Hotbox

The characters and events portrayed in this work are entirely fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or deceased, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

PART ONE

Chapter One

             
“Hey, Ty! Telephone!” Lou hollered from the office.

             
“I’m kind of in the middle of something here!” I yelled back.

             
It was just the engine roaring until Lou’s voice returned. “It’s your dad!”

             
I sighed. Now what? My father only found the time to call me when he needed something
,
and I
really
wasn’t in the mood for another one of his stories. Last week’s excuse was just about all I could take. The hardest part was that he actually believed that
I
believed him.

             
I turned off the engine and wiped my hands off the best I could. Lou gave me a sympathetic frown as I took the phone from his hand.

             
“Yeah,
Dad
, what’s up?”

             
“Hey, son! How are ya?”

             
“Uh, j
ust fine. How are
you
? Did you settle all of that stuff with
Lenny
?”

             
“Oh, u
h,
Lenny
? Yeah, sure, sure—”

I shook my head
, knowing
he didn’t
.

“—
Anyways, kid, about your game
tomorrow…”

             
It was the same thing, week after week. He had used every excuse in the book throughout my life; I’d heard them all.
I was most surprised that he actually called to tell me. Normally he’d promise an appearance, but never show.

             
“Sure,
Dad
, don’t worry about it. Maybe another game, huh?”
             
“Oh, yeah, I’ll be at the next one for sure. Hit one outta the park for me, would ya?”

             
“
Sure
,
Dad
.”

I hung up the phone and avoided Lou’s look of pity. Even
he
had seen more of my games than my own father.

“Hey, fifteen more minutes, okay?” he called after me. “I gotta get home to
the
wife.”

“I’m done. I was just trying to get a jump on tomorrow.”

I closed the hood of the car
and
cleaned up my workspace. It was
eight
o’clock on a
Friday
night;
a night that I didn’t have a game and Lou was willing to keep the shop running just so I could get some hours. Baseball seaso
n didn’t offer me much income—I
was too busy with
school
, practices, and games—b
ut Lou was easy to work
for
because he really liked me. I was his best mechanic, even if I wasn’t around much in the spring.

Luckily I had a scholarship to help me out. I would never be able to afford college otherwise. My dad never saved a dime; if he did it was for cigarettes and alcohol. H
e
had never been
much of a father to me,
but a small part of me (a very small part) was still hoping he would someday change.

I’m originally from Tacoma, Washington. I was born and raised there,
and
attended
junior college
to play baseball
. My g
oal was to play ball for fun, maybe let it help me get a college degree. I was fortunate enough
to be seen by the right people
and I got a s
cholarship offer to transfer
to
a
four-year university
. I’m fin
ishing my senior year right now
and I’ll be graduating with a degree in
business
.

My father seems to think I’ll make it to the
Big Show—the m
ajors.
I
t’s not reall
y something I’m in the position to pursue right now, b
ut the idea of being done with b
aseball kind of bothered me.
Even just playing on a
low
minor team would have suited me just fine, b
ut
with the way my life was
right now
,
that didn’t look like a possibility. Professional baseball
wasn’t something
I was counting on or anything—I
just wanted a way to continue playing ball. Coach Tucker said if I were ever available, he would take me as another coach in a heartbeat.
Surprisingly, even with all of the problems in my life, I was somehow blessed with options.

“See ya tomorrow,” Lou said after locking up and walking to
his car.

“Goodnight
,
Lou.”

I got into my own rig, a
‘
98
F2
50. It was
more than
a dozen years old, but I guarantee
I had
it
running
better than anything
new
.

It took fifteen minutes to get home to a three-bedroom house I shared with two other guys from my team. Sometimes privacy was tough since a lot of friends liked to
hang out
, but rent was cheap
er
and that helped me out.
I wasn’t
exactly
broke, but I tried really hard to be smart with what I did make
.
During the off-season
I worked in Lou’s auto
shop quite a lot.
I saved what I could for a rainy day and ends met just fine.

When my father hinted that he needed money, I sent it to my Aunt
Sue
. She used it to help him with “necessities.” Although I knew his own money went to the wasteful things in life, at least I knew that
the money I gave him
didn’t. It wasn’t the most logical reasoning, but I tried to convince myself that it was.

“Hey, Ty! Come spot me a twenty!” Aaron said the second I entered a full house. “Jesse’s just on a lucky streak
, but I got him on this one
.
” 

Aaron and Jesse were my teammates, second base and
center
field. They were complete
opposites. Jesse was a junior; he was pretty quiet and kept to himself, but he would usually participate in whatever the rest of us were doing.
He was your all-around
nice guy.
Aaron was a
senior and made sure the other guys remembered that. He was a
loud mouth and a
lways had something to say
.
He was
usually the one to be
disciplined for rattling off his own opinions to the coaches.

Foul
and
offensive
were two words that also described him well
.

“I’m not spotting you anything,” I told him. “You still owe me ten bucks from last week and I know I’ll never see it again.”

“You give me twenty and I promise you’ll get it all tonight.”

I shook my head. “Sorry, bro. Find another sucker.”

They continued their game of cards as I took note of
who was in the house. The usual lineup was
there—
Jack,
Trent
, and
Alex
—and their girlfriends
Megan
,
Taylor
, and Macy. There were a few on the couch watching a movie, but the second I saw Holly, I groaned.
She was already on her way to greet me
before I could escape down the hall.

“Hey, Ty,” she smiled.

Holly wasn’t exactly
unattractive
—she
would actually be nicer looking without so much makeup
—but there was something about her
(maybe a lot of things)
that just didn’t click with me
,
and I found myself always trying to avoid her.

“Hey,” I replied.

“Have you been at work?” she asked.

“Uh, yeah, which is why…” I started toward the hall “…I’m gonna go shower.”

“Can I
join you?”

I hated the way she thought her smile was actually seductive. I was sure she used it quite a lot, and I felt sorry for the
fools
it actually worked on.

I
didn’t reply and
left for my room. It was
so
worth it to pay a hundred bucks more just to have my own bathroom. I locked the bedroom door first before heading into the bathroom, shutting and locking
it
too.

Holly and I
went out
one time
,
mainly because Aaron
tricked
me
in
to
.
Rule number one: never let Aaron Jenson set you up on a date.
I think I wanted to get rid of her after
five minutes
. She was very shallow, always wanting to know how she looked, and always expecting to be complimented
constantly
. It wore
me out. Can’t a guy just say “Y
ou look really nice” and that be enough?

After showering,
I
stretched across
my bed fo
r a while, completely exhausted
but unable
to sleep even if I wanted to. T
he noise from the front room was too loud. Luckily we had one neighbor that worked nights, so he was never home, and the
elderly
woman
on the other side
of us
was hard of hearing. Plus
she likes us. W
ell, me anyway. She thinks I look like her son (
from
forty years ago).