Franny’s mother rushes out the door.
Benny’s mother says, “Oh, no!”
Mrs. Prim lowers her head, weeping. “I’m sorry to tell you all, but Hargie’s . . . dead.”
“What?” El Grande whispers.
Mrs. Prim nods. “The sheriff’s mother told me. It’s terrible.”
Bo opens his mouth, but nothing comes out.
Franny grabs on to the porch rail.
Benny’s mother puts her hand to her heart.
I look at Walt. It’s like a truck fell from the sky.
We stand there, frozen.
Chapter
12
FLOWERS PILE UP at the Hornets’ Nest stadium.
The Hillcrest Herald brings out a special edition.
HARGIE CANTWELL DIES
17-Year-Old Was the Winningest Pitcher in Hornets History
A Town Mourns
I didn’t know him, but when you read about someone, when you know how fast he threw and how many batters he struck out and how tall he was (six foot one) and how much he weighed (210 pounds), it feels like you know him.
He had a heart attack—that’s what people are saying.
A boy that young and strong . . .
I know that hearts can fool you. People don’t think there’s a thing wrong, and then it’s too late.
It’s like a giant vacuum came and sucked up all the energy in Hillcrest.
“He probably had some kind of undiagnosed heart condition,” a man whispers behind me. “It happens to young athletes—they get dehydrated, stressed. No one sees it coming.”
I touch an electrode and look at the stained glass windows filtering in the light.
Walt and I are at Peaceful Lutheran Church with the rest of the town. Cars are double-parked on the street—there’s no more room in the parking lot.
Maybe if Hargie had worn a heart monitor, he’d still be alive. I’ve never been to a funeral like this.
The high school chorus sings, or tries to.
Hargie’s father stands up front and tries to say a few words, but he lowers his head and can’t go on.
I look over at Franny, who is crying; Bo is folded forward in the church pew. Their mom is sitting with her eyes closed. El Grande is looking at his hands.
Sometimes loss is a thing so thick, it hangs in the air.
I am sitting next to a woman who is sneezing, and this isn’t good. I try to lean toward Walt because I have to avoid germs.
I hate even thinking about it at a time like this!
Walt and I change places on the pew. He’s like that, my dad, always protecting me.
Pastor Burmeister’s voice cracks as he leads us in the Twenty-Third Psalm.
Walt puts his hand on my shoulder. We prayed this before my transplant surgery. We prayed so hard.
The Lord is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters;
He restores my soul.
We finish saying the psalm together.
There’s a hush as a big teenage boy comes forward. His eyes are red from crying. He unfolds a piece of paper and stands there looking at it; then he reads.
“Hargie, you were my best friend. You knew that. I hope you knew I always wanted to be like you, to play like you. You always gave it all you had in every game, in every practice. We practiced for years, you and me. I’d always be the one who got tired first, and you always wanted to keep going. You always outlasted me . . .” He stops to take a deep breath. He’s crying now. “Just know this: the team and me will always have an empty place because you’re gone. Always.”
He stands there holding the paper, then he goes back to take his seat with the Hornets. The team walked down the aisle together before the funeral began. I don’t see Coach Perkins, though. I look around, then behind me—I think that’s the coach sitting way in the back. I guess he couldn’t find a place to park.
Pastor Burmeister talks about knowing Hargie from the time he was a baby.
“I baptized him right here. He had so much energy inside him. How he will be missed.” Pastor Burmeister looks at Hargie’s parents. “Michael and Dellia, we will gather around you—this church, this town. We will walk with you through this valley, through all of the shadows of this impossible loss. We will remember your boy, our boy. We will thank God for his life.”
One by one, people stand to say, yes, we will support you.
We will remember.
◆ ◆ ◆
On the local news tonight, Coach Perkins stands by Hargie’s poster in front of the Hornets’ Nest.
“Hargie was like a son to me. He was a brilliant boy on and off the field.” The coach shakes his head; his eyes fill with tears. “I wish it was me in the casket instead of him. Baseball has lost a superstar at every level—high school, college, and beyond, I’ll tell you that. We’re dedicating the rest of this season to Hargie Cantwell’s memory. He was a gift to us all of excellence, strength, and fierce courage.”
A blanket of sadness covers Hillcrest.
People light candles and put them in front of the Hornets’ Nest.
People are quiet—on the bus, in the stores.
The middle school plants a tree by the baseball diamond in Hargie’s memory.
At school, there are extra counselors around for kids to talk to about Hargie’s death.
In English, we talk about how to construct an interesting opening sentence.
In Civilization class, we talk about ancient Greece.
In Science, we talk about what happens when atoms split.
At lunch, we talk about the rumors.
Did Hargie really have a heart attack, or . . .
Was he drunk, like some say?
On drugs?
Riding his bike so fast, his heart stopped? That can’t happen, of course.
But everyone is trying to understand what happened in their own way.
The only good news this week comes from Dr. Dugan. Walt grins as he tells me. “Your blood looks good, blood pressure is just a little low, but Dr. Dugan doesn’t want to change your meds yet. We’ll see her and the transplant team next week.” He high fives me.
Right now I’m at the public library that’s between the high school and the middle school. It has a place to remember Hargie in one of the reading rooms—a long piece of paper hangs on the wall, and people write about their memories. There’s a bench you can sit on to think about him.
I’m sitting on that bench, thinking about his fastball ripping across the plate.
I’m thinking about myself a little, too. I don’t want to sound selfish—I mean, a kid has died. But I gave up a lot to come here, and now everything is changing.
I feel awful even thinking this way!
Franny and Benny walk into the room. Benny takes a green marker and carefully draws balloons with strings on the wall:
“Can you sign your name?” Franny asks him.
Benny shakes his head.
“Yes, you can. I’ve seen you do it lots of times.”
“How many?” Benny asks.
Franny thinks about it. “Over a hundred and fifty-one times.”
Benny writes:
B
e
nn
Y
Next to Benny’s balloons, Franny writes:
Dear Hargie,
Thanks for showing me about working hard
and never giving up.
Your Fan 4ever,
Franny Engers
They see me now and sit with me on the bench. Benny kicks the back of the bench with his feet again and again. I wonder if he can understand about someone dying.
Benny whispers loudly, “Hargie died like
Mufasa.”
Franny nods. “That’s right.” She turns to me. “Benny’s favorite movie is The Lion King.”
Benny’s face gets serious. “Scar is bad.”
I nod. “Scar’s a bad lion.” Scar let Mufasa, the great lion ruler, die.
More bench kicking. “Forty-two,” Benny says. “Jackie Robinson.”
I smile. Jackie Robinson is my favorite ballplayer.
Franny looks at him. “How many hits did Jackie Robinson have, Benny?”
I know this. One thousand five hundred and eighteen.
“One five one eight,” he says.
1,518. This kid knows that?
Franny asks, “How many home runs did Jackie Robinson have, Benny?”
I know that, too. One hundred thirty-seven.
Major bench kicking. “One three seven.”
I’m looking at Benny. “That’s very good.”
“Very good,” he says.
“Franny, that book you wanted on Canada is in.”
A librarian tells her this; Franny goes to check it out. Benny and I wait for her.
I say, “Benny, how many bases did Jackie Robinson steal?”
He shakes his head, confused, and shouts, “No!”
Franny turns to look.
“No!” Benny says.
“Hey, I’m sorry. Wrong question!” I smile at him. “Forty-two.”
That quiets him down for a minute. I don’t mention that Mariano Rivera was the last player to wear the number.
Franny has her book; we go out the door. Benny decides to shout “No!” one more time. I try to change the subject. “Are you doing a report on Canada, Franny?”
She looks down. “No.”
“My dad and I lived in Toronto one summer,” I mention. “It’s great there.”
She doesn’t say anything.
“Have you been to Canada, Franny? It’s a big place.” That was stupid. Everyone knows it’s big.
She shouts, “I’ve never been, Jeremiah! Is that okay with you?”
“No!” Benny yells.
“I didn’t mean to—”
“I don’t want to talk about it!” Franny grabs Benny’s hand and walks off.
I stand here watching them go.
What just happened?
Chapter
13
I’M LOOKING AT a map of Canada, trying to figure out why Franny got upset about this country. I am eating my third multigrain waffle with organic butter and real maple syrup. They are serious about their maple syrup in Canada. I love waffles so much that Walt had a toaster in my hospital room and we made them whenever. This was my push-back on Jell-O, which seemed to appear any time, day or night, even when I hung a NO JELL-O EVER sign on my bed.
But waffles! They fill the atmosphere with goodness. Nurses would come into my room, sniffing the air, and say, “That smells so good!”
“The downside of being a robot, Jerwal, is you can’t eat waffles.”
Jerwal cocks his head at me like a dog. It took forever to get his head movement right.
“I have no insight on Canada, Jerwal. Do you want to watch the eagle cam?”
Jerwal glows.
There are two eagle cams I follow. The baby eagles from the Nature Conservancy are doing really well. “Let’s check in on the intact family.”
I link to the streaming eagle site. Right now a parent eagle is sitting on the nest warming three eggs. Male and female eagles take turns doing nest duty, which I think is awesome. Yaff’s mother mentioned this to Yaff’s father, who said, “No kidding?” and went back to watching football and dropping peanut shells on the rug.
“I think the female eagle is on the nest, Jerwal.”
Female eagles are a little bigger than the males. This one is pecking at the twigs, looking around, just content to sit there. You have to care about eagle details to get into this. It took Yaff a while to care. The fact that there was no audio drove him crazy. He kept screaming “This is boring!” when I first showed it to him, but then I explained that the babies in the eggs need protection, and the parent is showing a real dedication by not deserting the eggs or flying off to town to meet some friends after work and have a beer.
“Sometimes nature is quiet,” I told him.
He got into it then and it was hard to pull him away.
Yaff has the heart of an eagle—no matter what comes at him, he deals with it.
I miss him. I scroll through my eagle pictures, find the best one of an eagle building a nest high up. I type, I hope you’re going to be busy while I’m gone, and send it to him.
Whoosh.
Instant response: I’m not cleaning my room till you come back.
Smile. How come?
Just seems right.
Later.
Yeah . . .
Back to nature. The eagle mother sits on the big nest, watching, protecting—which is kind of what Walt did for me, except I’d already hatched when we met.
The babies should be pecking out of the shells in three weeks—that’s what the nature people think. I have to set a timer when I watch, or I’ll forget to do other things, like take my medicine.
Ping. I take two blue pills.
The mother eagle is rocking on the nest and opening her mouth like she’s singing a raptor lullaby. Walt said when I was little and couldn’t sleep, he’d sing me the Michigan fight song. He’s such a bad singer, I think I went to sleep to protect myself.
The eagle cam helps you remember all the great people in your life who’ve been there for you.
◆ ◆ ◆
“I know you have genius in you.” I tell Adler this as he drools. “It’s not always clear right off. It’s good you moved off the lawn. That’s the first step to a deeper life.”
I hold up a plastic bagel squeak toy. Right now we’re working on get-the-bagel. I put it on our front porch. “Adler, get the bagel.” Adler sniffs the air, doesn’t move. “No.” I say this sharply to remind him this is a command and I’m in charge. “Adler, get the bagel.”
Adler trots over to the porch, takes the bagel in his mouth, and brings it over.
“Good dog!” I give him a serious rub on his neck. “Excellent dog!” Adler wants love more than snacks. “Let’s do it again.”
That’s when Franny walks up. She doesn’t look angry anymore, which is good, but no way am I mentioning Canada. “Hi, Franny. How are you doing?”
“Sub-okay.”
“You must have known Hargie well.”
“No. Bo did. He’s . . . not talking to anybody.”
Bo is sitting on the front porch of their house looking at his hands. Franny’s mother jogs up the street, back from her run. She bends over, breathing hard.
Franny waves. “She’s training for a half marathon,” Franny tells me.
Mrs. Engers looks up. “It’s conceivable I might die!”
“You look strong!” Franny shouts back.
“Ha!”
Bo just sits there.
I throw the bagel. It’s a bad throw into Mrs. Prim’s hedge. Adler, dog genius, can’t find it.
I hear her old voice: “Well, I knew Hargie Cantwell, and I know his parents.” Mrs. Prim is looking at us from over the hedge; she squeaks the bagel toy. “And I heard that when Coach Perkins went to pay the Cantwells a visit, Mike Cantwell wouldn’t let him in the house. Matter of fact, he told him to get off the property!”
She throws the bagel on the ground. Adler runs to get it and brings it back to me.
“Good dog.”
“Why would Mr. Cantwell do that?” Franny asks.
Mrs. Prim straightens up as much as she can. “I suppose like most things, time will tell.”
Chapter
14
WE DON’T HAVE to wait long for time to tell us.
COACH PERKINS ARRESTED
Winningest Coach in Hillcrest Hornets History
Accused of Giving Performance-Enhancing Drugs to His Players
That news runs through Hillcrest like a wild horse you can’t catch. Coach Perkins is out on bail the next day and shuts himself up in his house. The sheriff seals off the locker rooms at the high school and the stadium as part of the investigation.
A pile of Hornets hats are thrown in front of the stadium.
A TV reporter stands next to the pile and asks, “Did he do it?”
Did he?
Everyone is asking that.
“He did not do it!”
Chip Gunther stands in front of his sports store, furious, and points a finger at the TV camera.
“I know this man. I was head of the committee that brought him here. He’d give his life for his players. The thought, the misrepresentation, that he would do such a thing is wrong. You hear me? Wrong! This witch hunt better end. I’m inclined to think there are people in other places who want to see this man fall. Well, he’s a winner and he’s going to win this battle! I guarantee it!”
The Hornets cancel their next two games.
“I know Coach Perkins,” Franny tells me. “I babysat for his kids. I made scrambled eggs in his kitchen!”
I don’t know what to say to that.
Her eyes look so sad, like someone close to her has died.
I look for her at school—she’s not there.
I look for her after school—she’s not at the baseball diamond, and neither are the guys who always play.
Everyone has questions:
Are the Hornets taking steroids?
All of them?
Some of them?
When will we know?
So much is coming at us:
HORNETS SUSPENDED FROM LEAGUE PLAY
Will Six Championships Be Overturned?
And the biggest one yet:
DID STEROIDS KILL HARGIE CANTWELL?
“There is strong circumstantial evidence that steroids contributed to that young man’s death,” the prosecutor says. “A charge of manslaughter against this coach is warranted.”