Wiffle

What had been so effortless in little league suddenly became awkward, painfully mechanical. My arm was hungry for eyes cocked my way from under dark hair and a shy smile. Should I be cool, confident? Should I flex my bicep? My hands wrap a little tighter around the plastic bat. Was I making too much of this? Did my best friend, standing like a statue on the "mound" (marked by a paper plate) know or care that I needed a hit?That I needed, like a salmon needs to charge upstream, to make the plastic swiss cheese pill dissapper into the trees? But no. Better to earn it. Better for it to curve through space, defying me to swing hard, my arms betting against the pitcher, against the ball, against her indifference toward me, that my swing wouldn't be in vain.

Could it be as simple as it looked, the way the spinning blur of the ball floats to me like a gift? I'm almost dissappointed. I draw it in, as though controlling it with a beam from my eyes, and gloriously, defiantly, swing.

Handle Time

Miles had just enough time to register that his friend Jill was suddenly on a call in the middle of their conversation before his headset beeped in his ear, telling him that he had a call of his own to handle.

A moment after the beep, in a well-conditioned pavlovian response, he began:

"ThankyouforcallingRiseWirelessmynameisMiles. How can I help you today?"

"I need to go over my bill. It looks like there were some roaming charges that just don't make sense. I was hoping you could help me clear it up," the woman on the other end answered distractedly.

"Certainly. I'll be happy to help you with that today. Can I get your name and the last four digits of your social?"

"Yeah. Lily Haber. Last four is 9046." A few breaths later she said "Hello? Are you still there?"

"Yes. I'm sorry. Just one moment."

Miles struggled to reorient himself. He rubbed his eyes and nodded.

"Yeah. I'm here. I'm sorry, something just distracted me here. What were those last four digits again?"

She sighed. "9046."

"Right." He swallowed and tried not to shake as he brought up her account information. It was her all right. Right name, right place, right age. He knew quality control could be listening. He knew he was supposed to give this one to a supervisor. But, after all, there was no need to mention how or why he knew this person.

"What can I help you with today Lily? Oh, right, excuse me, the roaming charges. Let me just bring your bill up here."

Five years experience had its advantages. He managed to bring up her latest bill without losing track of what he was doing.

"Do you have your bill out right now?"

"Yes. By the way, you guys have got to do something about the hold times. That was just ridiculous."

"I do apologize, ma'am. We do try to serve you as quickly as possible. Now, uh, can you tell me just where the problem is?"

She walked him through the bill. He followed along. The charge didn't make sense, but it was a problem he had seen once or twice. They had sent out a memo about it last week; a bug in the billing system easily remedied by a credit to the customer. No need to call for a supervisor. No drama. Just a few clicks and he would be done.

"Okay. Ma'am I see what the problem is here," his heart raced as he considered his next words. "Unfortunately it's going to take some time. Can I take a moment to handle this and I'll give you a call right back?"

"Uh, sure. I guess that's fine."

"Should I call your wireless number or do you have another line you'd like me to call?"

"Uh, yeah. I have a dead spot in my apartment, so you better call me back on my landline. It's 503-555-7046."

Miles struggled to keep up with the numbers as he jotted down her home address from the information he was seeing on the screen.

As he closed the call he made a point of skipping the part of the script that dictated that he remind the caller of his name.

"Thanks so much for calling Rise Wireless. You'll be hearing from me soon."

QC would probably not look twice at that since this was an unconventional call. Then again, they would wonder why he didn't simply resolve the issue.

As much as he tried to evade the fact that he was playing roulette with his job, that's precisely what he was doing.

He tucked the small note into his pocket, looking around as though he had just pilfered a candy bar.

The rest of the shift passed in a blur of call after call, and he nearly forgot about Lily. But just the presence of her name and number written down and in his pocket brought back the old feelings, good and bad. On this particular night it turned out that he and Jill got off their shifts at the same time. He trailed her out of the building. Her dark hair brought Lily back to his thoughts and suddenly the tiny piece of paper in his breast pocket glowed and warmed up in his mind's eye.

Driving home in the dark his mind stayed hypnotically fixed on her. A familiar cocktail of feelings and thoughts rushed through his brain and his body like a drug he'd been sober from since high school. She was back in his system.

The heady mix was a blend of the thrill activated by her proximity to him and the sick feeling of desperation and fear that had kept him from talking to her before she moved away and it was too late.

He only knew what city she had moved to from eavesdropping. She was still there, in that city. And now he knew precisely where she was.

He thought of getting rid of the paper. After all, it had been a relief when she had left and he had a chance to move on. She had been a terrifying obsession for him since the sixth grade.

And why shouldn't he have been obsessed? Can't fault me for my taste in women, he thought to himself. She was pretty in such a way that he could almost convince himself he was the only one who thought so, but it was more than looks that he had watched. She chose good friends; nice people he was nevertheless terrified to talk to because of their mere proximity to her. She had many developing talents, doodling beautiful landscapes during bored moments that found full flower in the painting class he had cooincidentally taken with her. She liked to wear flowers in her hair, and her smile made him want to weep. She wore white keds that she had personally decorated with stars and stripes.

When he arrived home and his room mate had not yet returned, he flipped on the television to forget her and had a drink. A few more drinks later, and after the room mate had gone to bed, he pulled the paper out and looked at it. Just a collection of numbers scrawled in his own frenzied hand. He thought of calling her, but realized it was too late.

He thought of moving to her city. He thought of putting himself on her street from time to time, hoping for a glimpse. No, he assured himself, she still had her name, so she was unattached. No boyfriends. No children. No exes. Only her waiting for him.

"Why didn't you say anything?" she would ask him after he worked up the nerve to talk to her.

He would smile and push back her hair and kiss her softly in reply. And she wowuld yield to him. And he would be happy, and get a new job in the new city and take care of someone.

He fished out a lighter from the spare kitchen drawer and went to the back porch. He simply stood there in the dark cold, holding up the lighter and the tiny note in a long hesitation, like a suicidal man contemplaying a long jump from the side of a bridge.

The flame almost surprised him, leaping from the gas vent and licking at the edge of the note. He dropped the flaming thing and Lily burned on his back porch.

He was half way to work the next day when he realized that he had promised to call her back to resolve her issue. He would not and she would grow frustrated and lose confidence in the service provided by Rise Wireless. She would call again, exasperated, and talk to someone else, another stranger, in another call center far away.

She would threaten to break her contract, cancellation fee be-damned, and they would transfer her to retention where they would bribe her and woo her and butter her up. But she would say no and hang up and that would be that.

He had let a customer down and might lose his job, but nothing could be done.

It was much too late.

No Name #1

My friend fell. He was on the way out to the playground after lunch. He just laid there while half the school passed him on the way outside.

“Get up! Why don’t you get up?” they said.

Another said. “You’re faking. He’s faking.”

They went out and they never came back. I still remember where he fell. Everything seemed big then, in the way that large important buildings are big in the adult world. You moved down the hall away from the cafeteria, past the vending machines, around the corner. Another left down the stairs--concrete clad in gripping rubber-- and the landing, and then the long flight down into the dark.

You move through the dim hallway that was dim in sickly fluorescent light. It turned black when the people ahead of you opened the door wide in to the bright sunlight facing south.

We had laughed a lot at lunch. We almost ran down the hall, forgetting rules, forgetting everything. His big legs frenzied down the stairs like we had done together a million times. He jumped the last steps. He fell, and didn’t get back up. He shouted and I came back to see what was wrong.

“Can you get up?”

He wasn’t crying. “Just give me a few minutes. It just really hurts right now.”

I looked at him and someone opened the door, letting the light into the long dark hallway. I left and joined them.

I wandered around the playground. I came in on a game of foursquare, then waited in vain to be picked for kickball. I toyed with tether ball alone. I trotted slow and alone from this game to that toy, like a kid in a nickel arcade waiting for his ride home. I thought of my friend again and I went back. Nobody else had.

He still laid there. “I’ve tried to get up and I just can’t,” he said.

I tried to lift him on one side. He was always heavy. On the day of our physicals I watched silently, invisble as I could be as the other kids laughed at him.. One hundred and fifty pounds in third grade was unforgivable. He didn’t look very fat. He was heavy, and fell from my hands when I tried to lift him..

People had stopped coming through. Lunch was over.

He tried to slip his leg under himself and shouted in pain, his voice echoing down the dark hallway.

“I’m getting a teacher,” I said.

The paramedics arrived with flashing lights, parking near the opened door at the end of the hall. Everyone gathered and watched in a circle and pretended they cared about him.

His face was dusty with the tracks from size 8 tennis shoes that had been brand new in September. They had his ankle braced tight and loaded him into the aid car like bread into a truck.

When we were gathered and corralled inside I turned invisible in the back corner of the classroom where my desk was and brushed my fingers along the margins of my text book. I wondered if he was okay. I wondered if he would leave me alone there, and if he would come back and try to do for me what I had done for him.

The next morning I cried and lost control and told my mother that I wouldn’t ever go back to school again.

It was another week before we saw him again, and we all pretended it hadn’t happened in our heartless way.

We didn’t go to the same high school.

Molly's Tantrum (PG)

Something terrible happened to Peter when he fell in love with Molly; he fell even more in love with her mother. He knew it was terrible the way only people who truly are in love can know that it is terrible, and dangerous.

Peter was left there alone with her. No, the "her" was really "them." Tom would be at the station for two more days, and it was almost time for the kids' nap. He sweated inside, and it threatened to escape, trapped as he was between action and agonizing inaction.

He was playing with Molly, and she alternately bossed him into being a dragon and a prince, depending on her whims. It made little difference to him, as long as he could keep the delighted giggles and prattle coming.

Peter had no children, and feared to. He feared for them, the way he feared for Molly. Today she had a friend. Now, he could be that for her. In a few years, he could not, and she would come home from school, when she went to school, and cry as he had used to. She would get over it, as he had. She would learn too, and probably even sooner, that she wasn't bad or stupid, but that her brain simply worked differently than most, better in some ways.

Molly was safe now, though. It made him happy. But he knew the same thing made her mom, Victoria, even happier. It was an opportunity, the kind he had trained himself to see, the kind that hid behind the meanings of spoken words, that flitted mysteriously in gestures, faces, tones of voice--all a foreign language to him that he had recently begun to learn.

Virginia was in and out of the living room. She carried baskets of laundry to and fro, and occasionally skulked into the kitchen to keep tidying dishes and cleaning between loads. She did all this, of course, to the extent that she could do these things and endure little Todd's demanding cries. She never raised her voice to the baby, working with seemingly effortless devotion and patience. None of this diminished her.

The books on the shelves were her's. The home she'd created was safe and beautiful.

She strode in. She strode out. Those legs, he could not but help but notice. Even in sweatpants-

It was like junior high school, feeling the need to hide what he felt, and yet hoping the object of his attention would notice and appreciate it.

"Go in there!" Molly shouted, her white-gold hair, floating wildly, tickling her face as she pointed her chubby little finger at him.

"Okay, okay," he obeyed, scooting deeper into the makeshift cave with walls of felt blanket, tenuously strung over stools, a piano chair, and an end table. The top of his head brushed the ceiling of Princess Molly's living room castle. Molly was not even two, but could speak in sentences and read. What would she be imagining, he mused, when she was twelve, or twenty? Would she survive until then?

"Molly." Virginia's warning voice came from the laundry room. "Didn't we talk about being so bossy?"

Peter heard her coming down the hall. She poked her head around the corner, her pretty brown ponytail brushing down around her chin. Every look he got felt a little like stealing, and so he did what he could not to linger on her eyes, or her hair, or anything else she might notice. He wasn't confident that he could know if he'd been caught.

Molly looked abashed, but only a little. As soon as Mother was safely down the hall, Molly repeated the order, this time more quietly, though he had already obeyed.

"Go in there!"

A washing machine lid closed. Todd began, again, to fuss and gurgle. Virginia muttered gentle words to him. The frustration leaked out, though she was earnest and soothing.

Whatever it was she had said, it wasn't good enough. Todd's noises escalated to wailing, and Virginia's tone grew more discouraged--hopeless, even.

"Please stop," she pled.

"You're in the dungeon!" Molly proclaimed, confident now that Mother was too occupied to notice her relapse into tyranny.

Peter sighed, grateful for a chance to sit still for a second.

"Okay. I'm in prison," he acquiesced, raising his hands. "Can I have visitors?"

"N-n-no!" she barked. She was trying to drop her infantile squeak as low as it would go. A little bigger, a little older, he thought, and she'd be genuinely scary. Not scary enough, he was sure.

Todd was only louder now. Virginia walked out of the back room, striding like she was on her way to halt one of Molly's tantrums. But she was clutching the baby to her shoulder, pacing back and forth. Todd's face was bright red as he wailed.

Her eyes were clamped shut. Her jaw was clenching, grinding.

"Please stop. Please stop."

She sounded defeated.

Now almost a whisper. "Please stop."

"Anything I can do to help?" he tried to say, croaking on nerves. He winced.

"Sorry, what?"

He cleared his throat and tried to be heard over the baby.

"What can I do to help?"

"Umm, look, I don't know. I just-"

A knock came at the door, rhythmic and musical. Todd stopped screaming, gently whimpering now, his attention fixed on the source of the noise.

"Trisha!" Molly screamed. She ran to the door and flung it open.

"Oh, Trish. Hi! You have no idea how glad I am to see you."

Virginia's desperation melted a little.

A girl, around eleven, stood in the doorway, smiling at Molly. In a flash Molly was wrapped around the girl's calf, squeezing tight.

"You can help me decide what to do with my prisoner!"

"Do you think you can just look after these two while Pete and I get some things done around here? I'd really appreciate it."

"Yeah, sure!"

"Really? I'll make it worth your while, honestly. You have no idea what good timing this is."

"Yeah," Trisha said, "I was passing by and it sounded like you could use a little help. She eyed Peter. Probably wondering why I couldn't handle it, he thought. Anticipation, however, throbbed louder in his chest than any resentment ever could.

Trish managed to pry Molly off her, and draped Todd over her shoulder. The boy was quiet now, his contented murmurs threatening to turn into giggles. Trish settled down on the couch and hummed to the baby, squeaking away at him in a high baby talk while Molly waged a ruthless campaign for her attention.

Virginia sighed, long and deep.

"Peter," she said, as though he had just arrived, and couldn't be more relieved to see him. "Can you come on back and help me tackle the mess back here?"

"Sure," he said, trying not to sound too eager.

He followed her back to the laundry room, his eyes eagerly wandering where they would as she strode down the hall in front of him. If only this house had a longer hall, and more hidden corners.

Virginia set-to, wasting no quiet moment. Peter looked around, thinking of what to talk about.

"How can I help?"

Laundry covered the floors, the top of the drier. Some of it was half-heartedly folded. Most of it was part of the mess.

"If you can wear it, fold it. If you can't-I don't know. We'll figure it out later."

Strands of her hair were falling down in her face, coming loose from the ponytail. She wiped beads of sweat off with her sleeve. Certain he might be making a horrible mistake, Peter spoke.

"You know I've been reading some really insightful books lately." Insightful? He prayed he had used the word correctly.

"Really?"

"Yeah. How's that English degree going? You going to graduate soon, or-"

"Oh, I never finished. I want to go back soon, but--."

"That'd be tough, I guess. With the kids and all."

"Tough. That's the word for it. School," she said, wrapping the sleeves of a long-sleeved T around her shoulders, folding the fabric up, meticulous work. "You know how it is, though, I guess, right?" Sure, he knew, having barely graduated himself, single and unattached.

Peter worked absently, his mind turning with what to say next, his palms sweating.

Common ground. That was supposed to be a good place to start.

"So, like I said, I've been reading a lot. If you wanted to, uh, you know, like, get together and talk about books or something-"

A scream came from the living room. Molly was probably just playing. Virginia didn't seem to think so. She moved her head closer to the door.

"Everything okay out there?"

Molly was balling now. He could hear Trish say "I told you that wasn't safe! Oh, you're okay. I think someone needs a time out."

Virginia was already on her way out. She snatched up her child and carried her to the kid's shared bedroom.

She said nothing. Molly protested, screaming all the way. She kissed the bump on the head the way a customs official stamps a passport. In a moment the child was behind a closed door, wailing and pounding on the door in protest. Trish was hushing and calming the baby in the front room. A moment later Molly's fit had faded into the background, and even began to burn out.

Nap time. Compulsory, perhaps, but right on schedule.

Virginia rested herself against the door, her eyes closed. She tried to rub the spreading exhaustion out of her face.

"So, what do you think? You can go ahead and pick the book, if you want, you know, we could read it. And I was thinking we could maybe get some coffee sometime-" Peter rambled, oblivious.

Virginia looked at him blankly, incredulous.

"Coffee," she muttered. "What makes you think I have time for coffee?" She hadn't raised her voice, but it might have been less of a blow to Peter if she had.

He stammered. And then stopped, holding his breath.

"Look, it's cool. Just an idea," barely audible.

He looked away. She studied him for a long moment. He wondered if she was wishing his head to explode, or if she would ask him to leave. He wouldn't know, but neither happened.

"Sorry," he muttered.

"No, I'm sorry," she said, coming to herself. "I shouldn't have-I'm sorry. It sounds good, really. Maybe if I could carve out some time, hire Trish or something. I don't know if it's such a good idea for me right now, though, you know? I mean, I used to go to a book club and all. I just don't have a lot of reading time these days, as you can see."

"Oh, hey, whenever. It's cool."

Peter heard the door open.

"Hey," he heard a male voice in the front room, and his heart almost stopped.

"Tom, hey," Virginia said, her long legs striding out to the tall man in the front room.

Peter almost didn't follow. He didn't know if hiding back there or coming out would look more suspicious.

The tall man hugged Virginia, firemen's arms wrapping down around her little shoulders. She gave him a short kiss, but it bore no resemblance to anything a customs official would do with a stamp.

"Howdy, Pete," Tom said. "What brings you around here?"

Peter swallowed, trying to avoid his brother's cool eyes. "I could ask the same," he said, trying to feel brave.

"They had a mix-up on the schedule at the station. Or I had the mix-up. Anyway, I've got duty tomorrow. Not today."

"Pete was just over to play with the kids. Kinda giving me a break, you know," Virginia said.

Tom eyed Trish playing silly face games with Todd on the couch.

"Look," said Peter. "I gotta go."

"Yeah," said Tom.

"Sure you don't want to stay for dinner or something?"

Dinner. A kaleidoscope of faux pas, discomfort, foot-in-mouth disease, and worst of all, the possibility of awkward, one-sided confrontation. All worth delaying, if not entirely avoiding.

"Nah. Thanks, though." He headed for the door. Not too fast, he hoped. Don't run from dogs or bears, he had been told.

"Thanks Pete," Virginia said.

He turned, and got a last look at Virginia before he waved to them all and left.

He kicked small stones down the sidewalk on the way back to his studio apartment. It'd be best not to go back there for a long while. Cool it off, maybe. Leave it be for a while.

When the kids get a little older, and have school. Firemen work long shifts.

He looked behind him, half afraid Tom would be following him. He feared a knock on the door, or a call.

When he got in the door, his place it was silent and still.

He slumped in a chair, breathing deep, speaking to himself in the language of his own thoughts: the only one in which he was truly fluent. Molly would miss him, and not know the name for what she missed, or remember his face.

He could not go back.