Pretend You Love Me (6 page)

As I took my practice swings in the warm-up circle, I heard Jamie start a chant: “Sza-bo. Mighty Mike. Sza-bo…”

The audience picked it up: “Sza-bo. Mighty Mike. Sza-bo…”

Shit. I shot eye daggers at Jamie. Like the rest of the squad, Jamie was dressed in the official CHS cheerleading uniform,
only instead of a short skirt he wore skintight short shorts. You could see everything. I kept telling him he should wear
a cup. He did a split jump in the air and landed it splayed on the ground. Ow. That had to hurt.

Jamie finger-waved to me. I pretended not to know him.

On the first pitch I hit a solid double. Could have been a triple, or a homer. Next up I’d adjust to this pitcher. She was
new, a freshman. Fast, but she telegraphed with her eyes where she was going to place the ball. I read the catcher’s signals.
Same as last year. Not smart. I had a good memory.

T.C. advanced me to third with a sacrifice fly and I stole home on a wild pitch. We scored two more runs in the first inning.

Amy Babcock was the best pitcher Coalton had ever had. Unfortunately, Amy graduated last year and her sister Gina was our
starter now. Gina wasn’t Amy. Her first three pitches scudded off the plate. She was rushing it. I rose from my crouch behind
home base and signaled her to slow down, take a deep breath. On her next pitch, the ball hit the strike zone, at least, but
the Buffs batter connected and tripled to left.

Gina looked shaken.

I called time and loped to the mound. “Forget it,” I told her. “She got lucky.”

“Yeah, right. That was my best pitch.”

“Gina…”

“I know. I’m sorry.” She shook her head at the ground.

I smacked the ball down hard in her glove. “You got the whole game, girl. Show ’em what you’re made of.” If not steel, I thought,
aluminum foil. Don’t crumple.

The next pitch was a rocket, in there for a strike. Atta girl, I sent Gina a nod of encouragement. The Buffs batter popped
the next pitch high in the air over my head and I threw off my catcher’s mask to snag it. Easy out.

Their third batter singled up the middle, then made the mistake of trying to steal second. Guess she hadn’t heard—no one steals
on Mike Szabo. My bullet smoked her so bad, she’d be embarrassed to show her face in Garden City again.

After the first inning jitters, we settled into our game.

Bottom of the last inning, it was Cougars nine, Buffs eight. Two outs. Gina had hung in there. She was getting tired, though,
a little wild. Garden City’s power hitter was up next. Lacey Hidalgo. I’d been hot for Lacey since Little League, not that
she knew it. She pumped twice and took her stance at the plate. “Nice ass,” I said under my breath.

“What?” She turned as the ball whizzed by.

“Stee-rike one,” the ump called.

Lacey slit eyes at me. I grinned behind my mask. Signaled Gina, inside corner. Lacey’s weakness. I don’t know if the ball
got away from Gina or her arm gave out, but the pitch sailed. Lacey’s bat caught the ball high and ripped it.

T.C. sprang like a cat toward second base and nicked the ball with her glove, but it dropped behind her and rolled into the
outfield. I groaned inwardly. The runner on second tagged up and sprinted to third. Then T.C. mishandled the ball and the
runner got waved home.

“Throw it, T.C.,” I hollered.

T.C. whirled. I kept my focus on the base runner. As she went into
her slide, kicking up a cloud of dirt, the ball smacked into my outstretched glove. Perfect throw. I brought my glove down
hard on the runner’s ankle an inch away from the plate.

“Out!” The ump punched the air.

I said to the runner, “Gee, sorry. Didn’t mean to soil your new unie.”

She nailed me with a death look.

I loved this game. I don’t remember when I started playing softball. Probably the day I was born. Dad said I had a sixth sense
about the game, that I could size up a hitter with one swing of her bat. An accurate assessment, if I do say so myself. I
was built to be a catcher. Strong leg muscles, center of gravity low to the ground. Speedy too. I could fly. I had to improve
on timing, though, and upper body strength to turn those doubles into homers.

For the limited time left I had to play, that is.

“T.C.” I caught her arm on the way into the dugout to gear up for the second game of the night. “Dead-on throw, girl.”

T.C. beamed. “It was, wasn’t it?”

We knocked fists.

In a doubleheader you can’t let the first loss affect you, but the Buffs did just that. By the end of the fourth inning it
was clear they’d checked out. We routed them twelve-zip.

Most of the people who’d driven down from Coalton made a point of coming by to high-five, or say, “Good game, Mike.” They
congratulated the other girls too. It wasn’t like I was a one-man team. Maybe I did bring in the majority of our runs, but
I didn’t win the games singlehandedly. That’s the thing about softball; it’s a team sport. No one player can determine the
outcome.

As I was removing my knee pads, I saw Coach Kinneson over by the backstop, jabbering away with a couple of suits, gesturing
at me. What were guys in suits doing here? It made me feel uncomfortable. Guilty. Like I was wanted by the FBI or something.

Jamie flounced up beside me. “Kicked their asses, Szabo.” He held
up a palm to high-five me. When I went to slap his hand, he jerked it away and jutted his hip into mine. God. He was so queer.

Kimberleigh Rasmussen, head cheerleader, bounded up behind Jamie and poked him in the ribs. He yelped and slapped her away.
“Hi, Mike,” she said. “Awesome games. You busted butt.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Jamie, we’re going to the A&W in Garden City,” Kimberleigh told him. “You want to come?” The rest of the squad was piling
into Kimberleigh’s SUV in the parking lot and hollering for Jamie. “You too, Mike,” she added.

“No thanks,” I said. “I gotta get back.” I didn’t really; just didn’t feel much like partying today. The end of every game
was a letdown. But especially this year. One less game to play. Counting down.

Jamie looked from Kimberleigh to me. “I’ve got to get back too,” he said. Shocking the hell out of me. Why would he choose
me over “his girls,” as he referred to the squad?

Oh. I got it. “Go,” I told him. “I don’t need your pity party.”

He looked at me funny. “If anyone’s throwing a party,
you
weren’t invited.”

I sneered at him. He pressed his cheeks together and pooched his lips.

Kimberleigh gawked at us like she didn’t know what the hell was going on. Me and Jamie did seem to have a language all our
own. Jamie said, “I’m scheduled to work at two, okaaay?” he drew out the word. Waggling a finger at Kimberleigh, he added,
“Don’t you girls do anything I wouldn’t do.”

Kimberleigh said, “What would that be?”

Jamie smiled. “Good point. Don’t get caught.”

She pinched his arm and he yowled. He was eating up this cheerleading crap. How he ever got voted onto the squad is a mystery.
His tryout cheer in front of the whole school went:

“Strawberry shortcake

Banana split

We think your team plays like—”

It must’ve been a joke to vote for Jamie. Maybe not. He was popular. Class clown. Athletic, though. Into gymnastics. He was
fun to be around, even if he was the world’s queerest queer. People seemed to get past it. Jamie was just Jamie. He’d always
been this way.

“Hey, you all right?”

I blinked back to the moment. “Yeah, why?”

He stared into my eyes the way he does, like he’s trying to see down to my soul. Sorry, closed for repairs. Jamie said, “Let’s
climb the water tower tomorrow and work on our bods. It’s perfect weather for sunbathing. Not so hot we French-fry our fannies.”

“Sounds good.”

“Eleven o’clock.” Jamie ground a stiff index finger into my bicep. “Don’t be late.”

“You’re the one who’s always late.” I slapped him away.

He clucked his tongue. “I operate on gay time. Oops, forgot.” He snapped his fingers in front of my face. “So do you.”

I clubbed his hand down. “I have to get my gear.”

“Meet you at the truck,” he said.

Coach Kinneson clomped into the dugout as I was guzzling the last of my ice water. I was starving, eyeing that hoagie in my
bag. I should’ve eaten on the way down. “Great game, Mike,” she said. “Both of them. You’re amazing.”

I might’ve blushed. She was always doing that, singling me out. It was embarrassing.

“Thanks,” I mumbled, adding as an afterthought, “You too.”

She gave a short laugh. “What do I do except make sure we have enough players on the field? Six, right?”

I smiled. She knew her limitations, anyway.

“I talked to Mr. Archuleta yesterday and he said his mother is better. They’re planning to bring her home from the hospital
tomorrow.
If he can get a nurse to come in for home visits, he’ll be back next week.”

“Yeah?” My hopes soared. I suppressed my urge to jump up and holler, “All right!” I don’t know why the news excited me. We
were holding steady in the standings, despite Coach Kinneson. Oh, that was mean. She was doing the best she could. She was
new to the team, new to Coalton. Most of us had been playing together long enough that the game was second nature by now.
We knew the teams, the competition. Winning was simply a matter of confidence and execution.

“Listen, Mike.” Coach Kinneson sat beside me on the bench as I switched out my cleats for my grungy Nikes. “I want to talk
to you about your future.”

“What future?”

She cast me a weird look, like I should know. “We need time to sit down and discuss it,” she said. “At length.”

What length? My future was predetermined. I’d be shoveling pig slop at the Merc till I died.

“Do you think you could stop by my office on Monday?” She started jamming bats into the golf bag she used for hauling equipment.

Coach Kinneson also happened to be the new principal of Coalton High. I squatted to help her as a little quiver of fear shot
up my spine. She’d only been at CHS three months and already she had a rep as a hardass. You didn’t go to Dr. Kinneson’s office
unless you were in deep shit. People would wonder what I’d done.

“Mike?”

You also didn’t argue with the principal. “Sure,” I said. “No problem.”

“Come during your homeroom. I’ll make time for you.” She squeezed my shoulder on her way out. Pivoting back, she added, “I
can see it now.” Arcing her hand in front of her face, Dr. Kinneson quoted an invisible headline, “Hometown Girl Makes the
Grade.”

What grade? The only grade I knew for sure was Miz S’s A in Geom
etry. Had Dr. Kinneson been talking to my teachers? Is that what this was about? What’d I do? I did enough to get by. More
than enough.

Jamie was sprawled on the hood of my truck, pumping his pom-poms at people as they drove off. He had a future—in the hospitality
industry.

“Get in,” I ordered him. He scooted off the front of the truck and jumped in the passenger side. We slammed our doors in unison.
As I followed the stream of cars heading back to Coalton, Jamie cranked up the radio. On I-83, I accelerated to the speed
limit. There was no limit for Mike Szabo. Not today. I was feeling good. Forget Dad, the anniversary. Forget the future. We’d
won both games, the sky was blue, the wheat was green. Toby Keith came on the radio and Jamie cranked up the volume. We had
hand gestures for this song. Pointing at each other, poking our chests, we sang along with Toby at the top of our lungs: “I
wanna talk about
me
, I wanna talk about
I
. I wanna talk about number one, old my, me my…”

I dropped Jamie off at the Dairy Delite. There was an hour to kill before my wastoid of a brother needed the truck, so I figured
I’d swing by the Merc, see if Everett could use me. I wasn’t scheduled to work, but I could always use the money. Especially
if Darryl was out spending Dad’s social security on stock cars.

I slowed at the stoplight. Idled the engine. It wasn’t a conscious decision, almost as if my brain shifted gears and took
me along for the ride. I turned in the opposite direction of the Merc, toward the main power line, heading straight for Xanadu.

X
anadu came tearing out of the house and sprinting across the yard as if she’d been anticipating my arrival. “Thank God you’re
here,” she said. “I’ve been calling you all morning to get out here and save me. Where’ve you been?”

“I had a game,” I told her. How’d she get my number? How else? From the tri-county phone book.

“What do you mean, a game? What kind of game?” She flipped her hair over her shoulder, then lifted it in the back and let
it fall.

“Softball,” I replied, wishing I could touch it. Run my fingers through it.

Her eyes scanned me up and down. I knew what she was thinking: Coalton’s a bush league.

Maybe we were. Maybe we weren’t.

“Are you any good?” she asked.

I shrugged. “We’re okay. We usually go to quarterfinals.” In case she didn’t know what that was, I added, “The state tourney.”

“Not the team.” She gave my shoe a little kick. “You.”

Me? My foot tingled. “I made first team All-State two years running.”

Did she smile? Did she realize what a big deal that was? To me, anyway. My time was running out. “Come on, let’s go.” She
grabbed my jersey front and yanked me toward the driver’s side door. I stumbled at the unexpected move, the strength and force
of her.

Faye appeared on the porch and Xanadu called back, “Mike and I are going to town, Aunt Faye. That okay with you?”

Going to town. I liked the sound of that.

“I finished unloading the dishwasher and folding the tea towels like you asked.” Xanadu crossed her eyes at me, adding in
a mutter, “Six hundred fucking tea towels. Who uses tea towels, anyway?”

I waved a greeting at Faye. Please, I prayed, let it be okay.

Xanadu didn’t wait for Faye to answer. She climbed in on my side and slid across the front seat. My duffel was in the way
so she tossed it into the back, then kicked off her sandals and curled one leg underneath her, fanning her hair out over her
shoulders.