Home Run Read online

  Benji was wrong. Josh didn’t even get a chance to hit in the first inning. Called Stomper by his teammates, the Louisville pitcher sat the first three batters down, including Sheridan, with just fourteen pitches. The game turned into a pitching battle, with Sheridan ending the beginning of the second inning almost as easily as the Lions’ pitcher ended the first.

  Josh retrieved his bat and batting helmet from the dugout and stepped right up to the plate. The error was still on his mind. His father was on his mind. Bricktown was on his mind and the gunshot too. What wasn’t on his mind was hitting, and he felt a sudden and wild fury with himself. He needed to hit home runs. Stomper eyed him, grinning like a dog when it finds a half-eaten hamburger. Stomper wound up and delivered his deceptive sidearm pitch. Josh swung for the fence, and missed. Three times he swung, and three times he missed, one right after another.

  Josh banged his bat in the dirt.

  Coach Swanson stood with his clipboard, straight and strong and frowning. “You’re trying to kill it. Let’s just get a hit next time up.”

  Josh ground his teeth, knowing the game would keep going downhill for him from there. He had a second gaffe in the field. It was a play he would normally make, a diving grab at a line drive that put a Louisville runner on first. The good thing for the Titans was that Sheridan was red hot. It wouldn’t be totally accurate to say that Jack Sheridan won the game single-handedly, but it wouldn’t be far from the truth.

  Sheridan shut Louisville out after a fourth-inning double, and on offense he had a home run in the fourth to put them within one. After Sheridan’s big hit, Josh stepped up and swung for the fences himself, ignoring Coach Swanson’s reminder just to get a hit. Josh whiffed the first two pitches and knew he had to swing at whatever came to protect the plate. The ball came in high.

  Josh swung.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  JOSH DIDN’T WHIFF. HE nicked it and stayed alive. Stomper’s grin faltered. He threw another, and Josh got a piece of that one too, fouling it into the backstop. Josh felt like he had a handle on the action of Stomper’s sidewinding pitches. Stomper wound up and threw. Josh smashed it, feeling the power of his swing. In that moment it all came together for him. He could feel it. He could see it.

  A home run. He’d tie the game. It was the beginning of his quest.

  As he tore down the first-base line, he realized the ball had gone higher than he would have liked. The Louisville player in left field was sprinting toward the fence. Josh rounded first. The ball fell fast; the defender stretched his glove.

  And caught it.

  The sound of his bomb smacking the player’s glove hit Josh like a lightning bolt. He staggered to a stop, slouched, and shuffled back to the dugout.

  Coach Swanson spoke through his teeth. “I said a hit.”

  Jaden gave him a sympathetic look, but the rest of his teammates didn’t even look at him as he sat on the end of the bench.

  It wasn’t until the end of the fifth inning that Stomper started to fade. He gave up two hits and had runners on second and third before just barely getting out of the inning. The Lions were ahead 3–2 at the top of the sixth, but they didn’t get another run off Sheridan. The Louisville coach replaced Stomper in the bottom of the sixth with a kid built like a fireplug who threw nothing but overhand four-seam heat and right down the middle. Josh was licking his lips in anticipation.

  The Titans’ eight-hole hitter whiffed, but Preston, at the bottom of the order, was hit by a wild pitch.

  With one out and a man on first, Esch, the Titans’ leadoff hitter, fouled off half a dozen heaters and finally struck out on a fastball he just couldn’t catch up to.

  Then Goldie smacked a double. Preston, afraid to make the last out at home, stopped at third. Goldie held up at second.

  With the winning run on, Sheridan stepped into the box. An outfield hit with two out would win the game since both runners would be moving on contact.

  Josh stewed in the dugout, knowing that he could crush a ball off this guy and win the game. It would be a piece of cake to go hard on a pitcher who threw nothing but flat, middle-of-the-plate heat. All the bad stuff could be erased. But Josh rooted hard for Sheridan anyway.

  “Come on! You can do it!” he shouted along with the others. Then he remembered the derby. If Sheridan won the game, Josh wouldn’t get to hit.

  Jack Sheridan did it, all right. He sent a line drive right over the second baseman’s head. It skittered between the outfielders and clattered against the fence. The runners on second and third scored. Sheridan took a bow from second base toward the howling Titans dugout. His two-RBI double ended the game.

  The only one not cheering was Josh.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  THE TITANS’ BUS TOOK them to lunch at Legal Sea Foods in downtown Boston. Several tables had been reserved for the team. Sheridan sat with Coach, Goldie, Preston, and a couple others. Esch sat with Josh and Benji.

  Jaden came in talking to Martin. She’d gotten to know him as they talked statistics in the dugout.

  “This man knows his baseball.” Jaden put a hand on Martin’s shoulder, and his face reddened. “Come on, sit.”

  Martin did, and immediately unfolded his napkin and set it on his lap.

  “Martin was telling me incredible things about Mickey Mantle, the best switch-hitter baseball ever saw.” Jaden looked around at the rest of them. “Like you, Josh.”

  Josh jiggled the ice in his water glass, took a swig, and crunched a cube. He hadn’t gotten over not hitting a homer.

  “So, he’s a baseball genius because he likes Mickey Mantle, who was a Yankee?” Benji wrinkled his nose. “Doesn’t sound very impressive to me.”

  Jaden leaned over toward Martin. “He’s only kidding. He’s still bitter about Babe Ruth being sold to the Yankees a thousand years ago.”

  “Actually, I’m a Braves fan.” Martin spoke quietly and looked at his bread plate. “My dad knew Chipper Jones. . . .”

  “Nice,” Jaden said.

  Martin was obviously uncomfortable, and when the waitress came, she accidently knocked his crutch over. It clattered to the floor, and Martin turned bright red.

  Josh was so down about the game, he could barely feel bad for him. Excitement in the rest of the team was high, though, and everybody around them buzzed. Esch ordered the famous clam chowder, and everybody else followed suit. A few minutes after it arrived, Benji looked at Josh’s bowl. He’d taken just one spoonful.

  “Dude, are you . . . I mean . . . Let’s not waste it, right?”

  Josh pushed his bowl over to Benji. “Knock yourself out.”

  “Come on, Josh. It was one game.” Jaden scraped the bottom of her soup bowl for the last creamy bite.

  Jaden’s words didn’t help, and the second game later that day wasn’t any better for Josh. They won, and he got four at bats; but he only got on base once and that was because of an error by the right fielder, who muffed a pop fly. The other three times Josh struck out swinging for the fences. Benji was the only heavy hitter to knock one over the fence, and that didn’t make things any easier. In all the hundreds of baseball games in his life, Josh had never been so rattled. Coach Swanson looked like he’d been chewing glass when he gazed at Josh in the dugout.

  That evening at LongHorn Steakhouse, where the team was having dinner, he called Josh aside and said he was swapping him and Benji in the order. It was the exact opposite of what Josh needed. Every spot he moved down in the lineup meant less opportunities to bat, especially with Benji at cleanup. In that spot he’d be an all-or-nothing hitter if ever there was one.

  During dinner, Jaden and Martin chattered back and forth about game stats, but Josh barely ate.

  Benji jawed a piece of steak and gulped down some milk, leaving a mustache of white foam on his upper lip before he wiped it with his sleeve and leaned across the booth. “Dude, heavy hitters are interchangeable. That’s all it is. You can’t get down when heavy hitter two takes a turn at cleanup. Come on. How would
you feel if I moped when I was batting fifth?”

  “It’s different, Benji.” Jaden gave Josh a worried look. “He’s all twisted up about this Home Run Derby. He’s in a slump. Josh, one hit and you’re out of this slump.”

  “You’re telling me?” Josh scowled at the forkful of mashed potatoes he let drop to his plate with a clatter.

  “Josh, if you don’t eat, you’ll never hit. Eat.”

  Knowing Jaden was right, he shoveled in dinner faster than Benji, but he didn’t even taste it.

  “Dudes.” Benji splayed his fingers and lowered his voice. “If heavy hitter two ends up in the derby and wins the house, heavy hitter two is giving that house to heavy hitter one. We are a team. Don’t think I want this for myself, but I could win it. I got one home run already. I could get on a hot streak. You never know.”

  Josh smiled at his friend. “Thanks, Benji. I appreciate that, but I gotta get back to myself. I gotta get into that derby in Houston. It’s like I can see that bathtub sitting out there over the fence. I see it in my sleep. I see it when I close my eyes. It’s like my destiny. I just gotta get there.”

  “So,” Jaden said, “you relax tonight, get some sleep, and start fresh tomorrow. We play that team from Portland, and I saw the pitcher they’re probably going to start the game with. He throws a four-seam fastball too, no movement, straight down the middle how you like it.”

  “That kid today threw heat. I choked.” Josh picked up his fork and let it drop again.

  Jaden reached across the table and squeezed his hand. “But tomorrow you won’t. You could get two round-trippers in two games and be right back on track. Tomorrow is gonna be your day. I can feel it.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  THAT NIGHT WAS THE first in several that Josh really slept.

  He woke early, feeling good, better than he had for several days. Light seeped in through the curtains. Benji snored softly. Josh slipped out of bed, went to the lobby, and logged on to one of the hotel’s free computers. He went right to the Qwik-E-Builders website and found the Home Run Derby page. He didn’t have to reread the rules; he knew them. What he wanted to do was just stare at the picture of that big red bathtub. It was an old claw-foot thing, and the picture showed it in all its glory, sitting on a tall platform behind the Houston Astros’ center-field fence, tilted at an angle so you could probably see it from home plate.

  It reminded Josh of one of those games on the midway at the fair, the beanbag toss where, if you put one through that silly clown’s red mouth, you won a stuffed animal bigger than a small kid. The sight of it gave Josh a chill. He felt like he could blast a hit right in there, but instead of a stuffed animal, he’d win a house. He visualized it and tried to imagine the sound of his bat cracking and then the thunk of a baseball dropping into the tub with a double bang as it banked off the side, hit the bottom, then rolled around, spinning to a stop.

  At the breakfast buffet in the morning, he saw Martin trying to balance his tray and work his crutch.

  “Here.” Josh didn’t even give Martin a choice. He scooped up Martin’s tray, then stopped at the sight of his face.

  “I’m trying to be nice,” Josh said.

  Martin forced a smile and looked around nervously. “Thanks. I should do it on my own, though, or Coach will come down on me.”

  “Jeez, is he that bad?” Josh frowned.

  Martin shook his head violently. “No, he’s not bad. You don’t get it. He’s right. I don’t want people feeling sorry for me.”

  “Well, I don’t feel sorry for you. I’m just trying to help. And you can sit with us, right? Don’t tell me you can’t. Come on.”

  Sitting next to Benji, Josh dug into his eggs.

  Martin picked up his own fork and began to eat.

  Jaden had been waiting for a specialty omelet, and she joined them after a few minutes, obviously pleased to see that Josh had invited Martin. She sat down right next to him and patted his arm. “See? Josh knows talent when he sees it too.”

  “Talent?” Benji blinked at her before chomping on a piece of bacon.

  “My friend here has a great baseball mind, Benji. Remember the movie Moneyball? Martin has that kind of insight. My bet is he’s a big-league general manager one day.”

  Martin looked down at his plate and shook his head. “No way.”

  “Martin, come on. Stop being so modest.” Jaden looked at Josh. “We sit in the dugout together, and Martin tells me what’s going to happen before it even happens. It’s crazy. I love it.”

  “Well?” Josh waved a fork at Martin. “What do you think about my situation?”

  Martin chewed a mouthful before he said, “That depends. Are you going to keep swinging for the fences?”

  “Well,” Josh said. “I’m not sure how well that worked for me, right? I didn’t put one out of the park, and I cost myself a spot in the batting order.”

  “You’ll get it back,” Martin said. “Sometimes just relaxing is the key. You’re the best player we’ve got. Coach does that lineup thing to his best player sometimes, to get him motivated.”

  “Not sure if I’m the best player with Jack on the team now.” Josh spread some jelly on his toast and took a bite. He wasn’t fishing for compliments; he really respected Sheridan’s skill.

  “Forget hero worship.” Benji leaned into the middle of the table, wanting to be heard. “You gotta just play baseball. Get back on track. Do not get distracted.”

  Benji pointed his finger at Josh, and even though Josh suspected his words were a string of lines he’d probably stolen from the movies, Benji was right.

  Josh just had to play.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  IT WAS THE PERFECT day to get back on track. A front had moved through, leaving a trail of high, wispy clouds, sunshine, and a bite of a breeze hinting at autumn. Hard-core baseball fans and devoted parents from around the country crowded the stands. Crimson Harvard balloons were tethered to some kids’ wrists while others escaped to float high and free out over the Charles River, hurrying toward the ocean. Josh inhaled deeply, catching a hint of grilled onions and chicken from a vendor whose truck shouted “Souvlakis!” with its sign and smells.

  The Portland pitcher Jaden scouted was the one who did indeed start the game. And as promised, he had a strong arm and a heavy fastball. Most of his strikes came in knee level or lower. He struck out the first two batters before giving up a single to Sheridan. Benji, he hit with a pitch. Benji went down like a side of beef, but recovered and waved before jogging down the first-base line.

  On deck, Josh took a final swing and glanced back into the dugout. Jaden sat shoulder to shoulder with Martin, who was bent over some papers. She clenched her fist and raised it, mouthing the words, “You can do this.”

  He stepped into the box. The first pitch came in fast and low. Josh tried to get under it and missed. The next pitch was way outside, and he let it go. In came a ball above the letters. A small voice inside Josh’s head screamed for him to let it pass, but his heart said, “Go get it,” and he did, banging it out of the park, but fifty feet foul of the first-base line.

  “A hit!” Coach Swanson screamed, his face like a boiled lobster’s. “We got two on! LeBlanc! Get me a hit!”

  Josh’s hands were sweating so badly he thought about pulling off his batting gloves, but he wanted to get on with it. He wanted that next pitch. He wanted his first home run, to break his slump and move on with his quest. He rubbed the rosin glove on his bat handle and tightened his grip when he dug back in.

  The pitcher’s eyes swam with doubt, maybe even fear. Josh’s explosive hit confirmed that whatever the pitcher had heard about the power of his bat wasn’t an exaggeration. The pitcher licked his lips and blinked a couple times, then wound up and let one fly. It was knee high, his best pitch. Maybe it would drop out of the strike zone, maybe it wouldn’t. Josh wasn’t going to wait to find out. He dropped his shoulder just a bit to get his swing up under it. If he could tag this pitch, it would go a mile.<
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  As if time slowed to a crawl, Josh watched the ball come, saw the spin, and swung. The bat clanged like a fire bell, clear and true.

  The ball took off for heaven.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  IT NEVER MADE IT to heaven, or if it did, it got spit back down.

  The center fielder backpedaled, got his butt right up to the fence, raised his hands, and hooted as the ball dropped into the pocket of his glove. Josh gripped the bat, and it trembled beneath his fingers. He wanted to throw it into the dirt, into the dugout, into the face of his mean coach. Instead, it shook in the double clutch of his hands, draining the anger and frustration from the rest of his body. Josh clenched his jaw so hard his head hurt.

  Even Coach Swanson kept quiet when he saw Josh’s face. Josh said nothing, but got his glove and went out to second base. He ranted to himself and fumed, blowing off steam as best he could without simply pulling his hair out of his head and spinning around like a complete nut case. He didn’t get another at bat until the end of the third inning. They had a 1–0 lead, thanks to a double by Sheridan and an RBI double by Benji. Josh breathed deeply, not wanting to leave the on-deck circle until he calmed himself.

  Jaden came out of the dugout wearing her Titans uniform and carrying her clipboard. She patted his back. “Go do this.”

  Josh nodded, knowing that he could. He approached the plate.

  After two pop-up foul balls and a 0–2 count, Josh struck out swinging at a fastball so low that it actually hit the catcher’s foot. He gritted his teeth and stormed back to the bench, avoiding eye contact with everyone.

  He got up one last time in the sixth inning, this time facing a less-talented pitcher who laid one in on the first pitch. Josh got under it and blasted the ball for all he was worth. It went so high Josh lost sight of it, then came down without the right fielder having to move more than three feet to get under it. They won the game, but Josh felt worse than he had the day before.