Velvet Rain - A Dark Thriller (41 page)

Would I know if things changed?

He spoke, weakly. “Can you forgive
me?
”

“Of course,” Lynn said, emphatically. “We all do.”

Ryan added: “I really am sorry. I just … I mean, I can’t—” He seemed lost in the moment, yet somehow hopeful, like a man wandering in the woods for days when he finally sees the campfire in the distance. He looked to his mother, who nodded, and then the boy turned to the door. “Guys.”

Big Al hobbled in first, cane in hand. Georgia followed. Ben Caldwell fell in behind them. They held a solemn, reflective air, and yet their eyes told Kain it was all right … everything was all right.

“Guess I’m late for work,” he said.

Big Al chuckled and shook his head. “Cripes.”

Kain regarded the young shortstop. The brim of his wrinkled Yankees cap hung over his eyes a bit.

“Ben’s a good egg,” Ryan said. “He won’t tell.”

Ben Caldwell looked as worn out as Lynn. He crossed his heart. “Hope to die, mister.”

“We’re all good eggs,” Georgia said warmly.

Ryan put out a hand again. Kain looked up quizzically.

“Deal’s a deal,” Ryan said. “I already called Coach.”

Kain smiled. Shook the boy’s hand.

“He really is a good teacher,” Lee-Anne said. Despite the bandages, the girl was grinning ear to ear.

“We better go,” Big Al said. “The old guy needs some rest. Come on, now.”

Only Lynn stayed, closing the door behind them. She took something from the bureau, hesitated, and then sat down next to Kain. There was a small grumble of thunder.

“Good people,” he whispered. “The best.”

She agreed with a nod. She slipped him the envelope.

“I wasn’t snooping,” she said. “It was on the table, and … well, I … I just looked. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

The letter—the
note
—was inside. The photograph, too.

Kain studied the faded print. It seemed unfamiliar suddenly, as if the memories tied to it were not his own. He slipped it back. Set the envelope down.

“No scars,” Lynn said.

“I don’t know what to say … I’m so sorry.”

She shook her head. “No … you don’t have to be.” She had small tears in her eyes. She wiped them away.

Kain took up the diary. He took her hand, so soft and so warm, so trembling, and placed the book within it.

She regarded it uncertainly; regarded
him
the same.

“Read it,” he told her. “Then we’ll talk.”

~ 16

It was another week before the first pitch was thrown. The arm had healed, the bandages had come off, the bruises had faded; the only real scar was the black memory of that horrible night. The Tribe had been told he was under the weather; Big Al had called every day (sometimes twice, the big lug) to check on his progress. He had slept most of the week away, his fever breaking just two days ago, that benumbing rain with it. And while the rest had been good for the body, it had been a long and laborious hell for the soul. Surprisingly, the boy had agreed on the calisthenics, had even thanked him for the conditioning tips, and the hour-long warm-up had stirred the old drifter muscles. He only hoped that somehow, working together, they could bridge the gulf that had separated them since that distant spring day, when Ryan had caught him staring from the stands after the incident with Jones. He had risen at dawn feeling most uncertain about their chances, and now, as he gripped the bat tight, wondered how it was such a wonderful slice of hickory had become such a bloodstained killing machine.

Still, despite all that had transpired, because of it, he supposed, he found himself looking longingly to that dreamy Iowa sky. It was fresh and deep, the air, oh so sweet. It was good to be alive again.

The boy—it was hard to think of him that way now—stood on the home-made mound, his brim pulled low. He held the guise of a gangly gunslinger. He waited patiently, barely stirring, and after a pair of soft, deliberate swings cued him, flew into his delivery. The ball came hard and high, a foot over the batter’s head, striking the guesthouse two
time
zones out of the strike zone.

The batter looked down at the ball. Looked up.

“Little rusty,” the pitcher said, shrugging.

Kain walked up to him. Handed him the bat.

~

The drifter slipped his hand into the glove. Almost immediately, he was taken with the scent of well-oiled leather. It smelled fine and sweet. It swept him back, back to where the Turn could never take him. Faces. Places. Pennant races. Crowds. Spit tobacco (although he used it infrequently, only in the dustiest ballparks). Long bus rides (which he enjoyed; he had always slept better in those days, the ceaseless hum of the engine quite comforting). Friendship and camaraderie. Laughter.

He looked to the horizon. The sun, still low and pumpkin in the early morning, was as warm as any sunset in so many ballparks. He sported a subtle grin and felt it curling wider. He stood tall on the mound, looking quite out of place, what with the blue jeans and T-shirt. The long hair. The boots. Still, in his mind’s eye, he could pass. He could.

“How’s
this
gonna teach me anything?” Ryan said. He tapped the bat in the dirt. The “plate” Kain had carved not three weeks prior had been swept away by the rains.

“You’ve got a rocket for an arm, Ryan. No question. But you have zero control.”

“Hey.”

“That’s not a putdown,” Kain said. “Just a fact.”

“You sound like Coach.”

“He sees the potential in you. So do I.”

“Then why am I standing
here?
”

“Remember what I told you?”

“Yeah, yeah. You used to play ball.”

Kain motioned with his glove, and the boy settled in. He felt the rust as he raised the glove in front of him. His eyes narrowed. He waited for a swing, and when it came, like an old pro called in to close, he slipped into a natural, near-perfect delivery. The ball sailed smoothly, straight and true, and as the batter swung, it changed direction in a wicked curve and blew by him.

Ryan straightened, clearly stunned. “What the heck was that?”

“Control,” the pitcher said, and gave him a wink.

~

The veranda offered comfort as they sipped iced lemonade. Kain relaxed in the shade of the swing chair, while Ryan had curled up on the deck near the steps, his back against the railing, soaking up the rays.

“I thought you played right field.”

“One season,” Kain said. “But it turned out I was better at throwing strikes than catching fly balls. I pitched for almost three years.”

“Hmph.”

“Don’t take it so hard, Ryan. That was a damn good breaker. Not bad after all these years.”

“So where’d you play?”

“Eastern League. Binghamton Triplets.”

“No kiddin’. Triple-A?”

“Uh huh. We finished first the last two seasons … won the EL championship in ’40. I closed the last game. Eight straight strikeouts. My claim to fame.”

The boy looked at him dimly.

“I’m really sorry about what happened, Kain.”

“Me too.”

“I never meant to go crazy like that. You know?”

Kain nodded.

“… What’s it like?” Ryan asked.

“… The Turn.”

“Yeah.”

The drifter finished his lemonade. “Hell on Earth.”

~

They spent the next few hours on the mechanics of pitching, working the intricacies of the delivery, from the wind-up to the follow-through. Kain talked. Kain demonstrated. Kain corrected and coached. At first the boy seemed stuck in his ways, inflexible as iron, but under his expert tutelage, he was able to melt that stiff, stilted delivery—and the
I can’t do this
attitude—and re-mold them. By midday, Ryan was throwing strikes with a newfound grace. He hadn’t become a
different
pitcher … he had
become
a pitcher.

“Nice work,” Kain said, standing not at bat, but beside the mound, where he had been the entire time.

Ryan fired one more strike. Dead center. The scuffed hardball struck the wall with a thud and rolled in with the scattering of a dozen other marked balls.

“Thanks,” he said. “But I gotta get my speed back. I’m gonna get killed out there.”

“It’ll come. But for what it’s worth, you look like Whitey Ford.”

“He’s a southpaw.”

“True,” Kain said. “But he’s all about control—in every sense of the word. You can’t shake him. He’s the rock in that Yankee bullpen.”

“Can’t argue that.”

“Three strikes?” Kain asked, playfully.

The young pitcher shifted. Adjusted his cap. “Sure.”

Kain took to the batter’s box. He carved a new plate with the bat, then set his swing where he wanted it. When the pitch came, he nailed it.

“I told you,” Ryan said, watching it fly. “I told you.”

Kain walked up to him and patted him on the shoulder. “It wasn’t the pitch, Ryan. It was you.”

~

They gathered the balls (one had split its stitches like some zombie skull coming undone, making it more useful as a rock than a hardball), and while Ryan was inside fixing them lunch, Kain rocked slowly on the swing. It seemed hotter now than before the rain, the air thick and dead. Just enough to sicken him, he could smell the rancid remains of Pepper, the stench lingering in the swelter like the permeating rot of a garbage dump in August. Ryan had told him the grisly details yesterday, had explained how he’d had to fish the tabby out of the crawlspace with a stick and a hook. How he wasn’t able to get all of it, on account there wasn’t much left of him but bone and guts. How he had buried him with Abbott (and what was left of Costello) about a quarter mile out back. The boy had shown him the mass grave, the small mound marked with a simple wooden cross he had fashioned in the barn. He had etched their names on it with a knife.

The boy caught him looking at the footprints. They were faded now, like a long lost memory.

“I still can’t believe it,” Ryan said from behind the screen door. He came out and set a plate of sandwiches on the table. “I never noticed them. Ma showed ’em to me. It’s just so weird. Sorry.”

Kain poured himself some lemonade. He said nothing. Those ghostly contours served but a cold dish of reality, reminding him just how distant he really was from the rest of humanity. If the boy only knew. If only.

Ryan took up in a folding chair. “So it’s
me?
”

“Sorry?”

“The pitch. You said it was me, not the pitch.”

“Anyone could have hit that. That is, anyone who knows Number 23.”

Kain held up a ball. Rolled it through his fingers.

Ryan followed the nimble finger-work. “Yeah, so?”

“Fastball,” Kain said. “You do it every time.”

“I do?”

“Every pitcher has his quirks. Hell, I used to decelerate before every curveball—and got killed for it. It can be anything. Some guys, they move their glove a little differently on some pitches. Tilt it this way. That way. Some lift their knee a bit higher on a certain pitch. They don’t even know they’re doing it. The littlest thing can tip a batter off.”

“Coach never said anything like this.”

“It takes a good eye, Ryan.” Kain paused. “But I’m not the only one who knows.”

Ryan considered. “Jones.”

“Uh huh. He’s a hitter, that one. A damn good one.”

“Jeeze!”

“But now you know,” Kain said.

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“There’s, uh … something else.”

Kain looked at the boy solemnly. He hadn’t wanted to bring it up, had been avoiding the subject altogether, but looking at him now, he felt he owed it to him. There was fire in the kid’s eyes. Not that burning anger he was used to seeing, but that burning desire he’d seen in so many ballplayers. Still, he couldn’t help but feel he should be minding his own business.

“What is it?” Ryan said. “Tell me.”

“How did it feel … going after Jones that day?”

The boy’s expression dimmed.

“We don’t have to talk about it,” Kain said.

“Lousy. Okay? I felt lousy.”

“Why’d you do it?”

“Why do you think? The guy got to me. You were there.”

“I know,” Kain said. “But why? You didn’t have to.”

“I know! Jeeze!”

“Was it the home run? Was it Jones? What was it?”

“We lost. We
lost.
Happy?”

“Ryan.”

The boy looked away; turned back. “Because of me, okay?
Me.
”

“Is that so bad?”

“Ask the guys. Ask anyone.”

“You can’t beat yourself up over it. In the end … it’s just a game.”

“I guess they taught you that in the Eastern League.”

“Not exactly,” Kain said. “But I learned a long time ago you can’t always change the way things turn out.”

The boy had to laugh. “Coming from you, that doesn’t hold much water.”

“The rabbit doesn’t always come out of the hat, Ryan.”

The boy paused to consider, and his expression brightened. “That’s why you got me to hold Beaks the next time round. Ben would’ve hit him again.”

The drifter tapped his temple.
Right.

“I guess I understand, Kain. But it doesn’t make me feel any better.”

“Can I ask you something? Something personal?”

The boy regarded him cautiously. Nodded.

“What do you want to do with your life?”

“How the heck should I know?”

“I think you know what I mean.”

Ryan dropped his gaze.

“When you’re out there—when Jones is swirling that bat and crawling under your skin—you’ve got two choices, Ryan. You can pitch
around
him—you might walk him if you’re lucky, but he’s so good he’ll likely run you out of the park—or you can pitch
to
him. It’s you against him. Your best against his. Life’s no different. Pitch around it, or pitch
to
it.”

Something stirred in the boy. There was life in his eyes, something hopeful, yet something tempered and wary.

“Can I ask you something else?”

“I guess.”

“That first pitch—way back when—were you trying to skull me?”

~

They finished lunch. Ryan never did answer the question, only shrugged as he laughed it off. They worked on a new pitch, a breaking ball, and within an hour or so, the kid held an extra weapon in his arsenal. It needed control, needed speed, but all of that, as Kain assured him, would come. They broke again for a short respite.