No Arm in Left Field (3 page)

“Nobody called me,” he said huskily.

“Didn’t Tony call you?”

“
Tony?
Was
he
supposed to call me?”

“Yes! He told me you weren’t going. He said that you decided to go to dinner with your family!”

“The liar!” Terry cried. “He never called me at all!”

“The rat,” Mick said softly.

Terry saw Tony the next day at practice. He was boiling mad. “Tony, I heard that you were supposed to call me last night,”
he said, trying to control his rage.

Tony blushed. “I thought you were going to dinner with your family,” he said.

“I didn’t say I was,” Terry shot back. “I said that we had
planned
to go, but
that I would go to the World Series movie instead. You must have heard me.”

Tony’s lips pressed together, then spread apart in a forced smile. “You didn’t miss anything,” he said. “It wasn’t that good.”

“I
bet
it wasn’t,” Terry snapped, and stamped angrily toward the pile of bats. He selected one he liked, slipped a metal doughnut
over the fat part of it and began swinging it hard back and forth over his shoulder.

L
ATER
,
WHILE
waiting for supper, Terry and Mick played catch on the front lawn. Terry was trying to strengthen his throwing arm. He
had
to be able to peg the ball to second or third base when it was hit to deep left. Mick had put a handkerchief in his glove
to cushion the throws and was catching them with hardly a wince.

“How am I doing?” Terry asked.

“I don’t know,” Mick answered. “It’s hard to tell. Let’s go to the ballfield after supper.”

Mick’s father came by and paused on the sidewalk.

“Hi, Mr. Jordan,” Terry greeted him. “I’m trying to build up my throwing arm.”

“Hi, Dad,” Mick said.

“Hi, boys,” Mr. Jordan greeted them. He was tall, yellow-haired, and had the long, lithe build of an athlete. “Mind a bit
of advice, Terry?”

Terry held up his throw and looked at Mr. Jordan. “Anything you want to tell me is sure welcome, Mr. Jordan,” he replied honestly.

Mr. Jordan grinned. “Well, it isn’t much, but it might save you a lot of torture later on.” He slapped at an annoying bee.
“I understand what you’re trying to do, but at your age you’d better not throw too hard nor too long or you might come up
with a permanent injury in that arm.
You’re just a kid yet. Your arm isn’t strong enough to take it.”

“That’s why I’m throwing harder,” Terry explained, frowning. “So it will be stronger.”

“You’re taking a chance, Terry,” Mr. Jordan warned. “A big chance.” He shrugged and started toward home. “Well, don’t say
I didn’t warn you.”

Terry smiled. “I won’t, Mr. Jordan,” he promised, “because, as of right now, I’m going to take your advice.”

Terry waited for Mr. Jordan to walk on, then looked at his friend. “Now there’s a guy who turns me on, Mick,” he said happily.
“Not even my own father tells me things like that.”

He pegged the ball to Mick, then heard footsteps on the porch behind him.

“That’s because your own father doesn’t
know a thing about baseball,” said a voice. Terry turned to see his tall, broad-shouldered father standing behind the screen
door, a genial smile on his lips.

Terry chuckled. “Did you hear what Mr. Jordan told me, Dad?”

“I sure did,” Mr. Delaney said. “And I think that it makes a lot of sense.”

He came off the porch, stopped beside Mick, and began to play catch with the boys.

Presently a dune buggy with a huge flower painted on its hood came buzzing up the street, crept up to the curb, and stopped.
Out of it hopped Tony Caster-line and Jeff Roberts. Terry saw that the driver looked to be about nineteen or twenty, wore
long hair, and had a striking resemblance to Tony.

The two boys waved to him as he stepped on the gas and sped away.

Terry looked at Tony and Jeff without speaking. His first impression was that they had come to see him, since the dune buggy
had stopped directly in front of his house. But the guys motioned to Mick and ignored him completely.

“Excuse me, Mr. Delaney,” Mick said, and ran over to them.

Terry smiled at his father.
Don’t worry, Dad,
his look said.
Those guys don’t impress me a bit.

They continued to play catch — just the two of them — and were interrupted when Mrs. Delaney came to the door and told her
husband that he had a phone call. He excused himself and went into the house.

A minute later Tony and Jeff started to leave, and Mick returned to his post to continue playing catch with Terry.

“Hey, you guys,” Terry suddenly called to them. “If you want to join us one of you can use my glove. I’ve got another one
in the house, and one guy can sit out for a while.”

Tony and Jeff looked at him, said something to each other, then returned to the lawn. Terry smiled and sent his glove spinning
toward the boys.

“You use it,” Tony said to Jeff.

Jeff caught it and put it on. As Terry started toward the house for his other glove, Tony called to him, “Never mind, Terry.
I don’t think your glove is going to feel right to either of us.”

Terry looked at him; the real meaning
behind Tony’s statement hit him like a baseball bat. What Tony meant was that he wouldn’t use Terry’s glove just because it
was Terry’s.

Before Terry could decide what to say, Jeff took off the glove and tossed it back to him. “Here,” he said. “I really don’t
think it fits, either.”

Terry’s face felt hot. He had hoped that his friendly gesture would bear fruit, that it might start to close the gap between
them. But his offer had been turned against him in order to humiliate him. His eyes blazed. “All right. If the glove isn’t
right, let’s play bare-handed. That okay with you guys?”

Jeff gazed in sheepish inquiry at Tony. “Yeah, that’s okay.”

Tony shrugged.

Terry winged the ball to Tony who
gasped at the ball’s impact on his hands. “Take it easy, will you, Terry?” Tony asked.

Terry, seeing Tony’s discomfort, smiled a bit and nodded agreement. They lobbed the ball between the four of them.

“Your father ever play professional baseball?” Tony asked as he caught a soft throw from Mick.

“No. Just sandlot,” Terry replied.

“My father played in the majors,” Tony said, a spark of pride in his voice.

“He did? With whom?”

“The Minnesota Twins.”

Terry’s heart skipped a beat. He had never before met a kid whose father played major league baseball.

“He was an infielder,” Tony added.

They tossed the ball back and forth a few more times, and Terry could see that
neither Tony nor Jeff were enjoying catching it bare-handed. After awhile Tony said that they had to leave, and they did.

“Aren’t you going to ask me what they wanted?” Mick asked.

Terry shrugged. “I figure you’d tell me if you wanted to,” he said.

Mick smiled. “They told me that our first league game is Tuesday against the Yellow Jackets. But I already knew that. I think
it was just an excuse for them to stop here and cause a bit of trouble.”

Terry nodded. “I figured that,” he said. “And I’m glad they did. I guess maybe next time they might
want
to use my glove.”

Mick chuckled. “I guess they will,” he said.

T
HE YELLOW JACKETS
had a picture of a fat bee on the front left side of their jerseys. They had first raps and looked extremely confident of
winning their first game.

On the mound for the Forest Lakers was Woody Davis, a slim kid with arms like spindles but with plenty of speed. A crowd was
divided between a large group in the stands behind the backstop screen and a smattering in the small bleachers behind first
and third bases. It was a hot June day and a lot of the women were fanning themselves to keep cool.

The Yellow Jackets’ lead-off hitter looked for a walk, and almost got it as Woody worked the count on him to 3–2. Then Woody
slid a pitch by him.

“Strike three!” yelled the ump.

In left field Terry Delaney wished that if a ball were hit out to him it would be a shallow drive, one that he wouldn’t have
trouble throwing in to the infield. The thought had hardly left his mind when
bang!
— a long hit zoomed out to deep left! He ran back… back… lifted his glove and caught the fly over his head!

The Forest Laker fans cheered as he pegged the ball in. They didn’t know, though, how hard his heart was pounding and how
relieved he was.

A pop fly to the infield ended the top half of the inning.

Jeff Roberts, leading off for the Forest
Lakers, put on his protective helmet, stepped to the mound, and faced the Yellow Jackets’ short, husky pitcher, Jim Durling.
Ready to follow him were Tony, Terry, and Rich Muldoon.

Jim released a couple of high pitches, then grooved one down the middle. He grooved the next one too, and Jeff smashed it
to center field for a single.

Tony got the signal from Coach Harper to bunt, and laid one down neatly just inside the third-base line. The Yellow Jacket
third baseman, waiting for exactly this to happen, nevertheless didn’t play in close enough to field the bunt and get Jeff
at second. He managed, however, to throw Tony out at first.

Terry let an inside pitch go by for a strike, then swung at a high, outside one that he missed for strike two.

“Bring ’em down, Terry!” yelled Tony, who had run back to the bench.

Terry stepped out of the box and rubbed his hands in the soft dirt, while a chorus of yells rose from the fans. He returned
to the box. In came a pitch he liked, and he swung. Foul ball!

Nothing and two. He felt nervous and sweaty. Hundreds of pairs of eyes were focused on him, waiting to see what he would do.

A wide pitch. One and two.

Another pitch looked good to him. He swung hard — and missed. “Strike three!” the ump yelled.

“That was a mile high, Terry!” Tony shouted. “You’ve got to bring ’em down, man!”

Terry tossed the bat aside and returned,
head bowed, to the bench, the roar of the fans lingering in his ears.

“That was high and outside, Terry,” Coach Harper said evenly. “Next time step a few inches closer to the plate. See what happens.”

Terry nodded.

Rich, the Forest Lakers’ cleanup hitter, belted a foul ball into the third-base bleachers, then lambasted a high pitch to
deep center. The ball was caught and that was it for the Lakers’ half of the inning.

The Yellow Jackets’ lead-off hitter cracked Woody’s first pitch to right field for a neat single, then made it to second on
a sacrifice bunt. First baseman Bud Philips brought the ball to Woody after the put-out, talked to him a minute, then returned
to his position.

Woody threw two wide pitches to the
next Yellow Jacket, then grooved one.
Crack!
A blow to deep left center! Both Terry and Rich bolted after it. Terry reached it first, picked it up and heaved it to second
base.

The ball hit the ground far short of the bag. Second baseman Jeff Roberts snorted disgustedly as he ran after it. The runner
on second scored. And the hitter, after rounding first and second bases, made a beeline for third. Jeff, grabbing up the ball
on the outfield grass, pegged it quickly to Ed Caliel. The throw was high and the runner slid safely into the bag.

“A triple!” Tony grunted, casting a burning look at Terry. “A good arm would’ve got him at second!”

Terry, hurt by Tony’s stinging public accusation, bent over, cropped a handful of grass and tossed it angrily aside.
Most of the time he was able to laugh off remarks guys made about his poor throwing arm. But it was getting so that Tony’s
remarks always hurt.

My throwing arm is just an excuse,
Terry told himself.
It’s my color that Tony doesnt like.

The Forest Lakers settled down and Woody Davis faced the next batter. There was one out and a man on third.

The pitch. Then a smashing blow to second! Jeff fielded the ball and whipped it to first. The runner on third started for
home, then dashed back.