Out of Left Field

by Kris Hui Lee

  Carrot tosses me another ball. This time I throw a slider. He fouls it over the first baseline, nearly taking out Cody’s head.

  “Dude, you trying to sabotage my entire baseball career?” Cody calls.

  “Yeah, I thought that was Santino’s job,” Sara says.

  Joey points the bat at me. “She pitched it.”

  “You know, instead of trying to blame everything on me, you could apologize,” I suggest.

  “What does apologize mean?” Joey asks.

  I reposition the ball in my hand for a curve ball. “Ready to be struck out?”

  “You wish.”

  Curve balls are my pitch. Every pitcher’s got one—the pitch they throw better than the rest. Most pitchers’ curves have an 11–5 trajectory, like on the hands of a clock, because it’s difficult to get a perfectly vertical 12–6 drop. Thanks to Nick, I’ve got the 12–6 nailed. Back in his pitching days, Nick could throw his curve so it looked like it was going to be a straight shot down the middle of the plate, but at the last second, it would drop. It was his pitch, and consequently it became mine.

  I like to save this pitch for special occasions, like striking Joey out. I align my feet, wind up, and throw.

  Joey doesn’t swing.

  “Strike three!” I shout. “Suck it.”

  “That was a ball!”

  “It was a strike!”

  “Nuh-uh!”

  “Uh-huh!”

  “Looked like a strike from over here,” Jiro says from the outfield.

  “Thank you,” I say. I look at Joey. “Jiro says it was a strike. So it was a strike.”

  “Cody!” Joey calls, seeking confirmation.

  “Sorry, man, I think it was a strike.”

  I point at him. “I always knew I liked you.”

  Cody salutes me with a grin, and Joey throws the bat on the ground and sulks to the outfield.

  “Someone call the waaambulance,” Sara calls after him. “We’ve got a crybaby on the field.”

  “Shut up, Fox.”

  “Maybe I should ask Chizz for a spot on the team,” I tease him. It comes out as a joke, but as soon as the words are out of my mouth, I realize how much I actually want to. I mean, I did strike out Joey.

  Joey scoffs. “Like I said, gonna have to kill me first.”

  Despite his protests, I continue pitching, racking up strike after strike (although if you ask him for his account of the day, he’ll likely say otherwise). We hardly notice that two hours pass until after Carrot runs a victory lap around the bases for hitting a home run and says, “Did anyone else hear the earthquake in my stomach?”

  That draws all our attention to how hungry and thirsty we are. The sun is up high, beating down on us. Sweat drips down my neck and back. Time to call it quits.

  Joey, Carrot, and Jiro, who live on the other side of the subdivision, leave together, singing “Bohemian Rhapsody” at the top of their lungs.

  I tell Sara and Moriarty to go on without me, because I’m going to try and find that ball Joey hit into the pond. I’m pretty sure it landed toward the edge of the water, and I’m not one to let a perfectly good baseball sink into a pile of mud. It takes a good five minutes of wrestling some surprisingly ferocious cattails and getting a mixture of muck and pond water in my shoes for me to retrieve it.

  It also gives me a moment to dwell on who’s going to take Cody’s spot in the sectionals game. Since Sara jokingly nominated me for the position, I can’t help but wonder what that would be like.

  I was four the first time I played ball at the sandlot. Nick, who was six at the time, was starting Little League, and my dad wanted him to be the pitcher. Nick, even then, wasn’t the kind of person who liked to be the center of attention. He’d rather be in the bleachers cheering for his friends. But, as it turned out, Nick was a natural.

  I don’t know what it was about seeing my big brother on the mound that inspired me. I do know, in those first couple of years of him owning the Little League strike zone, I wanted to be like him. He had a pitching arm gifted to him by God, but he dragged his feet to every game, threw tantrums before practices, and often bargained to clean the entire house twice a week if he could quit baseball.

  Sure, he grew out of the reluctance eventually, but he never loved baseball as much as I do, which is ironic, considering he led the Corrington baseball team to the state title his senior year. Even though I love baseball in a way he never did, I lack the guts it takes to carry the responsibility of being a pitcher. Hence, the only place I ever pitch is at the sandlot, where my only real responsibility is to show up. And even then, showing up is optional.

  I trudge out of the murky pond with the muddied baseball in my hand.

  “Thought you might have drowned.”

  I’m surprised to find that Cody is waiting for me.

  “Was that fun for you?” I ask, kicking some pondweed off my left shoe. “Watching me struggle? Thanks for the help by the way. I really appreciate it.”

  He lifts his casted arm a few inches. “Sorry. Out of order.”

  I frown at him. “What happened to getting that ass hat removed?”

  “Doctor said he could only fix the fractured wrist. Couldn’t do anything about the ass hat. Sorry.”

  I sigh and shake my head. “Why are you even still here?”

  He holds out a clean baseball. He tosses it to me, making me drop the other ball to catch it. “I wanna show you something.”

  I narrow my eyes. “Show me what?”

  He gives me a sly grin that makes me even more suspicious but also curious. Then he grabs my hand with his good one, which catches my heart off guard. It skips about ten beats before my brain reminds it to start pumping again. I hardly register him pulling me to the pitcher’s mound, too focused on the warmth of his calloused hand. My hand is all like, Boy hand. Boy fingers. BOY. And my frontal lobe is like, Don’t be stupid, hand. It’s just Cody.

  Okay, so maybe when I said I’d rather be stung to death by rabid jellyfish than like him, I kind of lied. Ninety-nine percent of the time, I’m down with the jellyfish. But the other one percent of the time, when my hormones betray me like this, getting cozy with him seems so much more comfortable.

  But then I remember how painfully awful it was when Joey and Sara weren’t talking to each other, and how when they finally started talking to each other again, their interactions were filled with passive-aggressive gestures and angry stares.

  Besides, I’ve held hands with Cody before. We’ve touched before. You can’t see someone basically every day for eleven years and not have touched at least once.

  But this is different! my hand protests.

  Shut up, my brain says.

  Cody drops my hand. He gestures for me to stand at the center of the mound.

  I try to get a read for what he’s thinking, but his face is neutral.

  “Pretend you’re going to pitch.”

  “Why?”

  “Just do it, okay? I’m trying to help you.”

  Deciding to trust him, I position the ball in my hand, set my feet into the mound, and bring the ball to my chest. I’m about to pivot my foot when Cody grabs my right shoulder with his good hand.

  “You have the worst posture I’ve ever seen on a pitcher.”

  I relax my muscles and let my hands drop to my side as I frown at him. “‘Do what I say,’ he said. ‘I’m trying to help you,’ he said,” I mimic.

  He laughs. “I’m getting there.” He walks around to stand behind me, his hand still resting on me. My brain preemptively tells my shoulder to shut up. He pulls back, showing me how badly I was slouching. Then he moves his hand to my left shoulder and does the same.

  “Big difference, right?” Before I can answer, he continues, “And when you lift your leg, keep your spine straight. You’re always slouching like an old lady
.”

  I suddenly feel really self-conscious about pitching—which hasn’t happened in recent memory. Why is he doing this? To be patronizing? To make himself feel better about his fractured wrist?

  “It’s basic Pitching 101,” he says. “That’s the first thing they teach you at pitching camp.”

  “I went to pitching camp.”

  “Yeah, like, eons ago. Clearly you’ve forgotten everything they taught you.” He lets go of my shoulder and circles around to my front. “Okay, now pretend you’re going to throw.”

  I don’t say any of the sarcastic remarks or ask any of the very valid questions going through my mind. I just do what he says. I get into the stance, pivot my foot, bring up my knee and elbows, take my stride—

  “Okay, stop,” he says, grabbing my pitching arm to keep me from throwing.

  Now we’re in the very awkward position of me midpitch, with my leg outstretched, my left arm in front, my right arm in back, and him standing next to me with his hand on my bicep.

  What the hell is going on?

  He moves my elbow back so it’s aligned with my shoulder. Then he takes my left arm in front and aligns it with home plate. “Elbow alignment. Important. It’ll help your control.”

  This is all too much. Cody keeps his pitching secrets under a Fort Knox–level lockdown. If he starts telling me how he throws a killer changeup, I might have to tell his parents that the aliens have replaced their son with a doppelgänger.

  I retract my limbs and stare at him dumbfounded.

  He laughs. “Nick taught you well, but you’ve never had an actual coach. You’ve got all sorts of bad habits.”

  “But why did you…?”

  He shrugs.

  I backhand his shoulder. “Don’t shrug. Why are you giving me a pitching lesson?”

  “Isn’t it obvious?”

  “Obviously not obvious if I’m asking you why.”

  “I thought you’d like some pointers before you try out to be my replacement.”

  My heart slams to a stop. Did Cody Kinski just suggest I take his place? Hell.

  I must have disbelief slapped all over my face because Cody laughs a little and says, “I know you want to.”

  “I was joking,” I say totally unconvincingly.

  He smiles. “I’ve known you for forever. You wouldn’t give up the chance to show up a bunch of guys. And I also know that this”—he gestures to the sandlot—“isn’t enough for you.”

  This is all true. But taking his spot on the team is daunting. He’s Cody Kinski. Iron-Arm Kinski. Me pitching in his wake is laughable. Sure, I play ball recreationally way more than the average person, but no way have I logged enough competitive hours or gone to nearly enough training camps to play on Chizz’s team. No matter how the scene might play out in my imagination, in reality, I’d walk onto the field at tryouts, and every last person alive will die of laughter.

  Would it be nice to be standing on the mound, smack in the center of the infield, taking down the patriarchy with my killer arm, crowd cheering as I pitch us to victory? Yeah, probably.

  But then there’s the other possibility: choking. Completely screwing up. That’s too much pressure.

  I mean, I know I’m good. But I’m not Iron-Arm Kinski good. Not good enough to carry the weight of expectation that comes with playing at sectionals. Maybe for a regular season game that doesn’t have much consequence (and let me emphasize maybe), but this is asking too much.

  The hypothetical idea of playing on Chizz’s team might be alluring, but in reality, I couldn’t do it. The proof of that reality is in the scoreboard of the last softball game I ever played. I will never get the image of that scoreboard out of my mind.

  “That is all…very…ridiculous,” I tell Cody unconvincingly.

  The corners of his lips turn up. He starts off the field. “Not that ridiculous.”

  I stand on the mound for a moment, taking all this in, before following him.

  I don’t want to believe him.

  But even more than that, I do.

  4

  Right before we’re about to leave for dinner with Abram, an email pops into my school inbox. It’s a mass email to the entire school from the Corrington High School Athletic Department. Subject: Varsity pitching tryouts Monday 3:45.

  It’s obviously meant for guys who are already on the varsity team or who are on the fresh-soph or JV teams.

  Not for outsiders and not for girls.

  “Marnie!” Mom calls from downstairs. “You ready to go? We’re leaving in five!”

  I look down at the sweatpants and tank top I put on after my shower. I shut my laptop and get up to rummage through my closet. I don’t suppose throwing on a T-shirt will suffice. Not for Mom, who’s big on good first impressions and who has been desperately trying to get some nicer clothes in my closet for the last five years.

  I find a pair of black skinny jeans and a red tunic top I borrowed from Sara and never gave back. Downstairs, Mom is in a panic, trying to find her keys, get Nick to put on a tie, and fix her bun. Hoping to avoid any criticism of my haphazard fashion choices, I slip past her as she sics Dad on Nick, and I head to the car in the garage.

  Later, on the way to the restaurant, I confer with the familial unit about my dilemma.

  “On the one hand,” I say, after telling them the situation, “I could play for real on a real team in a real game—I mean, if I can even get on the team and if girls are even allowed to play on a boys’ team. But on the other hand, I don’t do well in real games.”

  Silence fills the car as the three of them mull this over. I know we’re thinking about a very specific day—May 30, almost exactly twenty-four months ago, my freshman year of high school. Sara and I were the only two freshmen to make the varsity softball team, her for her mad sprint times, me for my arm. We’d made it to regionals, mostly due to Brynn Loren, who had a .810 batting average (the second highest nationally) and was known as not only our cleanup batter, but as our janitorial queen. She cleared the bases like it was nobody’s business. If she was on the opposing team and I had to pitch against her, I’d probably run the other way.

  In the seventh inning of that game, after I let two batters get on base and the third hit a three-run homer, I really did run the other way. Away from softball. Away from competitive sports. Away from team sports. Away from my teammates. Even though they all patted me on the back, saying, “It’s cool, Marnie. It wasn’t your fault,” I knew it was. Home runs always felt like my fault.

  In Little League, I got upset when we lost, but those feelings would go away after a bowl of ice cream and some video games. After that regionals game, I was below rock bottom for nearly two months. I don’t know why I let it get to me so much. Maybe it was because I hate losing or because I hated that thirteen other girls lost because of me or because it was a reminder that I wasn’t good enough or maybe it was all of the above.

  “No harm in trying out,” Dad says. Of course that’s what Dad would say. Dad would do anything to have a kid on the team again. He would never admit it, but I know he misses coming to our games, setting up the lawn chairs off the sidelines, drinking an iced coffee, and chatting up other players’ parents.

  “Chizz probably wants someone on the team,” Nick says. “Or someone from JV.”

  “But he sent an email to the entire school,” I remind him.

  “Probably ’cause he couldn’t figure out how to send it to only the guys on the teams. As I recall, Chizz and technology are like oil and water. Anyway, the tryouts are likely for backup in case the relief pitchers fall through.”

  “We’ve only got one relief pitcher.” It was a gamble on Chizz’s part, having only one backup. He didn’t want anyone but Cody on the mound. But if need be, Ray Torres would step up. Except, he’s pitched only two games the entire season. Jiro is technically a relief pitcher too, but h
e’s never pitched a game this season.

  “To be honest,” Nick says, “I think the guys who are on the baseball teams—varsity or JV—will get priority over, well…you.”

  “Spoken like a male baseball player,” Dad teases. “Marnie, you should try out. To hell with the boys. We all know what an arm you’ve got. And hey, I’m sure Chizz would love to have a Locke on the team again.”

  “A Nick Locke,” I say. “Not a Marnie Locke.”

  Back in his day, Nick was the Cody Kinski of the Corrington baseball team—the pitcher with a reputation to make the opposing team quiver in their cleats. Chizz loved Nick so much, I honestly thought he might propose. When I got to high school, Chizz probably thought I’d be as badass as Nick, but he found out I’m mostly just a pain in the ass.

  Dad looks over his shoulder from the front seat. “Like I said, no harm.”

  “Except being laughed in the face by a bunch of egotistical jocks,” I say.

  “Hey, you’ve grown up with Nick, Joey, and Cody,” Dad reminds me. “Surely you’ve developed a thick enough layer of skin.”

  Trying out for the baseball team would be the real test of that.

  I’m about to ask Nick how he would’ve reacted if a girl tried out for his team, but a song I don’t know comes on the radio, and Nick says, “Oh, hey, I love this song. Turn it up.”

  The conversation ends.

  All the while, Mom stays silent in the driver’s seat, her eyes fixed on the road ahead, focusing on anything but me talking about trying out for the baseball team. Let’s just say Mom got the short end of the stick when it comes to having common interests with her daughter. Based on the photographs from her college days and the conversations I’ve overheard with her girlfriends, she would’ve rather had a daughter who liked to go shopping, have makeover nights, and watch rom coms with her. Sometimes I think she feels cheated. Dad got two kids who inherited his athleticism, his love for baseball, his sense of humor, his tallness, and his big brown eyes. All Nick inherited from Mom was her neat-freak tendencies, and all I got was her reddish-brown hair. I didn’t even get the waves. Dad taught me how to bat and throw, and, well, Mom never even got a chance to teach me how to use a straightener.