High Heat (17 page)

I headed straight for the weight room but stopped short when I saw the rates: three dollars for a single visit, twenty dollars for ten. "You want to do some lifting?" the man at the main counter called out.

"Not now," I said, feeling my empty pocket. "Maybe tomorrow."

"Go on in. Give it a try. See if you like it. In the summer it's free in the mornings to kids under eighteen."

"Really?" I said. "It doesn't say that here."

"It doesn't? Well, it should."

I pushed the door open and stepped inside. There were maybe ten different stations, and at each station there was a chart explaining how to do the lift properly. I started with the bench press. I had nobody to spot me, so I had to keep the weights on the low side and do lots of repetitions, which is the right way to lift anyway. After the bench presses, I worked through squats and curls, all the regular stuff.

It was hard work, but it was good to feel my muscles strain. I'd pump iron, then rest, then pump some more. When I finally looked up at the clock, it was nearly noon. I did two more reverse curls, then hustled to the gym to start my new job.

I was nervous. I'd played basketball in grade school and junior high. I had a decent outside touch, but I wasn't fast enough to play guard, and I wasn't tall enough to play in the front court, so I lost interest. I knew the rules, or at least most of them, but I wasn't sure about the signals for blocking fouls and charges and that sort of thing.

When I stepped onto the Bitter Lake gym, the first guy I saw was Miguel Alvarez. He smiled and called out, "You refereeing too?"

"Yeah," I said, smiling back.

Seeing him made me realize how much I liked the guy.
You could tell he just wanted things to go well for you and that he'd help you if he could. I couldn't think of anybody I'd rather work with.

In the next few minutes, four more "refs" showed up. Two of them were black guys, Abdul and Jonas, who definitely looked like basketball players. There was also a tough-looking girl named Brandy and her friend Carmen. Both had about fifty earrings in each ear, and their clothes reeked of cigarettes. The six of us stood around until a man came onto the court. "Welcome," he called out. "I'm Matthew Falk. You must be my summer refs."

Falk was a young guy with short gray-blond hair. You could tell he was both strong and fast. He had the easy smile of a coach who is used to being liked by all his players. "This week you'll learn how to ref. Starting next week, you'll be assigned to different gyms in the North End. You'll come here, and we'll drive you to wherever your games are. You'll handle three games a day, Monday to Friday. Pay is twelve bucks a game. Any questions?"

That afternoon we shadowed Falk, watching him as he refereed scrimmages. The next day we took turns doing the refereeing, with him supervising. After the first scrimmage, Falk took me aside. "Remember, this is a rec league. Don't call everything. Blow the whistle only if they can't play through the contact."

On day three Miguel and I did better, except Falk said we should have called a technical foul when this little punk slammed the basketball against the wall and shouted, "This game sucks!"

At night I studied the rule book and practiced the moves refs make: hands on the hips for a block, two arms up for a three pointer. Sometimes I'd get dramatic, pretending I was calling an NBA game: Kobe and Shaq and Kidd and Webber. "What are you doing?" Marian called up. "The whole room's shaking down here."

On Monday Miguel and I were on our own. We were assigned to the Loyal Heights gym, which was closer to town. The players were fifth and sixth graders, and it was only a summer league, but it was work. And I don't mean the running up and down the court. That was easy. The hard part was making the calls as best you could, then tuning out the whining coaches and kids.

Falk watched our last game that day. I thought we'd done terribly, but when the final buzzer sounded, he came onto the court with a smile on his face. "Don't get down on yourselves. You made some mistakes, but that happens. The important thing is you worked as a team, picking up the calls for one another. You're going to do fine."

That evening Mom asked me how the job was going.

"It's good. I like it."

She smiled. "I'm glad."

I quickly settled into a routine. I'd get up around nine, clean up, eat a little, then jog to Bitter Lake. Once I was there, I'd lift weights until noon, when I'd meet up with Miguel. The bus would take us to Loyal Heights, Ballard, Meadowbrook, or wherever we'd been assigned for the week. We'd finish around four and be back at Bitter Lake by four-thirty. I'd run
home, shower, and then eat dinner. After dinner I'd watch a baseball game on television or maybe a movie. By eleven I'd be asleep, and the next thing I knew the alarm clock would go off and it would be time to start over again.

My days were set, but sitting around the house alone in the evenings got boring. You can watch only so many baseball games on TV, rent only so many movies.

It was a Wednesday evening, and for Seattle it was hot—close to ninety. Mom was at work. Marian had made a new friend, Laura Curtiss. Along with Kaitlin, they'd gone swimming at Madison Pool. I had some money in my pocket.

There was a mom-and-pop grocery store right on Greenwood, but for some reason I headed to the minimart where Lonnie and I had stolen the beer. When I got there, I stood at the door for a second and peered in. The Vietnamese lady wasn't at the counter, so I pushed the door open, walked to the coolers, and grabbed a Dr. Pepper. As I did, my eyes fell on a long line of Mickey Stouts.

While I stood in line waiting to pay, I wished that Lonnie hadn't gotten kicked out of Whitman. Not that I was going to steal again—that was stupid. But sitting around and talking, hanging out with him, those had been okay.

Outside the store, I looked in the direction of Lonnie's apartment building. Why not go see him? If he was drinking or doing drugs, that didn't mean I had to. I could hang out with him, talk, pass the time.

As I came up to the crosswalk, the light turned red. It was
a long light—the cars flew by me one after the other for what seemed like forever. Finally the light turned green, but I didn't cross. Who was I kidding? If I started hanging out with Lonnie, I'd be drinking again. Or smoking dope, if that's what he was doing. Maybe not the first night or the second, but eventually.

I didn't want to go home, so I headed down 130th toward the Northwest Athletic Complex. Miguel played baseball there in the evenings. "You should come by. It's mainly Mexican guys, and Salvadorans, but there are some Anglos who play."

"I'm done with baseball," I'd told him.

He'd shrugged. "We'll be there if you change your mind. We play every night."

Before I could see the field, I could hear the sound of a baseball game: the crisp snap of a well-thrown ball finding the pocket of a glove, the ping of an aluminum bat making solid contact, the voices of players. I climbed the steps from the street to the field, walked along a tree-lined path, and came out behind the backstop.

I didn't spot Miguel at first, and for a while I wasn't sure I had the right game. Most of the guys were older than me, with mustaches or beards. I heard more Spanish than English. I couldn't have been standing there for more than a minute or two when Miguel's voice rang out. "Shane, over here."

His team was batting. I walked over to his bench.

"You here to play?" he said.

"Just to watch."

"Come on. Play."

"I can't. I didn't bring my glove."

He waved that off. "No problem. You use someone else's. We're short two players." He paused. "You can pitch if you want."

"I'll play, Miguel, but I'm not pitching."

"Okay, Shane. Don't pitch. You play outfield like Coach says. We need a right fielder."

"Right field it is."

"I'll introduce you to the guys." He lowered his voice. "They're good guys mostly, but not all of them. You know what I mean."

He called out six names in about seven seconds. Manny, Jose, Pedro. I nodded to each of them, but I couldn't have matched a single name with a face. Not that it mattered, because none of them took any notice of me. They nodded, then went right back to their conversations.

I sat next to Miguel and watched the game. The talent was about the same as in a high school game, only a couple of the older guys were better than anybody in high school, and a couple were worse. The pitcher—an older guy—adjusted his game to fit the player. He'd throw some serious fastballs to one batter and then throttle way back when the next hitter came up. Miguel's team—it was hard to think of them as
my
team—scored a couple of runs. I was on deck when the third out was made.

I didn't know how I'd get a glove, but Miguel took care of that for me. The guy he asked stared at me suspiciously for a few seconds, then handed it to me. It was a nice glove, a burgundy Rawlings that had been well cared for. I was going to be sure to hand it back to him and not toss it.

I trotted out to right field, surprised at how nervous I felt. I almost wished I was pitching. I'd have been comfortable on the mound, especially in this type of game, but I felt lost in right field.

The other team got a couple of hits and a walk, and with two out they had one run in and runners at second and third. The batter was a lefty, the biggest guy out there. The center fielder called out to me. "Hey, you." With his arm, he was motioning me to move back. I took five steps and looked over. "More!" he shouted. Who was I to argue? I took five more.

On the second pitch, the guy turned on a fastball and crushed it, sending a towering fly ball down the right field line that ended up in the parking lot. That started a huge argument as to whether it was fair or foul. Even though I was taking Spanish in school, I couldn't follow what these guys were saying. A player on our team ended up running down the line pretending to be the ball, curving as he ran. That seemed to do it—the decision was foul. The next pitch was some kind of changeup, which was smart. The batter was angry about losing his home run and ready to crush another ball. He was way out in front, tried to hold up, and ended up sending a bloop toward me in right.

It was just a pickup game, so I probably should have played it on a hop, even if playing it safe would have cost two runs. But I wanted to show these guys that I could play. I got a good jump and sprinted in. At the last second I dived, and the ball stuck in the web of my glove. I hit the ground hard, but the ball stayed put like a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of a sugar cone.

As I trotted in, my teammates came over and patted me
on the back. "Nice catch! ... Way to go!...
Muy bien.
"

We played for another hour. I struck out and popped up in my two at bats, but I caught every fly ball hit my way. Our team ended up winning by a half dozen runs or so. When the game broke up, Miguel gave me a playful punch in the shoulder. "See? I told you. It's good. You come tomorrow night?"

"Yeah. I'll come tomorrow night."

He reached out and shook my hand. "Good. Good. It's fun."

I had started toward home when he called after me. "Hey, Shane, you know that guy you hit in the head?"

All the good feelings drained out of me. "What about him?"

"He was here yesterday."

"What?"

"The guy you hit," Miguel repeated. "He was here. Yesterday. He played."

"Reese Robertson was here?"

"I don't know his name, but I remember his face."

"It couldn't have been him, Miguel. He wouldn't—" I was about to say that he wouldn't play with a bunch of Latinos in a pickup game, but I caught myself.

"He wouldn't what?" Miguel said, and I could tell he'd mentally finished my sentence for me.

"He wouldn't have the time to play. His coach runs a summer team. He'd be on it."

Miguel shrugged. "Well, then it must have been some guy who looked just like him. I struck him out twice. Fastballs inside."

I played right field again on Thursday night, picking up my first hit, a seeing-eye grounder up the middle, and scoring my first run. I also ran down three fly balls. On Friday night I struck out twice, but I threw out a runner trying to go from first to third on a single. When the other guys saw the strength of my arm, they called me Ichiro, which made me feel pretty good.

Saturday night I got to the field early. Before Miguel said anything, he tossed me a ball. I fired it back, and we fell into a comfortable rhythm. We must have thrown for five minutes before he motioned for me to look out toward center field. "That's him, isn't it? The guy you hit." He waited while I looked. "It is, right? I told you it was him."

My heart was pounding like crazy. Anger surged. Reese just wouldn't go away. "Yeah, that's him."

"You going to say something to him?"

"Why should I? I don't know him."

"You hit him in the head, Shane. You got to say something."

I fired the baseball back to Miguel. "I don't have to do anything."

A pickup game has a life of its own. One minute a bunch of guys are throwing the ball around, and the next the sides are chosen and the game is going. Exactly how it all happens is a mystery, but I made sure I wasn't on Reese's team.

We started in the field, and I quickly hustled out to my position in right field. But I could feel his eyes on me, and I couldn't keep my eyes from drifting toward him.

Miguel was pitching for us. When Reese came up, he took his practice swings and stepped into the batter's box, looking
just like the old Reese Robertson. Fast bat, fast hands. Then Miguel threw him an inside fastball, and Reese's left foot buckled and his left side opened up. He squibbed a little dribbler toward the mound, and he was out before he'd taken ten steps out of the box.

We played seven innings that night. Reese batted three more times. Miguel struck him out on three pitches and got him on another pathetic ground ball to the right side. When Reese came up to the plate for the last time, Alberto Guerrero was pitching. Guerrero was probably thirty years old. He liked the game to move, so he grooved pitches down the middle for everybody. Reese fouled off Guerrero's first pitch, then drove the next one over our left fielder's head. I watched as he flew around the bases, his long stride eating up the ground, turning a triple into a home run. Guys on his team swatted him on the back, and I could see his smile from three hundred feet away. But when he sat down on the bench, the smile disappeared as quickly as it had come. If I knew Guerrero had laid the ball in there, then Reese had to know it too.