7 Days at the Hot Corner

by Terry Trueman

  And as Zeke walks away, I think about what he just said about the whole gay thing and I realize that I actually agree with him. What’s up with Zeke Willhelm being a better friend to Travis, even if it is incognito, than I am, when they’re not even friends?

  I’m thinking about the hot corner again, about how hard it can be to play it straight up and right, to know that rocket shots may be coming your way at any instant and that the best you can do is stand your ground, which may not be enough.

  Word of the fight is getting around school the way these kinds of stories always do, bigger or smaller than reality but with everybody having an opinion about what happened, especially kids who weren’t even there.

  Zeke is a total skate-head and already a mild legend of sorts within his group of friends for his amazing skate tricks. But now he has become an instant hero in a lot of kids’ minds. Floyd, whose social stock was already a couple of hundred points below zero, hasn’t really been hurt by what happened, and in his own mind and that of the gay-bashing population, he probably feels okay too. In reality, looking at the whole thing, “the fight” was pretty much of a draw.

  But gossip about Zeke and Floyd’s fight has found its way into one of my classes. By third period Mr. Robbinette in World History is ready for us. Zeke’s in this class too. The weird fact that something happening in the real world could relate to anything we ever talk about in a class is a miracle—I can’t remember a time, other than varsity baseball, when anything real has ever happened at school.

  We’ve been studying World War II, talking about Nazi Germany, the rise of the Nazis to power and how their use of propaganda helped them. Today we watch the film Triumph of the Will, which shows the way Hitler worked up crowds by screaming and ranting. It’s pretty amazing. It’s like the German people fell in love with the way Hitler seemed so sincere and so dedicated to his beliefs, more than with what he was actually saying. Hitler probably never said, “I think we ought to gather up all the Jews in the world, including defenseless women and children, and gas them to death.” He probably never directly said it, but we now know that’s what he did. And yet the film shows all these Germans—young; old; good-looking girls; strong, handsome guys—and they all look ecstatic as they listen to that loony up there screaming. I flash for half a second back to the people I saw at the Public Health building waiting to get their AIDS tests—any of those Nazis, if they were alive now, could have been one of us, sitting there in that waiting room. What I mean is that they look like normal people.

  After the film, Mr. Robinette starts the discussion. “It wasn’t only the Jews that Hitler persecuted and killed. It could be anybody who wasn’t an Aryan.”

  Johnny Little, class clown, interrupts. “Is that anybody not from Arya, Idaho?” He is pretty funny some of the time.

  Robinette smiles at him and answers. “Something like that. An Aryan, according to Hitler and the Nazis, was a person of pure blood and superior racially to all others. Unless you agreed with the Nazis, went along with their plans and views, you were likely to end up in either a work or a death camp. Jews, political opponents, and anybody perceived to be an enemy was subject to arrest and worse. Although Hitler started out by targeting Jews, it ended up that anybody who didn’t agree with him was in trouble. Eventually, Hitler lumped jobless people and the mentally ill and retarded people and gays all together as ‘undesirables.’”

  Robinette pauses a second and then says, “I know there’s been lots of buzz around school recently as a result of the article in the school paper about homosexuality. In Nazi Germany, Jews had to wear a Star of David on their coats so everybody knew they were Jews. At the concentration camps, gays had to wear a pink triangle.”

  Zeke Willhelm, fat lip and all, still basking in the glory of getting beaten up, says, “If you didn’t like somebody, you could just accuse them of being a Jew or gay and the Nazis would take care of them for you, right?”

  Mr. Robinette says, “Yes, that happened a lot. But what I hope we can focus on today are the ways, sometimes less obvious and sometimes not, that unequal treatment is still alive. The Nazis’ forcing people to wear identification was a blatant, in-your-face example of this, but I’d like you to think about the ways people show their prejudices now—these are perhaps more subtle but are still hurtful. We brand people we’re afraid of just as much today as before, not with badges like the Nazis did, but by fear, gossip, and innuendo.”

  This all makes some sense to me until I glance around the room and make the mistake of looking at Matt Tompkins. Matt plays first base on our team. Teammates are supposed to be friends, and I am friendly with most of the guys, but with Matt it’s impossible—for me at least. Matt Tompkins is big, strong, and real quiet. He always has been, even from when we were in the seventh grade. He’s been in classes with Travis and me all through our middle school and high school years. He’s always gotten by on his bigness and strength and athleticism, but he’s a real private guy, and way too serious. Even in baseball he never seems to be having fun. The truth is, I’ve never liked him and he’s never been a friend. We just don’t get along.

  And right now he’s in the back row where he always sits; his jaw is tight and tense, working overtime. He is staring at Robinette. In his expression is a look of horrible concentration, like I’ve seen on him only in real tough situations on the ball field a few times. Once when we were playing Kettle Falls, they had a guy on third and two outs in a game we led by one run. Both Matt and I, him at first base and me at third, were told to play way up, to prevent a squeeze play (where the batter bunts and the base runner on third charges home). Of course, there’s a danger to playing only twenty feet back from home plate. If the batter swings away, which he almost has to do because you’re so close that the squeeze play won’t work, there’s no way you can get a glove up in time to defend yourself. I remember that day, glancing at Matt for just a second, and wondering if he felt as scared as I did. It so happened that the batter took a called third strike, but Matt didn’t look afraid, just tense and angry, like he looks right now.

  Matt’s glare suddenly shifts to me. He stares straight at me and looks sort of crazy. I feel my stomach flip-flop, and I look away from him as quickly as I can. What’s going on? Why is Matt Tompkins staring at me?

  The final bell, ending the last class of the day, rings and I’m sitting in biology, completely bored—somehow photosynthesis just doesn’t cut it with so much else going on.

  I’m thinking about the huge pile of negative garbage in my head, when I realize that there is one person I’ve always been able to turn to when I’m really confused. I’ve got two hours before our game this afternoon, so I’m going to go visit Travis’s mom, Rita. I miss her, and who knows, maybe she’ll help me make some sense out of this whole thing.

  Maybe I can even talk her into letting Travis move back home (even as I think this thought, I have to admit that I feel a little guilty—some friend huh?).

  As soon as school gets out, I hop into my pickup and drive the mile and a half to Rita and Roy’s house.

  I walk in the door and yell hello, and Rita hollers back “Travis?” from the back of the house—I think the kitchen. It freaks me out, her thinking I’m Travis.

  “No,” I answer, “it’s Scott. Can I come in?”

  Actually, I’m already in, and as I finish asking, Rita rounds the corner from the kitchen to the dining room and sees me.

  “Hi, Scott,” she says, walking right up to me and giving me a big hug. She forces a smile and looks uncomfortable.

  I hug her back and smile a phony smile too.

  “How are you?” she asks, staring into my eyes, then pulling away from me but still holding my upper arms.

  “I’m good,” I say.

  Rita is a great mom. She always teased and kidded with us, took us to Wild Waters, the water slides over in Coeur d’Alene, during the summer. From when we were little, she always had cookies around, good kinds, too, for snacks.

  We walk acro
ss the living room, and I sit on the couch while she sits in a little rocking chair right near me.

  “Are you all right?” Rita asks.

  I feel like saying, How could I be all right? But instead I answer, “Yeah, I’m good … kinda stressed.”

  There is a short, awkward pause; then Rita, ignoring my comment, asks me point-blank, “How’s Travis?” Her face looks old and sad now.

  Of course, I should have known this question was coming; after all, it’s what I came here for, to talk about Travis. But somehow her asking it so directly catches me off guard. It just seems so odd that Rita is asking me how her son is. I look into her eyes for a second, but something makes me look away. I don’t know; it’s like I feel guilty all of a sudden.

  “It’s all right, Scott,” Rita says, reaching over and patting my knee. “It’s okay.”

  “Sure,” I say.

  Rita takes a deep breath, then speaks in a real soft voice. “We just don’t know how to deal with this thing.”

  I say, “I know, I don’t really—”

  But Rita interrupts. “We never thought we were prejudiced toward gay people … I mean we aren’t prejudiced—it’s just that Travis …” She hesitates and I can see tears in her eyes. “He just can’t be gay, not my little boy.”

  I say, “I know. It’s so weird, really.” Saying this feels lame to me, and stupid, but nothing else comes to mind.

  Rita asks me, “So you and Travis are happy?”

  I say, “What?”

  She says, “You guys are … doing okay?”

  It dawns on me that Rita is talking about Travis and me like … like we’re … together! I feel my face start to burn.

  “I’m not gay, Rita,” I blurt out, feeling my whole head turn bright red.

  “Of course you’re not,” Rita says. “Neither is Travis.”

  “No,” I insist. “I mean I’m not gay; Travis and I aren’t a couple or whatever you call it …” She doesn’t seem to be listening to me. I say, “How could you even think that?”

  Rita smiles at me. “I care about you no matter what, Scott, you know that,” she says softly. But I can tell she doesn’t believe me. How can she not know that I’m straight? After all the times I’ve talked to her about girls, life, my parents, everything, how can she doubt me when I’m telling her the truth?

  I feel crazy. I want to scream at her, I want to holler, just like I did at Travis, but instead of saying anything, I just sit here, burning up with embarrassment.

  Suddenly I understand the real reason I’ve come here—it was to somehow get back that feeling of the way things had been before Roy asked my dad if Trav could live with us. I wanted to just walk in, raid the fridge, and BS with Rita. I wanted her to be my second mom again, to be here for me and talk to me and tell me that everything was gonna be all right. I wanted Rita to reassure me in ways that my real mom and dad couldn’t. After all, my parents split our family apart for reasons I still don’t understand. I wanted to know that, somehow, everything was the same between Rita and me. But the opposite of what I wanted has happened: My fears about losing Rita and Roy were right on—they’re not here for me anymore; maybe they never really were. I remember what Travis had said to me: You think my parents are perfect....

  Now that Rita thinks Travis and I are some kind of gay twosome, everything has changed. Roy and Rita live in this nice, pretty house and she bakes cookies and he goes off to work, but when their son really needs them, they’re not here for him. And they’re definitely not here for me either.

  Sitting in the Adamses’ living room, I look at Rita and feel—I don’t know exactly how to describe it … still embarrassed about her thinking I’m gay, but mostly … I hate to say this, but mostly I feel ashamed of her for what she’s doing to Trav.

  Nothing she’s said helps any of it make any more sense. I feel depressed. I’m so disappointed in her, and maybe in myself. Mainly, though, I feel awful for Travis. Nobody in his family is on his side.

  I get up from the couch.

  “I gotta go, Rita,” I say.

  “Of course, Scott,” she says with another fake smile. We walk in silence to the door, where she gives me another awkward hug.

  She looks me in the eyes as we finish hugging. “Tell Travis that we …” She pauses, and the tears I saw a few minutes ago come back. “Tell him that I’m sorry, but with his little brother here, until he can figure out how to be … until you guys realize …” She pauses again and finally just says, “No, forget that; just tell him we miss him and that I’m sorry.”

  I nod my head numbly. “Sure, Rita,” I say, trying not to show how sick I feel. I just want to get out of here. My chest hurts and my palms are wet.

  I make it out the door. I jump down off the porch onto a little path leading toward the driveway. This path is a line of heart-shaped cement bricks, set down low in the grass. In all the times I’ve been to this house, I’ve never paid any attention to these stupid little heart-shaped stepping-stones before. But I notice them now; cement hearts: Yeah, that’s about right.

  You live in fantasyland … where my parents are perfect and yours are not because they got divorced.

  “Up yours, Travis,” I whisper to myself, but I realize that I don’t really mean it anymore.

  After talking to Rita, I feel terrible, even worse than before. Thank god I’ve got a game in an hour. Thank god for baseball.

  Baseball offense, final thoughts: You step up to the plate and tap the dirt out of your cleats. If you’re successful one time out of every three, you’ll end up in the Hall of Fame, so even if you’re really good, your chances of failing are pretty high. A good hitter has to stay calm and centered, keep his weight balanced and his emotions under control, and if he does all that and does everything else just right, he’ll still probably not get a hit. Makes you wonder, doesn’t it? Why even play?

  Day 3

  (Thursday)

  Keeping your head in the game: Whether on defense or offense, you have to keep your head in the game, and to me this means that you have to know what’s going on in every situation and how things change with everything that happens. This means that a man on second with two outs is a whole different concern than a man on first with one out. Keeping your head in the game just means knowing what is going on!

  What is going on?

  Well, first off, we won again yesterday. It was great. In baseball the worst teams win a third of their games and the best teams lose a third of theirs—so how can our team win 16 games in a row, like we’ve done this season? Such things are extremely rare, almost impossible; believe me, I’ve subscribed to Baseball Weekly since I was nine years old, and there are winning streaks, but an undefeated season like we’re having is unheard of. Okay, for a little perspective: The most wins in a row in Spokane high school baseball history, before our team this year, was 13, back in 1954! 1954! Wasn’t Teddy Roosevelt president then or something? And get this, that 1954 team was from Gonzaga Prep, and they didn’t even go undefeated that season—they lost in the semifinals of the city play-offs.

  So the answer to the question “What is going on?” is that we are—Thompson’s baseball team!!

  Still, I have to admit it, the rest of life at school is happening too. But it’s been three days since the “Coming Out” article hit the newsstands at Thompson H.S. Three days since my HIV test. So far as I can tell, nobody has ID’d Travis, nor has he gone any more public. Truthfully, the excitement caused by the article has quieted down a little bit. Although the question of Who’s the gay guy? is still a semi-hot topic in the cafeteria and hallways, mostly it’s not angry, more like just curious.

  Actually, more and more students have started to notice what we’re doing in baseball—we got a big write-up in this morning’s Spokane Herald. The article even mentioned me and two other seniors by name. It was pretty cool. We’re getting a little bit famous. Of course, that also means more pressure.

  It’s just before our game today. I’ve been hoping that t
he whole gay thing has maybe died away completely, but as we’re changing, getting suited up, Willie Brown, our second baseman, and Tom Archer, our left fielder, joke about the article.

  “It’s not one of you guys, is it?” Matt Tompkins asks, gruff and serious.

  “Not me,” Tom says, laughing, “but I think Willie might be yer man.”

  “That true?” Matt asks, turning toward Willie and squaring up.

  “No way!” Willie says. He’s a full head shorter and probably twenty-five or thirty pounds lighter than Matt. “I’m no fag!”

  “Hey.” Josh Williams’s voice comes from the other side of the bank of lockers. He steps around and stands looking at all of us. “Fag is derogatory slang,” he says. “It’s offensive.”

  “Sorry,” Willie says.

  Josh plays center field on our team and is also team captain. He’s a senior and a three-year letterman in football, basketball, and baseball, a pretty fantastic athlete. He’s also an excellent student. Josh is popular in the sense of being widely known in our school. How many really close friends he has I don’t know. I never see him out much. Travis and I always call him Josh Flanders behind his back, after the Flanders family on The Simpsons. Led by the dad, Ned, they’re the perfect “All-American” family, the opposite of the Simpsons. For the Flanders family, who are always happy and successful, “darn” is a swear word. That’s Josh Williams—scary, squeaky clean. If it’s possible to be too good … Josh is that. I often feel a little less than fresh when Josh is around, and when it comes to moral certainty and self-assurance, nobody is about to step up against Captain Josh.