The Youngest Hero (40 page)

In a huge story inside—with photos from the previous night’s game—my whole deal was played out. Somehow, the reporter knew
everything—except about the pitching machine and the name of the “family friend” who attended the game with my mother.

Poor Lucky
, I thought. He would have loved the free publicity. He had introduced himself to the scouts, but not to the reporters.

Most amazing to me were quotes from the Arlington Heights players, including the leadoff man and shortstop.

“He’s a player,” Brian Ewart, 20, said. “I ran him over on a bunt in the first inning and he came up scrappy. After I leveled
him at second on his inside-the-park homer, I got booted and he stayed in and killed us. He’s got it all.”

The article made a big deal of my batting average and raised the question of whether I was too good for American Legion–level
baseball.

“Of course he is,” Coach Jim Koenig says. “You only want to hit over five hundred in a softball league. These few kids who
run up astronomical numbers are showing they’re ready for the next step.”

But the next step would be college, and Elgin Woodell just turned thirteen. He won’t be eligible for the professional baseball
draft until he graduates from high school, five years from now.

There is the possibility of some genetic advantage from the boy’s father, a short-term minor-league standout in the Pittsburgh
Pirate organization.

Neal L. Woodell died last year of an alcohol-related illness at the Alabama State Penitentiary in Birmingham where he was
serving a lengthy term for reckless homicide while driving without a license.

I was thrilled but Momma was in tears.

“All our business, right out there for everybody,” she said.

“Somebody famous right under your own roof,” Ricardo said. ‘They even have the address here, but not the name of the place.”

“That’s a relief,” she said. “Otherwise your phone would be ringing off the hook, and we’d have to move.”

“Oh, no, we don’t want that!” Ricardo said. “Stay here and I’ll protect you!”

“May I keep this?” Momma said.

“Of course! I’ll get more. I’d like to post this in the lobby, let people know who they’re living with! Elgin, you’re like
royalty.”

I didn’t feel so special. I had dreamed of this kind of a story, but the last thing I wanted was for it to hurt Momma.

“I have to get going,” she said. “I can just imagine what kind of a day I’m gonna have at work.”

“I’m sorry, Momma,” I said as Ricardo left.

“I guess I knew this was coming,” she said. “I just didn’t expect it to wake me up and slap me in the face this morning. You’d
better get some breakfast and get ready for work yourself, young man.”

“Momma, you think I still have to work when we’re so close to going professional?”

I could tell she didn’t think that was funny.

“You are an employee, Elgin. You don’t quit without notice, and you don’t quit without knowing where your next check is coming
from. You could be years away from making money in baseball. I know everybody believes different, and I s’pose I do too. But
don’t start—”

“I know, Momma. Don’t start counting your chickens and all that.”

“Anyway, you want to just leave Lucas high and dry? He’s grown fond of you, El, and he won’t be happy if you up and quit on
him.”

“Fond of
me
? C’mon, Mom, you think I’m blind? I think I’ll be seeing a lot of Lucky whether I work for him or not. Right?”

She didn’t answer.

“Right?”

She was fighting a smile.

“Right, Momma?”

“You’re obnoxious sometimes, Elgin, you know that?”

“Course I do. Doyle told me that last night. I’m obnoxious and rich.”

“Get some breakfast.”

“I
’ve got a couple of errands this morning,” Luke Harkness told me. “Could you watch the place while I’m gone?”

“Could I?” I loved the idea of selling, dealing, negotiating.

Luke told me how to call for help if I needed it, what to do and not to do.

“Your mom will probably kill me when she hears I left you here alone, but I won’t be gone long. I’ll call you in an hour or
so.”

“Don’t worry about me, Lucky.”

I strapped on the apron Luke often wore, but I had to take it halfway around my body again before I could tie it. I waited
behind the cash register, rehearsing my lines. “I can let that go for fifteen. The boss paid about ten for it, so it’d be
a real deal.”

But no one showed up. Not one customer. Two or three peered in the window and kept moving. One did some window-shopping, but
scowled and walked away. After an hour, Lucky called.

“One more stop and I’m on my way back,” he said. “Any customers?”

“Nope.”

“None?”

“Nope.”

“What do you make of that?”

“I think they see a kid here and they don’t want to come in,” I said.

“Nah. Hey, if nobody comes by, I’ll try to buy somethin off ya when I get there.”

About ten minutes before I expected Lucky, a middle-aged woman stopped at the window, looked at the door, looked through the
window again, then knocked tentatively, her eyes on me.

“It’s open!” I called.

She pushed the door slowly, ringing the bell. “You’re open for business?”

“Yes, ma’am. May I help you?”

“You’re open then?”

Was she deaf? “Yes, ma’am.”

“Well, you might want to turn your sign around then.”

“Hm?”

“Your sign. It says
Closed.
”

“Oh, man!”

I hurried over and turned the sign around. I smacked myself in the head.

After looking around she thanked me and passed Lucky on her way out.

“I see you noticed the sign,” Luke said.

“Not till that woman showed me. You do that?”

What was different about Luke?

“Yeah. Sorry. I figured if you noticed, okay. If you didn’t, well it was just a slow day and I didn’t do something stupid
by leaving you here alone.”

“Lucky, what’d you do to yourself?”

“You can’t tell?”

“Your beard is gone!”

Lucky had had some gray in his red beard, but now with it gone, including his sideburns, he looked younger. He was red-haired
and freckle-faced, just like my mom, and he was a good-looking guy. He had left only a bushy mustache.

“I like it!”

“Really?”

Luke looked self-conscious as he took the apron from me and slid a crisp, new manila envelope under the counter.

“What’s that?” I said.

“Personal. Listen, don’t feel bad. You know we don’t get much business in the morning.”

“Yeah, but I feel like you don’t trust me.”

“Elgin, listen. You’ve been great. I know you won’t be here much longer, but if you ever need a job, you’ve always got one
here.”

“You mean if I go into a slump?” We both laughed. “You were gonna try to buy something off me.”

“Right! Where’s that glass bowl, that ugly one I couldn’t get rid of?”

“You know as well as I do,” I said. “You think Mom wouldn’t show me that?”

“You never know.”

“You guys in love?”

Luke looked at the floor. “I can’t speak for her,” he said finally.

“Then speak for you.”

“I like her an awful lot. She’s a wonderful woman.”

I chuckled. “Well, you’re awful pretty together; she’s pretty and—”

“I know, and I’m awful. Great junior high humor there, Elgin.”

“You gonna get married?”

“Slow down, cowboy,” Luke said. “She doesn’t even know how I feel about her yet.”

“The heck she doesn’t. Guy gives a woman a present like that—”

“Shut up.”

I giggled. “Ugly thing.”

“I know, but she loved it.”

“So you gonna get married or not?”

“You’re way ahead of me, pal.”

“Going to our church was smart, Lucky.”

“Hey! I went to that church long before you did. Don’t accuse me of that. That is something I’d never do.”

“I know. Mom knows too. You mean a lot to her.”

Luke couldn’t hide his smile. “I do?”

I nodded. “So what’s the deal? You guys serious, or what?”

“We haven’t even talked about it yet.”

“Honest?”

“Honest.”

“What’d you cut the beard off for?”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“That’s what I’m asking you.”

“C’mon, Elgin. I cut my beard because I’ve had it more than twenty years.”

“That’s a reason to keep it. You cut it for Momma, didn’t you?”

“Didn’t she like it?” Luke said.

“She’s never said, but you must think she didn’t.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Then why’d you cut it?”

“I don’t know.”

“C’mon.”

Lucky moved around to the front of the counter and leaned back on it. “Don’t you have some sweeping or somethin to do?”

“With all that free time you gave me this morning?”

“Sorry. I owe you.”

“Tell me why you cut the beard and we’ll be even.”

“Man, Elgin, if Billy Ray Thatcher could play ball like you can pester, you two could trade jobs.”

“I’m waiting.”

“Your mom said something about never having seen me without the beard, so I thought maybe she deserved a peek.”

When I arrived home late that afternoon, I was disappointed to find that Elgin had nothing on the stove for dinner. “I had
it all ready in the refrigerator. All you had to do was—”

“I had some of it, Momma. And you don’t need any.”

“Elgin, I’m famished! All day interrupted by everybody stickin that newspaper under my nose, asking me how much longer I was
gonna be working there. I am so glad to be home, but what am I supposed to do for dinner?”

“You’ve got a date.”

“Mr. Thatcher’s not coming by till nine-thirty. I can’t wait that long to—”

“Not that one. You’ve got another date.”

“I do?”

“Yeah, Lucky told me to tell you he’s coming by for you at about six.”

“You’re supposed to tell me or ask me?”

“C’mon, Momma. You know you want to go out with him.”

“Well, maybe I do and maybe I don’t. But that’s no way to ask for a date.”

“So stand him up.”

“What do you know about standing anyone up? Why didn’t he call me at the office?”

“He said he didn’t want to embarrass you. He knows how you hate having people know your business.”

“He said that?”

Elgin nodded.

“How sweet.”

“So, you’ll be ready at six?”

“I might. What am I supposed to wear?”

“Dress up.”

“He said that?”

Elgin nodded. “Maybe he’s gonna pop the question tonight, huh?”

“Elgin! Lucas and I hardly know each other! We’re a long way from that serious, so don’t worry.”

“I’m not worried. Should I be?”

“I don’t know, El. Do you like him?”

“Sure I do, Momma. Do you?”

“You know I do.”

“Do you love him?”

“Well, that’s none of your business.”

“It is if you’re gonna marry him.”

“I’m not going to marry him! Now will you quit sayin that?”

“Don’t marry him if you don’t love him.”

“Elgin!”

“At least tell me if you love the guy.”

“I certainly wouldn’t tell you before I tell him!”

“So you do.”

“I’m not saying another word.”

“Don’t you think I deserve to know?”

“Not before he does.”

“You kissed him yet?”

“Elgin!”

“Well, have you?”

“No! And I wouldn’t tell you if I had!”

“Mom, this
is
my business.”

“It most certainly is not.”

“You’re my business, aren’t you?”

I shook my head and pressed my lips tight. Actually, I was amused. I had worried what Elgin would think if Lucas and I grew
more serious. He had to be wondering what it would be like to have a male figure in the family, whether he was going to be
adopted by a new father. He didn’t seem apprehensive.

But I was anxious about my date.

I headed for the basement, not wanting my mother to feel embarrassed about answering the door to the new Luke Harkness. She
might want to hug him or something, but not with me there.

She had argued that I should be there because it wouldn’t look right, a man coming to our place when she was alone.

“Well, Momma, he’s more particular about that than you are.”

I set the machine closer to the plate than ever, hoping what was happening to my career would heighten my senses. I forgot
to double-check the aim of the thing before getting into the batter’s box.

There was no time to even flinch. I took the first pitch on my right wrist, an inch above my hand. I dropped to the floor
and scooted to my right, settling back against the wall where I was safe. I was within four feet of where the next fifty-six
pitches slammed off the wall, and I covered my ears against the noise.

The spot where the ball drilled me was hot. I held it tight with my left hand, but every time I let go to look at it, I nearly
screamed with pain. It didn’t feel broken, but I had no experience with such injuries. I’d been hit enough times, but now
all I cared about was how long I might be out.