Out of Left Field: Marlee's Story (16 page)

Throughout the innings that followed, neither team scored so by the end of the seven innings of regulation play, the score remained tied at 0-0. Marlee couldn’t believe the game was going into extra innings. She was happy about the way she was pitching, but she was also frustrated because the extra innings delayed her alone time with Susie. She couldn’t even catch Susie’s eye to vent what must be their mutual frustration. She wanted this game over with.

Marlee’s right shoulder muscles ached a bit, but she still felt good enough to continue pitching in the extra innings. Especially because her rise balls were rising on a fairly regular basis and her change-up was working like a charm. Lisa would sometimes signal for the change-up on the first pitch and Marlee had to stifle her laughter each time a Panther batter swung uncontrollably. She even held in her laughter pretty well when she struck out Susie with the change in the fifth inning.

What Marlee didn’t like, however, was that Jeri avoided her in the dugout and still hadn’t said a word to her. But Marlee refused to be shaken by her friend’s coolness because she had already vowed to make it right. As soon as the big weekend was over she would talk to Jeri about her wonderful and fabulous new relationship with Susie. She had no idea how she was going to do it, but if Jeri didn’t want to be her friend after that, she’d deal with that later.

Unfortunately, Marlee’s team couldn’t get any runners on base in the top of the eighth inning and consequently couldn’t score any runs. If the Cougars had any chance of winning they needed to hold the East Valley Panthers scoreless in the bottom of the eighth inning to force a ninth inning with the top of the Cougar batting order due up. Jeri would lead off and she was probably their best chance at scoring a run.

Marlee smiled and watched Susie step up to the plate to lead off the bottom of the eighth inning.
She can do a lot of damage if she ever gets hold of one of my pitches.
Marlee smiled, but caught the scowl Lisa threw her and stopped smiling.
Concentrate
, she scolded herself.

High inside fastball. Strike one. Lisa called for a change-up on the outside corner. Marlee delivered the change-up and Susie swung wildly and missed. Marlee winced. Susie probably hadn’t been expecting the change-up on the second pitch. She didn’t really want to strike Susie out again, but remembered that this had been the original game plan the first time the two teams met. And besides, all was fair in love and softball. Right? Lisa called for the rise ball. Marlee relied on her fastball most of the time, but since the rise was working well that evening she didn’t protest. And as soon as she let it go, she knew the pitch was good. Strike three. She struck Susie out for the second time that night.

Lisa ran all the way to the mound with the ball and hugged Marlee. “Way to go, girl.” The hug spun Marlee around so she couldn’t see Susie’s reaction. By the time Lisa let go, Susie was already sitting in the dugout. Marlee couldn’t help feeling that Lisa had distracted her on purpose.

Sorry, Susie,
Marlee thought.
I’ll make it up to you later.

The next two Panther batters grounded out in turn to force the ninth inning and Marlee was riding high. The Cougars still had a chance. Marlee ran to the dugout and caught up with Lisa on the way. “You are just brilliant today, Lisa.” Marlee clapped her friend on the back with her gloved hand.

“I calls ’em like I sees ’em. And besides, I don’t have anything to do with it. You’re the train, I just keep you on the track.” Lisa began the arduous process of taking off her catcher’s gear in the hopes that she would get up to bat that inning.

Marlee called out to Jeri in the on-deck circle, “Get ’em Jeri. Show them what we’ve got.” Marlee didn’t expect a response and didn’t get one.

Jeri fouled off several of Christy’s rockets and Marlee thought, or hoped that Christy was getting tired. Jeri, ultimately struck out, but Christy needed nine pitches to do it.

With one out, Julie, the Cougars’ number two batter, got up to bat and fouled off pitch after pitch after pitch. Everyone could see that this infuriated Christy. Christy kept glaring at Marlee in the on-deck circle after each foul ball. Marlee didn’t know why Christy was shooting daggers at her because she wasn’t the one fouling off the pitches. Unfortunately for the Cougars, Christy won the battle and Julie struck out. Marlee got up to bat with two outs.

Marlee took another practice swing in the ondeck circle. Her mother, bundled up in the stands, gave her two thumbs up for encouragement. Marlee nodded and headed toward the plate. She put her hand up and asked the umpire for time to get set in the batter’s box. She anchored her right foot in the box and stretched her bat across the plate to make sure she was the proper distance away. She then brought her left foot in and bent her knees. She took one practice swing that signaled to the umpire she was ready for the pitch.

She could hear the Cougar fans yelling for her. Lisa’s voice was always loudest. “C’mon Marlee. Smack it outta here, #3.” Her coach clapped her hands and reminded Marlee about the release point. Marlee heard her mother yell encouragement from the stands. She wasn’t sure about Jeri. She couldn’t worry about that right now. She focused on Christy.

Watch the release
. She watched the release all right. Another Christy Loveland rocket roared straight for her head. Marlee saw it coming, but could not react fast enough this time. A thunderclap ripped through her skull followed quickly by searing pain in her shoulder. She knew she’d been hit and was on the ground.

Pain pounded through her brain. She heard someone moaning and through the din heard voices shouting weird things like “Yer out!” and “Keep her helmet on.” She couldn’t figure out what was going on and struggled to open her eyes. White-hot pain drove them closed again. “Call 9-1-1,” was the last thing she heard.

Chapter Eleven

Wounded

MARLEE WOKE UP when she heard her mother’s voice.

“Marlee?” Her mother eased open her daughter’s bedroom door. “I hope you’re up for company. Jeri and Lisa are on their way over.”

“Sure, Mom. C’mon in.” Marlee attempted to sit up in her bed. “Ooh.” She winced.

“Shoulder?”

“Yeah. And my head aches a little.” She lay back down.

Her mother walked to the window and pulled up the shade. “Does that bother you?”

“No, it’s nice.”

The late Saturday afternoon sunlight cheered up the room considerably. Marlee had slept through the morning and into the late afternoon. She was a little disoriented. She opened her eyes wide and blinked a few times in an attempt to wake up.

“How about if I open the window, too? We could use some fresh air.”

Her mother opened the window a few inches and then sat on the edge of the bed. Marlee filled her lungs with the fresh air in an attempt to shake the cobwebs from her head. The fresh air and the prospect of company perked up her spirits.

Her mother pushed a lock of hair behind her ear, a familiar gesture. “I must have been your bad luck charm, yesterday. The first game I come to this year and look what happens.”

Less than twenty-four hours earlier Marlee had been whisked away from Sandstoner Fields in an ambulance and taken to East Valley Hospital. The emergency room doctor diagnosed her with a mild concussion and a mild shoulder sprain. The doctor kept her overnight for observation, to make sure there was no abnormal swelling in her brain, but Marlee was glad she could go home early Saturday morning. The hospital was kind of scary and the whole place smelled like sick people. Thankfully they let her mother stay in the room with her overnight. Although she was sixteen years old, almost seventeen, she needed her mother.

“Mom, I feel fine. The doctor said it’s just a mild concussion.”

“And a shoulder sprain. I’m just glad you only had to stay one night in that nasty hospital, but I’ve got you home now and that’s where you’re staying for a while. Oh, and,” a hint of a smile appeared at the corners of her mouth, “I’m supposed to observe you for signs of weird behavior.”

Marlee smiled, too. “How are you gonna tell, Mom?” They both laughed.

“They didn’t know what they were asking, did they?” She pulled the covers tighter around Marlee.

“Mom, you don’t have to tuck me in.”

“Oh, I know, sweetie. Instinct, I guess. Well, Jeri and Lisa should be here any minute so let me go downstairs and unlock the kitchen door.” Marlee’s mother grabbed her big toe through the blanket and gave it an affectionate squeeze.

“Mom?” Her mother turned around and leaned against the doorjamb. “I don’t think you were bad luck. Maybe I have, like, a guardian angel and he made sure you were there. ’Cause I got hurt.”

“Maybe.” Her mother smiled, but Marlee could see tears well up in her eyes. “Maybe it was Daddy.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

A few minutes after Marlee’s mother went back downstairs, Marlee heard Jeri’s Mustang pull into the gravel driveway. She tried to sit up again, but this time the pain in her head wouldn’t allow it. And with her arm and shoulder tightly bound with a body wrap, she couldn’t get any leverage to sit up.

She ran fingers through her short hair in an attempt to make herself presentable. Using her left hand felt awkward, but she guessed she’d have to get used to doing a lot of things left-handed now that her entire right side was tied down and useless.

Marlee swallowed hard trying to calm her nerves. After all, she and Jeri hadn’t been speaking. They had met in Mrs. Taylor’s algebra class in middle school. Marlee was in seventh grade and Jeri was in eighth grade. They hit if off immediately. And once they discovered their mutual love, more like obsession, for softball, their friendship was sealed. Marlee hoped she could salvage some of that friendship after she revealed her secret. A secret that she had begun to accept for herself.

“Marlee?” Jeri opened the door fully.

“Did we win?”

Jeri and Lisa burst into laughter as they fell over each other trying to get in the door.

“Oh, she’s okay.” Jeri exchanged a look with Lisa. “And we were worried.”

Lisa plopped into the recliner. “Yeah, we won.”

Jeri sat on the edge of the bed. “When Christy got thrown out of the game—”

“Thrown out?” Marlee looked at her friends in disbelief.

“Oh, yeah,” Lisa said. “As soon as the ball hit you, the umpire yelled, ‘You’re out! You’re out of this game!’”

“Oh, my God,” Marlee said. “I heard that. I thought he was calling me out. I was so confused. Then what happened?”

Jeri took up the tale. “Well, Coach put Kerry in to run for you, seeing as you couldn’t do it, slacking off going for a joyride in an ambulance.” Jeri rolled her eyes. “Then East Valley put in their back-up pitcher. I forgot her name.”

Lisa broke in, “Mary something-or-other. But then I was up to bat with Kerry on first base.”

“Yeah, and Lisa hits one to Susie in left field—” Lisa objected to Jeri’s version of the story so Jeri modified it. “Okay. Okay. Lisa hits it in the gap between left and center. But Susie, girl, she didn’t even run hard after it. Kerry practically scored by the time Susie picked up the ball at the fence. And then you know what Susie did?”

“What?”

“When Susie picked up the ball, she lobbed it to second base. Second base! Lisa was running to third. Susie knows better than that. But, anyway, Kerry pitched in the bottom of the ninth and held them off so we won the game one to nothing.”

Marlee smiled at Jeri’s enthusiasm. This was the Jeri she knew. Her heart was split at that moment. Her heart rejoiced that Jeri was back to her old self, but her heart ached over needing to tell Jeri “the truth.” Her heart also ached over Susie’s part in their win.

“Did she do it on purpose?” Marlee wondered out loud.

“Who? Susie or Christy?” Jeri asked with derision.

“Yeah, really,” Marlee agreed. Marlee had meant Susie, but she let Jeri think she meant Christy. “I can’t figure out why Christy would throw at me. What did I ever do to her?”

Lisa pulled at the ends of her long braid. “Easy. She was jealous.”

“Yeah, you were pitching a better game than she was,” Jeri added.

“I guess.” Marlee shrugged, but instantly regretted the movement.

Jeri softened her voice and asked, “So, are you okay? What did the doctor say?”

Marlee told them about the mild concussion and shoulder sprain. “And, and this really sucks, I can’t play ball for at least a week, maybe more.”

Her friends gasped.

“Oh, my God. A week?” Lisa slammed the foot rest back into place and sat bolt upright in the recliner. “How are you gonna stand it? Geez, how am I gonna stand it? We have games on Tuesday and Friday.”

“C’mon, you know she has to get better,” Jeri reprimanded. “She has to get strong to kick some Panther butt in the playoff game in a couple of weeks.”

Lisa groaned. “Yeah, but we have to win all our games between now and then for that to happen. Because you know they aren’t going to suspend Christy All-County-Ace-Pitcher Loveland. And with her, they’ll win the rest of their games.”

Marlee groaned, too, as she realized the gravity of the situation.

Jeri patted Marlee’s good hand. “Don’t worry about it, Marlee. You need to focus on getting better. Kerry is a pretty good pitcher, you know. She’s learned from the best. You.”

Marlee blushed. “Thanks. And yeah, she’s a good kid. It’s hard to be on varsity as a freshman, though.”

Lisa said, “Hey, you and I did it, right? She’ll be all right. I’ll take care of her. Geez, I can’t believe it. An entire week.”

“Or more, if I don’t get better.”

“Trying to depress me, eh?” Lisa sulked. “But listen, before I forget. Sam called me this morning. She seemed so eager and your mom said it was okay. She and Susie are coming by today.”

Marlee smiled when she heard that Susie was coming to see her. She tried to sound nonchalant even though her heart began to do flip-flops. “That’s fine.” And she also couldn’t help wonder why the East Valley second baseman was so eager to come over, too.
I guess we’re friends now.