The Pitcher by William Hazelgrove

Author:William Hazelgrove
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Koehler Books
Published: 2013-01-17T16:00:00+00:00

23

I’M ON THE PORCH READING about Zambrano getting ninety million bucks for pitching for the Cubs. So that got me thinking. Back in the seventies they didn’t pay dudes that much, but the Pitcher played a long time. Now they pay guys a million bucks who never even play. Back then players played for teams and free agency hadn’t cranked up salaries to where players are now “banks” as the Pitcher called them. I figure Mom isn’t going to the doctor because we don’t have the money. And if the Pitcher played in the majors for like twenty-five years … anyway, I figure it’s worth a shot

So I pick up the medical bills and walk across the street. Shortstop doesn’t even look up as I stand outside the garage with the papers in my hand. I wipe my hands on my shorts, then knock on the peeling wood. I breathe in the old heated tar of his drive. I can barely hear because my heart is slamming in my chest. I knock again. The ballgame rises up and down like a rainstorm. I chip away some paint from his garage door, then slip under.

I can’t see a thing. It’s like I’m in a dungeon, but then my eyes adjust. I see the Pitcher watching the game. It looks like the Orioles and the Cardinals. I clear my throat.

“Mr. Langford?”

He turns around, then jumps up. He covers his mouth with his hand, blowing smoke into the TV light.

“You throw that goddamn baseball against my garage?”

I shrug.

“Yeah.”

He stares at me like I have just barfed. Bam Bam Bam. My heart is pitching fastballs. The Pitcher stares at me like I’m some kind of alien. Who would do something like that and then come ask for money?

“What in the hell would make you do that?”

“I dunno,” I mumble, shrugging again.

“Well, you must want something to do a rockhead thing like that,” he says as he walks back and stares at the television.

The Cardinals just got a hit and he’s examining the screen like a doctor. I can’t think of anything to say. I really just want to go back outside. But then I think of Mom and don’t move. The Pitcher watches the game up until a commercial, then turns.

“You still here?”

“Yeah.”

“So, what the hell is it you want?”

I stare at Mom’s medical bills gnarled in my hand. And like I’ve never even asked someone for a hundred dollars and now I’m going to ask this dude for seven grand? I really had gone loco as Mom says. Who else would go ask some dude in his garage for money after they wailed a baseball against his door? Nobody. Except Ricky Hernandez. The Pitcher stares at me, trying to decide which part of my head I fell on. I can hear his fan, the ballgame. I can even hear Shortstop breathing.

Then he turns back to the television.

“You want a Coke or something … you look hot.”

“Yeah.”

He walks to his refrigerator and gets a Coke and motions to his footstool.

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