Rounding Third

Rounding

Third

“Another solid
addition to the growing canon of gay teen lit. I’ve been wondering when someone
would write a book about the gay teen experience for athletes—a sort of Take Me
Out for gay teens. This just may be it!”

—Brent Hartinger

author of Geography
Club and The Order of the Poison Oak

“From the opening
sentence, Rounding Third resonates with readers. Gay, straight, young, old,
avid athletes or non-fans—all will find something to relate to, and learn from,
in this compelling and important story.”

 —Dan Woog

author of the Jocks
series and syndicated

GLBT sports columnist
(“The OutField”)

Rounding

Third

Walter G. Meyer

MaxM

LTD

Rounding Third

Copyright © 2009 Walter G. Meyer. All rights reserved.

ISBN 978-0-9825132-0-0

Cover photograph and author photograph by Joseph Panwitz.

Book and cover design by David Maxine.

First Printing

September, 2009

www.waltergmeyer.com

MaxM LTD.

Progress
always involves risks.  You can't steal second base and keep your foot on
first.  ~Frederick B. Wilcox

                       
1

“Why do you even bother coming out for the
team, you worthless little faggot?” Danny Taylor demanded as he slammed Bobby’s
head into the cemetery fence again. “You’re not going to play any more than you
did last year. You’re just in the way!” Taylor hit Bobby again, and this time
Danny’s ring dug into Bobby’s forehead. Bobby could feel the skin tearing above
his eyebrow.

    
Taylor backhanded Bobby so hard his head spun into the wrought iron posts.
Bobby staggered sideways, grabbing the cemetery fence to keep from falling.

Taylor slapped Corey Brickman on the arm and
they both laughed. They walked back to Brickman’s pimped-out Camaro and got in.
Brickman spun the tires to spit gravel as the car fishtailed off the shoulder
and back onto Route 303.

Bobby propped himself up against the fence
and tried to catch his breath. He looked through the bars at the generations of
dead ancestors and wondered if they were laughing at him, too. He picked his
iPod out of the tall weeds.

    
Bobby didn’t want his parents to see him, at least not until the bleeding
stopped, so instead of heading straight home, he turned down McKinley Road away
from his house and kept running.

As Bobby continued running, the sweat stung
in his cuts, and once he had to use his shirttail to wipe the trickle of blood
out of his eye.

He had hoped this year might be different.
The new kid on the team smiled at Bobby and had actually said hello a couple of
times. Today Bobby had resolved to speak to him and found the boy was friendly.
It was that shred of hope which motivated Bobby to really try his best in the
scrimmage game at practice.

He had been so concerned with impressing the
new guy that he hadn’t considered how Danny Taylor would take being
embarrassed. He hadn’t set out to embarrass anyone, that was just sort of a
side effect, and, as bad as his face hurt, it was almost worth it to see the
look on Taylor’s face when, thanks to Bobby’s base stealing, a runner scored.

Danny was the captain and quarterback of the
football team, and although not the captain of the baseball team, he was the
shortstop and unquestionably the leader of the tightest clique on the team.
Danny had the movie-star kind of good looks that seemed only possible with the
aid of good lighting and make-up. He attracted the attention of everyone, male
or female, as soon as he entered a room. Bobby had watched people fawn over
Danny since they were in the first grade together. “Oh, Mrs. Taylor, your son
is sooo handsome...” It was the kind of adulation that had helped Danny grow
into the most insufferable asshole in school, which, given some of the other
competition, was quite an accomplishment.

In spite of, or perhaps because of, Taylor’s
arrogance, he always had a flock of disciples around him as though some of his
greatness might drop to the ground and they could snatch it up. The first day
of baseball practice in tenth grade Bobby had glanced over at Danny. His
radiance was such it was hard not to stare, and Bobby was met with a slap to
the face and the question, “What are you staring at, faggot?” There was so much
threat and malice in the voice that ever since Bobby had averted his eyes in
the presence of the young prince.

    
He had learned long before that when you were his size   
getting in the way of Taylor and his kind often meant kissing a locker, so he
stayed away from them as much as possible. As Bobby’s grandmother used to say,
“The nail that sticks up is the one that gets hammered down.”

As Bobby ran, his face stinging, he had
plenty of time to reflect on the futility and stupidity of having called
attention to himself at practice. The grandstanding seemed like the thing to do
at the time, but now any chance he had of fitting in on the team was gone. He
marveled how he had once again managed to fall so quickly out of step. Although
he often suspected that he was the only one doing the right step, and everyone
else was out of sync.

                  
   
2

“Shit sauna.” It was probably not the best
way to start a conversation with the new guy at the beginning of practice, but
when Bobby saw him exit the green port-a-john that was the first thing that
came to mind.

The new player was slipping his hand into his
baseball glove as the plastic door twanged shut behind him.

    
“It stinks really bad,” Bobby continued. “That’s why we use the woods.” Bobby
jerked his head toward the trees beyond the leftfield fence.

    
“I was wondering what was going on back there.” The new kid fumbled to get his
glove off his right hand to shake. “I’m Josh Schlagel.”

“I know.” Bobby had noticed him on the first
day of school last fall. New kids weren’t that common at Harrisonburg High,
although the new housing developments were changing that. “Bob Wardell,” Bobby
said at the same moment that Danny Taylor sent a ball soaring over the right
field fence. Bobby had said his name so quietly it had been swallowed in the
cheer that accompanied the batting practice homerun.

“Nice to meet you, Rob,” Josh said.

“You, too,”
Bobby said, looking down. He liked the way it sounded to be called
Rob
instead of
Bob
. His parents still called him
Bobby
, and he wished
they would drop the ‘y’ now that he was seventeen, but since his father was
Bob
,
they still called him
Bobby
.

“What position do you play?” Josh asked.

    
“Left out.”

    
“Left outfield?” questioned Josh.

    
“No, left out. As in, I don’t play. That’s my end of the dugout,” Bobby said, pointing
to the far end of the bench down the first base line. They called it a dugout
although it was just a bench not lowered into the ground and lacked a covering
of any kind.
 
“I hear you
might start the first game,” Bobby said. “You should. You’re good. I’ve watched
you throw smoke in practice.” 

    
“Thanks.”

Their nervousness was growing into a silence
between them.

Both were relieved when Coach Hudson called
out in his nasal Southern wail, “Huddle up!”

They trotted over to join the team. Coach Hudson
announced the starting line-up for the Harrisonburg Hawks’ first game: Josh
Schlagel would start on the mound. There was some grumbling, mainly by Danny
Taylor, that Buff Beechler should have started, but Bobby didn’t hear Buff
complain. Beechler was one of the few seniors on the team and certainly the
largest, hairiest student at the high school, quite probably in the state of
Ohio, and possibly the world. His nickname,
Water Buffalo,
had been
shortened by overuse to just
Buff
.

After giving the line-ups, Hudson said,
“We’re going to play a five-inning inter-squad game to get us ready for
Belleville next week. The starters will be the A team. The rest of you will be
the B team. Since B will be a man short, Beechler, you’ll play left for the A
team and first for the B team; when you’re batting we’ll get you a sub.” Josh
was to play first for the A team to save his arm for the opener.

    
Bobby was thinking these line-ups would leave them an outfield of pitchers and
him as the only semi-experienced infielder on the B Team besides Buff. Not a
good thing.

Harrisonburg High wasn’t so large as to
require even having cuts for most of the teams. If anyone showed up for
practice and tried, they were pretty much entitled to a spot, even though it
might be clear that they were never going to play. The baseball team had only
seventeen players, so aside from the starters and five pitchers, Bobby was one
of only three extra fielders.

    
Hudson’s next announcement caused even more concern: “To make sure everyone plays
hard, the losing team will run two laps.”

    
“Yeah!” Danny Taylor laughed.

    
“And since the A team should have the advantage, win or lose, for every run the
B team scores, the A team will run a lap.”

    
“What?” Danny asked.

    
“You didn’t hear me, Taylor?” Coach Hudson demanded in his southern twang. “For
you, it’ll be two laps per run.” Hudson appeared to be a large man at a
distance, but up close, most men would have stood taller than him. Most men,
but not Bobby. Hudson’s age could have been between thirty and fifty and his
thickness made it hard to tell if his body was muscle, fat, or muscle that had
turned to fat. Rumor had it that Hudson had played minor league ball in Arizona
or New Mexico or someplace out west, but Hudson never mentioned it or told any
baseball stories. He never talked much more than the matter at hand so no one
seemed to know if he had a wife or kids or if he had a life off the field.

The threatened laps meant laps not just
around the field, but around the campus, which included the baseball field,
football stadium and all of the academic buildings. And up two pretty good
hills, or at least what passed for hills in northern Ohio. A lap was just under
a mile on the path worn to dirt by the many teams that used it for their
training runs.