

  “Then, after Roberto’s game, I want to see you two in my office.”

  The brothers looked at each other, then at their manager.

  “I’m not asking for a vote,” Chozen said. “I’m telling you, both of you, to be there. The one that doesn’t show won’t be a member of this team tomorrow. That’s all. Go.”

  The New Orleans Pelicans were coming off a scandal involving team members and even a coach betting on games. In the stands, their fans wagered openly on everything from point spread to number of foul balls in a game, but that was overlooked by baseball and city authorities alike because it was New Orleans. The Pelicans had lost five straight after the sanctions were imposed and gave up first place to the Houston Buffs. On the way to Lake Charles, the Pelicans stopped in Crowley and picked up two wins against the bottom-feeding Cajuns.

  In the top of the first inning of the day game, Tycer left two on, and from the way the Pelicans charged the field, it was clear they had simply used Crowley to whet their appetite. Their pitcher, Trader Hornn, had bounced in and out of the Major Leagues so many times even he had lost count.

  While Hornn warmed up, Judge Sam Carlton philosophized over the loudspeaker about whether Trader should be called a veteran rookie or a rookie veteran. By the time he finished, the fans were thoroughly befuddled about something that mattered no more than a cotton ball in a hailstorm.

  At thirty-five, Trader Hornn didn’t have anymore bounce in him, but he had plenty of tricks, some of them mean, and the scorekeeper posted nothing but zeroes for both teams through the fifth inning.

  In the bottom of the sixth, Lamar Cagle hit a solo home run over the right-field fence. Judge Carlton rapped his gavel. “That’s a hole-in-one.” The judge was famous for his cross-sports metaphors. Harry Chozen despised them. Harry’s chosen game was baseball, and he hated seeing it corrupted by the jargon of other sports.

  The score held at 1-0 until the top of the ninth. Tycer opened the inning by walking the Pelicans’ second baseman, Stuart Stelley. From sliding headfirst into too many knees, the scrappy Cajun had the broken-nose look of a palooka boxer. Tycer struck out the next batter. Stelley stole second and was sacrificed to third. Then a deep opposite-field hit that should have been a double became the first visitor’s inside-the-park home run in the Lunkers’ eight-year history. The Lunker bats didn’t produce in the bottom of the ninth so Tycer found himself with a sterling three-hit loss.

  With Roberto Alemán’s hitters coming alive behind his dazzling pitching, the Cuban shellacked the Pelicans in the nightcap, 8-1.

  In his office after the game, Harry Chozen looked at Ricardo to his left, then at Roberto to his right. He had placed them as far apart as possible in the small office.

  “Men,” Chozen said. “I’m tired.” He inspected his calloused hands, brushed red dust out of the hair on his left arm, then looked up. “And I’m not a babysitter. Comprende, Ricardo? Babysitter?”

  Ricardo stared blankly at his manager.

  “Roberto,” Chozen ordered. “Help him.”

  “Cuidaniños,” Roberto said. Ricardo scowled at him.

  “What exactly is it,” Chozen said, “between you two?”

  Roberto said, “Mr. Chozen, I am fine with my brother. He is the one with the problem.”

  “Ricardo?”

  “Him I have not liked since I can remember.”

  “He seems nice enough to me. If this started as a boyhood squabble, maybe you two can patch things up now that you’re men.”

  “I do not think so,” Ricardo said. “When we were small, everyone, even our mother, she mistake him for me and me for him. So I decide to be different from him in every way. I still cannot stand the sight of him because he look just like me in the appearance.”

  Harry Chozen was dumbfounded. He tried to reign in his impatience at Ricardo’s childish attitude and understand him. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine what it must be like to hate your own image and have it walking around in public to surprise you at any turn. Chozen was a pudgy man and did not especially like his body type, but he had a face with character and he was as strong as two men, so he saw those as compensating traits.

  He opened his eyes and examined the twins. Compared to Ricardo, Roberto looked neat and clean, even though he had just pitched nine innings. Chozen shook his head.

  “Men, we have a long season ahead of us, and I don’t plan to waste my valuable time side-stepping two little girls who get their feelings hurt every time someone says Boo. Now, both of you. Stand up.” They looked at Chozen, then at each other. “Now!”

  They stood.

  “Face each other.”

  They faced but did not look at each other.

  “Look right into each other’s eyes.”

  Roberto raised his eyes and held them steady on his brother’s. Clenching his teeth, Ricardo shifted from foot to foot like a nervous kid. It took several tries before he was able to keep his eyes locked on his brother’s.

  “Roberto,” Chozen commanded. “Step within arm’s length of Ricardo.”

  Roberto stepped forward carefully, then leaned back.

  “Now,” Chozen directed. “I want you to hit Ricardo as hard as you can—but not with your pitching hand.”

  Both brothers looked at Chozen.

  “Go ahead and do what I tell you.”

  “But Mr. Chozen, sir, I do not want to hit my brother.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because he is my brother.”

  Chozen turned to Ricardo. “Ricardo, maybe you can inspire him if you hit him first.”

  “No, Mr. Chozen, sir, I not like to do this.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it would be like hitting myself.”

  Chozen shook his head. “Ricardo.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “I couldn’t have put it better myself. That’s the same reason no one should ever hit anyone.” Chozen mused on this gem of moral philosophy from the mouth of an illiterate. “Roberto, Ricardo, I’m not asking the two of you to fall in love with each other. But I am telling you to be civil. Do you understand ‘civil,’ Ricardo? Polite. The two of you will be polite to each other. Even if you don’t feel it in your heart. That’s called manners. That’s what civilization is about, being civil to someone you don’t like. Because once that first wall of d
ecency is knocked down, men do terrible things to each other.”

  * * *

  The Lunkers played beyond their own expectations against Houston. Bobby’s win capped a three-game sweep that moved Lake Charles into third place and knocked the Buffs back down to second. The highlight of the series occurred in game two with the score 5-4 in Houston’s favor. In the top of the ninth, Zig Emory was trying to drive Cagle home from third with two outs. Ziggy hit a pop fly to left. Jimbo Green, a zealous teenager showing off for the home crowd, caught the ball with his cap. Fans and players were dispersing when Rules Atán reminded Chozen of the infraction.