The days passed by in a natural rhythm. Every morning Silas and I walked the bluebonnet fields, came home, and had dinner with Sallie. She was a wonderful cook, and eating at her table was a great blessing. The afternoons were spent either in town or doing chores around the house. Usually after supper Silas, Sallie, and I sat in the back yard, though about once a week we all walked into town and ate at the restaurant. It was a relaxed setting, friendly, clean, and the food was good. Mostly, though, I enjoyed the walking.
One day, just after dinner, Silas and I painted most of the front side of the shed. Silas got agitated with me because I refused to climb the ladder past the second rung from the bottom, said I was being a big baby, said I needed to let go of my lifetimes of fear. I told him I'd let go of being afraid of heights whenever he developed some patience, and he sulked away for a couple hours. We never finished painting the shed, and by suppertime he was being civil with me again.
I went with Silas a couple of afternoons to help Lucy and Ray put in the potatoes. Silas said it looked like half the town had come in, but he was exaggerating. There weren't more than seventy-five to ninety or so of us in the field either day.
It was during my second week in Paradise that Silas asked me about softball. We were walking the bluebonnets.
"I understand you used to pitch for the Presbyterians," he said.
"What?" I stopped walking, and Silas stopped and looked back at me.
"The Presbyterians. Didn't you pitch for them one summer?"
I hadn't thought about this in years, and I smiled just a faint smile. "Yeah," I said slowly. Then I shook my head and said, "No, no, I didn't pitch for the Presbyterians. I pitched for the Episcopalians the summer before I started high school. My friend who asked me to join the team was a Presbyterian."
"What were you?"
"Catholic."
"Why didn't you pitch for the Catholics?"
"They didn't ask me to play."
Silas stuck out his lower lip, raised his eyebrows, and nodded his head. "Makes sense." We started walking again. Every now and then he'd bend over and touch a bluebonnet, and sometimes I'd bend down a touch one, too After awhile he spoke again.
"Wanna pitch again?"
"Silas," I laughed, "that was over forty years ago."
"Oh," Silas said. "Well, just thought I'd ask." He continued walking and bending over and touching.
"What about it?" my curiosity finally bested me.
"Oh, nothing really," he acted uninterested. The less interested he seemed the more interested I became.
"No, really," I pleaded. He stopped and grinned.
"We need a pitcher for our game with Chatemore tomorrow night. Lee Chang left yesterday for a trip to visit one of his daughters from three lifetimes ago. He's the only pitcher we got. He's gonna be gone a month or so. We need a pitcher."
"Well," I said, "I'm flattered you ask, of course. But like I said, that was nearly half a century ago. And to be honest with you, I wasn't that good. I only agreed because Rochelle asked and I didn't have much else to do with my summer. Besides," I lowered my head, then bent down to a bluebonnet, hoping my next words would be a little muffled. "We lost every game."
"Every game?"
I stood back up, put my hands on my hips, and sighed. "Yes. Every single game. Everyone was aggravated with me. The Catholics, who said I betrayed them by playing for another team. Rochelle, who said I embarrassed her in front of her friends by being such a lousy player. The Episcopalians, for, well, obvious reasons. The only ones who were tickled with my performance were the Baptists and the Presbyterians."
"Winners?"
"Yeah. Baptist won first place in the league, Presbyterians came in second."
"So, you don't want to pitch for us?"
"What happens if we lose the game?"
"We probably will lose the game. Chang's a lousy pitcher, too. We always lose. Wanna pitch for us?"
The next afternoon Sallie packed a picnic and the three of us headed for town. It had rained overnight, and she told Silas to wear his boots, but he refused. His toes squished in the mud all the way to Wilsonville, and he slipped twice, but caught his balance both times. When we got to town Sallie and I waited for him outside while he went into McMillan's store, washed his feet, and came back outside wearing a new pair of sneakers.
The bleachers in the softball diamond were already filled. The fans of both towns were mingled together, and everyone seemed to be chattering nonstop. Sallie waved to a couple of ladies in the stands, said goodbye to Silas and me, and climbed up to join her friends.
"Come on," Silas tugged at my elbow. "Let's get warmed up."
The teams from both towns had old people, young people, in between aged people. Men and women, boys and girls. Some black folks, some yellow folks, some brown folks, some red folks, some white folks. And two mocha colored men with blond hair and purple eyes.
Silas and I were in the dugout waiting to bat. He poked me in the ribs with his elbow and nodded toward the field "Boy, that angel can sure play ball, can't he?"
"Where?" I searched over the ball field, but I didn't see anyone who looked much like an angel.
"There! On third base! He just hit a triple. Brought Shakra and Mrs. Ellis home. You didn't see that?" He slapped me playfully upside my head.
I swatted his hand away and ducked. "Of course, I saw the play," I said. "But where's the angel?"
"I told you, Newbie. Right there. On third base. Oh, look, he's going to try to steal home!"
The runner on third base didn't look much like an angel to me. He was dressed in jeans and a green polo shirt, and wearing a New York Yankees ball cap. He looked to be in his thirties. His hair was nearly shoulder length and he had about three days' of stubble on his face. All in all, not much to look at.
"Shoot!" Silas smacked his fist on his knee. The angel got up and wiped at the mud on his jeans, and shrugged playfully at the bleachers as he walked back toward our dugout.
"Doesn't look much like an angel," I said.
"Hush, Newbie!" Silas whispered in a growl. "Don't be rude!"
Team spirit was fierce on both sides, but all in all good-natured. Chatemore's shortstop didn't like one of the calls the field umpire made, and there was quite a commotion for a few minutes, but it got resolved pretty quickly.
It occurred to me that if nations conducted themselves the way Paradise plays softball there would soon be no wars.
As I had promised Silas, I was a lousy pitcher. No one seemed to care, though. I walked about half the batters who faced me, but every now and then someone would get a hit and for a few minutes there would be quite an uproar on the field and in the bleachers.
We lost the game but I struck out a player in the fourth inning.
Later that night, when I was boasting about it on the way home, Silas scolded me with a chuckle. "Oh, I wouldn't make that big a fuss about it," he told me. "The kid was only nine years old, for goodness sake."
"Still," I cradled my pride. "An out's an out."
Sallie giggled.
After the game was over we found a little spot under a tree not far from the softball diamond. Another couple from Chatemore had also brought a picnic, and the five of us ate together.
I must have been hungry, because when I finished eating I realized my companions were only about half way through their meal. They were talking excitedly with one another, all at once, the way people in small groups frequently do. I smiled politely for a little while, and then, bored, said I was going to walk around a little. Sallie told me not to get lost. Silas told me no, go ahead, get lost. Then he laughed and put that little twinkle in his eyes.
There was a large moon out. Spring was in full swing now, and the air only a little chilly. I wondered how my forsythia bushes outside my house in Kentucky were looking now, and I wondered if the daffodils still had their blooms. I wondered if Janey missed me and how her grandbaby was getting along, and I wondered if my death had caused my book sales to skyrocket. I grinned and imagine
d they had.
I could barely hear Sallie and Silas' conversations with the couple from Chatemore. I squinted into the night, could hardly make out their shadows. I turned around, took three or four steps, and bumped my knee into a park bench.
The moon was reflecting off a small pool of water. The pond, I realized. I sat down on the bench, and looked at the moonbeams bouncing off the water for a long, long time.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN