The Flood Girls (24 page)

Jake looked around the bleachers and wondered if the ten dollars he was paid per game would be worth it today. He was supposed to remain unbiased, but his allegiance would be with Laverna's team. His project was coming along, he supposed, the seventh shirt nearly finished. He had considered making shirts for himself and Bucky, but that would only result in cries of favoritism. The Flood Girls could use all the help they could get, but Jake would behave like a professional. He could not afford to lose this job.

The Flood Girls were playing the ladies from Quinn Lumber Mill, but the bleachers were full of firemen's wives, ex-wives, widows, or daughters. The people who surrounded him in the bleachers had sharpened their knives for Rachel, and they did not hide their hatred. They leered at her in the dugout, snickered when she let the balls roll past during warm-up. A small town never forgets, or forgives. Rachel was still a mistress and a murderess in their eyes.

The Flood Girls' fans sat in the rear corner of the bleachers. The pack of old men came to cheer on Laverna, and take delight in the chaos. They had been coming to support the Flood Girls for as long as Jake had been keeping score, and Jake supposed that Laverna's team provided the most entertainment in the league. All the old men looked the same to Jake, except for the Chief. Rachel told Jake that he was her sponsor, and Jake had read enough of the AA books to know how difficult the job must be. Especially today.

The ladies from Quinn Lumber Mill all wore orange T-shirts, and during their warm-up, they threw as hard as they could. Jake winced at the smack of the ball in their gloves. They were out for blood.

Before the game began, as both teams continued throwing balls back and forth on the field, Jake saw the stray dog enter the dugout. Apparently, Della was unable to tame him. The dog seemed drawn to Laverna, and sniffed at her feet. Laverna tried to shoo the dog away, but it wouldn't leave. Finally, Laverna bent down, and Jake figured she was going to pick up the dog and throw it toward the concession stand. Instead, the dog nipped at Laverna's calf. Laverna screamed, and Red Mabel was there in seconds and swatted the dog in the head with her baseball glove. The dog yelped and bolted out of the dugout.

“For fuck's sake,” said a voice behind Jake. He turned around and saw one of the volunteers from the ambulance hand his beer to his wife and make his way down the steps of the bleachers. “This game hasn't even started yet!”

The volunteer took his time getting to the dugout of the Flood Girls. Laverna was cursing, and Red Mabel threw the duffel bag that contained the first-aid kit at the volunteer. Jake watched as he pushed up Laverna's slacks, and cleaned the area with antiseptic and wrapped it several times with gauze.

The warm-ups were over, and Bucky dusted off home plate and addressed the bleachers.

“Play ball!” Jake knew that Bucky loved saying those words.

Rachel's first at bat came during the bottom of the second inning, and she was wearing her usual punk rock clothes. Her T-shirt was much too big for her, and the neck was stretched out from years of wear. The gaping T-shirt revealed the strap of a lacy black bra and her small amount of cleavage. Jake was scared. If Rachel had been sixteen, Laverna would have sent her back to the house to change.

Jake wanted to close his eyes for the first pitch.

Bucky had no problem pronouncing it a strike. Rachel didn't even bother swinging at it.

“That bitch has some nerve,” declared a woman, prehistoric-looking, all brow and jaw.

“Please watch your language,” said Jake. Huffily, he turned back to await the next pitch.

The bleachers snickered at him. The troll toasted the man next to her, and beer slopped on Jake's elbow. He turned to glare.

“Look,” said Jake. “I've got a job to do. I need to keep a clean and accurate record of this game. Especially the clean part.” He made a show of wiping away the drops of beer on the corner of the scorebook.

“Shut up, freak,” said the troglodyte. Jake inched away from her.

Jake observed Rachel in the batter's box. Something was wrong. She had let the ball go sailing past her with a purposeful nonchalance. She dressed more provocatively than usual. This seemed to be the old Rachel, and he wished the Chief would descend from his perch to give her a good talking-to.

The next pitch also flew directly across the plate.

Bucky called the ball as it smacked into the catcher's mitt. “Strike!”

“Slut!” The woman next to him waited for this exact moment, watching the pitch closely, shouting at almost the same time as Bucky's call.

The bleachers whooped at this, and someone slapped the troglodyte on the back. Jake wanted to curl up and put the scorebook over his head as the laughter continued, but instead stared down at Rachel, who stood in the batter's box, attempting to appear oblivious, even though the woman's voice had been loud enough to hear in the outfield.

The third pitch went wild, and someone else had yelled out “Whore!” before Bucky even had the chance to declare it a ball. The entire infield from Quinn Lumber Mill chortled.

Jake knew it wasn't the troglodyte, as she was sitting right next to him. This was a man's voice, and Jake didn't bother turning around to determine the source.

“Please,” said Jake, speaking to the air in front of him. “There are rules for unsportsmanlike conduct.”

“We ain't playing, princess.” The voice was familiar, and Jake wondered if it was Ron, the owner of the movie theater. “Ain't nothing you can do.”

Bucky finally realized something wasn't right, and swiveled his neck to stare into the bleachers. He looked as confused as always.

Jake put his face in his hands, and then reluctantly, he studied Rachel again. She was staring at the pitcher, expressionless, as if she couldn't hear any of the heckling.

The pitcher, doubled over in laughter, managed to regain her composure. She grinned as she lobbed another perfect pitch to the catcher.

Before Bucky could call Rachel out, the bleachers bombarded the field with slurs. There were many voices this time, and all around Jake they hollered out.

“Slut! Slut! Slut!”

Red Mabel leaped from the bench and ran into the bleachers, and Laverna didn't even attempt to stop her.

The Flood Girls stood up in the dugout as Red Mabel tore through the bleachers, beer flying everywhere as she took hold of some woman's hair and yanked her down the steps. Jake wished it had been the troglodyte, but Red Mabel's anger was never accurate.

The crowd was on their feet, shouting out profanities, and yet Rachel just stood there, waiting for a pitch that would never come.

Two other women jumped on Red Mabel's back, which was a mistake. They surely should have known better. One got an elbow to the mouth, and the other was thrown through the air and slid across the wooden steps.

Jake shrieked and ran just as the beer started being thrown, as four volunteer firemen took each one of Red Mabel's limbs and dragged her from the bleachers. She cursed and spat in their faces.

The volunteer firemen pulled Red Mabel into the grass, and two of them sat on her. Red Mabel managed to bite one of the firemen, and that was when Bucky finally called the game, over after two innings.

Rachel calmly walked back to the dugout. She dropped the bat in the dirt as if nothing had happened.

After the crowd dispersed, Jake walked onto the field and tried to hand over his scorebook to Bucky, who frowned and kicked at the dirt around home plate. Bucky threw his count clicker to the ground.

The Flood Girls were silent as Jake approached the dugout. The women were packing up their duffel bags. Martha and the Sinclairs were already gone. Laverna comforted Red Mabel. The gauze on Laverna's calf was perfectly white. Jake wondered if the dog had even drawn blood.

Jake stepped into the dugout and grabbed Rachel's hand.

“You should probably come with me,” he said. “If anybody tries anything in the parking lot, I can give an excellent and accurate witness statement.”

The parking lot was still full of vehicles, but they made it to Rachel's truck without incident. There were a few catcalls, but the riot Red Mabel caused seemed to temper them a bit. For a full minute, Rachel sat in her truck and stared out at the empty field. If she was going to drive, this would not do. Jake shook her arm, until she turned, and regarded him with heavy eyes.

“There's something you need to see,” he said.

“I'm not in the mood,” said Rachel.

“Please,” he protested. “We need to flee this scene. As soon as possible.”

“I just want to go home,” she said.

“They could be waiting for you there.”

Silently, she turned the key in the ignition and followed his directions.

At the cemetery, they stood in front of Frank's plot.

“I haven't seen this before,” said Rachel. “That makes me feel like an asshole.”

“I loved him,” said Jake. “He was the only man who was ever nice to me.”

They stared down at the plot; clumps of grass emerged, and dande­lions had popped up, beginning their march to take over the bare soil.

“I don't know what to say about today,” said Rachel. “I guess I was kind of expecting it this whole time, to tell you the truth.”

Jake reached out for her hand. “You remind me of him,” he said. “Good and bad. You've taken really good care of me, and you don't have to. But today you had that look in your eye.”

“What look?”

“Frank got that look sometimes. Like he wanted to burn everything down. Like he was staring past everything already and he could see the ashes.” Jake stared at Rachel until she looked at his face. “He had that look the last time I saw him.”

“I don't want to burn anything down,” said Rachel. “I'm done with destroying things.”

“Exactly,” Jake said, and continued to hold her hand, as the sounds of a riding lawn mower began, and they both ignored it.

When they drove back through town, they saw the dog. It ignored the nonexistent traffic, and galloped across Main Street, still on the run.

A
s sixth period finally ended, Rachel drew a pentagram in the center of the pig, the only mark on the paper. The rest of the biology class actually dissected pigs, and the room was filled with the sounds of popping and ripping. Rachel refused. Her pig remained on Mr. Tyler's desk, Saran wrapped in a cake pan. Her customized assignment was to consult her textbook and draw the circulatory system. She also refused to do this, and put on her toughest face when the bell rang. She entered the halls of her high school, a place where she had once been beloved. She sought protection in the freshmen corridor, walking to the last period of the day, study hall. Before, being wasted and slutty had been charming, had elevated her status. But crossing Laverna was unforgivable. Parents had apparently warned their children to stay far, far away from her, had encouraged them to say awful things right to her face, to scrawl terrible things on her locker door. She thought that the girls in her class would eventually get their fill, would gobble up all the blood in the water. A year later, the knives were still out.

After class, Rachel just wanted to get the hell out of the building, go home, and get ready for the Fireman's Ball. She was going tonight, despite Black Mabel's and Krystal's warning her of the carnage.

Rachel's locker door was open.

Inside her locker, a pile of fetal pigs.

The smell rose up, and she nearly gagged. She heard the laughter, and was surrounded by the bravest girls in her biology class. Rachel's coat and purse were soaked with formaldehyde. She would not let them win. She grabbed her coat and shook the bodies onto the floor. More laughter, as Rachel slammed shut her locker door.

Della Dempsey tried to stop Rachel from leaving. She boldly stood in her path, and screamed with the others. “Murderer!” “Slut!” Rachel was a foot taller than Della and threw an elbow, caught Della right on the chin. Della cried out and fell to the floor, dramatic as always. Rachel stepped over her, kept on walking. She had a bus to catch.

As she strode down the hall, other girls waited with contraband from biology class. Rachel kept walking, even as they threw tiny hearts and stomachs in her hair.

That night, Rachel was going dancing.

She rode the bus to the trailer court, shivering in her seat. She had stuffed her coat into a garbage can. She had carried her purse onto the bus, and the bus driver cursed at the smell.

She sat in the back, surrounded by empty seats. The bus ride took twenty minutes, and Rachel removed the soggy SAT study guide from her studded purse. She memorized vocabulary words during every bus ride. She had to think about college. She spent the weekends on math, the math she had once cheated on. She no longer had peers to terrorize for answers. She had always known she was a smart girl but had never wanted it to define her. She used to be the fun girl, the promiscuous girl, the dangerous girl. Now she was determined to be the girl who was leaving.