The Heart Does Not Grow Back: A Novel (4 page)

In the bottom of the first, Mack turned on the first fastball he saw, cutting a low line drive through the wind and into the Pepsi-sponsored scoreboard in left field, breaking two bulbs in the “0” lit up under the visitor’s score. He trotted around the bases, touching home plate as he looked up at me and said, “The Natural, motherfucker!” with a double-bicep pose. The ump warned him about swearing as he high-fived his jealous teammates on his way into the dugout. It was one of those rare moments when things were perfect for both of us at the same time.

*   *   *

When I called Regina, it felt like my public speaking class, the knots building in the middle of me, every word I intended on saying sounding lame. Crumbs on the linoleum stuck to my socks as I paced the kitchen, holding the phone, suffering from a paralysis each time I considered dialing—a sure sign I liked her even more than I let myself admit—all this without ever really talking to her, a crush sparked by her looks, her lotion, and the chemicals of teenage lust that poisoned logic.

She picked up the phone, sparing me the awkward, traditional Asking of the Father, something Mack had mentioned before, and absolutely hated.

Regina and I shared a weird kind of small talk, the language of avoiding the true issues at hand. I mentioned the weather when I really wanted her to know that I was a decent guy, that I liked her and wanted to go on a date with her sometime. She mentioned her registration for cheerleading camp, which was coming up this summer, when I sensed what she really wanted me to know was that her friends would make fun of her if we went on a date, so it wasn’t happening, but she was decent enough to offer a spoonful of hope.

Just when I sensed she was getting around to saying something substantial, maybe about us, another phone call came in. She was polite enough to not click over immediately, asking if I could call her back after the weekend, during which she’d presumably be out having a good time while I was putting some miles on my Nintendo.

Mack had assured me she’d play hard to get, but that she’d eventually say yes. He insisted that my bold move on her had changed my social standing. He maintained that I would clear the fence and be “hitting the skins” in no time, his favorite Mackism. I didn’t care about the skins. I just wanted the nervous pressure of planning a date.

I saw her on Monday at school. The sun was vibrating off the glass doors behind her, sending thick strands of light over her shoulders, into her hair. I asked her if she wanted to maybe talk over lunch. She countered by asking me to call her at seven. I sensed a little bit of annoyance, but Mack knew his shit, always had, so I had to trust him and make the call.

I was careful about my plan that night—her house was four miles away, in an adjacent small town called Meeker. The sun wasn’t quite down, but it was dark enough for me to move undiscovered. She had willow trees in her yard and I could see the glowing, moving silhouette of a television through the thin curtains of the living room. When I got closer, I could hear the murmur of the evening news. I kept my back to the siding of the house, the ridges digging into me, scooting along as if I were steadying myself on a ledge.

At the back of the house, I found her window. I crept through a partial alley, the ground moist, the siding in the back spotty with growing moss.

From my angle through the glass I saw a pink comforter on the bed. The walls were plastered with posters—boy bands, cheerleading, a movie poster for
Bring It On
. Enough evidence for me—I didn’t want to risk getting caught taking a direct view. Staying low to the ground, I reached up and put a single rose on her windowsill. The flower was an eight-dollar job from the Wal-Mart florist, complete with baby’s breath and a green cellophane sheath.

Once I got home, I dialed with greedy fingers. I was proud of the rose, and grateful for the much-needed shot of confidence. Even though the girl who answered sounded like Regina, since she and Raeanna were twins, I couldn’t be sure, so I asked for her.

I heard a long, disappointed sigh and knew it was Raeanna on the phone. She didn’t tell me that Regina wasn’t there, she just said, “She wanted me to tell you sorry, but she can’t.”

“Can’t what?” Clarity was important to me.

“She’s not going to talk to you, not because she wants to be mean, she just doesn’t want to go out with you,” Rae said, sounding upset. “I don’t think she was going to this whole time. But you’re a super nice guy, and cute, and all that.”

“Can I talk to her?” I asked.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Really. I think you’re a nice guy, Dale. She can be like that. I hope you’re not upset.”

“It’s hard to get pissed about being rejected when I didn’t even get as far as asking her anything to be rejected about. I mean, that’s got to be a first, right?”

Rae laughed a little. “I guess. Maybe you should call the Guinness Book of World Records.”

“Famous for failure,” I said, and offered up a fake chuckle, as if I didn’t really believe it.

“Don’t say that,” she said. “You’re the guy silly girls like Regina will wish they had when they grow up.”

“Thanks,” I said, and meant it. “Look outside her window, on the windowsill. That’s for you. For doing your sister’s dirty work.”

I think Raeanna wanted to talk more, but I was hurting, faking my way through the humor, so I hung up and stared at the television. When I couldn’t muster any real tears, I knew that I’d expected a “no” all along.

FOUR

When I started my junior year, Regina was dating Clint Phillips. I had no explanation for it. I didn’t know how he operated in his social circles, or class. He must have been exceptionally gifted at hiding whatever it was I’d glimpsed on our night out bashing mailboxes. As for him reaching down into the junior class for a girlfriend, my crash-and-burn story with Regina was something that I couldn’t live down, a story that had a long life in the halls of a small school. I truly think that Clint went after Regina as a way to fuck with Mack by magnifying my heartache, getting the girl who’d said no to me so publicly, but I kept that little theory to myself. Even if it was true, it didn’t work. It barely registered with Mack. The baseball season was approaching and he was on my ass to try out for the team.

He insisted that if I could hit him, I could hit anyone. He told me I had a great arm and that by working out with him, I had the potential to be one of the best players on the team. I was just hitting my growth spurt, right at six feet tall with a build thicker than seniors two years older than me. Mack was still clocking in at five-foot-eight and holding, but he was built like the trunk of an old oak tree.

I couldn’t commit. I couldn’t imagine the awesome threat of failing in front of people who expected me to fail. Unlike Mack, the adoration of others as a group never mattered to me. He enjoyed rumors and confrontation and having a trove of girlfriends. He liked newspaper clippings and keeping track of his batting average at home in a loose-leaf notebook, just to make sure the junior-high kids who kept the scorebooks weren’t fucking him out of a few precious points in his quest for another six-hundred batting average. I had zero ambitions when it came to sports, or anything for that matter. I only made grades because it was easy, not because I cared.

The first practice was that afternoon and Mack offered me my last chance as the bell rang—I could head out to the diamond where wannabes would show up with gloves and sweatpants, ready to make a mark during tryouts. And they really weren’t tryouts—with a school so small, everyone who wanted a spot pretty much got to dress up and sit on the bench. They got to take batting practice and they got to ride the bus to road games. They got out of school a little early sometimes, and girls would make glittery posters with their jersey numbers to hang in the hallway.

I told Mack no for a final time and headed for the parking lot, where a fleet of buses growled, idling, waiting to suck up kids and spit them out on corners and driveways. This was usually my chance to steal a look at Regina as she walked across the parking lot to where Clint’s mud-spattered truck was parked. She always had books under her arm, a purse slung over her shoulder, and she was always playing with her long brown hair. Since she’d made it clear she didn’t want me, of course that magnified my delirious and inexplicable desire for her. I spent my junior year in a trance of juvenile rejection, that special depression reserved for first loves. I never pursued another girl and I didn’t care that no adoration, not even a rumor of a crush, floated my way. Mack was always pointing out other girls to go after, but it always came back to Regina. I was Regina’s if she wanted me, and I could wait as long as it took.

But that day, I didn’t see her walking across the parking lot. Behind the lot was the baseball diamond, and I noticed Regina and Raeanna sitting on the bleachers.

I saw Mack pacing the outside of the dugout, aggressively stretching his shoulder while all the other players were standing around with their gloves tucked into their armpits. I never got on the bus. While Coach Gunther was addressing the players, telling them about expectations and responsibility, I walked up, glove in hand, wearing gym shoes and jeans, and took a knee with the rest of the players. A murmur drifted from up front as players whispered and nudged that yes, Dale Sampson was trying out for the team.

“Giving this a go, Dale?” Gunther said.

The players were silent, waiting for me to answer.

“You got it, Coach. Figure if I can hit Mack, I can hit anyone in the conference.” Mack turned around and gave me the thumbs-up while the rest of the team stifled laughter.

Clint, much to my disappointment, had developed into a hell of a baseball player, so naturally, he and Mack were the captains for the intrasquad game, and picked the teams. Mack picked me first. The game was going to be three innings of live baseball. Coach Gunther wanted to gauge players in game situations on day one to see what he was working with.

Mack took the mound and struck out the first two hitters. Clint got aboard with a bloop single that had him clapping with excitement as he rounded first. He stole second on the next pitch but ended up being stranded when the next hitter popped out.

Mack pumped his fist and pointed at me in a “let’s go” gesture. Jogging in from the outfield, I realized that this game, played with no crowd, meant everything. Just a bunch of boys in mismatched sweatpants with flecks of mud kicked up the backs of the legs hoping to crack the everyday batting order. The alternative was becoming a bench monument, shivering in the cold of spring while Mack and the defending conference champions ran around the field with steam coming off their sweating necks.

Clint took the mound and retired the side in order, throwing nothing but his fastball-changeup combo. He had a lively fastball, not with the sheer velocity of Mack’s, but he threw across the seams in a way that cut it, making it move a little in the strike zone. From the dugout, I watched Clint’s eyes—he knew his roster spot was locked, but he was intent on impressing Regina. She was his girlfriend of at least three months, but he carried himself like a man trying to win her over for the first time.

“He gets a hot piece of ass, and suddenly, he thinks his shit smells like roses,” Mack said, sitting next to me in the dugout. He stood up and began twisting the handle of a bat, in case a runner got on and he would get a shot at Clint. “He’s normally a cocksucker, but he sure has a bounce in his step now that makes me want to slug the fucker even more.”

I watched Clint’s exaggerated windup. He whipped a ball down the center of the plate—Matt Nelton, our catcher, was calling balls and strikes. “Sorry, Jerry,” Matt said to one of the wannabe players. “That was strike three, man.”

Inning over. I snagged my glove and headed into the outfield. Mack grabbed my shoulder. “Hey, you’re hitting after me next inning, all right? So don’t freeze up like a bitch. Let’s jack this fucker.”

Mack retired the side in order, the only contact being a weak pop-up from Todd Lake, a fat, short kid who had no business on the ball diamond. He acted like the out was a World Series grand slam, his body language heightened as he snapped the Velcro off his gloves in mock frustration.

As Clint took his warm-up tosses, I stood in the on-deck circle with a bat in my hands and a helmet at my feet, waiting for Mack’s at-bat. He never took warm-up swings, he just flexed against the handle of the bat, twisting it, gazing not at Clint, but through him.

Mack’s athletic successes were usually rooted in what I called his hate gland. Those invisible secretions were often pumping through his blood whenever he started with the gazing and flexing. He convinced himself of his opponent’s transgressions. He played and fought and broke up with girls in an angry fashion, and he worked at the anger. Tried for it, even. Standing there, I knew he was assigning all kinds of blame to Clint—Clint was the reason his father hit him. Clint made his mother leave. Clint thought he was better than him. Clint was laughing at him. Clint didn’t respect him.

Mack turned to Regina. “You shouldn’t have come to practice,” he said.

“And why is that?” She looked cold, her arms crossed, her cheeks red against the spring air. Rae looked decidedly more comfortable in the cool weather, her chin resting on her palm.

“You’re about to see what a talentless bitch your boyfriend is.”

She shook her head at him with a sly smile, but he didn’t see it, digging into the plate for his at-bat. The first pitch was a one-hopper in the dirt. Mack pointed the bat at Clint. “I’m not fuckin’ walking,” he bellowed. “Throw a strike or I’ll climb that fence and bang her myself.”

“You’re so mature,” Regina said as Clint wound up. The next pitch buzzed Mack’s chin. He jerked back in time to evade it.

“Enough of that crap!” Gunther hollered, sitting on a bucket down the third baseline, jotting his notes. “Play ball or I’ll send you both to the locker room.”

Mack dug in. Clint looked pissed, his windup bigger and longer than ever, tipping off a fastball. Not that Mack needed the tipoff. He drilled a line drive that screamed through the infield. Clint turned his head and flailed with his glove as the ball whizzed by his ear. Mack rounded first without slowing down, stretching it into a double without a throw.