Twenty-Seven
Trudy
Miss Duffy squinted, straining to see Trudy’s future in her magic crystal ball, which was really just a Styrofoam sphere wrapped in aluminum foil with some rhinestones and sequins glued on. The school secretary would entreat the spirits on anyone’s behalf for only two Booins Festival tickets.
“What do you see?” Trudy played along.
“Oh, my dear. I see you ... stuck ... in a little love dilemma,” Miss Duffy said, breathy and sultry. “May I ask whom you have your eyes on?”
“You mean besides my fiancé, Haskel?” Trudy laughed. “I know how this works, Miss Duffy.”
“My name is Esmerelda, dear!”
“Sorry. Esmerelda . You’re just trying to get me to say enough so you can make something up so that I’ll actually believe you’re—”
“Ooh ooh!” Miss Duffy held up her hand, commanding silence.
“What’s this I see?” She swirled her hands around the ball, furrowed her brows, and swayed.
The gold medallions on her headband jingled.
Her eyes closed, revealing gigantic swaths of blue eye shadow.
“Ah-ha!” She popped her eyes open again.
“Exactly as I thought. There’s not one, but two men in your life. ”
Trudy, guiltily and instinctively, tried to get a glimpse of the other side of Miss Duffy’s aluminum-foiled ball, but Miss Duffy covered it up.
“Ah-ah-ah! No, dear!” Miss Duffy wiggled her fingers and the long crimson fingernails she’d glued on made a clickety-clackety sound.
“We don’t want to frighten the spirits.” She leaned in.
“Both of these men are very handsome, Trudy.” She hummed with her eyes closed, sculpted the air around the ball.
“ Tell meeee about the mennnnn ... for Truuuuudeeeee ...”
Trudy giggled. “Miss Duffy, I am engaged !”
Miss Duffy shushed her, then looked gravely concerned, almost pouting. “They are very sad, Trudy. And one of them ... he’s been in a rainstorm.”
“What?”
“Soaking wet, dear. But the other one is very flashy and stylish; he’s wearing a tuxedo.”
Trudy couldn’t help but think of Jimmie, jumping in the swimming pool wearing his vest and bow tie that night, the water dripping off his nose.
Miss Duffy frowned. “My dear, they would both be so brokenhearted if you rejected them, but only one of them really loves you. Do you wish to know which one?”
“Sure.” Trudy shrugged. “Why not?”
“Excellent!” Miss Duffy held out her palm. “Another three tickets, please.”
Trudy let out a playful chuckle, stood, and slung her purse over her shoulder. “In that case, you’ll have to keep me guessing, Esmerelda . I need my tickets to take Pete on the haunted hayride.”
“Suit yourself,” Miss Duffy said. “You know where to find me when you change your mind, but remember, as the night grows darker, the spirits raise their prices! And Esmerelda, herself, must be home by nine to catch Knots Landing .”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Trudy stepped out through the beaded curtain.
Miss Duffy called, “Darling, tell the next soul in line to come in; I’ve been expecting them!”
The October breeze tossed the scent of corn dogs and funnel cakes all over Bailey Springs Park and caused the ghosts—made of pillowcases stuffed with wadded-up newspapers—to dance alongside so many orange and black streamers suspended overhead.
Trudy walked between all the fundraising attractions, wishing she could hide out in Miss Duffy’s fortune teller booth for the rest of the evening and avoid the Beaumonts.
She reminded herself to save some tickets for the face painting hosted by the art club. Last year Pete had chosen Dracula, although Trudy had hoped for something cute, like a lion or a puppy.
The most talked-about fundraiser was always the Spook House by the senior class. Trudy didn’t like the idea, though, of navigating a plywood maze with her students dressed as monsters jumping out with weapons, even if they were only plastic.
“BOO!” Frankenstein’s monster leapt from behind a hedge.
Trudy screamed and almost peed herself.
Coach Meechum laughed as he pulled off the rubber mask.
“Don’t do that!” Trudy slapped his arm and breathed to calm herself inside that gorgeous purgatory of being both angry and amused simultaneously.
“I’d say I’m sorry,” Meechum laughed. “But I’m not.” He tugged his baseball cap back on the right direction; he’d had it backwards to accommodate the mask.
“I should’ve expected this from you.” Trudy smiled and straightened the red skirt she’d donned for the devil’s theme the cheerleaders had chosen for their bake sale.
“The Booins Festival is my favorite event of the year,” Shug said. “Where else can you have deep fried batter with powdered sugar for dinner?”
“Can’t argue there.”
“Where ya headed?” Shug asked. “I’ll walk you.”
“Devilish Delights,” she said. “AKA the cheerleaders bake sale. I assume you’re headed to the dunking booth?”
“Did the swimsuit and flip flops give it away?” he said. “Another perk of my illustrious job, also known as my sacred duty to be exploited by the school district for dollars.”
She glanced down and noticed his feet, an ordinary thing that shouldn’t have made him seem so vulnerable and cute but did anyhow.
They were long and bony, but strong and grounded—the feet of an athlete.
The hair on his legs stood outwards, showing goosebumps in the autumn breeze. “You’re gonna freeze.”
“Nah! Good for my constitution.” Shug hit his chest with his fist. “And most folks in Bailey Springs are really bad pitchers, so I’m good.”
“I see.”
He looked at his watch. “I’ve got about five minutes; I could walk you to the bake sale.”
“Actually,” a grin crept across Trudy’s face. “How about I walk you to the dunking booth?” she said. “Got a few Booins tickets burning a hole in my purse.” She rubbed her right arm with her left hand. “And my pitching arm here’s feeling confident.” She flexed her bicep, smiling devilishly.
Shug rewarded her with a big laugh. “Is that a challenge, rookie?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” She squared up to him. “Perhaps more of a promise .”
“Whoa!” Shug stepped back, nodded his head, playing it up. “Okay!” He took off his cap and scratched his head. Bit his bottom lip then flicked his hat back on, backwards again, meaning business. “How about a little wager?”
Trudy watched the muscles in Shug’s legs jostle as he shimmied up the short ladder and onto the seat that hovered above the water.
In her right hand, Trudy spun the baseball Heinz Steinbrugg, the kicker, had handed her.
“Betty-betty easy, Missus Aber-nah- tee ,” Heinz said. “Hit zee red dot wit zee baze-ball.”
“Lookee here, y’all!” Shug called from his perch.
The financial success of the dunking booth, of course, hinged on the dunkee’s ability to heckle pitchers and draw a crowd, incite folks to make a go at sinking him.
“She thinks she’s got it, folks. Our chemistry teacher is mixing up quite the compound of luck and confidence. ”
What Shug didn’t know was that Dub had taught Trudy to throw a fastball in kindergarten, and she’d never forgotten.
In fact, sometimes, to pass time, Trudy and Dub would still head out back, throw pitches and chat.
Dub had deemed pitching a fastball a necessary life skill, but Trudy suspected he did it because after fathering a second girl, he realized he was likely going to miss out on the paternal romance of teaching a son to pitch.
Either way, Trudy was finally putting Dub’s training to use.
“Luck’s got nothing to do with it, Coach.” Trudy hollered back, rolling up her sleeves.
The crowd approved of the taunting with cheers and jeers.
“Goodness gracious!” Meechum said, so patronizing and condescending. He was good at this. “She’s figured out the equation, folks. Better step right up and see what she’s got in her little test tubes.”
Their wager was simple. Three pitches. If Trudy hit all three, Shug would cover her lunchroom duty for the rest of the school year.
If Trudy missed (and she knew she wouldn’t), even once, she’d go fishing with him.
She had to go three for three—practically unheard of in Booins Festival dunking-booth lore.
Meechum had drawn a crowd, forty or so, looking on in anticipation.
Shug’s feet dangled above the water, swinging back and forth and not at all grounded like they were before.
Trudy stared at the red circle with determined focus.
She turned to the side and gripped the baseball the way she’d learned, her index and middle fingers across the seams.
“What do ya know!” Shug heckled, his smile growing wider, his feet quickening their pace. “Science Lady’s got quite the wind up!”
The crowd sneered and whistled. The corners of her mouth turned up.
Shug shouted, “We need a pitcher! Not a belly itcher!”
Trudy remained unfazed. She raised the ball above her head, lifted her left leg, and in one fluid motion, stepped forward and ripped the ball smack into the red target with a zing.
Shug’s feet and legs, wide eyes, and open mouth went tumbling into the tank with a satisfying splash.
The crowd shrieked with delight, a wave of laughter and applause rolling as water spilled over the edges of the tank.
Trudy couldn’t stop grinning or the laugh that escaped her lips. But she wasn’t done. Two pitches to go.
The crowd grew as Coach Meechum reattached the seat and regained his perch. He rubbed his eyes and pounded on the side of his head, freeing water from his ears. “Beginner’s luck, folks!”
Trudy wound up again.
“We should take Miss Abernathy to Vegas; she’d come back with—”
Splash . Another fastball, smack dab into the target. Shug was swimming again. The onlookers squealed with glee again. He came up coughing, having gone under mid-heckle. Even though he kept smiling, perhaps he realized how foolish he’d been, falling for this wager that seemed too good to be true.
“Look on the bright side, Coach,” Trudy hollered. “You’ll never have to miss Spaghetti Day!”
“You got me, rookie.” Shug sat ready to receive his third, and final, wager-losing dunk.
From the crowd, shouts and whistles of encouragement flew at her. Her freedom from the noisy cafeteria, eating her lunches—every single one of them—in peace, in the teachers’ lounge like a grownup, was a single pitch away.
Haskel called from the crowd and snapped her out of focus. “Come on Trudy!” His perfect teeth gleamed in a handsome grin. Was anyone else wearing a suit to the Booins Festival? Leon perhaps.
Shug, on the other hand, sat in the dunking booth like a stupid wet puppy who didn’t know any better, everything a game.
Those too-big feet swinging happily, he was clearly in his element, even though undignified and embarrassing.
Life was fun, especially when it involved someone winning, and another losing.
“Y’all think she’s got another one in her? ” he hollered.
The crowd cheered, collectively hoping she did indeed have another in her. They craved another zinger, another dunk. Haskel winked and wiggled his thumbs-up for emphasis.
“Whatcha waitin’ on, rookie?” Shug hollered.
She remembered Miss Duffy’s crystal ball.
Of course, she didn’t believe in all that stuff, especially not spirits communicating through Styrofoam and Reynold’s foil.
But there they were: two men, one soaking wet, the other in a suit.
Miss Duffy’s question rang in her head, “Do you want to know which one really loves you?” It felt like an opportunity to find out.
Losing a bet, she realized, gave her an excuse because it wouldn’t really be a date, but more like honoring the word she’d given.
She took a deep breath, wound up with fingers placed over the seams, focused her eyes on the red target, and missed it by a mile.