Home Run: A Novel (16 page)

Chapter Twenty-two

Intentional Walk

Cory was still walking in this inkblot of a town when Helene’s name showed up on his phone.

“Helene,” he said in a way that politely said,
I don’t need any more guilt trips from anybody else, thank you very much
.

“Assault? This is your idea of lying low? You are killing me.”

“It wasn’t assault,” he replied.

“
Killing
me. An uploaded photo went from Facebook to a Grizzlies blog to ESPN.”

Cory stopped near the curb and looked at the sleeping center of Okmulgee. Now the world at large had another image of Cory Brand: slugging a fellow coach and, oh yeah, a police officer besides.

Everything was crumbling down around him, and all he could do was watch. Everybody wanted his entire world to get smeared and wiped away, and they just wanted to stand by and laugh. Nobody understood. Nobody got it. Nobody ever would.

He wanted to reach out and hit something, blast it far away deep into the night where the shadows watched from hidden bleachers.

Helene continued to moan and critique and chastise, and he just wanted her rambling mouth to shut up.

“Just fix it,” he eventually interrupted. “That’s what you get paid for. It might take a little effort, but I think you soak enough out of me to put in the time.”

He clicked off the phone and kept walking, kicking a metal trash can and sending it hurling into the road.

The night seemed as though it would never end. Cory wasn’t sure how much time had passed or where exactly he was going. When a car slowed down and then stopped by him on the edge of the road, Cory figured it might be someone with a gun who was going to take the little cash he had and then sink a couple of rounds in his skull. That would show the world, as they grieved his passing and wished they had treated him a little better.

“Need a ride?” a familiar voice asked.

It was J. T.

Wonderful. Another face to feel guilty in front of.

“Well, my truck’s at the field.”

“Hop in.”

He didn’t ask why Cory was out here in the middle of the night walking. Cory knew J. T. had heard about the game. Everybody that had
anything
to do with his life knew about it. But he appreciated not being asked. He climbed in and sat in silence for a few moments as the car moved down the road.

“I used to be a road warrior,” J. T. said out of the blue as the car coasted along. “King of the road. Spent a lot of my time driving. That was when gas was a lot cheaper. And when people didn’t connect by computers.”

Cory didn’t want to hear it. Another sad story from another sad soul. It didn’t matter.

“I was in sales. I might seem a bit laid-back for a salesman, but I wasn’t back then. I was relentless. I’d force people to go my way just so they could get me off their backs. Relentless.”

For a moment, Cory glanced at J. T. It was hard to believe the mild-mannered guy could be anything resembling relentless.

“I gave everything I had to the job, and I drank because of the pressure. Meanwhile my marriage was falling apart, along with every other part of my life. It was on the road late one night when I finally called out to God. I needed help. I needed—well, I was tired. Tired of trying to control things and not being able to manage any part of my life.”

The sleeping town of Okmulgee passed them by. Cory looked out his window while J. T. continued talking.

“You know, when I was about three or four weeks clean, I thought I had this thing licked. But then life would happen, and before you know it I was at it again.”

J. T.’s deep voice sounded like an authority on pain. Cory could only say “okay,” but he didn’t really want to talk about recovery.

“It wasn’t until I finally understood
why
I drank that I could see my way out of it.”

Cory didn’t say anything. He knew why he drank. Because he liked how it tasted and how it made him feel. Pure and simple. Sure, there was his irritating knee, and also his irritating agent—those were two more reasons to drink.

You could fill a phone book with reasons why you drink.

They pulled up to the lone truck in the parking lot next to the baseball field. Cory wanted to jump out of the car and sprint away from this man with his deep thoughts and deeper history, but he couldn’t.

J. T. parked the car but left it running as he looked at Cory. “It wasn’t about my drinking. It was about my pain.”

Cory nodded and tried to give him an earnest, heartfelt,
I-feel-your-pain
look. “Okay, well, thanks for the ride.”

As J. T. drove away, Cory looked at his truck sitting in the middle of nowhere. Nobody around here could possibly understand what he was going through. It didn’t matter what kind of curveball life had thrown at them. They couldn’t possibly begin to understand the stresses and temptations and struggles of being Cory Brand.

Unless they walk in my shoes, they won’t ever get it.

Just one more day, and you’ll change.

Just one more day, and they’ll see.

Just one more season, and the season will pass.

Just one more year, and the needs will go away.

Just one more failure before you make things right.

Just one more apology before you make amends.

Just one more outburst before you finally relax.

Just one more drink before you actually can.

Then another. But just one more. Just a few more and just a few more after that, and then tomorrow you can go ahead and change.

Just one more day, and peace will finally come.

Chapter Twenty-three

Backdoor Slider

The back roads were like wrinkles forever etched in Cory’s skin from all the times he had walked and ridden over them. They seemed to lead to nowhere, just more Oklahoma countryside with flowing fields and endless sky. But this five-acre plot of land was the place where he’d grown up, where his father had made his childhood miserable. Cory hadn’t been back in a long time.

As the sun started to wake up, Cory drove down those roads and turned onto the dirt driveway. The land had stayed in the family, with Clay and Karen now living there with Carlos. As Cory drove toward the house, he noticed that it had a new look about it. Fresh paint, a new roof, flower boxes on the windowsills, even a wreath on the door. After Mom had died, the remaining color on this farm had faded to black and white. It had turned into a reflection of its owner, Michael Brand.

Not far from the pretty house that Karen had surely helped make her own sat the old dilapidated red wooden barn. Time had only made it look more classic and ageless, at least in Cory’s eyes. This had been his old hiding place, his refuge and sanctuary. The shadows had kept his secrets safe—at least most of them.

He parked and walked to the barn, noticing the pathetic leaky tin roof that never got fixed. It probably wouldn’t have taken much, but some things in this life were just meant to stay broken.

Cory kicked open a side door and could see piles of furniture and items that belonged to his youth. The old couches and dining room table. The wooden baseball-themed pinball game they’d played to death. Pictures and boxes of mementos all surrounded by old baseballs. He picked up one of the balls and sniffed it. He liked the way it smelled and felt in his hand. It reminded him of all the things the game promised him when he was younger.

It took him a few moments to find the power breakers. Once he turned them on, the interior of the barn was aglow in cold, ghostly light. It took another couple of minutes to open the sliding doors on each side of the barn.

This was like waking up a dead man, or at least one who had been in a coma for over a decade. The smell was the same, and the shadows still hovered around like they always had. The remnants of hay underneath the vaulted roof were moldy by now. Cory could taste the dust in the air as he walked around.

In just a few moments he began to find some comfort in this place. The old bat in his hand connected with the first baseball shot off by the pitching machine. The ball wailed against the side of the barn wall. The machine stood at one side of the open doors, and Cory stood on the opposite side, trying to thread the needle.

He hit every ball the machine whipped toward him.

Being in this place made him feel six again. And ten. And sixteen.

The years were the same because his life was the same.

Every day he had woken with fear and urgency. He never stopped wondering what might happen before breakfast or before they left for school or during those long and awful summer days. He never stopped looking after Clay and never stopped preparing to hit the ball.

Cory smacked a ball straight ahead out of the barn.

Every hit had been an attempt to fight off the Devil.

Every ball had been a round fist of hurt thrown his way.

Every day and month and year spent in this place had been the same. It had felt like one long hangover. It was the party that he had missed. The joy of growing up and being young and playing ball and loving life.

As each ball flew toward him and his face and body became drenched in sweat, Cory hit harder and straighter, hoping each smack would beat down the memories inside of him.

But the memories wouldn’t go away.

On the front porch of the house, Clay stood listening to the crack of the baseballs. Each hit seemed to wound him a little more, yet he couldn’t go over there. He would leave Cory alone. At least for now. It was too early to try to sort out his brother’s problems. The best thing Cory could do was hit those balls.

Karen joined him with a cup of coffee. He smiled in appreciation and took it.

For a long time they stood there, not saying a word, just listening to the sound of baseballs being hit one after another.

They say it’s all heartache and misery, but that’s because they don’t know how great this feels.

Cory doesn’t have a worry in the world. He feels great, and yesterday and tomorrow are nowhere to be found in this bliss of today.

He knows it’s temporary, but this temporary is temporarily glorious. He feels invincible. Yesterday’s heavy grays don’t matter because today’s bright blues blow them away. It’s like the sunrise coming out of a tsunami.

He takes another drink and turns up the stereo and watches the highlights and waits for her to come back into the room.

Nobody should feel this good, and anybody who has a problem with it doesn’t know how good it feels.

The day blurs away, and Cory feels great.

One hundred ninety pounds of potential.

He turns up the music just a little more. The neighbors might complain, but the cops won’t do anything. If they come again—if—they’ll just laugh and maybe even come in and have a drink like last time.

He’s not going anywhere, and he’s not going to sleep anytime soon.

The TV shows the game highlights, and he laughs as he watches his teammates staring out with blank faces. He laughs because they’re all in the same bliss as he is right now. They’re leaving the loss behind; tomorrow they’ll be ready for another day and another chance.

A figure emerges from the darkness of the hallway, and Cory just smiles.

Life has never been better.