He glances over his shoulder. Tinsley isn't looking at us anymore. She's checking her phone.
"Because other people want me to."
I take a pinch of the soil, rubbing it between my fingers. Definitely silt in this stuff. It feels soft as talcum powder— silken, buttery—but there's also sand. That part feels gritty. Also, I now see the soil isn't red but orange. Probably full of iron.
"You're like that," he says.
I stare at the soil. The red icicles, I decide, are probably clay. But I can't tell if they're manufactured like bricks, or if they were naturally formed.
"Like what?" I ask.
"You do things because other people want you to. You like to make other people happy."
I lift my gaze, meeting his eyes. Home plate sits between us, but the afternoon sun falls against his back, casting his shadow toward me. When I drop my eyes again, the dirt holds our dark outlines. Our foreheads look like they're touching.
I nod. Our shadows kiss. I feel a flutter below my stomach.
"You're right," I manage to say. "I am like that."
I take a Sharpie from my pack and write the soil's location on the canister—HOME. Meaning, home plate. But as I write out the letters, my mind goes home, to the place where I do all the things that make other people happy. Like hide my real life. Eat really bad meals. Pretend Friday night dinners are still held at Drew's house. I do all these things for my dad. And for my mom.
DeMott scoops another handful of soil, shaking it until only the red icicles are in his palm. "You know what these things are? Pernicious."
"Good word." I nod, watching our shadows kiss again.
"I'll bet they're still some stuck in my kneepads from years ago."
"Kneepads—you were a catcher?"
"My white socks turned orange in the wash." He lifts his hand, and his shadow seems to caress my face. The feeling in my stomach is so strong I have to look away.
"And I've played just about every field in town," he says, dropping the stones. “I've never seen another field with these mean red things."
I stand up, shattering our shadowed embrace, and take a deep breath to remind myself why I'm here: Drew.
Picking up my pack, I walk down the foul line. The St. Benedict players are dumping their gear in the visitor's dugout. DeMott follows me.
"I thought baseball was a spring sport," I say.
"Not for the little guys. Elementary school and younger. The city doesn't have enough fields for everybody to play in the spring."
At first base, I scoop soil and mark the new canister. DeMott stays right next to me, glancing to the outfield where the St. Christopher's players have paired off to throw and catch. I glance over, capping the canister. They're such little kids. Pipsqueaks. Why would Drew come here, to watch kids who can't even catch? The only reason she even watches the Braves' minor league is because every once in a while
a player gets called up to the majors—somebody like Titus—and Drew already has the guy's stats going. She gets all wiggy
with math-joy about that head start on numbers.
But these kids?
"Have you ever seen her, watching the games?" I ask.
"Who?" DeMott stares at me.
"Drew."
He's still staring.
"My friend, Drew?"
"Oh. Right. Sorry." He's blushing for some reason. "From the pictures I saw on her computer, I've never seen her before. Then again, I never really look at the stands. But Tinsley might know. She’s always up there. Gabbing on her phone."
We both glance over. Sure enough, Tinsley's yakking on her cell phone and hopping foot-to-foot in her cute ankle boots. Like she's cold and trying to get warm.
"I hate those things," he says.
"What things?"
"Cell phones."
"Me, too."
He smiles. "That's two things we have in common."
Now I'm blushing, so I grab my pack and quickly make my way around the diamond. DeMott follows but says nothing more. I take soil samples from all three bases and find a dry top layer, almost flaky, but Saturday's heavy rain has percolated through to the next layer, depositing silt. Eluviated, that's the word. When water carries material through soil. When something's deposited on the lower levels, the prefix changes: illuviated. The same leeching process that forces my dad to add new topsoil to the garden every spring. I keep thinking about geology because it takes my mind of DeMott, standing so close I swear I feel heat from his skin.
"She's going to be okay," he says suddenly.
I don't look up.
"You know that, right?" he says. “She's going to be okay.”
Finally, I dare to look at him. That steady blue in his eyes never flickers. No wavering. No doubt or pleading or pretending, and a sense of relief floods through me. I keep staring into his eyes, not wanting to break contact, and then I see something else. Sadness. A deep reserve of sadness, going so far down into him it never reaches the surface. I want to tell him we have three things in common.
I look away, trying to get the courage to speak. I cap the canister, swallow my pride, and the moment is gone.
"What an honor!" The St. Christopher's coach comes barreling toward us again. "Such a huge honor."
He's got his hand out, like he's going to shake DeMott's hand. Or my hand? Quickly, I brush my fingers against my jeans then stick out my hand.
The coach walks right past me.
DeMott turns, watching him. "Holy Moley!" he exclaims.
I turn to see what's going on, but the sunlight stabs my eyes. Still holding the Sharpie, I lift my hand to block the light. All I see is a black shirt, and skin as black as the shirt.
"The boys are over the moon." The coach pumps the black man's hand. "We can't believe you're our umpire."
The umpire, wearing the black shirt, smiles. He sees DeMott walking toward him with his hand out too. Then the man looks over at me.
His smile falters. He looks uncertain.
"Raleigh," he says. "What're you doing here?"
Titus.
The umpire is Titus. He walks toward me. The coach and DeMott shift to either side of him, like he's Moses, parting the Red Sea.
"Drew with you?" he asks.
Her name on his lips. It makes me even sadder. But also because I've never seen Titus looking like this. He looks . . . happy. And the man is never happy. Ever. If someone cracks a joke in the diner, he never laughs. He doesn't even smile.
But right now his eyes shine, his teeth glow in a wide white smile.
"You don't know," I whisper.
"Say what?"
"You don't know."
"Girl," he shakes his head, "plenty I don't know."
"She's missing."
"Missing—the game?"
"She's gone…missing. Nobody's seen her since Friday."
His smile falters. He turns his head, eyeing me like there's more, like I haven't gotten to the punchline.
DeMott picks up another clue. He turns to the coach and says, "I'll go work with your catcher."
The coach nods, whistles for his players again. I watch the catcher come loping over the green grass, a puppy getting used to his big feet.
DeMott lays an arm across the boy's thin shoulders, leans down to speak with him, guiding him toward home plate.
"Raleigh," Titus says. "Talk to me."
His huge frame seems to swallow the sun. His gaze has gone back to its default setting, a dark heavy expression that's so serious and grave you want to confess every bad thing you've ever done.
"Remember when I left your place on Friday? I've been looking for her ever since. It's like she disappeared. Her stupid parents think she ran away. But I know she didn't run away, that's not what happened. I know it."
He frowns. "You know?"
Just what I need. Another skeptic.
"Okay, fine. You know those purple Converse tennis shoes she always wears? I found one, buried in a quarry down the road from here. And her bike—"
He holds up his hand. The palm is pale pink. "You found a
shoe
—one shoe?"
"Maybe the police found the other one, but they're telling me they didn't find anything else, which makes no sense. I mean, they were searching that quarry all morning."
"The police." He takes another step back. "The police are involved?"
"Titus—she's missing! Officially missing. Why isn't anybody listening?"
His dark gaze roams over the field. The two teams zip balls back and forth, their bright white socks flickering as they run. Titus's eyes begin to dart, like he's trying to follow every baseball, every player.
"I need to go," he says.
He turns, walking fast to home plate. Over his shoulder he carries a black bag. When he reaches the plate, he opens it and removes a small broom. He begins sweeping the plate marker, brushing it with furious energy, rubbing and rubbing. I can see the dust and debris and little red pieces of clay flying in the sunlight. He cleans until the plate is nearly white again.
"Are we done here?"
I turn around. Tinsley is standing behind the fence at third base, the phone still in her hand.
When I explain that we need to wait for DeMott because he's helping the catcher, her sigh hisses like the steam radiator in my upstairs bedroom. I turn my back to her again, watching DeMott. He crouches along the first base foul line. Beside him, the boy imitates his stance. With their large gloves raised, they look like some human breed of bicuspid, both of them hinged on their love for this game that I will never understand.
Fifteen feet away, the pitcher stands waiting. DeMott gives him a signal. He winds up, fires the ball.
Thwack
!
Right smack into the kid's glove.
DeMott springs up. "You did it!"
The catcher stands, slowly lifting his wire mask, staring into his glove. When he looks up at DeMott, his awe dissolves into a huge smile.
"Told you you could do it," DeMott says.
Tinsley releases another sigh.
"Seriously?" she says. "This is what he skipped practice for?"
***
We walk back to DeMott's truck—DeMott and I, Tinsley pussyfooting between us.
"So, let me get this straight," he says. "You don't even like baseball but you're on a first-name basis with Titus Williams?"
I shrug. Not to be rude, but because I'm puzzled by the grass. If Drew was here, shouldn't I have found blades of grass in her shoes?
"Raleigh, that guy's a living legend."
"We eat at his restaurant."
"He's got a restaurant?"
Tinsley heaves another hissing sigh. And just for that, I explain the whole thing—how we found Titus's restaurant on Opening Day, how Drew immediately recognized the big guy behind the grill, how Titus gave us free shakes that day and how Drew won another one every week after that because she always beat me there. "Until this Friday. When I really wish she had beat me there."
There's a moment of silence before he says, "She sounds like an amazing girl."
"Amazingly troubled," Tinsley says.
"And you two hang out with Titus Williams?" he asks, ignoring her comment.
"No. Nothing like that."
"DeMott," she says, "if you hurry, you can still make practice."
He checks his watch. Looks at me. "Need a ride home?"
"DeMott! What did I just say?!"
"I heard you." He gives her an odd smile. Kind, but sort of pitying too. "I always hear you."
Yes, the grass is certainly puzzling, but the other enigma is DeMott and Tinsley. Obviously they're dating. I mean, they went to Homecoming and all that. Tinsley could have any guy, and she picked DeMott. Oh, did she pick him.
In the parking lot, she stops at a puddle leftover from Saturday's rain. "DeMott?" Her voice sounds like a child's. "I need your help. I don't want to ruin my boots."
He picks her up like she weighs nothing—because she does—and sets her down on the other side of the puddle. When he turns, apparently coming back for me, I leap over the water. But my landing is off.
"Oh!" Tinsley cries. "You splashed my boots."
"Sorry."
I wait as the two of them deal with Tinsley's suede boots. Frankly, I can't see any water on them and DeMott says he can't either but that doesn't stop him from reaching into his truck and taking out a towel, wiping the boots while she tells him he's a true gentleman.
I watch this whole production with mixed emotions. Helen tells me guys like girls who are a little bit helpless. Needy. If that's what they want, I will never have a boyfriend. It's that simple. I hate relying on anyone. Ever.
"Sure you don't need a ride?" he asks.
“I'm sure.”
Tinsley looks over her shoulder, and smiles.