Pitch and catch

I could tell Bobby liked me most. His face usually showed it. He'd smile wide as a big C when he saw me and his teeth would shine, the upper front ones biggest, sparkling against the daylight's rays like he was some kind of boyish angel. His mom liked that, too, clutching onto the wheel of his chair like it was his only leg, while sharing in and calming his unrestrained joy. I heard her sigh as she stroked the side of his face. She didn't want him getting too carried away or something, but her own face gave away her quiet celebration of his ecstacy. That was just the way it always seemed to happen when I came around.



"Yeww-ew-ew ca-an thrrrooow mm-me the ball," he said, stuttering and shaking and moving and twisting, the moment I entered the house and saw him in the room next to the kitchen. Then he'd smile, with those gleaming whites, sure as shooting.



He always said that, too, the same thing. The first time I came over to his house, a year ago or whatever, I had brought my ball and mitt and was looking for his older brother Rick, who was a real good player, our team pitcher. I didn't know about Bobby then or that he was in a wheel chair. I'm talking about the first time I went to Rick and Bobby's house, which was just down the road from where I lived. I only know when I first saw him I looked at him and didn't say a word. He was sleeping or so I thought. I didn't hink he was dead, but he could have been.



After I had knocked on their back door and his dad let me in, I was waiting in the kitchen for Rick. Their house wasn't too big, especially the kitchen. I know the frigerator was right there, with all those magnets on it, as soon as you came through the door. One of the magnets was for an insurance company and was the only one with a piece of paper under it. Then I looked over into the next room and saw a wheel on a chair. My head did one of those gumby twists. The wheel was a dull brown and rubberish looking like the bottom of a pair of worn sneakers. But in the chair, which was just a steel-like chair with a stained, dark blanket draped over it was this kid who turned out to be Bobby. He was just sitting in that hard metal chair like a grandpop, asleep. His head was tilted and he was resting against the side of the steel bar, and he was kind of drooling. I drool, too, when I sleep so I figured he was asleep, not dead.



I didn't hear nothing for a while so I kicked the wheel. I was getting tired of waiting. Bobby woke up quicker than a dog. At first he didn't say nothing and just looked at me. He had on these pair of glasses that were real coke-bottle thick and licorice black on the sides. His hair was a bit matted, and his nose was kind of crooked for some reason. And his glasses didn't quite fit. "Did I wake you?" I asked, in a semi-whisper. He didn't say nothing so I figured I probably had and that he was mad like my dad gets mad when I wake him. My dad gets mad and doesn't say nothing a lot.



"I'm Mike, here for Rick. Your dad went to get him, upstairs. He's your brother, ain't he?" I sort of pointed to the other room with my arm outstretched, but he was silent. When I did, Bobby saw my glove and the ball in it, and shifted his glare on to them. He took off those glasses and hooked 'em over his forehead. His eyes were glazed, and redish on the sides like he was crying, but he still latched his eyeballs onto the ball and glove like he was looking into the future.  "You wanna play ball with us?" I asked. "Rick didn't tell me he had a brother. You any good, cause we need third base."



I was sort of lying when I said that because Harry Otto, who was older than the rest of us, played third. Except he didn't always show up except when he was bored. Harry was into his specially painted and crafted cowboys and Indians, and his trains, too. He got 'em for Christmas because he was an A student. That's what he told us, anyway. I got to admit his stuff was cool, and I couldn't really yell at him for not wanting to always play third. "Thrrr-oo me ttthe ball," Bobby said. They were the first words he spoke after I woke him, and so I threw him the ball. It took him about five seconds for each word, I think, even if he said them every time I saw him. "Sure," I answered, and tossed it to him kind of sideways. The ball fell easily onto his lap, which was covered with a black wool blanket like the one in my bedroom closet, for winter. I didn't use that blanket much cause it gave me the woolies.



Bobby pulled his arm from out of the blanket and started fiddling with the ball. Man he fiddled. His arm was crooked, too, like his nose when I first saw it. I was wondering if he was younger or older than Rick. He looked a bit mangled to me for a kid, like he belonged in an old foggies' home. Funny, you'd think he just found gold or an after-school snack the way he massaged that thing. "I got more balls in the shed at my house if you want to keep that," I said to him. I had two left but I wasn't sure if the one was find-able. He didn't say nothing and kept working the ball like it was the bottom of the ninth and Babe Ruth was up, or somebody who could hit. "Does that blanket give you the woolies," I said, wondering to myself if maybe my mom would finally trade blankets between me and my sister, Prissy. She was always cold and could better use it, anyway. Bobby didn't answer my question-he rarely answers, if you haven't noticed- and kept slapping that ball and his hands against it. I knew in my mind that I'd let him keep that ball. Then all of a sudden he went bat-shit crazy on me.



He started shaking and vibrating and spitting and the whole chair began to rattle. "Woe, there," I said-"you need to slow it down." I grabbed the chair, and just about then his mom pushed me out of the way. His dad was right behind and started pulling up Bobby's sleeve. He had a needle in his hand. "Bobby! Bobby!" his mom starting screaming. She sure was yelling at him, telling him to calm it down. I sort of dropped back out of the way and tried to vanish into the small kitchen. "Where's Rick?" I said loudly, but nobody was paying me much attention. Right then, Rick came a jumping into the kitchen. He sounded like thunder. He gave me a typical head nod and a finger point but didn't say nothing and opened the big refrigerator door. I saw that note again under the magnet as Rick looked inside the door and came out with a piece of lunchmeat ham in his mouth. The note had a doctor's name on it. "Let's go, he said, paying no never mind to his brother's commotions. "Cya, mom, Rick yelled. "Cya, Dad." Cya, Bobby."



And off we went to the diamond, wondering if Harry Otto was going to play third, and except for that Bobby had my ball in his steel chair. As always.