The Best Bad Luck I Ever Had (11 page)

Emma saw them too. “Something wrong, Dit?”

I shook my head again.

Mrs. Seay eventually arrived to tell us that school had been dismissed for the day. Her hat had blown off her head, and her pale cheeks were rosy with excitement. When the boys came back with the gas, me and Emma pushed our way to the front of the crowd. We stood beside the wings of the plane, stroking the shiny metal.

I saw Elbert across the way and waved. He waved back till he saw Emma standing next to me. Then he frowned and turned away.

Before I could decide what to make of that, the pilot jumped onto the wing. He stood up, balanced himself with outstretched arms and poured the gasoline into a hidden tank. When he was finished, he jumped down right next to me and Emma.

“You like planes?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” Emma answered.

“Maybe you’ll get to take a ride someday.”

Emma’s eyes shone. “I sure hope so.”

The pilot winked at us, then Big Foot and Dr. Griffith forced all the children back.

“Hold her tight,” the pilot instructed the grown-ups, “till I’m ready to go.”

Big Foot, Dr. Griffith, Mr. Walker and Pa held on to the wings of the plane. The pilot spun the propeller and the engine sprang to life with a mighty roar.

The pilot climbed back into the cockpit, adjusted his controls and gave a thumbs-up. The men let go and scattered. The plane shot forward, slowly lifting off the ground.

It headed straight for a grove of trees.

“He’s not gonna make it!” Mrs. Pooley cried. She covered her eyes.

But at the last moment, the plane rose up and just brushed the top of the branches.

“What a relief!” Mrs. Seay sighed. “I was afraid he was going to crash.”

But as I walked home, I didn’t feel relieved. I felt worried. Worried that the days of keeping my friends separate were just about over.

20

 

 

 

THE DAY AFTER THE PLANE CAME TO town, I convinced Emma to give baseball another try. I sent her way out in right field, and for the first two innings not a ball came near her. Then Elman hit a ground ball and Emma actually managed to pick it up and throw it to first. She grinned like a horse with a mouthful of sugar. Of course, by that point Elman had already made it to third, but it was a start.

By the time she got up to bat, however, Emma was no longer smiling.

“You okay, Emma?” I asked.

“Dit, I can’t do this.” Her hands trembled.

“Sure you can,” I said as I handed her a bat and pushed her toward home plate. “It’s easy,” I said, though she was holding the bat all wrong.

Raymond threw the first pitch. It was a nice, slow ball. Emma winced and jumped to one side.

“Strike one,” cried Buster. He was catching, and Chip was on first. They hadn’t made no kissing noises or girlfriend jokes at school that day. Maybe I’d been wrong about them whispering about me and Emma when the plane landed.

Raymond threw the next pitch. It was nice and easy again. Emma swung, missing the ball by a mile.

“Strike two!” Buster sounded pleased.

“Emma,” Raymond yelled. “I’m trying to make it easy for you!”

Emma bit her lip. Raymond pitched again. Any gentler and the ball would have dropped out of the air. Emma swung so hard, she fell to the ground.

“Strike three. You’re out!” Buster yelled.

Emma left the bat on the ground and walked back to the circle of old stumps we used as our dugout.

“Don’t worry, Emma,” Pearl said before taking her turn at bat. “Nobody hits the ball every time.”

Emma started to cry.

“You’ll hit it next time,” I said without much conviction, watching the tears drip off her chin onto the dusty ground.

“Next time,” Emma spat, wiping her nose. “There’s not going to be a next time.”

There was a loud crack. We looked over. Pearl was sliding into first base.

“Even Pearl can do it,” Emma moaned. “Why do you think I’m so good at reading? It’s because I can’t do anything else!”

She was probably right, but I didn’t think it would make her feel better to hear me say it. I stood watching her cry, unsure what to do.

Mitch, the slow boy, lumbered over to her and put his arm around her. “Don’t cry, little Emma,” he said as if talking to a puppy. “I ain’t no good at reading.”

Emma hiccuped and gave a little giggle. Mitch’s face broke into its usual grin. I felt all churned up inside, like milk before it turns to butter. Mitch had found a way to comfort Emma, while I just stood there like a fool.

I was up to bat next. Raymond was a decent pitcher, but I could usually get a single or maybe even a double off of him. He threw a fastball, but I knew I could hit it, so I started to swing.

“Girlfriend,” muttered Buster, just loud enough for me to hear.

I was thrown off balance and the ball snapped into his glove. In a loud voice he called, “Strike one.”

The next pitch was a curveball. Soon as I swung again, Buster whispered, “Saw you with her.”

Strike two.

I turned to face him this time. “What’d you say?”

“Nothing.”

Buster exchanged a glance with Chip on first, and I knew it wasn’t just about baseball. But I didn’t know what to do. Raymond was waiting and everyone was watching me, so finally, I just stepped back up to home plate.

Raymond threw the ball.

Buster hissed, “Nigger lover,” but this time, I hit the ball. Might even have been a triple, but instead of running, I threw down my bat.

“Say it again,” I yelled. “Say it to my face!”

“Say what?” said Buster with a smirk.

I slugged him. Hit him right in his nose. He staggered but didn’t fall over, so I punched him in the stomach. He jumped me then, and even though we were the same size, he was stronger from working all summer. It might have gone pretty bad for me, ’cept the one good thing about having so many brothers and sisters is there’s always someone to pull you out of a fight.

Before I knew what was happening, Raymond and Elman were holding me and Chip had Buster. Blood was running down Buster’s nose, and I knew I’d have a black eye. Emma had disappeared and Pearl was crying and I didn’t know if I was mad at Buster or Chip or Mitch or Emma or even myself. I only knew that even though I had hit the ball, I had most definitely struck out.

21

 

 

 

THE NEXT DAY AT SCHOOL CHIP ASKED Mrs. Seay if he could switch desks and go sit with Buster. Mrs. Seay gave me a funny look, but I didn’t say nothing and Buster didn’t have a desk partner, so finally she nodded. Chip didn’t look at me as he walked back to our desk and collected his things. We’d sat together since third grade.

The rest of the day, I could see Mrs. Seay talking, but I couldn’t hear nothing. The empty space beside me was like a whirlpool, sucking away all my thoughts, getting louder and louder, till all I could hear was its roar.

After school, I rushed through my chores. I didn’t dare show my face at the baseball game, and I wasn’t ready to face Emma, so I decided to pay Elbert a visit. I was gonna put my problems at school out of my mind and focus on the Fourth hunt. Since my plan with the rabbits hadn’t worked out too well, I was gonna collect me some scrap metal. With the war going on, Ulman said if you were willing to put in the time collecting old bottle caps and wire, you could be rich. Maybe I could convince Elbert to ditch the store for an afternoon and help me out.

But Elbert wasn’t too enthusiastic when I ran the idea by him. “Haven’t seen you around much, Dit,” he said as he swept off the porch outside of the barbershop.

“I’ve been busy.” Felt a little bad about that. Even if Elbert couldn’t go fishing as much as he’d used to, I could’ve stopped by just to say hello. Afraid I couldn’t remember the last time I’d done that.

“Busy with that Emma girl?” He didn’t look up from his sweeping.

“She’s all right, Elbert.”

“What happened to your eye?”

I was annoyed ’cause I knew he’d heard about it. “Got in a fight. Why weren’t you at the game anyway?”

“Don’t have time for games. You know I’ve been helping out my pa. Getting pretty good at cutting hair too.”

Took a long look at Elbert then. He was only fifteen, but suddenly he seemed a lot older. He was taller, his shoulders were broader and I’ll be a monkey’s uncle if there wasn’t fuzz on his upper lip and chin. Elbert had gone and grown himself a beard!

“You aren’t sweet on her, are you?” he asked.

“What?” Elbert had been talking, but I guess the whirlpool was still roaring in my head, ’cause I hadn’t heard a word.

“Emma,” he repeated. “You ain’t sweet on her?”

“No.”

“Good. Whites and Negras shouldn’t be sweet on each other,” Elbert said firmly.

“I thought your grandpa was a white man?” I asked.

Elbert froze like he’d just spied a copperhead, about to strike. “Who told you that?” he whispered.

“My pa.”

Elbert took a step closer. His mouth screwed up like he’d bit into an old lemon. “I ain’t supposed to talk about it.”

“Come on, Elbert.”

He rolled the broom handle back and forth in his hands. “My grandpa was a white man, a big plantation owner. Took my grandma out in the woods and nine months later she had my pa.”

“Without being married or nothing?” I said. My voice sounded too loud.

Elbert shook his head. “And guess who the man was.”

“Who?”

“You can’t tell no one.”

“I won’t.”

Elbert took a deep breath, then lowered his voice till I could barely hear him. “Big Foot’s daddy.”

“Big Foot’s your uncle?”

“Shhh!” Elbert glanced around, though we were alone on the street. “You can’t tell no one or there’ll be trouble.”

“I promise.”

We were both quiet for a while, then Elbert asked, “So you sure you ain’t sweet on that Emma?”

“She ain’t my girlfriend,” I said firmly. Then an awful thought occurred to me. “Are you sweet on her?”

“No,” said Elbert.

“Good.” I felt more relieved than I expected. Finally I blurted out, “You gonna help me get rich or not?”

Elbert sighed. “My pa is over at the church. Really should ask him if . . .”

“Aw, shoot, Elbert. You know he’ll be busy there all afternoon.”

Elbert smiled then, the old familiar smile I remembered. “Sure,” he said. “Give me a minute to close up and then let’s go find us some scrap metal.”

22

 

 

NEXT DAY AFTER SCHOOL, DOC HALEY was back at the shop and Elbert was busy giving Reverend Cannon a shave and shoe shine, so I went off to collect some scrap metal by myself. While I was pulling some wire out of a tree, I stumbled onto an old nest. In the nest were some owl pellets. I broke them apart with a stick and poked at the skeletons of mice the owl had swallowed whole, digested and then spit back up.