Pitcher's Baby (2 page)

For the next three hours, I’m not a
starting left-handed pitcher for the Phoenix Ravens.

I’m not the only child to a single, middle
aged, French-Canadian woman.

I’m not divorced and fatherless.

I’m just me.

Lucas Bouchard, a twenty-six-year-old male
riding the streets at night, enjoying the raging guitar and heartfelt lyrics of
one of his favorite bands.

When I finally make it into town, I can
barely keep my eyes peeled open. I leave my luggage in the trunk and leave the
car parked in the driveway of the single-story ranch-style house. Aaron and I
purchased this place together when we first got signed three years ago. I found
it on the foreclosure list, and we were able to get it for a fourth of what
it’s actually worth.

Looking up at the front porch now, I can
honestly say I’m proud of our investment. Six bedrooms, two of which are master
suites, five full baths, three half-baths, a living room, and the den, which we
converted into the game room for the Playstation4 and Xbox one. It even has an
in-ground pool in the back yard.

I toss my keys on the table by the front
door in the entryway and kick off my shoes before heading down the hall to my
room. Unbuttoning my shirt, I let it slip from my shoulders to the floor and
then let my pants fall in a heap next to it. I’m not worried about them. I’ll
pick them up in the morning before Clarisa comes by and yells at me for missing
the laundry basket again.

Clarisa is our house cleaner who comes
once a week when we are away and three times a week when we are home to
maintain our perfect home. She also does most of the grocery shopping for us
too, but don’t get me wrong, she’s a hard ass. Just because we pay her to clean
doesn’t mean she lets us walk all over her. She will be the first to chase me
down the hall with a broom if I leave an unnecessary mess for her. In a lot of
ways, she reminds me of my own mom.

Pulling back my comforter, I climb in
between the silky softness of my 5000-count sheets. It feels so good to be back
home and back in my own bed. Turning on my side, I reach my hand out, searching
for my favorite pillow to rest beneath my head, but my hand gets tangled in
something stringy, and then I’m being attacked from everywhere and nowhere.

“Get your filthy hands off me. RAPE,” a
woman shrieks into the pitch-black room. I roll, trying to get away from her
abusive swings and find a light to turn on, but instead, I manage to knock the
lamp on the ground. It shatters, causing tiny glass fragments to splinter
across the wooden floor.

“Stop. Who are you?” I try to catch her
swinging hands, but just when I think I have her, I hear the soft wails of a
baby coming from the corner of the room.

“Get out. I’m calling 911!”

“Just stop. Who are you? You’re in my
room,” I yell back at her and flip on the light switch, casting a bright glow
across the room.

“This is my brother’s house. Not yours,”
she says, reaching for the squalling baby. I pick up my cellphone and hit speed
dial, calling Aaron.

“What’s up man?”

“Did you forget to tell me something?” I
have to yell over the screaming woman and baby in the background, but I think
he manages to hear me.

“Oh fuck, Charlee.”

“Aaron?” she asks, and I pass the phone to
her, sitting on the edge of the bed as she walks into the hall for privacy.

“You said the first door on the left was
mine, Aaron, and then I had some strange man crawling in the fucking bed with
me while I was dead asleep, giving me a heart attack.” She pauses while Aaron
answers her. I already know what he’s going to say.

“I was in the first room on the . . .
fuck. Ok. You’re right. Son of a bitch. You mean I was in his damn bed? Oh my
God.” Another pause. “Yeah, I got it. Okay, I’ll see you then. Love you.”

She walks back in the room, holding my
phone straight out for me, and for the first time, I get a good look at her.
She and Aaron favor a lot, which I guess makes sense, considering they are
twins. Long, kinky-curly, dark blonde hair hangs in her face, hiding her hollow
brown eyes. She looks exhausted, and judging by the squirming newborn in her
arms, I can imagine why. For a second, I feel like shit for waking her, and
then I shake my head. All I did was come home to my bed. How was I supposed to
know she was here when Aaron failed to tell me?

“So, I guess I owe you an apology,” she
says, looking anywhere but toward me.

“Don’t worry about it. Shit happens.”

“Right, okay then, I’ll just get our stuff
and go.” She takes another step in the room, and her foot catches on a piece of
glass from the shattered lamp. “Oh, fuck.” She hops up and down on one foot,
blood pouring from her heel. I can see the cut is deep.

“Here, sit down. Let me get you
something.”

“No, I’ll be fine,” she says, turning back
toward the door. The baby in her arms is crying again and squirming around,
making it even harder for her to hobble on one foot. I try to sit and give her
the space she asked for, but I just don’t have it in me.

“You’re really hard-headed, aren’t you?” I
say, taking the baby from her arms and cradling her in mine. “Go on, clean up
your wound. We will be right here when you come back.” She looks from her
crying daughter back to me, weighing her options before hobbling off to the
bathroom. I just shake my head and glance down at the squalling baby in my
arms.

“Votre maman est si têtu bébé fille,” I
murmur to the infant in my arms while I bounce lightly up and down. She stops
her crying and instead gazes up at me questioningly. I think she finds me
entertaining. That, or she agrees with my prior statement that her mother is
very stubborn.

“Une jolie petite fille es-tu?”
I
murmur, nuzzling her soft cheeks. The sweet, intoxicating scent of a newborn
baby takes me back to five years ago and the last time I held someone so tiny
in my arms. I would do anything to be able to go back to those days.

“Oui, you’re a pretty little girl.” She
smiles up at me and yawns widely before closing her eyes and drifting off to
sleep.

Charlee walks back into the room just as
I’m setting the baby on her bobby pillow in the center of my bed. She glances
around the room frantically at first, and then, after spotting her daughter,
she sighs and walks back out the door, returning moments later with the broom and
dust pan. Together, we manage to clean up the broken glass and get all of her
things moved into her room across the hall. Aaron had Clarisa buy a swing and a
bouncer as well as a basinet that she had set up next to Charlee’s bed,
anticipating the arrival of the baby.

I try to ignore the tears I see spring to
the surface of her eyes when she sees it all, but I can’t. Seeing the raw
appreciation and relief reminds me once again of the many things my own mother
gave up for me when I was growing up and how much I truly owe her.

“I’m sorry about scaring you earlier. I
didn’t know you guys were coming,” I say to her, trying to ease the tension in
the room. Her shoulders tense, but she doesn’t turn to me or reply, so I walk
out of her room and back to my own, where her sleeping daughter still lies on
my bed.

“Come on, beauty, let’s get you to bed,” I
whisper to her as I lift her beneath her head and bottom and carry her from the
room.

Entering the room, I see that Charlee is
sitting on the edge of the bed holding a stack of letters. I don’t think she
notices me enter, and I don’t want to startle her again, so as quietly as
possible, I ease the baby into the bassinet and then lean down and kiss her on
the forehead. She’s so precious. I’ve always envied the young, especially at
this age. They have nothing to worry about. Someone else takes care of their
every need.

 “Bonne nuit, belle fille,” I whisper to
her and then walk from the room, closing the door quietly behind me. It’s been
a long night, and I’m beyond ready to lie down and get some sleep.

Chapter
Two

Charlee

As soon as the door shuts, I pull out my
phone and Google what he said, typing in the best translation I can
—
Bonne
nuit, belle fille
– Good night, beautiful girl
.

My heart aches when I read the touching
words. Why can’t her father love her this way? Why doesn’t he see her as the
beautiful blessing she is? A complete stranger has spent less than an hour with
her, and he held her more in that time than her own dad has in the last six
weeks. I wish I could blame it all on the drugs, but I know that’s not true.

He didn’t want a baby. He was pissed when
we found out I was pregnant and demanded that I have an abortion, but I
refused. In the end, he stayed and pretended to be happy until we found it was
a little girl. Then everything changed.

I understood that he wanted a little boy
if he was going to have a child, but that’s not the hand we were dealt. Why
couldn’t he be happy that we were blessed with a healthy child? Instead, he
found comfort at the end of a glass pipe with his buddies, and for the time, I
stayed with him, at least until my beautiful Everly Grace was born. Then I’d
had enough.

The final straw was when he showed up at
the hospital, high as a kite, and then left me at eight centimeters dilated to
go across the street to get a tall boy. My daughter was welcomed into this
world by a team of doctors and nurses. She didn’t meet her father until she was
one week old. He didn’t show back up at the hospital, not even to sign the
birth certificate, so as far as the state of Arizona was concerned, her father
was unknown.

Laying my head against the fluffy pillows,
I close my eyes and try to dream of a future of happiness. A future where I no
longer have to worry about how I’m going to afford my next can of formula and
my next pack of diapers. I long for that security, for that stability. I want
more than anything to give that life to my daughter—to give her the life I
never had.

I hate being here and living off Aaron,
even though I know he doesn’t mind. He loves having me here, and having his
niece close by makes him even happier, but I feel like a moocher. He has worked
his ass off every day on the field to make the money he makes, and he supports
himself. He shouldn’t have to support me too.

Lying in the bed, I doze in and out of
sleep. I try to shut my mind off and escape into the far Netherlands in the
dream world, but after being woken earlier, my body just won’t allow it. At
least Everly is sleeping soundly in her new basinet. Everything in my life has
been flipped and turned upside down so suddenly that at times, I can’t figure
out which way is up and which way is down. My mind stays actively buzzing,
eating away at me every minute of every day, reminding me of every single
misgiving and tricking me into believing I am less than I am.

My monster doesn't sleep under my bed. She
sleeps inside my head, lurking in the far recesses, just waiting for the chance
to pounce. She doesn't need to be provoked or invited. One minute I can be
smiling, almost enjoying life, and the next, I’m falling on my knees, alone and
afraid but unable to reach out for help.

How can I, when I can't find the words to
explain what's happening in my own mind? The way my throat tightens,
constricting the air I need to exhale, trapping it in my lungs, another
unwilling passenger to the torture I am forced to endure. Pain embraces me,
like the loving mother I never had, on my way through the kaleidoscope of
emotions flowing through me.

Fear.

Regret.

Loneliness.

Shame.

I accept them all. I have no choice. I am
. . .
broken
. This single word describes who I am better than any other
in the Webster’s dictionary.

I hate myself.

Flipping on the bedside light, I sigh with
relief as the darkness is pushed away, however briefly. My alarm clock reads
5:42. I have been lying here awake for at least two hours, trying to crawl back
out of the hell my mind creates while I sleep. Most people dream. A lot of
those people even have nightmares. The difference between them and me is that
when I wake up, my nightmare doesn't disappear. It clings to me and follows me
throughout my day, whispering sweet nothings in my ear like a sweet lover.

My nightmare has a name.

I call it
life.

I should have taken my damn sleeping pills
last night
, I think silently,
but I hate the way they make me
feel during the day
. Slow. Lethargic. I should have known better, but at
least if I am bone tired today, I know it's from lack of sleep and not some
pharmaceutical bullshit running rampant through my system.

Technically, I don't need to get up from
the comfy confines of my bed yet, but falling back asleep right now is
impossible, so I grab my journal from under my mattress and peel back the
abused, creased cover in search of the next available blank page. I find one at
the back. It's almost time for me to replace the pages in it again. Thank God I
still have a case of the paper that goes between the leather covers. Unsnapping
the pen from the tie around the top, I allow myself ten minutes of my own
personal therapy. Writing down the words flowing through me is the only time I
feel somewhat normal. I pour myself out into the page before me.

Once there was love,

Now there is pain

In the house of misery

Losers stand to gain.

The pain has now gone away,

Numbed by Life. Dead to me.

There's a new flame

Burning in my soul.

Not like her; she must stay.

God! I'm losing total control.

I lost one love,

But I gained two:

The power of the heart

And the never ending start.

                        -CC

When I finish, I read back over it and
wonder where these words come from, how they manage to just erupt from within
the tiny confines of my blackened soul when I put pen to paper. I close the
pages, letting the rough leather cover and my three-year-old hair tie hide the
words from me, keeping me from having to dwell on them anymore. I lock them up,
just like I lock myself away from anything else in this world that might make
me hurt . . . even just a little bit.

Throwing back the covers, I climb from my
personal heaven when all I really want to do is throw a pillow over my head and
shut out the world for one more day, to just close my eyes and forget the
promise I made to myself last night, but I can’t. Shit, it's only been eleven
hours, and I already regret calling Aaron and admitting how much I screwed up.
He was furious with me for letting things get as bad as they had and not
calling sooner. I guess I should have.

“I’m your brother, Char . . . your fucking
twin. Let me be there for you,” he said.

Not just for me, but for Everly too. He’s
right. She deserves better than this shitty life I have been giving her for her
first six weeks of her life, so I swallowed my pride and packed my bags. Our
flight left at 11:40, due to arrive in Phoenix at 3:10 pm. I wish I could say I
was excited, but in truth, I was just ready for this particular stage of my
life to be over. I’m ready to relax and settle in, not worry every time I hear
footfalls in the hallway, wondering if it’s the building manager here with
another eviction notice, or worse, the power company here to shut off my
lights.

 
No time like the present.

Padding across the room, I try to tap into
some hidden reserve of energy buried deep inside on my way to the bathroom. I
turn the shower on hot and wait as the steam fills the room.

Today will be a good day.

The mirror hanging above the bathroom sink
mocks me, challenging me to look into its glassy depths. Normally, I try to
avoid mirrors whenever possible. I hate to look into my own eyes and see the
secrets and fear staring back at me, judging me. I'll never understand how the
world doesn't see the real me. All they see is a pretty, dark skinned,
blonde-haired, brown-eyed beauty with soft skin and big, full lips. They never
see the scared, lonely little girl screaming for help inside, but I do. I see
the shell of a woman who isn’t good enough, who will never be good enough.

My eyes float down my naked body, slowly
perusing it. The steam is etching its way across the mirror now, slowly as hell.
I start at my feet. I've always thought they were too big for the rest of my
body. My second toe is slightly longer than my big toe, and it reminds me of a
monkey or a sloth. I curl them in, hating the way they look, and then allow my
eyes to travel higher. My knees bow backward slightly, and I remind myself to
pull them forward, even if it hurts to ignore my natural stance.

“Stand straight. Don't stand like that,
fucking whore!”
I can hear my dad’s voice echo through my
mind, a long ago memory I wish I could forget.

My thighs are a little too rounded and run
straight into my narrow waist. My hips jut out sharply and I poke them, trying
and failing to shove them back. If only all my fat didn't go straight to my
hips and thighs, then maybe I would be pretty. Then maybe
someone
would
love me. Yeah, right. Fat chance of that happening. I inherited my Dad’s
family’s build. Thin waist and hippy.

Maybe if I lost that last five pounds,
I
think, pinching the fat of my thighs between my hands and leaving red splotches
across my skin.
Nah, I can't lose any more weight. Then I would be too
skinny, and no one loves a girl who is too skinny.
I am already cutting it
close. At 5’ 9”, my 147 pounds leaves me rail thin, and I know losing five more
pounds would leave me looking like
her.

My gaze passes over my arms and the
numerous scars lining each of them, in a hurry to beat the race against the
steam, to my face and the secrets hidden there. No need to revisit the proof of
my failed attempt to cut the pain from my soul during one of my darkest days. I
have plenty of opportunities to gaze at the puckered red and white scars
throughout the day. I raise my head higher. Lifeless, shit-brown eyes stare
back at me.

Who are you?

I don't recognize the woman standing
before me. I never have.

Where are your scars? How do you hide
them?
I silently question the reflection staring back at me.
She really is beautiful, stunning even, I think, until I look into her eyes. In
there, I see me and all the things I try to hide from the world. My thoughts
spin in a vicious circle, taunting me, reminding me who I really am.

Miserable.                  

Frail.  

Unloved.

Sick.                                        

Pathetic.

Beaten.

NO!
No,
not today. Today, I will love me. Today, you will not win,
I
tell the monsters in my head and then turn away from the hazy mirror, climb in
the hot shower, and let my mind wander back to a time long ago. A time when I
could smile, and it didn't take everything in me to do it. Like a projector, I
see the clips pass by until finally it stops on the day everything changed. The
first day I met
her—
my mother.

Thirteen years earlier…

I’m sitting at my desk, studying
multiplication tables when the buzzer rings overhead in Mrs. Brooks’s third
grade class.

 “Mrs. Brooks, please send Charlee to the
office to check out.”

 “Thank you, Mrs. Smith. I'll send her
now,” Mrs. Brooks answers before turning her chair my way and instructing me to
gather my things.

I slide the chart sheet back inside my
desk before closing the lid and then push my chair under before going to grab
my backpack off the hook by the classroom door. I walk with hurried steps
toward the office. I can’t believe I’m getting out school early today! My large
lips are stretched so far across my face, I probably resemble the Joker from
Batman, but I don't care. This is the best day EVER!

The door on the other side of the office,
directly across from me, shuts noisily, drawing my attention away from my game
of avoiding cracks in the black and white squares on the floor. Aaron, my
brother, walks in. His cheeks are flushed, contrasting heavily with his pale
skin and making the freckles across his nose stand out even more. He must have
run from his class too. We hardly ever get checked out of school. Meeting in
the center of the office, we both look around, searching for who checked us
out.