The Eagles came out swinging, and by the third inning they were up 4 to 1. Cricket made two plays at short that I would put in a museum. Wyatt tripled in two runs in the fourth. In the fifth, with the score 5 to 5, Cricket bunted his way on and stole second, and the whole stands came off its feet. We went into the sixth leading 7 to 6, with the Eagles at bat and one more half-inning to hold.
I had kept my word. Mason played right field the first three innings. In the sixth, according to the card I had written on Monday, long before any of it, he went to first base. I had not changed a thing. When I called his name, he trotted out onto the infield in the new red jersey with the eighty families on the sleeve, and I swear he was glowing. I did not look at Tobias. I could not have borne to know what was on his face.
The Eagles got a man on, and then another. A fly ball to center for one out. A strikeout for two. And then a runner stood at third base, with two outs, the tying run, and a boy came to the plate who had hit a home run off us in the first game, and I could feel my heart beating in my neck.
Get a new story in your inbox every morning.
Facebook doesn’t show you every story we post. Our free newsletter does. Join 2,500+ readers.
He hit the first pitch hard. It was a rocket, a low line drive to the left side that I thought was gone, and I watched Cricket dive across the infield dirt, a small boy flat out in the air, and come up with the ball in the heel of that cracked cousin’s glove.
He had no time to set his feet. He came up on one knee, and he threw.
It was too high. I knew it the moment it left his hand. It sailed wide of the bag, over the head of the boy standing on first, and the batter was digging for first like a train, and the ball was going over, and I thought: That’s it. That’s the game.
Mason jumped.
A round-cheeked boy who had played right field and batted ninth, who had never once been asked to catch anything under pressure, left the ground with his glove up and his right foot still, somehow, on the bag. He stretched until I thought something would pop. The ball hit the pocket of his glove with a sound I heard from the third-base line.
The umpire’s hand went up. “Out!”
Seven to six.
For a moment, nobody made a sound. Then the whole park came apart. I know the boys piled onto the infield in a heap, all fourteen Cardinals, and that Mason was at the bottom of it with his glove still on his hand and a smile that took up his whole face. And I know that Cricket, small, glasses crooked, got out of the pile and stood next to Mason, and the two of them put their arms around each other’s necks.
Cricket had thrown it. Mason had caught it. I want you to hold on to those two things.
It took a while for the field to clear. I shook hands with the Eagles’ coach, who was gracious, God bless him. And when I looked up, I saw Tobias standing at the end of the dugout, with the thermos in one hand and his hat in the other. I walked over. I did not know what I would say. He did not say anything for a long time. He looked out at the infield, where the boys were still tangled up on the grass.