In Open Spaces (12 page)

“Lawrence Andrews.” Lawrence shook hands as if it was the most important thing he could possibly be doing at that moment, looking me square in the eye. I felt as though we’d just completed an important business transaction. He stepped back and settled his broad, bony hands onto his hips in an effort to look relaxed.

“So you two are brothers, are you?”

Jack and I nodded, not looking at each other.

I asked Lawrence Andrews the most common question heard around our county with so many newcomers around. “Where you from?”

“Nebraska, but we live just the other side of Belle now, near the river.”

“Quite a trip from here,” I said.

“Yeah, well, I left yesterday afternoon and stayed at the Roberts road ranch last night.”

It was Lawrence’s turn to pitch, and he planted his left foot even with the stake, stepped stiffly out with his right, then swung his right arm back and then forward without the slightest bend of the elbow, like a pendulum. It seemed that none of the joints halfway down any of his limbs worked. The wobbly shoe landed on its side then rolled away from the pit. It was, without a doubt, the least graceful act I ever witnessed. From the corner of my eye, I could feel Jack’s gaze on me, and I had to turn my head, knowing that I would have to stifle one of those explosive bursts of laughter if I glanced his way.

“How is that road ranch doing, anyway?” I asked. “I wouldn’t think they’d be getting much business with everyone either broke or buying vehicles.”

Lawrence tossed his second shoe, this one soaring with less wobble but no better results. “As a matter of fact, not too well. They’re talking about buying more land, going back to ranching.” He stepped away
from the pit, surveying his tosses with a calculating expression, as if he might figure out what he did wrong if he studied it long enough. “Or they might move to town. They were in Oregon for almost a year after Sophie’s husband passed on. So they’re having a hard time getting back into the routine anyhow.”

“Sophie’s husband?”

Lawrence nodded. “Cancer.” He brushed his hands together, then looked them over. He spotted a smudge on the edge of his palm, and he licked his thumb and rubbed the spot clean. Then he took a sudden, almost threatening step toward me. A flicker of a smile flashed across his face. “I’m going to marry her,” he said.

Lawrence came so close to me that I had to stiffen my muscles to prevent myself from stepping backward, and the others stopped what they were doing and turned toward Lawrence. We were not so much surprised by the announcement as by the peculiarity of its delivery. My first instinct was to ask whether Sophie knew about this plan, but I had a feeling Lawrence wouldn’t get the joke. He was so proud.

“Look, Blake.” Lawrence held his horseshoes out. “Why don’t you take over for me here? I’m not much good at this anyway. And I want to go see what’s cooking.”

“All right.” I took the shoes, feeling a sudden admiration for Lawrence’s modesty. “Nice meeting you, Lawrence. And congratulations.”

The others offered Lawrence good wishes.

“Thanks, fellas,” he said.

I watched Lawrence, his long gangly frame teetering like a newborn colt’s through the crowd. “Have you ever seen a prouder groom-to-be?” I asked.

Art Walters, who had been silent since the announcement, looked from the side of his eyes at me. “That fella is in for trouble,” he said.

We all smiled, a bit uncomfortably, knowing that Art’s one attempt
at marriage had fallen short of a year. “Why’s that, Art?”

“Any man who’s that worshipful of his bride is gonna be gathering eggs before the ink is dry on the marriage license,” he said.

We all laughed.

Art sniffed. “You can laugh, but take my word on that. Just wait and see.” And with that, Art tossed a perfect ringer.

It was an ideal day for the fair. The temperature topped out at eighty degrees, with no wind. The mosquitoes were light. I bathed in the heat, playing horseshoes for a while before partaking in the tents bursting with homemade food. I wandered among the displays of livestock and children’s art and always, always, maintained a vigilant awareness of where Rita was. I couldn’t help it. Jack had even teased me about it on occasion, accusing me of being lovesick. He had no idea how right he was.

I noticed the endearing tilt of her head as she listened to my mother tell a story, and the way she relished a leg of fried chicken, or a piece of rhubarb pie. I noticed the elegant movements of her hands, no matter what she was doing. Even wiping the corner of her mouth with a napkin, Rita had a graceful air.

“You ready to play some ball, Blake?”

I dropped my horseshoe and followed Jack toward the two baseball fields that several of us had carved out of the sagebrush. We had stuffed six flour sacks with sand for the bases, and Steve Glasser cut a couple of wooden home plates. He sank them into the ground back-to-back, a little off center, so two games could be played in different directions without interfering with each other. He then rigged a couple of canvas tarps, like sails, to prevent balls from scooting past the catcher onto the other field.

There were coin tosses to decide which teams would play, and we
ended up drawing Belle Fourche, while Capitol and Camp Crook took the other field. Our little community, which was about a fifth the size of Belle, had never beaten them that any of us could remember, so we stormed the field with a resolve to change history. I took my position at third base, and Jack started out catching.

Ever since I can remember, every baseball game between two of the communities out here starts out with an air of easy banter, with everyone acting as if they don’t really give a damn who wins or loses. But nobody’s really fooling anyone. The polite chatter usually lasts an inning or two; then the jaws set, the eyes narrow, and the spoken word takes on a harder edge.

Belle Fourche scored three runs against us in the first inning. We answered with three of our own on a solid, bases-loaded triple by Jack. And we scored two more in the second when Gary Glasser hit a grounder between the legs of Lawrence Andrews, who was as awkward in the field as he’d been in the horseshoe pits.

After Teddy Teagarten, Belle Fourche’s blacksmith, hit a ball over everyone’s head with two runners on, Belle Fourche led by a run, and our pitcher surrendered the ball, which took five minutes to find, to me. I trotted in from third base, and took a few deep breaths while I warmed up. I nodded to the next hitter.

I felt as if the desire of our entire community was being funneled toward me, and I discovered that I liked the responsibility. I liked the pressure. But in the fifth, my determination to live up to these expectations took over, and I started throwing too hard. I walked the first two batters, bouncing several pitches in the dirt. I took a short break, walking behind the mound, breathing deep, and when I returned to the rubber, I looked up to see Lawrence Andrews at the plate. He had shown little promise with the bat, so I felt myself relax a little. My first pitch to him was a good curveball, screaming toward the middle of the plate. Lawrence took a big swing, but when the ball broke down and away, he missed completely with a twirl that looked more like ballet
than baseball. His bat was tipped at an angle, toward the sky, and one leg kicked up behind him. I had to bite my lip to keep from smiling as I took the throw from Jack.

I took a little something off the next pitch, and lost control of it, bouncing the ball a foot in front of the plate. The runners moved up one base, now standing on second and third. Jack held up his palm, encouraging me to relax, and I tried to talk myself calm before throwing again. The ball sailed toward the inside corner, and Lawrence twirled toward it. Somehow, the bat plunked its target, and the ball squirted along the bumpy ground, bouncing back and forth like a jackrabbit, toward Steve at shortstop. He crouched, but the ball caught the nub end of what had been a scrub of sagebrush. The ball bounded into left field, and both runners scored as Lawrence loped to first. In his excitement, he rounded the bag, looking bewildered about what he should do next. His pause gave our left fielder time to throw a strike to the first baseman, who tagged Lawrence on the thigh. Lawrence trotted off the field with a huge grin, not the least bit discouraged about getting thrown out. The Belle Fourche crowd was delirious, clapping him on the back and ruffling his oiled hair.

I took a deep breath, got my rhythm back, and retired the next two batters, striking out the last one. But with those two runs, we came to bat behind by one. Still, I was excited. The competition, the energy from the crowd, it all felt good. I was pitching well, and I knew that Lawrence’s hit was a fluke. As I ran off the field, I glanced over at the crowd and saw Rita, who was clapping, and smiling at me. She waved when she saw me looking at her, and it made my heart swell a little.

“What the hell happened there?” Jack stood next to me, his face toward the ground. At first I thought he was angry, but a glance at his expression told me otherwise. He was laughing.

“I don’t think that guy could hit his chest with his hand,” he said, still laughing.

I chuckled. “Hell, his eyes weren’t even open.”

Jack spit into the dust, smiling, but his tone became businesslike again. “Yeah, well, let’s beat these guys for once, huh?”

I nodded.

“Don’t hold anything back.”

A thin coat of dust gathered over the crowd as the game moved from inning to inning with no runs scored by either team. Jack, who had moved to shortstop, made an incredible diving catch of a shot up the middle by Teagarten. And we had a good laugh when one of my pitches got past Steve and hopped over the tarp, skipping onto the other field just as the batter there hit a grounder toward the second baseman. Both balls came toward him, from different angles, and he froze as if he’d just come upon a rattler.

But the highlight of the game came in the seventh inning, when Shag Tompkins hit a long fly ball to right field. Art Walters, whose legendary status in the community had nothing to do with his athletic ability, was standing out there with his back to the game, gazing at something. We all yelled, and Art turned just in time to see the ball coming right down at his head. His hands flew up in front of his face, and the ball bounced off his palms, and ricocheted directly into the front pocket of his overalls.

Art was looking around at the ground, crouching, trying to find the ball, when he suddenly spotted the dome of dusty white in his pocket. He plucked the ball from his overalls and held it up, proud as hell, as though he’d planned it that way. Our fans cheered as if a three-month drought had broken.

Shag argued briefly that the catch couldn’t count, but he was laughing too hard to make a very convincing case for himself.

By the top of the ninth inning, I had not allowed any more runs, and we were ahead by one thanks to Jack’s second triple of the game. Belle Fourche was up with one out and a runner on second. I walked the next batter, knowing that Lawrence was up after him. I felt confident that Lawrence couldn’t repeat his earlier heroics, especially if I gave him my best curveball. So I took a deep breath, and bore down, snapping off a beauty. The ball dropped toward his shoes. Lawrence spun, his eyes clamped tightly shut. And in a miracle of almost religious proportions, the ball and the bat crossed the plate at the same moment, in the same place. A pock rang out, and the ball floated like a sick bird out over second base. Jack raced toward it and dove, but missed it by a foot. There was so much spin on the ball that it squirted past the charging center fielder. Both runners scored, and if Lawrence had run like anything other than a lame colt, he might have scored himself. But he stood with both feet on second base, too happy to care that he was perhaps the most comical sports hero in the history of Montana.

I shook my head, half angry but also amused. And as I tried to gather myself for the next batter, I caught a look from the crowd—an intense expression aimed right at me. Thinking it was Rita, I looked away immediately, knowing that a look from her right then would completely destroy my concentration. But as I wound up, my eyes quickly glanced that way again, and saw that it wasn’t Rita at all. After I threw the pitch, and the batter swung and missed, I looked over again to see the same powder-blue eyes staring at me with an unnerving allure. I knew the face was familiar, but because I hadn’t seen her for several years, it took me a second to recognize Sophie Roberts. She smiled, a smile so inviting that I blushed, quickly averting my eyes, remembering with some alarm that just a few hours before, I had learned that this woman was engaged to Lawrence Andrews. And then it occurred to me that he was standing behind me, and I realized that she wasn’t even looking at me, but at her fiancé, the hero.

The whole exchange left me flustered, and I walked that batter. Jack trotted over from short.

“Where the hell are you?” He pointed at his head. “Is there something else you’d rather be doing?”

“I’m all right,” I said impatiently.

“Yeah?”

I nodded. “Yeah. Come on. Let’s get back to the game here.”

Jack trotted back to his position. And maybe it was his intention, but I was annoyed enough that I struck out the next two batters with six pitches, firing the ball so hard that Steve kept taking off his glove and shaking his hand.