The Truth (3 page)

Then

We get to the ball field forty-five minutes early, as Coach Neville requires. As always, he greets each one of his players as they arrive. He normally gives Devon, his best hitter, an extra big welcome, but this time he seems cautious. I'm sure word's gotten around.

After Devon has joined the other boys, the coach walks up to Mom and me. A look of concern knots up his wide features. “I heard what happened,” he says. “Is he okay? Do you think I should—?”

“He's fine,” I say before Mom can respond. “Just let him play as he normally would. It's better that way.”

The coach nods. “Normal. Yeah, I get that.” He looks at me. “Are
you
okay?”

“I'm fine,” I tell him.

He nods again, then reaches out and gives me a firm handshake. “Damn brave of you, son. I don't know if I'd be able to do it.” He squeezes my shoulder. “Damn brave.” Finally, he turns and walks over to the team. Mom and I head for the minor league field bleachers.

Next year, after he has turned eleven, Devon will move up to Maple Braden Little League's “major league” level. This year, at five foot four, he's already taller than all the other kids playing at the “minor league” level. He's had a monster season. I think the other teams have stopped trying to figure out how to pitch to him and just hope that when he hits the inevitable home run, it doesn't happen at too crucial a moment in the game.

Dad used to say, “Devon believes you're as happy to see him as he is to see you,” and he was right. He's friendly with everyone. Everyone likes Devon. He was the kind of little kid who'd walk up to people he didn't know and say hi. Mom and Dad took special care in explaining the rules to him about talking to strangers.

Devon was seven when our father was killed. When Mom told him, I was right there, trying my best to keep the tears back and stay brave for him. The look of utter heartbreak on his face as he cried in my mother's arms broke my heart. If I'd had any doubts before, from that moment on, I knew it was my job to be there for him. No matter what.

It's what my dad would want.

Normally, after Mom and I have found our places on the bleachers, Terry comes over. But this time I see him talking with Matt, Ben, and Eric. I'm surprised to see them; they never hang out at the Little League ball fields during games—most of the kids from school don't unless they have a brother involved, and even those that do, I don't see them here every game like Terry and I are.

Terry waves for me to come over.

“You want something from the snack bar?” I ask Mom.

“No.” She doesn't look at me. I think she still believes Devon should have stayed home from the game after what happened last night, even if winning this game does give the team a bye in the playoffs, which means time to rest pitching arms. As I approach Terry, Matt, fair haired and wearing the usual tight T-shirt to show off his muscles, steps forward and says, “So this is where you two doofuses hang out during the spring.” He gives me one of his smiles. “I hear your brother's a big home-run hitter, Chris.”

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

“You weren't at school today,” he says. “Terry said you were gonna be here. We wanted to talk to you about what happened.”

I look at Terry. He shrugs and says, “They wanted to know what I knew. I told them it was better if they talked to you themselves.”

“Hey, you're famous now.” Ben gives me a light punch.

“Yeah, right,” I scoff, feeling my face begin to burn.

“I already heard they cleared you. Called it self-defense. That is cool.”

“Cool?”

“How you stood up like that,” Ben says.

“You're gonna tell us all about it, right?” Eric asks.

“Tell…?”

“You're not gonna leave us out of the loop, are you?” Matt says. “We want to hear all about it.” He points his finger like it's a gun and makes a popping sound.

“I…I can't now. Devon's got a game…”

“Well, I figure we could talk some during the game—”

“It's an important game,” I say, sounding lame. “For the playoffs. I should watch.”

Matt looks irritated but then his face bursts into a grin. “Sure,” he says, “we understand. Your brother—what's his name?”

“Devon.”

“Right. It's cool the way you are with him. Especially after your dad died. He must think you're a hero now.”

When I don't respond, Matt asks, “You doing anything this weekend?”

“Don't…don't know.”

“Maybe we can take you out. Then you can tell us all about it.”

“I…I don't think—”

“He's probably got reporters hounding him, big story like that,” Ben says. “You could end up on Fox News talking to Sean Hannity.”

“All right,” Matt says. “Monday at school. Lunchtime.” He's still smiling, but I can tell he's not happy about having to wait. “But we want details.” He leans in. “I'd stay, watch your brother play, but I got a date.” He winks. “I hope he hits a home run.”

Pointing at me again like his finger's a gun, he makes another popping sound then walks away. The others follow him out of the complex.

Terry clears his throat and says, “You going to the snack bar?”

On the way, it seems like everybody we pass is looking at me. Some nod their heads. A few look away.

Terry orders a hot dog. I just get a bottle of water, but when I try to give a dollar to Mrs. Wheat, who runs the snack bar, she pushes it back into my hand. “It's on the house, Chris,” she says. “From now on, it's always on the house.”

She turns to another customer. I look at Terry, shrug, and put the dollar back in my pocket.

On the way back, Jon Roney, a father whose son is also on the team, stops me. “I want to shake your hand,” he says. His grip is too hard, and I try not to wince. “I want you to know—a lot of us want you to know—we're behind you one hundred percent. There are going to be some who'll try to turn this into something else. Don't let them get to you. Guy like that, breaking and entering, who knows what might have happened if you hadn't… You stood up for your family. Hell, you stood up for the whole neighborhood. That was a brave thing you did, son.”

He squeezes my shoulder, then nods and goes back to the bleachers. The people he is sitting with smile in my direction. I don't know what to do, so I smile back.

Is it possible word hasn't gotten around yet that it wasn't just a
guy
; it was a
kid
? Maybe the police are keeping that part quiet. For now.

Terry and I find a place on the bleachers away from other people for the moment. He unwraps his hot dog, takes a bite, and looks out at the field. I look at my bottle of water and decide I'm not thirsty.

We watch the coach hit balls to the team. I catch Terry glancing sideways at me a couple of times. His brother, playing shortstop, makes a nice play on a pop-up, pedaling backward into shallow left field. “Nice catch, Brady!” Terry shouts.

Unlike Devon and me, no one would doubt Terry and Brady are brothers. Like me, Terry is no athlete, but he still shares his brother's reddish-brown hair and wide-eyed demeanor.

Taking a couple more bites, Terry looks at me. “You think Devon's gonna hit another one out tonight?”

“Maybe,” I say. Devon's on a tear. He's hit seven homers in his last five games.

Silence again. Terry finishes his hot dog. I'm thinking I should say something when Terry says, “Hey, are you mad at me?”

I look at him. “About what?”

“Telling those guys you were gonna be here.”

I just shrug. I'm not sure how I feel about it, actually.

“They were asking me questions at school, wondered if I knew anything, and I just told them you'd be here tonight, that they could ask you—”

“It's all right,” I tell him. “No big deal.”

Terry looks at me. “You doing okay?” he asks.

Again, I shrug. “Yeah.”

“I was surprised you were coming tonight.”

“It's important to Devon,” I say. “He
needs
to be here.”

“Everybody's talking about it,” Terry says. “From what I hear, most people think you did the right thing.”

“
Most
people, huh?”

“My dad says you're a hero. Like your father was. A lot of people are saying that.”

The two teams have finished going through their drills. I see Devon trotting toward his team's dugout, a focused look in his eyes, getting his game face on.

“So you're really okay?”

“I don't think it's sunk in yet,” I mutter.

“What do you mean?”

“It still feels like it could have been a bad dream. I'm gonna wake up any minute and things will be back to normal.” It's the same way I felt when Mom told me Dad had been killed and that she was going to need me to be strong for Devon, because he was only seven and it was going to be especially hard on him.

We watch the head coach from each team meeting with the umpire, talking over the ground rules. The other team's coach seems a little intense. His team's tied with ours for second place, so he needs a win to get a bye, like we do. Whoever loses will have to play in the first round.

“What's it like?” Terry asks.

“What?” I say.

I'm glad the sudden cheer as Devon's team takes the field cuts off Terry's response before I get the chance to learn what he meant. I watch Devon take his position at first base. His team's the White Sox.

“I'm gonna go sit with Mom,” I tell Terry.

“Sure. You know my parents; they'll want me sitting with them to start. I'll come over third or fourth inning.”

I walk back to my seat. Mom smiles at me. “Devon seems okay,” she says. “Maybe you were right. This is good, him playing.”

Devon bats cleanup, and when he first comes up, it's the bottom of the first inning. His team has runners on first and second with one out and the other team, the Mariners, is already ahead, 2–0. As a result of Devon's recent spurt of home runs, a group of kids stand on the other side of the outfield fence, shouting for him to hit one out so they can catch it.

Devon hits a ground ball to the second baseman instead, who throws him out at first, moving up the runners. But thanks to a wild pitch on the next batter, Brady, who's on third, comes dashing in. I hear Terry and his parents' cheering above all the others.

His next time up, Devon obliges the chanting kids, launching one of his laser shots high over everyone's head to the T-ball field beyond where, fortunately, no one is playing. After three innings, the White Sox are in the lead for the first time.

Devon gets another hit, a single, in the fifth. But by the time his team comes up for the bottom of the sixth, the last inning, things have gone bad, and the White Sox are facing a six-run deficit.

“This doesn't look good,” I hear Mom mutter under her breath. But she claps her hands and shouts encouragement with the rest of the White Sox fans.

Terry had joined me at the top of the fourth. I hear him repeating, “We can do this, we can do this.” He looks at me. “If they can get a rally going and get to Devon, he could win it with a home run.”

It would take a big rally to get to Devon's spot in the order.

But the boys put together a string of hits, and when Devon comes up, they are trailing by only a run with one out and no one on base. A home run will tie the game.

Everyone's buzzing. The kids are chanting beyond the outfield fence. Devon gets two strikes on him before he hits one long enough to clear the fence, but it's foul. You can hear everyone letting out a collective breath as the pitcher sets himself to throw the next pitch. Devon hits the ball hard. It doesn't clear the fence but he gets a double. So now he's in scoring position, representing the tying run with one out. The next batter walks. Now the tying
and
winning runs are on. The Mariners' coach brings in a new pitcher, the third of the inning. Our next batter comes to the plate. People are cheering, shouting.

He strikes out.

Now there are two outs. The noise of the crowd rises up again as the kid who could be our final batter steps up. I watch Devon lean toward third. He's not allowed to leave the bag until the ball crosses home plate, but he wants to get a good jump.

The batter swings and misses the first pitch. Then he works the count to two and two. The runners get ready. Coach Neville, handling third base, shouts to Devon, “Run on anything!” Devon has an intense look on his face.

The batter swings and hits a ground ball just past the second baseman's reach. A single. The right fielder is there to grab it. Devon's not going to be able to score. But we're still alive. Second place and a bye is still within reach. His coach is telling him to hold up at third. The bases are going to be loaded.

But to everyone's surprise, Devon runs through the coach's stop sign, chugging toward home plate. As big as he is, Devon must look to the catcher like a tank approaching. The right fielder is caught by surprise but recovers quickly and guns the throw. Devon still has a quarter of the way to go when the catcher catches the ball and turns.

Since the catcher has the ball in hand, the runner must slide to try and score. This is so the catcher or runner doesn't get hurt from a collision at the plate.

Devon's not fast, but he's smart and an excellent slider. If he slides to the back part of the plate, maybe he can elude the tag.

But he doesn't slide. Instead, his head goes down and his arms come up like a football tackle about to block, and he slams into the catcher, knocking him onto his back. The ball rolls away.

The impulse is to cheer. Score tied. But the umpire points to Devon and roars, “Illegal collision!
You're out!
” He emphasizes it with a pump of his fist.