Of course, there have to be two outs, and our team has to be losing by one run. It’s only fitting that the whole season would come down to AJ with a bat in his hand, at what my old friend Henri Cartier-Bresson would call “the decisive moment.” I’m crouched down behind the first base line, next to the dugout, with my camera trained on the exact spot where I know the next pitch is coming. I hold my breath so I won’t shake the camera, push down the shutter button halfway, and wait. I press it the rest of the way just as AJ’s bat connects, sending the ball way, way over the center fielder’s head.
As everyone on our side of the stands goes bonkers, I take the camera away from my face, turn, and look into the crowd. I immediately spot Angelika, who is standing up with her fists in the air, between a shouting, jumping Elena and a bunch of camera gear. She sees me, and mouths, “Did you get the shot?”
I mouth back, “What do you think?” And I smile.
I walk into the lobby of the assisted living place and take a left by the elevators. My heart is pounding. I’ve visited my grandfather twice a week since he came here. Sometimes I bring AJ, when he’s not too busy being the all-around athletic star of the school. Other times I bring Angelika. Grampa has a terrible memory for other people, but his face always lights up when he sees her. On this particular day, I’m alone, but I’ve brought a gift. On his good days, Grampa really likes it when I bring gifts. As I approach Grampa’s room, I know this isn’t going to be one of his good days. There have been fewer and fewer of those, anyhow. Mostly, Grampa just sits in the chair by the window, his legs covered with a ratty afghan, looking out over the back parking lot and the majestic Dumpster beyond. He was never much of a talker, it’s true, but lately it’s like there’s a curtain separating him from the rest of the world.
The doctors say that soon, Grampa will forget how to speak altogether. Unless he refuses to eat before then, which would be the end. Or maybe he will lose his ability to swallow, and a little piece of food will lodge in his windpipe. Then he’ll get pneumonia, which would also finish him off.
I try not to think about it.
Anyway, today he’s talking, but I can’t understand much of it. From what I can make out as I walk down the hallway, he’s complaining to President Johnson about the way the Vietnam War is going. It’s strange to hear these speeches he makes, because it’s like he is magically transported back to the 1960s, when my Gram was alive, and my mom was a little kid. Mom says those were happy times in Grampa’s life, so at least that’s a plus.
I walk into the room, and he is looking right at me. His eyes are slow to focus, so I try to jog his memory. “Hi, Grampa!” I say, closing the distance and leaning over to give him a one-armed hug. The other arm is behind my back, holding Grampa’s present. “It’s me — Peter.”
Grampa smells really clean whenever I visit. Mom says that means the home is taking good care of him. I guess so. “Peter?”
I nod.
“Are you my father, Peter?”
My eyes are burning. “No, I’m your grandson. Your father’s name was Peter, too, but I’m your grandson.”
He still looks completely puzzled. “Am I your father?”
Hoo boy. I shake my head. I hate this. I decide that maybe I should just show him what I’ve brought. If this doesn’t get him focused, I don’t know what will. I pull the little dinner tray table over so that it’s right in front of Grampa’s chair, and then lay the present on it. I ask him to help me rip off the wrapping paper, and he does. I notice that his hands are shaking. Mine are, too.
We get the paper off, and Grampa stares down at the framed photo I’ve brought him. It’s an eagle, soaring, lit from below by the early morning rays of the sun at Hawk Mountain. Grampa traces one wing with his pointer finger, then the other. He slides his hand across the body of the bird, then looks at me with the fierce pride I haven’t seen for months.
“I took this picture!” he exclaims.
“Well, no, Grampa. I took this picture. It was last week. I got up bright and early, like you always did. Mom drove me up there. I wanted to be there by sunrise, but I only have my learner’s permit, so I couldn’t drive until the sun came —”
“I took this picture!”
“Uh, anyway, I went to the mountain, and it was a perfect day: not too cold, but with the wind blowing in from the northwest. I sat down, set up your old tripod, and waited. And waited. And waited. I was about to give up and take the lens off the camera —”
Suddenly, Grampa leans forward and puts his hand on my arm. “The big lens? The four hundred?”
I’m excited. Grampa’s here again, at least for a moment. He’s really with me. “Yeah, the four hundred. I had it stopped down to f-eleven because the sun was getting pretty bright. Anyway, that was when I saw her.”
“Her?”
“The eagle. She came over the ridge maybe a hundred feet away from me. I mean, she was so close I had to zoom out. I mean, I almost could have gotten her with a medium-wide lens. It was like she was posing or something.”
“And then?”
“And then I did just what you always said. I got her in the viewfinder, breathed deep, pressed the button halfway, tracked her for a second or so, and then shot fifteen frames in burst mode. That was it. She flew back across the ridge, and that was the end of it. But I knew I had the shot. You don’t think it’s underexposed, do you? I mean, I could try to fix it up in Photoshop if you think it’s too washed-out or —”
Grampa squeezes my arm again. He leans so close I feel his breath on my forehead. “Peter, it’s perfect!” Then he sits up straight just as one of the aides comes in with his lunch. He calls her over and gestures at the picture. She says, in that slightly patronizing tone they all use in the locked ward, “What is it, Mr. Goldberg?”
He looks at her and puts on his biggest, warmest grin. “It’s an eagle, miss. I took that picture!”
She smiles professionally, and says, “It’s very nice, Mr. Goldberg. Now, where can I put this delicious food I’ve brought for you?”
Grampa looks at me, and his face is clouded, uncertain again. “I did take that picture. Right? With my 1949 Ciro-Flex Three-Point-Five camera! Didn’t I, Dad?”
My breath comes out in a whoosh. Behind me, the aide fluffs Grampa’s pillows, and walks out of the room. I take Grampa’s hand and squeeze. “Yes, you did take that picture. Great job!”
I make it out to the hallway before the sobs overtake me. My back slides down the wall of the corridor until I am squatting with my head in my hands. I don’t know how much time passes before my breath calms down again, but eventually I wipe my face on my sleeve. That’s when I realize Grampa is talking to himself. Maybe because my head is against the wall, I can hear him perfectly. He is saying the same thing over and over, in tones of little-boy wonder:
“I got the shot, Dad. I got the shot!”
Eventually, I get myself cleaned up and walk down the hall to the elevator. When I walk out of the nursing home, with my camera dangling from my neck, AJ, Angelika, and Elena Zubritskaya are leaning against the side of my car, waiting for me. I had told Angelika I wanted to visit my grandfather alone; giving him the eagle had felt like it should be a private ceremony. But I guess she had figured out I might need some support right afterward.
“Dude!” AJ shouts when I am still twenty feet away. “Did you bestow the bird?” He hasn’t developed a more sensitive manner of speaking over the years, but he’s here for me — and I am feeling the love.
Angelika elbows him in the ribs, and says, “What Adam means to say is —”
“I know. I know. Yes, the bird has been bestowed.” Angelika and Elena both smile, and AJ puts one arm around each of them. As AJ gives me a double thumbs-up, I grab my camera and swing it up to capture the moment. Looking through the viewfinder, I can tell this shot is going to be a keeper, the kind of picture you look at years and years into the future.
I press the button halfway down, and everything springs into focus: Angelik
a is looking right at me, laughing with AJ, but also concerned. AJ has the exact same smirk he’s always had, but his eyes are searching my face, too. Elena is tucked in under AJ’s shoulder, beaming up at him. If you had told me freshman year that my hound dog best friend would fall deeply in love with his very first girlfriend and bond with her forever, I’d have laughed — but there it is.
I flash back for an instant to my grampa, and wonder whether I should have corrected him, should have told him again that I had taken the picture of the eagle. But, I realize, in a bigger sense, that picture was his all along. He took me to the mountain, he gave me the tools, he gave me the love. I just put myself in the right place, at the right time, and got the shot.
Back in the present, AJ, Angelika, and Elena fill the frame. I press the button.
It’s funny. You’d think I’d be in a rush to get home, check out the picture on my computer, find out whether it’s really as perfect as I think it will be. But I don’t need to check.
Grampa was right: Sometimes, you just know it when you see it.
Three amazing local experts in Pennsylvania helped me with the research for this book: Laurie J. Goodrich, Senior Monitoring Biologist at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary; Brian Pepe, MSPAS, PA-C.A.T., C, Physician Assistant at Children’s HealthCare, Allentown; and Steven B. Miller, Jr., at Dan’s Camera City, Allentown, who is without a doubt the most patient camera salesman in the universe.
I also learned a lot from two extraordinary educators at Phillipsburg High School in New Jersey, along with their students. Thanks to teachers Andy Herbster and Lisa Weindel for showing me the ropes of high school journalism. Thanks, too, to students Kaley Beesley, Sam Lavin, Terese Yale, and Max Daigle for walking me through what yearbook and newspaper editors and photographers actually edit and photograph.
I got a ton of information from each of these people, although any errors of fact or interpretation are purely my own.
Jordan Sonnenblick is the author of the acclaimed Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie; Notes from the Midnight Driver; Zen and the Art of Faking It; and the 2011 Schneider Family Book Award Winner After Ever After. He lives in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, with his wife and two children.
Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie
Notes from the Midnight Driver
Zen and the Art of Faking It
After Ever After
Copyright © 2012 by Jordan Sonnenblick
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, SCHOLASTIC PRESS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Curveball: The Year I Lost My Grip / by Jordan Sonnenblick. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
Summary: After an injury ends former star pitcher Peter Friedman’s athletic dreams, he concentrates on photography which leads him to a girlfriend, new fame as a high school sports photographer, and a deeper relationship with the beloved grandfather who, when he realizes he is becoming senile, gives Pete all of his professional camera gear.
[1. Photography — Fiction. 2. Grandfathers — Fiction. 3. Alzheimer’s disease — Fiction. 4. High schools — Fiction. 5. Schools — Fiction. 6. Family life — Pennsylvania — Fiction. 7. Pennsylvania — Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.S6984Sho 2012
[Fic]—dc22
2011003768
ISBN 978-0-545-32069-6
First edition, March 2012
Cover photography © 2012 by Michael Frost with background image by David Madison/Getty
Cover design by Elizabeth B. Parisi
e-ISBN 978-0-545-39311-9
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
Jordan Sonnenblick, Curveball: The Year I Lost My Grip
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