Stealing Home Read online

  Jesus looked down at his plate and nodded sadly. No wonder he couldn’t throw the ball to save his life! Joey thought. I couldn’t either, with my left hand. No wonder he’d tried to put the mitt on his right hand when he first got it. And no wonder Joey couldn’t make the cardboard mitt fit his left hand!

  “Why didn’t you say something, man?”

  “You spend so much money. I . . . I no want tell you is no good for me.”

  “Hey, we can return it, no problem. We’ll just get you a lefty mitt.”

  Jesus seemed stunned. “Verdad?” he asked. “Totally,” Joey assured him.

  Jesus got up and hugged him. “I never know they make for lefties. I think is only for much money, for professional, no?”

  “Of course not!” Joey insisted. “Don’t worry about it, Jesus.” He shook his head in amazement. “I’ll bet you’re a lot better when you play left-handed, huh?”

  “Sí,” said Jesus, smiling shyly. “A little.”

  Joey wondered just how much better. One thing was for sure — Jesus was turning out to be full of surprises.

  9

  As they left school the next day, Joey and Jesus headed straight for the curb, where Joey’s mom was waiting for them in the wagon. “Got it?” Joey asked her.

  She gave him a thumbs-up. “It’s in the backseat. Check it out.” Joey got in. Jesus, who had gone around to the other side, already had the glove on and was beaming a smile that could have lit up the whole world.

  “Sí! Que lindo! How beautiful . . .”

  “Now don’t go crying about it again,” Joey told him. “It’s really no big deal. See, in America, stores make exchanges all the time.”

  “You no understand,” Jesus told him. “I no can explain.” And that’s all he would say. Jesus just sat there, caressing the soft leather, pounding the pocket, making the mitt his very own.

  They reached the field, and Joey led Jesus over to Coach Bacino. “Hey, Coach?” he said. “Is it okay if my friend Jesus works out with us?”

  Coach Bacino looked Jesus up and down. “Lefty, huh?”

  “Sí,” said Jesus, smiling that goofy grin of his.

  “You ever play before?”

  “Sí, sí! Mucho béisbol.”

  “Okay, get out in center field. Let’s see how you look.”

  Jesus ran out to center so fast that even Joey was surprised. “Well, he sure can run,” Coach Bacino said, chuckling. “Let’s see what he does with this.” He hit a line drive. Jesus streaked after the ball the second it was hit, ran it down, and snared it in the webbing of his mitt. Then he spun around and fired a perfect strike to second base.

  “Wow!” Coach Bacino gasped as the whole team erupted in applause.

  “Hey, who’s that?” Jordan asked.

  “It’s that Mexican kid,” Ellis Suggs said. “The one who lives with Gallagher.”

  “His name’s Jesus, you believe it?” Charlie said, and everyone laughed.

  “Hey, shut up,” Joey blurted out. “There’s nothing wrong with his name, okay? Just get over it.”

  “Shut up yourself, Gallagher,” Charlie shot back. “It’s a free country.”

  “It’s not free of jerks, obviously,” Joey said. “What’d you call me?”

  “Nothing. Did I say you?”

  “I’m not stupid. I know what you meant.”

  “So why are you asking me?” By this time, Joey and Charlie were nose to nose, and Coach Bacino had to step in to break it up.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” he yelled. “We’re supposed to be on the same team, okay? If you can’t say something positive, then keep it zipped. Next one who mouths off rides the bench — and I’m not kidding!”

  The team settled back down. Coach Bacino hit another screamer Jesus’s way. Jesus turned, leaped — and, impossibly, brought the ball down in his mitt.

  “Whoa! Would you look at that catch!” Coach yelled.

  “Hey, hey, Doctor J.!” Larry Levine shouted.

  “Doctor J.! I like it,” Jordan said, clapping his hands.

  “Hey, guys,” Pete interrupted. “You know what? I think we’ve just found ourselves a new center fielder.”

  “Wait a minute,” Jay Woo protested. “Does that mean I don’t get to play center anymore?” Jay played center for two innings a game — or he had, until now.

  “It means you’ll all be playing a little less,” Coach said. “If Jesus wants to play, I’ll ask the league to let us add a new player midseason.”

  “Yeah!” the whole group of them roared. “Fielders in for batting practice!” Coach yelled. “Hitters, take the field.” Now everyone would get to see how Jesus — or Doctor J., as they’d all started calling him — handled the bat.

  Jesus, hitting lefty, turned out to be a slap hitter. For his size, he didn’t have a lot of power. But he seemed to be able to place the ball wherever he wanted to. He used the whole field, hitting it where the fielders weren’t. He knew how to bunt, too, and with his speed, it was easy to see that he’d beat out a lot of infield grounders.

  “He’s an ideal leadoff hitter,” Coach Bacino told Joey. “Thanks, kid. He’s a real find. Think he’d like to be on the team?”

  “Would he ever!” Joey said. “Yo, Jesus!”

  Jesus was standing by home plate, surrounded by a circle of his brand-new friends. Suddenly he was the most popular kid around!

  “Guess what?” Joey told him.

  “I don’t know. What?”

  “You’re on the team!”

  Everyone cheered, and there were high fives all around. Jesus wasn’t crying now. He was too busy enjoying the moment. So busy that he didn’t even bother to thank Joey.

  The Marlins’ next game was on Saturday afternoon. Their opponents, the Yankees, were only 2–4, but the Marlins had not forgotten that the lowly Dodgers had almost beaten them. They were not about to let this game get away.

  In a surprise decision, Coach Bacino decided to have Joey pitch the first three innings. “Just thought I’d shake things up a little” was the explanation — which explained nothing, as far as Joey could see. He’d gotten used to coming in to finish up the game. Now he’d have to get right out there, mentally unprepared, and do the job.

  He was shaky from the start. Somehow, he couldn’t seem to find the plate. He walked two out of the first three batters. When he finally did get the ball over, it was right down the middle of the plate, and the hitter sliced a hot line drive over the second baseman’s head.

  The ball had “inside-the-park home run” written all over it. But Jesus, like a bullet, got there in time to snag it on the fly, right at his shoe tops! In one fluid motion, he threw to second base, doubling up the runner who had gone to third, thinking there was no way that ball would be caught.

  “Yes!” Joey screamed. “Incredible! A double play!” The spectators roared, and the Marlins jumped up and down in their excitement. “Jesus, you rule!”

  The Yankees coach put his hands on his head. “Did you see that play?” he said to his assistant coach. “Who is that kid, anyway? Hey, Bacino!”

  “Just moved to town,” Coach Bacino yelled back from the Marlins bench. “Check with the league. We got an exemption, same as the Dodgers for their new pitcher.”

  The Yankee coach muttered something nasty and turned his attention back to the game. Joey walked the next hitter, and the next, and Coach Bacino came out to the mound.

  “What’s up with you today?” he asked Joey.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Just throw it over.”

  “But they’ll clobber it,” Joey protested. “They’ve got the bases loaded, Coach.”

  “Never mind. Just don’t walk ’em home, okay? Make ’em earn it!”

  “Okay.” Joey concentrated on Pete’s mitt and threw down the middle. The hitter swung and laced one right back at him. It bounced past him, past second base, and into center field, where Jesus grabbed it.

  One runner had already scored. The kid behind
him was around third base and on his way home when Jesus released his throw. It was a perfect bullet, on one hop, right into Pete’s mitt. Pete tagged the runner in plenty of time. “Yer out!” the umpire called.

  The inning was mercifully over. Joey knew he had Jesus to thank for getting out of it with only one run. Now it was time to get that run back.

  Joey patted Jesus on the back. “You saved me!” he said.

  “De nada,” Jesus said shyly. “I go bunt.”

  “Huh?”

  “I bunt first pitch.”

  “Um, did Coach say to?”

  “No to worry, I bunt. You see.” He got up to the plate, and just as he’d promised, Jesus bunted the first pitch down the third-base line. It rolled to a stop right on the foul line. Jesus crossed first base before anyone even picked the ball up.

  “Who is that kid?” the Yankee coach yelled again. “His name is Jesus!” Coach Bacino called back, pronouncing it “GEE-zus.”

  “Very funny, Bacino. You’re a regular laugh riot.” Jesus stole second base on the very next pitch. One out later, he stole third.

  “How much you wanna bet he steals home?” Larry Levine said to the rest of them on the bench.

  “No way,” Pete said. “Nobody’s ever done that in league play.”

  “Somebody must have done it, back in the day,” Charlie said.

  “I never heard of it being done,” Larry said. “This kid is spooky good.”

  “And he’s ours!” Jordan said, smiling. “Yeah, baby. We’re number one.”

  Ellis Suggs struck out, and Matt Lowe came up to bat. The first pitch to him was in the dirt. Before the catcher had even started after the ball, Jesus was on his way home. “He’s going! Cover! Cover!” yelled the Yankees coach.

  The catcher grabbed the ball in his bare hand and lunged to tag Jesus. But the tag came too late — a nanosecond after Jesus’s toe touched the plate. “Safe!” the umpire cried.

  “Yeah! That’s what I’m talkin’ about!” Coach Bacino said, clapping. “Thank you, Jesus!”

  “Hey, hey, Doctor J.!” Larry Levine chanted. “He’s got the cure for what ails ya!”

  Jesus was mobbed as he came back to the bench. Joey slapped him on the back, just like everyone else, but his mind was on his own failure. Even with Jesus’s run, the game was still only tied. And Joey still hadn’t figured out what was wrong with his pitching motion. By the time he’d pitched his full three innings, he’d walked in two more runs, and the Marlins were down, 3–1.

  “Gallagher,” Coach told him. “You sit out for a while, okay?”

  “But Coach, I usually play center for three innings,” Joey protested.

  “Yeah, but I’m gonna ride the hot hand for now. Jesus is having himself a game, so I want to leave him out there.”

  Jesus made two more spectacular plays that day, had another infield single and a walk, and scored two more runs as the Marlins came back to win, 5–4. Coach Bacino gave him the game ball. Jesus was without a doubt the team’s new star and everybody’s hero.

  As for Joey, who rode the bench the rest of the game, he was steaming inside. He was yesterday’s hero, forgotten now. He’d nearly blown the game for them — for the second time in a row!

  And who had taken his place in the spotlight? Jesus. Good old Doctor J. — with the nice new lefty glove Joey’d bought him. Tentacles of jealousy began to wrap themselves around his heart.

  “Great game, Jesus,” he muttered. Then he spat on the ground. Twice.

  10

  As soon as they got to school on Monday, Joey could sense the difference. Kids he knew only from playing baseball against them were coming up to them in the halls. Every single one of them wanted to talk to “Doctor J.” Most of them ignored Joey in the crush to be “down” with Bordentown’s newest baseball phenom.

  “Yo soy Antonio,” Andy Norton said. “Cómo estás tu?”

  “Estoy bien,” Jesus replied politely, accepting Andy’s high five. “But my name no ‘Doctor J.,’ is Jesus.”

  “Sure, Doc,” Charlie Morganstern said when Jesus told him the same thing. “Call me Carlos, yo. You and me, we’re amigos, sí?”

  “Sí, sí,” said Jesus, more than willing to accept all the attention he was getting — especially from the girls. They had obviously heard about Jesus’s heroics on the ball field and wanted to check out the exotic new arrival on the scene. Never mind that he’d been there for almost a week and they hadn’t looked at him twice, except to see if he was some kind of space alien.

  Joey wished they would all just go away. But by lunch period, Jesus had been invited to three parties and a rock concert. He’d accepted every invitation — invitations that had not been extended to Joey. It was like Joey didn’t even exist!

  The worst part was, he had no one he could even talk to about it. Normally he would have sat down in a corner of the cafeteria with Larry Levine and complained to his heart’s content. Larry would have made some funny jokes about it and done a great Jesus imitation. Joey would laugh, and soon he wouldn’t feel so angry anymore.

  But where was Larry now?

  “Hey, hey, Doctor J.!” he was saying, slapping Jesus on the back as they met up on the lunch line. “Tacos today. Just like home, huh?”

  “No,” Jesus said with a sly smile that showed he knew Larry was kidding. “No like home. Here tacos no so good, I think.”

  “You think right, Doc,” Larry congratulated him. “I’d stay away from them if I were you. Try the chicken surprise. At least it’ll be . . . well, surprising.”

  Yes, Jesus belonged to everybody now. He was everybody’s new best friend. Even Larry’s.

  And Joey? He had exactly nobody. Not even Jesus.

  When they got home after school, Joey’s mom asked how everything was going. “Great,” Joey mumbled and brushed past her, heading into the kitchen to get some snacks.

  “Supercool,” Jesus said. “I go three parties and also concert of Twisted Fyshburger!”

  “Oh, my! Aren’t you the social butterfly!” Joey’s mom said admiringly. “I’m so glad you’re having a good time, Jesus. The agency called today to see how you were doing, and I told them everything was fine, so I’m glad to see it really is.”

  “Yes. I very happy here,” he said. “Joey very nice to me.”

  Joey, hearing this from the kitchen, slammed the peanut-butter jar down on the countertop. Good thing it was plastic, or it would have shattered all over the place.

  “Everything all right in there, Joey?” his mom called.

  “Fine,” Joey said, gritting his teeth. “Everything’s peachy,” he muttered to himself.

  Jesus came in. “We go practice soon, yes?” he asked. Joey didn’t answer. Instead, he concentrated on making himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  “Everything is all right, yes?” Jesus asked, noticing Joey’s silence.

  “Yeah. Fine,” Joey said, not looking up.

  “No, I think is no fine,” Jesus said.

  “I said it’s fine, and it’s fine, okay?” Joey snapped back.

  “I do something wrong?” Jesus asked.

  “No. You’re fine. You’re great. You’re perfect, okay? Have a good time at the parties and the concert.”

  “You come too?” Jesus asked, guessing at the reason for Joey’s upset.

  “Oh, yeah, sure,” Joey replied. “Thanks but no thanks. I only go where I’m invited.”

  “I invite you,” Jesus said.

  “Yeah, thanks a bunch,” Joey muttered. “But it’s not the same thing.”

  “I no understand.”

  “Skip it, okay? Let’s go to practice.” Putting the jars back in the refrigerator, he slammed the door shut, grabbed his sandwich, and headed for the garage to get his mitt and bat.

  At practice, Jesus was treated like a rock star. Half the kids on the team had figured out their Spanish names and were calling one another by them.

  “Pedro!” Charlie called to home plate. “Heads up!” “Okay,
Carlos!” Pete yelled back. “Fire it in!” When Jesus came up for his turn at batting practice, everyone started chanting, “Hey-SOOOOS! Hey-SOOOOS!” It sounded like they were booing, but of course they weren’t. They were saluting their new hero.

  Joey had had about all he could take. He knew the attention was fickle — that the first bad game Jesus had, it would all disappear like smoke. Still, it bothered him, like a thousand little needles pricking him under the skin. He knew he was close to blowing but didn’t know how to prevent it.

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Jesus was supposed to be homesick and lonely. But now he had more friends than Joey!

  Joey couldn’t shake the thoughts that kept crowding his mind. He whiffed on most of his batting-practice swings, then took third base on the rotation as the right fielder came in to hit.

  After the next batter, Joey moved to shortstop. Jesus was behind him in center field. Jordan cracked a shot right at Joey. Unprepared, his mind on Jesus, Joey muffed it, and the ball went by him. Jesus ran in to pick it up and throw it in. “You catch next time,” he told Joey.

  Jesus was trying to be nice, he knew. But Joey didn’t feel like being nice back. When Jordan popped the next pitch up to short left center, Joey drifted back to catch it.

  “Yo la tengo!” he heard Jesus call as he ran in for it. But Joey kept drifting back as if he didn’t hear him. As the ball came down, he stuck his mitt out. At the same time, he threw his weight backward, slamming into the onrushing Jesus. Unprepared for the impact, Jesus ricocheted backward, falling on his back and hitting his head on the ground.

  Joey wasn’t hurt at all by the accident. And it was an accident, he told himself. Wasn’t it?

  Apparently Jesus didn’t think so. As he was helped to his feet, he stared at Joey. The hurt in his eyes was unmistakable.

  “Sorry,” Joey muttered. But Jesus didn’t answer. Instead, he turned his back to Joey and slowly walked off the field.

  “Hey, Doc, where ya goin’?” Larry Levine called after him from left field.

  “Hey-SOOOOOS!” some of the others shouted. But Jesus wasn’t listening. Dropping his mitt to the ground, he just kept walking until he reached the road, and then the corner. He disappeared around it.