Striking Out

“Hey. Come on, let’s go.” He tugs gently at her hand and starts to pull himself away from the metal bleacher as she glances up from the ball game, the cooling air of the late May evening brushing past her face in a slight breeze.

“Where are we going?” He has invited her to the baseball game, after all, and she isn’t quite ready to leave. Her little brother is still two batters down the list.

“Just out to my car for something. Come on, it won’t take long.” Again, his hand issues that insistent pull. She relents, of course, assuming that she’ll be back in no time at all. His car is parked in the very back row, and it’s probably only about a two minute walk. It’s a small town baseball field, the kind that small town kids spend their summer nights frequenting, if only because everything else is boring and old hat.

Along the way, he says, “I want to kiss you, you know.”

“I want to kiss you too,” she says, as if already aware of where the conversation is going.

“We’ve been together for a little over a year, now,” he continues, pretty much confirming everything she thinks he wants to say.

“I know where this is going,” she says, as if they have been down this avenue before, and the topic has been resurrected many times. Strangely though, she takes his hand and almost passes him by. They’re nearly at the car when she stops. A kiss, sweet and simple while he unlocks the door to an old car, the kind of romanticized classic that young boys in small towns dream of driving from the time they see Steve McQueen until they’re well past their prime. This one’s painted a dark green, with stripes down the center of the hood. He and his Daddy worked hard restoring it. The seats are that fake leathery vinyl, and it gives an unhealthy squeak as they crawl into the backseat to talk, but not before he leans forward and twists the key into the ignition. Seals and Crofts’ “Summer Breeze” is barely audible from the speakers.

“So, what do you want to do?” His glance accompanies the question as if she’s the instigator, his eyes peering out from beneath boyishly long hair and impossibly unstylish eyeglasses.

“What do you want to do?” She throws the question back at him, before continuing, “You’re the one who told me we needed to come out here.”

He replies with a kiss, one that’s not completely unreasonable, but it segues into more, and eventually, the two of them arrive at the same awkward question that many teenagers before them have reached in the backseats of so many other muscle cars on hot summer nights.

“Summer breeze makes me feel fine, blowing like jasmine in my mind,” the radio says, ultimately disinterested in what they’re doing.

Her little brother is on deck, swinging his bat in preparation for the real thing. The boy in the car, meanwhile, is preparing for another kind of “real thing.” Cheeks are flushed. Eyes gawk like they’re staring into the face of Heaven, and that’s only him.

“Do you have anything to use?” she asks, concerned.

He glances at the glove box, as if to suggest that what she’s asking for is in there, before saying, “Nope. Do you still want to?”

It’s a moment of weakness, and one that she’ll probably regret for the rest of her life in the small town, but she says, “Yes,” instinctively and without thinking, and it starts. There’s some pain there, at first. It goes away for a bit, but comes back in a matter of seconds. Something’s not right, she thinks. She doesn’t say anything. Someone else is singing on the radio. She doesn’t like the song. She’ll probably never like it again after this.

“You ok?” It’s really more of an afterthought the way he says it, in between movements.

“Yes,” she lies.

He can’t even form a word as a reply, only a grunt. Heavy breathing follows, issuing from them both. Meanwhile, her little brother swings at his first pitch and misses: strike one. The boy in the car pauses to catch his breath. To anyone looking into the car, this might appear as vaguely comical. He’s almost bound to hit his head on the ceiling more than a few times. His pants are around his ankles still. Hers are on the floorboard. It’s not supposed to be like this. His glasses are about to fall off his face. She’s worried about ripping her shirt, the way she’s positioned. It’s definitely not supposed to be like this. He looks at her for confirmation but doesn’t wait for the response before he starts again.

“Slow down, just a little,” she finally inquires—just as her brother misses his second pitch: strike two.

“Ok,” he says but doesn’t really, because he’s too caught up in what feels good to him. It’s starting to feel a little better, though; not as abrasive. She could live through this, she supposes. His glasses finally fall off. They’re on the floorboard with her shorts. He moves a little faster, now, a little rougher, before finally giving the most pitiful cat’s mewling she’s ever heard. It doesn’t normally take him this long, she thinks.

Meanwhile, her brother’s bat connects with the ball. This could be the time, finally, after a season full of strike-outs and fly-balls, that he gets his home run. The crack of metal on the leathery ball echoes through the park and everyone wonders the same thing as the young boy at the plate. How unsurprising it is, though, that he misses the mark and the ball sails foul. Dejected, he tells himself that there will be a next time, maybe.

“How was it?” He’s completely ignorant of the situation as he fastens his belt.

“Good,” she lies again, sick at the idea that he’s still between her legs.

“Maybe we can do it again, later?”

“Maybe,” she says, certain that they won’t.

“Cool.”

“Yeah,” the night’s coolness strikes her abruptly as she gets out of the car. Baseball and muscle cars, she thinks, I must be an American girl.

—D. Fresh