I could hardly sleep that night, I was so excited. Dana rolled over at about one A.M. and stole her pillow back.
"What's wrong?" she grunted.
"The game," I said. I was running through lineups in my mind, planning strategies for situations that might arise in the sixth inning.
"Go to sleep. Deadline's tomorrow."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." I was editor of the Sawyer Creek E-Weekly, and Thursday noon was press time. I still had some unfinished articles. "That's just my job, but baseball is my lifeblood."
Thinking of lifeblood made me think of Jerry. The poor kid must have lost his parents. Back a few centuries ago, there had been a lot of purging and staking and garlic-baiting. Yeah, like I said, we're making progress, but sometimes I wonder if you can ever really change the human animal. I hoped nothing would come up about his being a vampire.
I knew how cruel Little League could be. Not the kids. They could play and play and play, making up rules as they went along, working things out. No, it was the parents who sometimes made things ugly, who threw tantrums and called names and threatened coaches. I'd heard parents boo their own kids.
In one respect, I was glad Jerry was an orphan. At least I didn't have to worry about his parents changing into wolves, leaping over the chain-link fence, and ripping my throat out over a bad managerial decision. Not that vampires perpetrated that sort of violence. Still, all myths contain a kernel of truth, and even a myth can make you shiver.
I finally went to sleep, woke up and got the paper online. I drove out to the ball field and there were four dozens vehicles in the parking lot. There's not much entertainment in Sawyer Creek. Like I said, Little League's a big deal in these parts, plus it was a beautiful April day, with the clouds all puffy and soft in the blue sky. Dana was already there, passing out baseballs so the kids could warm up. I looked around and noticed Jerry hadn't arrived.
"He'll be here," Dana said, reading my nervousness.
We took infield and I was filling out the lineup card when Elise pointed to centerfield. "Hey, looky there, Coach," she said.
Over the fence loped a big black dog, with red socks and white pin-striped pants. Propped between the two stiff ears was a cockeyed cap. The upraised tail whipped back and forth in the breeze, a worn glove hooked over its tip. The dog transformed into Jerry when it got to second base.
A murmur rippled through the crowd. I felt sorry for Jerry then. The world may be enlightened, but the light's a little slower in reaching Sawyer Creek than it is most places. There are always a few bigots around. Red, yellow, black, and white, we had all gotten along and interbred and become one race. But when you get down to the equality of the living and the living dead, some people just don't take to that notion of unity as easily.
And there was something else that set the crowd on edge, and even bothered me for a second. Hanging by a strap around his neck was one of those sports bottles all the kids have these days. Most of the kids put in juice or Super-Ade or something advertised by their favorite big leaguers. But Jerry's drink was thick and blood-red. Perfectly blood-red.
"Sorry I'm late," he said, sitting down on the end of the bench. I winced as he squirted some of the contents of the sports bottle into his throat.
"Play ball," the umpire yelled, and Elise went up to the plate and led off with a clean single to right. The next kid bunted her over, then Jerry got up. The first pitch bounced halfway to home plate and Elise stole third. Dana, who was coaching third base, gave her the "hold" sign. I wanted to give Jerry a chance to drive her in.
The next pitch was a little high, but Jerry reached out easily with the bat. The ball dinged off the titanium into center and we were up, one to nothing. And that was the final score, with Elise pitching a three-hitter and Jerry taking away a handful of hits from deep in the hole. Jerry walked once and hit another double, but Wheat Bran struck out to leave him stranded in the fifth.
Still, I was pleased with the team effort, and a "W" is a "W," no matter how you get it. The kids gathered around the snack cooler after the game, all happy and noisy and ready to play soccer or something. But not Jerry. He had slipped away before I could pat him on the back.
"Ain't no fair, you playing a slanty-eyed vampire," came a gruff voice behind me. "Next thing you know, they'll allow droids and other such trash to mix in. Baseball's supposed to be for normal folks."
I turned to find myself face-to-face with Roscoe Turnbull. Sawyer Creek's Mister Baseball. Coach of the reigning champs for the past seven years. He'd been watching from the stands, scouting the opposition the way he always did.
"Hey, he's got just as much right to play as anybody," I said. "I know you're not big on reading, but someday you ought to pick up the U.S. Constitution and check out the 43rd Amendment."
The Red Sox had never beaten one of Turnbull's teams, but at least I could be smug in my intellectual superiority.
"Big words don't mean nothing when they're giving out the Sawyer Cup," Turnbull hissed through his Yogi Berra teeth. He had a point. He'd had to build an addition onto his house just so he could store all the hardware his teams had won.
"We'll see," I said, something I never would have dared to say in previous years. Turnbull grunted and got in his panel truck. His son Ted was in the passenger seat, wearing the family scowl. I waved to him and went back to my team.
We won the next five games. Jerry was batting something like .900 and had made only one error, which occurred when a stray moth bobbed around his head in the infield. He'd snatched it out of the air with his mouth at the same moment the batter sent a three-hopper his way. I didn't say anything. I mean, instincts are instincts. Plus, we were winning, and that was all that mattered.
The seventh game was trouble. I'd been dreading that line on the schedule ever since I realized that my best player was a vampire. Maynard Solar Red Sox versus The Dead Reckoning Funeral Parlor Pall Bearers. Now, no self-respecting parlors were selling the blood that they drained. But there had been rumors of underground activity, a black market for blood supplies.
And Jerry had slowly been catching the heat, anyway. The grumbles from the stands had gotten louder, and whenever Jerry got up to bat or made a play in the field, some remark would come from the opposing bleachers. Oh, they were the usual unimaginative kind, like the old "Kill the vampire," the play on the resemblance between the words "vampire" and "umpire." The other common one was "Vampires suck." And these were the parents, mind you. They wonder where kids get it from.
The cruelest one, and the one that caught on the fastest, came from the unlikely mouth of Roscoe Turnbull, who'd made a habit of bringing his son Ted to our games just so they could ride Jerry's case. Jerry had launched a three-run homer to win in the last inning of one of our games. As he crossed the plate, Turnbull yelled out, "Hey, look, everybody. It's the Unnatural." You know, a play on the old Robert Redford film. Even I had to grudgingly admit that was a good one.
Now we were playing a funeral parlor and I didn't know where Jerry got his blood. I usually didn't make it my business to keep up with how the kids lived their lives off the diamond. But Jerry didn't have any parents, any guidance. Maybe he could be bribed to throw a game if the enticements were right.
So I was worried when Jerry came to bat in the sixth with two outs. We were down, four-three. Biff was on second. It was a situation where there was really no coaching strategy. Jerry either got a hit or made an out.
He had made hits in his three previous trips, but those were all in meaningless situations. I couldn't tell if he was setting us up to lose. Until that moment.
"Come on, Jerry," I yelled, clapping my hands. "I know you can do it."
If you want to, I silently added.
Jerry took two strikes over the heart of the plate. The bat never left his shoulder. All my secret little fantasies of an undefeated season were about to go up in smoke. I started mentally rehearsing my after-game speech, about how we gave it all we had, we'll get 'em next time, blah blah blah.
The beanpole on the mound kicked up his leg and brought the cheese. Jerry laced it off the fence in right-center. Dana waved Biff around to score, and Jerry was rounding second. I didn't know whether I hoped Dana would motion him to try for third, because Wheat Bran was due up next, and he'd yet to hit even a foul tip all season. But the issue was decided when their shortstop, the undertaker's kid, rifled the relay throw over the third basemen's head as Jerry pounded down the base path. We won, five-four.
"I never doubted you guys for a second," I told the team afterward, but of course Jerry had already pulled his disappearing act.
Dana was blunt at dinner as I served up some tastiwhiz and fauxburger. I'd popped a cork on some decent wine to celebrate.
"Steve, I think you're beginning to like winning just a little too much," she said, ever the concerned wife.
I grinned around a mouthful of food. "It gets in your blood," I said. "Can't help it."
"What about all those seasons you told the kids to just give it their best, back when you were plenty satisfied if everyone only showed a little improvement over the course of the season?"
"Back when I was just trying to build their self-esteem? Well, nothing builds character like winning. The little guys are practically exploding with character."
"I wish you were doing more for Jerry," she said. "He still doesn't act like part of the team. And the way he looks at you, like he wants you for a father figure. I think he's down on himself."
"Down on himself? Down on himself?" I almost sprayed my mouthful of wine across the table, and that stuff was ten bucks a bottle. I gulped and continued. "I could trade him for an entire team if I wanted. He's the best player to come out of Sawyer Creek since—"
"—since Roscoe Turnbull. And you see how he ended up."
I didn't like where this discussion was headed. "I'm sure Jerry's proud of his play. And the team likes him."
"Only because the team's winning. But I wonder how they would have reacted, how their parents would have reacted, if Jerry had struck out that last time today? I mean, nobody's exactly inviting him for sleep-overs as it is."
"He's just quiet. A lone wolf. Nothing wrong with that," I said, a little unsure of myself.
"Nothing wrong with vampires as long as they hit .921, is that what you mean?"
"Hey, we're winning, and that's what counts."
"I don't know," Dana said, shaking her pretty and sad head. "You're even starting to sound like Roscoe Turnbull."
That killed my mood, all right. That killed my mood for a lot of things around the house for a while. Lying in bed that night with a frigid three feet between us, I stared out the window at the full moon. A shape fluttered across it, a small lonely speck lost in that great circle of white. It most likely wasn't Jerry, but I felt an ache in my heart for him all the same.
At practice, I sometimes noticed the players whispering to each other while Jerry was at bat. I don't think for a minute that children are born evil. But they have parents who teach and guide them. Parents who were brought up on the same whispered myths.
I tried to be friendly toward Jerry, and kept turning my head so I could catch the look from him that Dana had described. But all I saw were a pair of bright eyes that could pierce the back of a person's skull if they wanted. Truth be told, he did give me the creeps, a little. And I could always pretend my philosophy was to show no favoritism, despite Dana's urging me to reach out to him.
Dana was a loyal assistant regardless of our difference of opinion. She helped co-pilot the Red Sox through the next eight victories. Jerry continued to tear up the league's pitching and played shortstop like a strip of flypaper, even though he was booed constantly. Elise pitched well and the rest of the kids were coming along, improving every game. I was almost sad when we got to the last game. I didn't want the season to end.
Naturally, we had to play the Turnbull Construction Claw Hammers for the championship. They'd gone undefeated in their division again. Ted had a fastball that could shatter a brick. And Roscoe Turnbull started scouting his draft picks while they were still in kindergarten, so he had the market cornered on talent.
I was so nervous I couldn't eat the day of the game. I got to the field early, while the caretaker was still trimming the outfield. Turnbull was there, too. He was in the home team's dugout shaving down a wooden bat. Wooden bats weren't even used in the majors anymore. Turnbull could afford lithium compound bats. That's when I first started getting suspicious.
"I'm looking forward to the big game," Turnbull said, showing the gaps between his front teeth.
"Me, too," I said, determined not to show that I cared. "And may the best team win."
"What do you mean? The best team always wins."
I didn't like the way he was running that wood shaver down the bat handle.
"You getting all nostalgic?" I asked, tremblingly nonchalant. "Going back to wood?"
"Good enough for my daddy. And my great-great-grandpaw on my mother's side. Maybe you heard of him. Ty Cobb."
Tyrus Raymond Cobb. The Hall-of-Famer. The Georgia Peach. The greatest hitter in any league, ever. Or the dirtiest player ever to set foot on a diamond, depending on whom you asked.