“Just be aware of it,” Eleanor said. “She admires you so much, and she’s getting to that age. I’d hate to see her hurt.”
There was this feeling, on softball nights—palpable as the crackling of mosquitoes landing on the bug zapper—of sex in the air: Women watching their men. Men performing as heroically as they could for their women. Their own, or somebody else’s. Some nights, you could almost feel the heat coming off the field, of the women watching the men, or watching the other women.
Whoever it was who’d been chosen to be Timmy Pouliot’s girlfriend that summer would be leaned against the fence, with a beer in her hand, away from the wives. When Timmy hit a home run, or just tagged home even, on a base hit, the girlfriend would plant a kiss on him and sometimes pat him on the butt. One time, when he made a home run, she jumped into his arms, and the kiss she gave him went on for a while.
Eleanor didn’t feel this way herself, but a lot of the wives hated Timmy’s girlfriends. Eleanor figured they were just jealous of a woman who still had her body, and time to apply polish to her toenails and run around on the back of a Harley.
“Did we ever look that good?” one of them asked, taking a long sip of Budweiser Light.
One night, Bonnie’s husband, Jerry, hit a particularly well-timed home run that brought home three runners to win the game. As he rounded the last base and slid into home, Eleanor turned to Bonnie. “That’s got to be the best feeling,” she said.
Bonnie had tossed her head back and laughed.
“Second-best feeling, maybe,” she said. There was pride in her voice, and maybe a certain awareness that among the assembled mothers there might not have been another who could have echoed the sentiment.
The women on the bleachers went strangely silent after that.
“You’re too close to the parking lot,” Eleanor called out to Toby. That was the thing about her life. She never had time to think about anything very long before somebody needed attention.
That night, driving home from the game, she decided once again that as soon as they got the children to bed, she and her husband would make love, but this time, the person who’d fallen asleep was Cam. And anyway, Toby had climbed in next to her. The hand that ended up on her breast that night was his.
26.
The Amazing Catch
The Yellow Jackets were playing a team from Franklin, one of the tougher competitors in their league. In the ninth inning, the team led by a single run, with the guys from Franklin getting the final at-bat and one of their best hitters on deck.
Out on the mound, the Yellow Jackets’ pitcher, Rich McGann, threw a ball, followed by a strike, two more balls, another strike. The batter—the Franklin second baseman—positioned himself for the next pitch. Strike. Out.
Eleanor looked over at Cam, poised a few feet from the bag on first base, waiting to tag out an advancing runner. They had to keep the Franklin boys from scoring and make another two outs to win. It had been six years since that night in his Vermont cabin when he’d taken off his clothes so she could draw him. He still had a beautiful body.
Franklin’s power hitter stepped up to the plate. Swung. They could hear the crack of the bat. Another few inches and he would have had a home run on his hands, but it was a foul. Strike one.
Another pitch. Another strike. Even Eleanor, who—even after all these summers—knew little about the game and mostly spent her time on the bleachers keeping an eye on her children, could tell from watching the batter that this was the kind of guy who, if he got his swing just right, could hit it to the far end of the field.
On the third pitch, he did just that. Even the two-year-olds, gathered around Coco as she handed out Rice Krispies treats, looked up from the dirt at the sound of the wood smacking the ball. Eleanor shaded her eyes from the sun to watch as it sailed over the outfield.
Then came an amazing moment. Harry Botts, the player who had never once in his seven years on the team actually made a catch, rantoward the spot where the ball was arcing down. Harry had a funny, loping run—not particularly fast—and his arm, as he reached out with his glove, seemed like a wet and floppy noodle. The way he held out his arm, he looked not so much like a ballplayer as he did a person going for a jog and checking the sky for rain first, to see if he needed to take his umbrella.
He caught it. More accurately, maybe, the ball landed in Harry’s glove.
The Yellow Jackets went crazy. So did the wives and girlfriends on the bleachers. Nobody could believe what had just happened, including Harry Botts.
He stood there, frozen, in the middle of the field, still holding on to the ball and shaking his head.
“I caught the ball,” he said. “I can’t believe I caught it.”
Harry just stood there. He was still gazing at the ball, still looking stunned. His teammates were calling out to him to field the ball to second base for a double play. Harry just stood there.
“Throw to second, Harry,” someone called out. Everyone did.
But Harry Botts just stood there. You couldn’t even be mad at him. He was just so amazed at what he’d done, it did not occur to him.
The other team scored, but the Yellow Jackets cheered for Harry anyway.
27.
Hawaii Ho
