Date: Thu, 1 Dec 2005 22:13:09 -0800 (PST) From: Robin Eagleson Subject: Luckiest Summer Part 10 The Luckiest Summer Robin Eagleson robineagleson@yahoo.com Part Ten A week later Mom had found a realtor, and a week after that there was a sign sticking out of the ground in our front yard. I was surprisingly indifferent about it, mostly because nothing had happened yet. There were three more weeks of summer left, and I knew that it was highly unlikely we'd sell the house before school started. Despite what Mom had said, I wanted to at least start the year out at the school I had been going to the past few years. When the time came, I would deal with having to change schools. It took a few days, but the calls came flooding in as soon as my friends all heard I might be moving. I'd never felt more popular, even though I hadn't even seen most of the people that called all summer. Nadia had told me it didn't matter if I was moving, and that she wouldn't let it stop her from marrying me someday. Then she'd kissed my cheek and I'd blushed for the next hour. She hadn't been acting any different since we'd started going out, really. The only difference was that we held hands more often now, which was okay. I hadn't kissed her since the time in the pool. Brad was never home. I'd get bored and lonely sometimes and wander over to see if he was home, but he never was, so I'd hang around for a few hours and play video games with Tyler and then leave. I hadn't spent the night once since Tyler had come back from camp, but as far as I could tell it didn't have anything to do with his return, and I didn't hold it against him. As for Tyler, he was alright, I supposed. I had learned to put up with him, and he really was a little easier to get along with since he'd come back. Dad and I had made another trip to Best Buy recently and I'd gotten the Ben Folds CD with the song on it I liked so much. I'd taken to sitting in my room and listening to it whenever there was nothing else to do, and I discovered that Brad was right; The Luckiest was only one of many good songs on the album. It was a boring afternoon in the middle of the week when I woke up and decided I wanted to go see Brad. Mom had left me a note saying the realtor was going to come by and show a younger couple our house at around one, and since I didn't want to be around when they came, I got dressed and crossed the yard to ring the doorbell. No one answered, not even Tyler. So I turned and walked down the driveway and headed for his work. I saw his car in its usual spot right in front of the door; the sight of it put me at ease. I peered in through the glass of the store to see if he was visible, but the employee area appeared to be empty. I stood outside uncertainly for a few seconds and then opened the door, listening to the beeping of the bell. I stood patiently at the door until I heard footsteps coming from the back, where all the lights were out. "Were you planning on waiting by the door all day?" he asked when he saw it was me. "You could have saved me the trouble of getting up if you had just walked up to the counter. I would have seen it was you from the back without having to move." "Sorry," I said softly. "I was bored." "Come on back," he offered, motioning for me to follow him with a broad sweep of his arm. "Where have you been?" I asked, scooting into the booth he was sitting at across from him. "Here," he said, looking at me as if I had asked a dumb question. "I've been kind of busy." "Doing what?" "Working and stuff. You know, just busy." "I've been bored," I repeated. "My mom put the house up for sale." "I saw that," he replied, scratching his cheek thoughtfully. "Are you pretty pissed about that?" "No." "Liar." "I was," I admitted. "But there's nothing I can do about it, is there?" "You can rip the sign out of the yard and hide it, for a start. You shouldn't go down without a fight." He was trying to get me to laugh, but I didn't. "Can I have a drink?" I asked, still sweating slightly from the walk over. "We're out of Root Beer," he responded automatically. "We're still trying to recover from the time you drank it all." I knew that couldn't be true, and I didn't even have to ask him if he was being serious. I had started getting his sense of humor a little more now. I scampered up to the front, grabbed a cup from the pile of them resting on the counter, and filled it with Dr. Pepper, the second best option, after hitting the button on the Root Beer just to make sure it really was out. I saw the buffet was sitting unattended, so I grabbed a few old slices and went back to where Brad was. "That pizza has been sitting out since noon," he told me in a distant tone when I sat down across from him. "We're slow as hell today. Not that I mind." "I don't care," I muttered as I tore into a piece. It tasted like barbeque beef. "Are you coming with me on Saturday?" he asked mysteriously, his eyes focused on the TV. I was starting to wonder if he had some kind of attention disorder, and that as long as there was a TV around he wasn't capable of looking away from it. "Where?" I asked, feeling a tinge of excitement for the first time in two weeks. It wasn't that I'd been unhappy, but I'd definitely been bored. "Houston," he said. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you're kind of a last resort. My plans fell through." "What are you talking about?" I asked, crinkling up my face and looking at him in confusion. "It's Sara's birthday this Saturday. I thought, you know, we could have an outing in Houston. We were going to see an Astros game and do some sightseeing. I had the tickets and everything, and now she can't go." "I'll go!" I said instantly, not at all offended about being the last resort option as he put it. "Do you think your mom will let you go?" he asked, finally making eye contact with me. "I'm not sure," I admitted. "But she can't stop me. I haven't gone anywhere all summer. The game is this Saturday?" "This Saturday at seven." "That's like, three days away," I said, doing some quick math. "Why didn't you tell me before now?" "She just backed out yesterday. I'm not very good at predicting the future." I chewed on my lukewarm pizza and pondered. He was going home in a few weeks, and I might be moving at any given time. We'd never get this kind of opportunity again. "I'm going," I told him forcefully. "I'll just lie and tell my mom I'm spending the night with a friend if I have to." "You can't do that," he shook his head. "I'm not getting arrested for kidnapping you. If you don't promise to ask, I'll have to talk to her and make sure it's really okay with her," he threatened, holding our eye contact. "Ask her, and if says okay, we'll go. Otherwise, I'll make Tyler go or something." "So if my mom says yes," I began carefully, "I can go?" "Yeah," he assured me. "It's not complicated. I've got tickets and even a hotel booked, so I'm screwed if I can't get someone." "You guys had a hotel room?" I asked, staring at him with an amused grin on my face. "Yes," he admitted, answering me directly as usual. "Not that it concerns you. We're both consenting adults according to the law. Actually she's turning nineteen this weekend." "Is that why you haven't been around as much lately? Because you've been with her?" I asked cautiously. "Sort of," he answered, his eyes back on the TV now. Then he looked at me again. "You're the nosiest kid I've ever met. Even Tyler doesn't ask me so many questions." I finished my drink and didn't say anything else. The bell rang again and Brad had to go the front to ring up a customer for the buffet. I left my dishes at the table and walked out while he was giving the customer his tray, waving to him on the way out. There were no unwanted visitors in the house when I returned, so I hoped I'd missed them. I went out to the pool for a few hours just in case, because that way at least I wouldn't have to interact with anyone if they did come in. I came in when the sun started shining down at an angle that told me it was now closer to the evening than it was the afternoon. Mom had started cooking again recently. She wasn't totally back to normal, and she was still smoking pretty regularly, but not being responsible for Jesse's whereabouts had taken a lot of the strain out of her life, and she seemed hopeful about putting the house on the market. I knew she had only waited this long for my sake because she didn't want to put me through moving, but knowing she might soon be getting a more affordable place had eased her mindset a bunch, too. She had been especially nice to me lately. "Mom?" I began, deciding to put her niceness to the test now and see how well it held up. She was making spaghetti tonight, hovering over the stove in an old pair of jeans and a t-shirt. She looked so much more relaxed now it was almost stunning. I came and stood next to her in the kitchen, leaning over the stove to watch her cook. The indistinguishable scent of oregano overpowered my nostrils. She had been humming while she cooked, something I remembered her doing occasionally when our family was whole. "It's almost ready, honey," she said, pushing me gently out of the way so she could rifle through the cabinet I was standing in front of. I thought she smelled nice tonight. Normally when I got close to her it smelled like cigarette smoke, but tonight I could only detect the perfume she'd been wearing as long as I could remember. "Can I go to Houston with Brad?" I asked nervously, immediately wishing I had worded it a different way. I shouldn't have gotten to the real question so quickly. I could have spent some time chatting her up first, testing out her mood and trying to earn favorable points with her first. I knew she trusted Brad a lot more than she used to, but maybe not this much. I tensed up and waited for her to reply. "What for?" she asked, keeping her tone pleasant, but definitely sounding interested. "To see a baseball game." "You don't like baseball," she told me while she stirred the sauce for the spaghetti. "I like it a little," I lied. "Anyway, I haven't gotten to go anywhere all summer, and Brad's going back to Dallas soon." She needed to know what she was denying me of if she said no. "When?" she asked. This was progress. There were a few signs that Mom was about to give me her consent, like when she answered "We'll see" if I asked for a favor, or if she began to focus more on the time something would be taking place instead of what would be taking place. "This Saturday," I said, starting to feel hopeful. "Your dad gets you on Saturdays," she responded immediately. "You only see him twice a week." "I can go over there on Sunday instead," I suggested. "We were also going to go out to lunch," she continued, sounding less and less approving by the second. "The three of us, I mean. You, me, and your sister." "We can do that on Sunday," I tried again. "Honey, can you go sit down or something?" she interrupted me. "You're really getting in my way here." I quickly scampered to the table and sat down, not wanting to do anything that might hurt my chances of getting a yes. I put my elbows on the table and rested my chin on my hands as I watched her cook. "So can I go?" I asked after I'd waited in silence for a few minutes. I was nearly bursting with a desperate need to know the final answer. "I suppose," she sighed, and I smiled broadly and jumped out of my seat to wrap my arms around her waist. "I'll need to discuss this with Brad, too," she added to sober up my mood. "I'm going to need a way to get hold of him, and he needs our number in case anything happens." I barely heard her. I was going to Houston with Brad. By two on Saturday afternoon we were speeding down Interstate 10-East in Brad's rusty Accord, driving nearly a hundred miles an hour. His air conditioner wasn't working today, so we had the windows down and I couldn't hear anything but the wind whipping past us. We listened to Ben Folds for a while until he said he needed a mood change and put in something hard and fast. "You don't have any idea how lucky you are," Brad had to yell at me so I could hear him over the wind. "You get to see Roger Clemens pitch in your first ever baseball game. I don't want you to ever forget that. You're seeing a living legend in your first game." "Why is he a legend?" I yelled back. He just looked like a regular guy to me. "He's got the most career wins of any active pitcher, and he's won seven Cy Young Awards. He's one of the greatest pitchers in the history of baseball." "What's a Cy Young?" I yawned. "Never mind." "It'll be cool to see him in person after seeing him on TV," I admitted. "It'd be even cooler if you got his autograph," Brad said, nudging me. "Professional athletes have a soft spot for little kids, you know." "Where are we sitting?" I asked, hoping he didn't really use me as a means to get autographs. "Not close," he said. He reached over me and opened the glove compartment to pull out a ticket. "Section 417. It's in upper deck. It's going to be packed tonight so there wasn't a lot left. But at least we'll have a really good aerial view. We're almost right behind home plate." I grunted something noncommittal and leaned back in my seat and closed my eyes. I hadn't slept well the night before because I'd been too excited. I didn't really care where we sat, because I wasn't planning on paying that much attention to the game anyway. I could hear him still talking but I was drifting off. "How much longer?" I asked sleepily. "A while. We'll be on I-10 for another couple of hours. Maybe less if we don't get pulled over for speeding or die in a fiery car crash." My eyes quickly came open and I watched the road wearily for a few minutes, my hand feeling around my chest to make sure I had buckled my seat belt. As usual, he was completely oblivious to my fear of his driving, and he continued to stay in the 95 mile-per-hour range while I sat stiffly in the passenger seat, occasionally leaning in over his shoulder to see if he had topped 100. Despite his speed, I still found myself dozing off in small intervals. At around half past three he woke me up from a light slumber and pulled into a Jack in the Box. "Are we in Houston?" I asked, rubbing my eyes to clear them. "No," he laughed. "This is Columbus. We have a little way to go still. I'm not driving that fast, for Christ's sake." He turned off the engine and stepped out of the car, stretching his long legs with a quick walk around the front of the car. I followed him inside, my stomach grumbling. Mom had tried to get me to eat breakfast earlier in the morning, but I wasn't hungry then. Now I wanted to eat until I couldn't move. The place was almost empty. There was no line at all, and I went up and ordered two breakfast burritos and a hash brown while Brad used the bathroom. I had brought my wallet with me this time, and I fished it out and pulled out a crumpled twenty dollar bill. I still hadn't paid Brad back for anything, and I felt a tinge of guilt for taking so long to clear my tab. "Can I get one of those little heads?" I asked the lady at the counter, pointing to the packages I saw in front of me on the counter. I knew people put them on their car, and I thought it would be a nice gesture to get one for Brad. "You mean an antenna ball?" She looked young, and she was smiling at me like she thought it was funny how I had referred to them. I nodded, slightly embarrassed, hastily slipping her an extra dollar and filling my drink while I waited for my order to appear on the tray. They were fast, and I had my food in a booth before Brad had even come out of the bathroom. He hadn't been joking when he had said he had to piss. I took nibbles out of my hash brown even though I was starving while I waited, slurping liberally on my orange juice. Finally he appeared and went up to the counter, perusing the menu carefully and predictably spending a few extra minutes charming the girl taking the order. I wondered if he was trying to start a collection of fast food girlfriends. By the time he sat down across from me with his food I was already almost done with my first breakfast burrito. Watching Brad eat was always fun. He was a big guy, and he ate like one. Today he had a Jumbo Jack and a Sourdough Jack with an order of fries, and he quickly devoured his Sourdough burger in about a minute. I chewed on my hash brown and grinned as he loaded up his fries with a half a dozen packets of ketchup, fingering the antenna ball I had bought for him in my pocket. I wanted to give it to him outside. I kicked him under the table and giggled as I ate. He kicked me back pretty hard so I took one of his fries and threw it at him. "What time do we leave tomorrow?" I asked him, even though he'd told me before. "We check out at eleven," he said patiently, as if we hadn't already gone over it. He'd talked to Mom about it extensively and programmed our number into his cell phone. I knew all the plans, but it was fun to go over them with him again just to assure myself that it really was happening. I was excited about getting to stay in the hotel room with him. "You didn't leave a whole lot of time for sightseeing," I grumbled, partially disappointed that the bulk of the trip was going to revolve around the Astros. "Well," he said thoughtfully, taking a drink, "Sara and I were going to leave a little earlier than you and I did. Once she couldn't go I figured it'd be better just to sleep in. It's just you; I don't have to impress you because you're not my date." "But we are sharing a hotel room," I giggled softly, kicking him again. "Don't remind me," he grunted. "That was supposed to be the best part of the trip." I wanted to tell him it still could be, if he was willing. It would definitely be the best part of the trip for me. "Aren't you glad I could come, at least?" I asked, pretending to be hurt. He swallowed half of his Jumbo Jack and looked deliberately away, messing up his face to make it look like inviting me had been a huge mistake. I kicked him again, harder this time, and he groaned into his burger. "I'd be a lot more glad I brought you if you weren't kicking the hell out of my shin," he mumbled when his mouth was empty. "Aren't you glad I came?" I repeated. "Yes," he finally said, rolling his eyes. "You know I like hanging out with you. Even if you are kind of weird." He had eaten the rest of his burger while I dreamily soaked up his compliment, and I had to hurry to catch up to him. The second breakfast burrito was harder to eat than the first, but I got it down without too much trouble and then went to use the bathroom before we left. I caught up to him at the door and fished around in my pocket as we came back out to the parking lot. "Here," I said awkwardly. "I got you this." I presented the antenna ball with little fanfare, holding the strange looking little ornament out to him inside the wrapping. He looked down into my hand and smiled, reaching out and taking it from me. "Thanks, buddy," he said, freeing it from the plastic and jamming it roughly at the end of his antenna. He studied it for a second. "That's got to be the stupidest fucking piece of merchandise I've ever seen," he laughed, shaking his head. "But I like it, since it's from you," he added, clapping me firmly on the back before ducking into the driver's seat. "It was only a dollar," I confessed when I was safely buckled into the passenger side. "A dollar? For that priceless piece of art? What a bargain!" "You could be a little more grateful," I smiled. "Oh, I'm grateful," he assured me. "It's just that if it cost anything over a dollar I'd storm back inside and start breaking things just to make sure they didn't gain anything financially." He put the car in drive and coasted slowly out of the parking lot. "It was actually a dollar and six cents with tax," I said invitingly. "That's it, I'm never eating here again," he announced firmly. "As a protest, I'll never again eat another item from a Jack in the Box menu. Until we drive back tomorrow. I'm gonna need another Sourdough Jack for the trip home." Then we were there, inside Minute Maid Park, the two of us, ascending gradually to the upper deck, winding around the stadium as we walked. The game wouldn't be starting for another hour, but Brad had insisted we get to our seats now, which meant waiting outside in a long line in front of the gates. Brad was beside himself with excitement. Every time I looked over at him I noticed a gaping grin on his face. He stopped and bought me an Astros jersey from a small kiosk outside the stadium, insisting I demonstrate my loyalty to the organization. My jersey had Ensberg on the back of it. His, a much older jersey with a different style logo on it, had Biggio on the back. He said he got it from his uncle. So we made our way through the crowds side by side, just a pair of Astros fans out to see an evening game of baseball together. I stayed close to him as we walked, and whenever my attention wandered and I veered away slightly he would reach over and pull me back over to him. At first I would do this accidentally, but I liked having him touch me, so I started intentionally wandering off until he finally grabbed my hand and squeezed it really hard. I gave him a long, helplessly goofy grin as we continued to climb while he shook his head at my absent-mindedness. He thought holding my hand would demean me into behaving, but it was exactly what I wanted. His hand was rougher than Nadia's, and a lot bigger. I liked holding his better, even if he didn't mean it in the way she did. Every time we passed anyone wearing Astros' gear, Brad either gave them a simple nod or sometimes even a high-five as he passed. I watched him interact with amusement. Sometimes it seemed to me like he was friends with the entire world. Whenever anyone made eye contact with Brad, they seemed to immediately like him. Except for the people that that had almost run me over in the neighborhood that one day; they hadn't seemed to like him very much. "Since this might be the only game you ever see in your life," Brad informed me as he continued to grip my hand forcefully, "I'm making you try something from every single vendor that walks by. That means peanuts, cotton candy, maybe some ice cream. And definitely a hot dog," he added as an afterthought. "I want you to get the full ballpark experience. Maybe this will be the thing that finally turns you into a bona fide baseball fan." I said nothing, staring dreamily into the distance and soaking up this perfect evening. There was something special about the setting, but I didn't attribute it to the supposed magic of baseball. The buzzing of the people walking by, all the orange camaraderie, and the late summer feel in the air all filled me with something, but I highly doubted it would change my opinion that baseball was easily the most boring sport ever invented. "Are the Pirates good?" I asked just for the sake of making conversation. We were catching glimpses of the playing field while we walked around the stadium, and I could see that they were out there on the field getting ready, taking turns hitting and tossing the ball to each other like it was leisurely game of catch. "No," Brad smirked. "They're terrible, and they're boring. I wanted to see a better team, but it's Sara's birthday, and there were tickets left, so that's just how it worked out." "Why couldn't she go?" I asked as we finally reached our section and walked through the tunnel. He had let go of my hand now, but it was still warm from being held so firmly. I let it fall limply to my side, finding that it felt much cozier to walk hand in hand. "Something about family plans," he mumbled, clearly not wanting to get into it. Then he looked over at me with a little grin. "There you go again." "What?" "Your game of twenty questions. You should consider being an investigative reporter when you grow up." "I'm going to be a professional tennis player," I said with a sly smile as I followed Brad up a short flight of steps and watched him glance at the number on the end of the rows and compare it with our tickets. "Me, too," he laughed. He found our row and stepped into it, settling into a seat and patting the one next to him to indicate it was mine. "Maybe we'll play each other in the US Open or something." "You won't be making any comebacks from 5-0 if we do," I taunted him. "You'd better call your Mom and let her know we're here," he interrupted me, reaching into his pocket and holding his cell phone out to me. "It's a good thing one of us is responsible enough to remember important things." I kicked his leg and dialed my number, where I promptly found myself in a conversation with Mom that I couldn't get out of. I knew she wasn't trying to be bothersome, but it was clear she was very worried about me being three hours away under the supervision of someone who wasn't that much older than me. I finally got her to let me hang up by telling her we were costing Brad a fortune. "I get free long distance, you know," he said. "And I don't pay for roaming, so actually you didn't cost me a dime." "She wouldn't stop talking," I sighed, giving him an exasperated look. "She kept reminding me not to leave your side and not to run wild in the city and not to do anything that might involve getting kidnapped." "Yeah," he said blankly, his eyes getting that far away look that he got when the games were on TV. He had spotted a few Astros on the field stretching near the home dugout, and he was trying to figure out who they might be. "Moms are like that. I'm eighteen and my mom still tries to run my life." "How could she?" I asked him skeptically. "You're not even living with her now." "Yeah, and it's been really nice," he laughed. "She's not that bad, but she does nag a lot." "You could stay here," I suggested softly, not even daring to make eye contact with him when I said it. I chose to watch the tiny figures of the Astros stretching on the field instead, pretending to be just as transfixed as he was by the sight of two dots that only vaguely resembled people. "What, and finish my last year of high school with a bunch of strangers? No way. I intend to have the best senior year ever, and I need, you know, friends to accomplish that." "You make new friends in three seconds!" I argued. "Yeah, but I'd miss all my old ones. Plus, Mom's gone a lot more than Dad. Dad's a homebody. I get the house to myself a lot more with Mom, and that means parties. Besides, I'm a Dallas kid," he concluded. "What about after high school?" I asked hopefully. "You can come back here for college, can't you?" "I wasn't really planning on going to college near San Antonio," he said carefully. "I wasn't really planning on staying in Texas at all, actually. To tell you the truth I'm thinking east coast. That's where all the respectable colleges are. But I must say, it's long been a dream of mine to live in southern California. There's just something cool about that place. At least from what I hear. I've never actually been out of Texas," he admitted sheepishly. That made two of us. East coast or southern California, it didn't matter either way. Both locations were nowhere near here, and what that meant was that I really would never see him again, and he wasn't even interested in giving me the faintest rays of hope otherwise. I couldn't help but be disappointed he didn't realize how important that was to me, but I didn't want to get in a bad mood now, not when we still had so much of the night left together. He flagged the first peanut vendor he saw, quickly acquiring a bag and ripping it open. He held it out to me and made me take one even though I didn't like peanuts. I sat and shifted in my seat, looking around interestedly as the stadium slowly started filling up. It was looking like a lot of people had made it down to the park tonight, probably to see the living legend Brad spoke so fondly of. I fidgeted and waited impatiently for the game to start, wishing we had brought a pair of binoculars so I had a better idea of what was happening on the field. The players were off and the grounds crew was watering down the dirt now. I was so antsy that I actually found myself growing eager to watch the baseball that would be following shortly. I entertained myself by occasionally wrestling with Brad, although he seemed far more interested in watching the grounds crew apply the foul lines than he was in fending off my attacks. And then the game started, and I got sad. I was sad because I loved Brad, and he didn't have a clue. I was pretty sure I had never loved anyone before, not like this, not in any way other than family love. That love was more the obligatory kind that you grow up having inside you, the kind you take for granted because it's never been any other way, like not having to go to school on a Saturday. That kind of love was routine and lazy; you were glad to have it, but it wasn't very intense most of the time. Whatever I felt for Brad was way different, and I didn't know when I'd ever meet anyone that I liked so much again. But I didn't matter to him, at least not in that way. Brad was about baseball, and meeting new friends, and dating girls, and eating sunflower seeds on the couch. I was only a distant glint in his life, one that he would hardly remember in a year's time. He would return to his life back in Dallas in a few weeks, and he would forget all about me. I wasn't important enough to him, and I didn't think it was possible to change that. The only way I could change it is if he loved me back, the way I loved him. I looked over at him distractedly and watched him clap along with the crowd. The top of the first was over. Clemens had taken care of the Pirates quickly, and the crowd was appreciative. Brad looked over at me and ruffled what little hair could still be ruffled on my head and gave me a fond grin. When he looked at me I was happy because I could sense he was happy, even though I wasn't the person he had wanted to come to this game with. I knew Brad liked me, at least as a friend, but what if I could get him to like me more than that? What if he wasn't the helplessly straight eighteen-year-old in a constant battle to meet girls that he seemed? There was only one way for me to find out, and I didn't have long to do it. My heart started racing as the Pirates took the field and the first batter for the Astros stepped in. I looked over at Brad again, but he didn't notice. He was totally absorbed in the game now that the action had started back up again. Maybe it was better that way for now, because I was sure my anxiety could be read on my face currently. I zoned in and out of the game in the bottom half of the inning, trying to get involved along with the crowd but failing every time I started thinking about my plan. I wasn't stupid enough to think it would work, but I wasn't stupid enough to think it couldn't work, either. As easy as it was to find gay porn, I figured quite a few people in the world had to be gay, and I wasn't that much younger than Brad. My heart went fast, and the Astros followed suit, sending just four batters to the plate before they were done with their half of the first, too. "God damn Ensberg," Brad grunted, irritated that he had struck out to end the inning. "It's your fault, Zach," he teased me. "You jinxed him by getting his jersey." "You said he was good," I responded defensively. "He has been this year so far," Brad said. "But now that you got his jersey he'll probably suck." He touched me again, a light nudge in the ribs to let me know he was just giving me a hard time, and then he was gone again. It was becoming clear to me most of our interactions would be coming during the time that the commercials were on when you watched on TV. I thought it was weird being able to see the players on the field in between innings. It felt like witnessing something private, that only the select elite spectators in the stadium would ever get to see. I had almost expected them to drop an enormous screen around the field and project commercials to the audience instead. The pace continued to move rapidly, much more rapidly than on TV, and what felt like just a few minutes later, the fourth inning was starting. Neither team had come close to scoring, and even though I was bored, at least the game was moving fast. I had expected a crawl, but this was more like a spirited jog. Brad stopped a cotton candy vendor and got me a stick, which I happily started working on, the sugar sticking to my fingers and lips and melting down my throat while I continued to plot against his sexuality. By the sixth inning Brad was sitting bolt upright, very tense. I could tell he was thrilled with the scoreless duel, but also very fearful things would go bad for his beloved team before they got anything going offensively. He had stopped making chit-chat between innings, although occasionally he looked over just to make sure I hadn't vanished. Most of the time he looked I had already been staring at him in the first place, and eventually I stopped trying to pretend otherwise when he caught me. He only shook his head and grinned, not knowing what I was up to and probably not caring. He had bigger concerns. I stood up and stretched my legs with the rest of the audience after the top of the seventh, a soda clutched in my sticky hand now that I slurped greedily. Neither team had scored yet, and there was an air of restless energy in the crowd. I could sense, even having never been in this situation before, that if the Astros did manage to score first, it would be a very loud moment indeed. Maybe there was something special about a baseball game, because the enthusiasm and tension was kind of contagious. In the eighth most of the vendors had stopped coming around, and I had to get up to pee. Mom would have freaked out knowing Brad hadn't come with me, but I think he would have been willing to sacrifice me to a kidnapper just to make sure he didn't miss a single pitch, and I didn't even consider asking him to come supervise. He handed me a ten dollar bill and told me to stop and get us both something ice cream in it at one of the food stands. So I went to the bathroom first and then paid for the ice cream, not realizing that I had forgotten to wash my hands until I had sat down next to him and handed him his ice cream sandwich. At least it had been wrapped when I gave it to him. The ninth inning was not yet underway as I tore into my quickly melting ice cream sandwich, the chocolate staining the pads of my fingers. I gulped it down quickly and watched as Brad carefully unwrapped his, clearly more concerned about making a mess than I had been. I boldly leaned over and rested my head on his shoulder. If I was really brave, I would be taking a much bigger risk soon. "Don't get tired now," he said when he felt my head on his shoulder. "This game might go on forever if no one can score. And look who's in the game now," he said, indicating to the new pitcher the Astros brought in. "Why'd they take out Clemens?" I yawned. "Didn't he do a good job?" "He fucking kicked ass," Brad said, and he had to talk into my ear so I could hear him over the buzzing of the crowd. "But this guy is their best relief pitcher. His name is Brad Lidge. I'm proud to share my first name with him. No one ever touches this guy. That's why I'm telling you, we may be here a while." No sooner had he spoken than Brad Lidge threw a pitch that the Pirate at the plate swung at and hit with a resounding crack that filled the suddenly quiet stadium. The ball sailed upwards into the night sky, and I quickly pulled my head off Brad's shoulder just to follow it. The ball continued to sail over the wall in left field. It was a home run. Despite the overwhelmingly negative crowd reaction, I couldn't help but be excited as I watched the player circle the bases. I had hoped I would get to see a home run in person. It was about the only thing that could be considered exciting. I suppressed a smile and dropped my head back on Brad's shoulder. "Don't say a word," he threatened, catching the amused look on my face, and I started giggling because I had wanted so badly to tease him for being wrong about the pitcher's invincibility. The crowd was deflated. Even though the Pirates didn't score another run in the inning, I could sense the game might as well have already been over when the bottom of the ninth rolled around and the first Houston batter came up. Brad tried his best to will his team to score. He clapped and yelled so violently I had no choice but to remove my head from his shoulder; his flailing limbs were making him an uncomfortable headrest. He groaned loudly with the crowd as the first two batters struck out, but continued to hoot as the third batter, none other than Craig Biggio, the likeness on the back of his ancient jersey, stepped in. I thought it would only be fitting if Biggio hit a home run and tied the game. Maybe it would be a sign of some sort. A sign of what, I wasn't sure, but it didn't matter anyway, because he grounded out to the short stop and ended the game. "Come on," Brad said disgustedly, standing up quickly and pulling me along the row behind him. "We've got forty-thousand other people to beat outside." I didn't like our odds, but I let him drag me without protest. I yawned sleepily, again wishing I hadn't been too excited to sleep last night so I would be more awake now. We quickly descended down the steps and made our way out the tunnel we came in, streams of people on all sides of us. Brad gripped my hand even more firmly than he had earlier, except this time I could tell he wasn't doing it to make me feel stupid, but because he really thought it was necessary. Every time we hit a stopping point and the crowd was pressed together, he would reach out and take a hold of my Astros jersey and crush me against him, so that nothing short of a natural disaster could possibly separate us from each other. Then the pace picked up again and I found his hand, wishing we had to navigate our way through suffocating mobs of people more often. We were finally freed from the chaos and out on the street before he let go of my hand, but I continued to grab a hold of the back of his jersey and let him lead me around like I was a blind person. I couldn't tell if he noticed or not, because he didn't acknowledge it one way or the other. When we came to an intersection and had to cross the street, he would dart across and drag me behind him. I was merely a very willing rag doll. It was deathly quiet when we finally got inside his car. For the last several hours there had been a constant murmur, an ongoing background humming that my ears had adjusted to. Now, inside Brad's worn down Accord, the world was shut out, and once again it was just the two of us. I leaned back in my seat and closed my eyes, resisting the urge to reach over and close my hand around his again. It was definitely something I could get used to. "That was an awesome game," he said, and his voice sounded strangely loud now that he wasn't competing with thousands of others to be heard. "Don't get me wrong, I'm pissed. I can't believe they got shut out again with Clemens out there pitching his ass off, and I can't believe Lidge blew it, but that was still a great game. Did you have a good time?" he asked, starting up the car and reversing out of our parking spot. "Uh huh," I nodded, feeling incredibly sleepy now. He was still talking, rambling on about something or other because he always talked, and he was good at it and I loved him for it, but I wasn't hearing him anymore. I was so thoroughly exhausted that I couldn't keep my eyes open, and I continued to doze off while he went on. "For Christ's sake, Zach," I heard him say. "Didn't you get any sleep at all last night? It's barely even ten!" But I was tired, too tired to care that this was our night together and I was wasting it. I woke up occasionally as we made our way through the roads, but nothing fully registered until I realized we were parked in front of a hotel. I knew that meant I had to get out, but I didn't feel up to the task. I heard the car ding when Brad opened his door, and then the clink of his keys as he pulled them out of the engine. Then there was the sound of his door slamming shut, and a few seconds later, the sound of my door being opened. "You're not sleeping out here in the car," Brad said, sounding amused at my unexpected bout with narcolepsy. "Come on, all we have to do is walk to the lobby and then go to our room. Maybe ride an elevator, you know, the usual. You can make it." "Tired," I groaned grumpily, rolling out of the seat and standing uncertainly on my feet, the world appearing hazy and unfamiliar. I managed to push my door closed, but that was all the energy I could muster. Brad drew me up alongside him, threw his arm around my neck, and pushed me towards the front door, although I slowed us down considerably by dragging my feet. Inside, I heard Brad give the man at the counter his name, but very little else registered with me as I leaned sleepily against him and waited for him to move and signal that we had our key. Instead I almost toppled over when he did move, and I heard him sigh and reach back to pull me behind him. When we were inside the elevator he hit the button for the third floor, sighed again, and lifted me off the ground altogether, hoisting me up against his shoulder as the elevator hummed. I didn't fight his decision to carry me, even though I didn't remember being carried anywhere within the last five years. Instead I hooked my arms around the back of his neck and nearly fell asleep before the doors opened and we had reached our floor. Then we were in the hall, and he was lugging me down the corridor. I watched the carpet from my aerial view hanging on Brad's neck as he walked slowly along the hallway, the simple pattern repeating itself over and over again until we were finally at our door. He slid the key in the lock, pushed the door open with the side of his body I wasn't hanging off, and then approached the bed and lowered me onto it. "Yeah, there's only one bed," he said darkly, although I wasn't about to comment on that, or anything else. "And I don't want to get your usual dizzying array of questions about why I got a one bed hotel room for me and Sara." "I don't think I'd need to ask," I mumbled quietly, my eyes already closed. "Good," he said, but he sounded surprised that I didn't make a bigger deal out of it. "Are you going to sleep with your shoes on?" he asked after standing over me for another couple of seconds. If I hadn't already started to fall into a deep sleep as he asked that question, my answer would have been yes. When I woke up in what I figured to be just a few hours later, I wasn't wearing my shoes anymore, and I was nestled in safely underneath the sheets. To my left was a big lump under the covers, and I could hear a steady breathing that told me Brad was every bit as out as I had been the last few hours. I could feel that my socks were still on, so I brought my feet out from under the covers and tugged them off, balling them up and throwing them in a corner of the room. Naturally, Brad had not removed any articles of clothing for me before tucking me in, so I quickly did away with my shorts and threw them in the area I figured my balled up socks were. I got up, then, and felt my way around looking for the bathroom. I stumbled towards where I thought the door was until I found it, and then I disappeared inside and flipped on the light switch. My sleepy reflection greeted me as soon as my eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness. I adjusted the strands of hair that were sticking up on end, rubbed my eyes a little, and then emptied my bladder again. I was all set to return to the comfortable bed next to Brad and sleep until morning when I remembered my plan from earlier. My heart automatically started pounding, and a fresh tingle coursed through my body. Without meaning to, I had just woken myself up nearly all the way by the time I slid back under the sheets. Thoughts raced through me as I calculated my odds of success, my heart beating all the while. I stared up at the ceiling and pondered my situation. I knew that some people liked me; I mean, at least a couple of girls found me attractive. There was Nadia, and even Nadia's friend Stacey. I guessed I wasn't a bad looking kid, so that wasn't the issue. I began to pop my fingers while I deliberated, my heart rattling faster in my chest with each passing second. I really didn't think Brad was gay, and that was probably what was scaring me the most about this plan I had hatched. No matter how good looking I might have been, I wasn't going to succeed if Brad wasn't gay. Add to that unlikely possibility the fact that I was just thirteen, and what I was about to do was maybe the longest shot of my life. Why would Brad want me? I was just a stupid little kid. I was only an eighth grader to be. I hadn't even kissed anyone until a month ago, and even then I didn't really kiss back. I jacked off in my boxers and sometimes wore them afterwards until Mom did the laundry. I forgot to wash my hands after I took a piss sometimes. I hated taking showers and would probably only take one a week if it were up to me. I fell asleep in cars and had to be carried around and tucked in bed, my lips were still sticky from cotton candy, and my fingers had dried chocolate on them. So why would Brad want me? Why would anyone want me? Maybe no one would. Maybe even Nadia and Stacey thought I was cute, but if they knew everything about me they'd be horrified. Maybe if anyone ever did get exposed to all my quirks and odd habits and shy smiles and continual blushing, they would run and never look back. Maybe not knowing when someone was joking would haunt me for the rest of my life. Was I always going to be like this? Was it always going to be so hard to feel comfortable with myself? The only person I felt really comfortable around was Brad. I didn't think there was much Brad didn't know about me, and he hadn't pushed me away. If there was one person in the world who would accept me for who I was, it was Brad. I looked over at his sleeping body in the dark, took a deep breath, and snuggled up close to him. It was time to put the knowledge gained through my research to the test. It was time to put my plan into action.