Welcome to the last chapter of the Mayfield Trilogy. We end with the title we started with, "The Perfect Game." To me, the three most important characters in the story are Eric, Noah, and Marty. This chapter brings closure to their stories. I tried to make this chapter one full of love. I will know from you whether I succeeded.
Many readers have asked for an epilogue. I have not decided if I will write one. As a writer I am of the opinion that a good story is left open, so the reader who invested his time in the story can come to his own conclusions about the characters. But, as a reader I sometimes wish the author would tell me what happened in the future, so I am torn. If there is an epilogue I will let those on my mailing list know when it is posted. And if there is one, I have no idea what form it will take. But the chances are pretty good that the story will end where it ends.
Please be safe. And please, be sure to donate to Nifty.
I know the ending of the trilogy will be sad. While this chapter will be quite emotional, I hope it leaves you with feelings of happiness.
CHAPTER 64 THE PERFECT GAME
<Saturday, July 13, Olympia>
[ERIC]
I had a talk with my father that set the tone for the next few days. He told me how proud he was of me and the young man I had become.
He listed my achievements as he talked. His list both embarrassed me and filled me with a great sense of pride: honor graduate, student body president, leader of the Go to State Team, baseball team captain, all-star baseball player, State A Tournament MVP, acceptance to Stanford—those were the items that headed his list.
While he never mentioned my perfect game as such, I know how proud he was of that. He told me after we got home how he'd yelled himself hoarse at the game and how his tears flowed after the last out. I'm glad he left that item off of his list, although the MVP hinted at it.
I thanked my dad for being a great parent, along with my mother. I knew I was blessed to have the home life I was afforded. While approaching adulthood seemed scary, I also knew that my upbringing had prepared me for the next step, which was going away to college. That would be made a lot easier by having Noah with me.
I thought about that talk as I drove Noah, Marty, Rich, and me to Olympia. This was the evening of Marty's speech to the young person's recovery meeting. Noah and Rich both had a good home life, just like I had, while Marty spent most of his teens walking through a minefield. I was eager to hear his story from beginning to end.
We pulled into the parking lot of the church where the group met. I have Marty a quick hug in the parking log and told him he was going to do great. He smiled, clutching the two items he'd brought for his speech. He assured me he was ready to tell the story of his addiction and recovery.
After we took our seats, I could tell Marty was nervous from the way he looked around the room. He was clutching at the teddy bear that was sitting on his lap. I estimated the number of people in the church multi-purpose room at fifty. Marty said he knew some of them, but most were strangers. He was sitting in the same row with the ones he knew best. Rich, Noah, Mr. B, Jeffrey, Sammy, Dallas, The Schnoz, Frankie, Marty's brother John, and me were all people he had invited to come because we were important to his sobriety. Rich was sitting with his brother, Mikey, who had been allowed to leave the drug and alcohol rehab center in Rich's care to attend this meeting.
The big surprise was the man sitting next to The Schnoz at the end of the row. Marty had also invited his father, Lewis Carlson, to come. I think each one of us was happy that he accepted Marty's invitation. I know I was happy that Marty invited him. Marty would often complain about how his father never came to watch him play sports when he was a kid. He told me that inviting him made him feel humble, and seeing his father walk through the door choked him up for a moment.
Marty had invited all of us, although Frankie probably would have been there anyway. He and Frankie had met in the treatment facility that Mikey was now attending. They were both young teens then-- Marty was fourteen and Frankie thirteen. The two found they had a lot in common, their homosexuality being the biggest. Over the years they'd stayed in contact and stayed sober. Frankie attended this meeting regularly.
I know Sammy was invited because of the whole "brother" thing. Marty loved Sammy, but it was Hurricane Jeffrey's love and openness that had a lot do with his staying sober early on.
After the usual readings and announcements were finished, the meeting secretary walked up to the podium at the front of the room. "As you know, the second Saturday of the month is a speaker meeting for the young persons' group. Today's speaker has attended many meetings here throughout his teens. Please welcome Marty, from Mayfield."
Marty walked up to the podium amidst polite applause, not to mention some titters by those who saw one of the two items he was carrying to the front of the room. He stood behind the podium and smiled his engaging, friendly grin.
"Hi, my name is Marty, and I'm an alcoholic,"
"Hi, Marty," came the enthusiastic chorus.
He set the teddy bear on the podium. "This is Mortimer, and he's a teddy bear." More laughter rippled through the audience. "He is an important part of my story."
"Hi, Mortimer," a few voices shouted out, bringing more laughter and some applause.
"I'm nineteen. I've been sober for five and a half-years, so you get the idea of how old I was when I came into these rooms. I remember my first speaker meeting in this room. I was thirteen at the time. A kid, whose name I don't remember, told his story, which I took to be a big pile of BS. I don't remember his name, not because he didn't leave an impression, but because my brain was so toxic at the time that there is a great deal I don't remember from those days. And the reason I thought it was BS was because a lot of what he said was my story and I didn't have the honesty to admit it. Instead, I decided it was better for me to go back out and see if I could make drinking booze work for me."
When Marty invited me he told me that a standard speech tells a person's story. The speaker shares what it was like, what happened, and what it is like now. Marty shared what his past was like first. He told of getting high for the first time when he was nine when his baby sitter gave him pot. He left out the sex. He told about the first time he got drunk. It happened when he was ten and went fishing with his father, who gave him a beer that turned into three beers.
"As soon as that warm feeling hit me, I knew I liked what I was drinking even though it tasted like horse bleep. And like so many of us, I learned that first time I drank that I didn't have a stopping mechanism. Even at ten there was no such thing as too much. Even after puking my guts out, I knew deep down inside me that I wanted more of what had been offered to me."
Marty told about drinking at least two or three beers almost every day by the time he was eleven. He had the okay of his father to have one when he wanted, but he usually cheated. By the time he was twelve, two or three were rarely enough. He was buzzed or drunk almost every day. Marty told about the parties he went to, where he quickly learned that alcohol and pot allowed a lonely preteen to fit into any crowd, or so he thought. He left out the sex.
His talk went into his showing up for sports practices high on pot, about taking alcohol to school, about being so hung over at football practices he could hardly function. He told how he drank before a baseball game.
"When I was in seventh grade, I actually stayed sober for the last part of the school baseball season. I won the Coaches' Award, which is a very special award at our school. But, I was convinced I didn't deserve it. The good feeling I got from that season didn't last because I knew I wasn't worthy of those feelings, just like I wasn't worthy of my teammates. I wanted the feelings that booze gave me. Before that summer was over, I was drinking more than ever."
Marty revealed how he turned his back on his friends, including his best friend, Rich. He left out the sex. He told about getting drunk and or stoned daily, while stealing money from his father to pay for it. His story eventually got into his taking the key to his father's gun safe, determined to take out the contents and end a life that was full of loneliness and despair.
"The book talks about our loss of control and of our pitiful, incomprehensible demoralization. That was me. I didn't like myself. I didn't like how I looked, I didn't like how I acted, I didn't like how I felt. My father told me I wasn't man enough for him, that I wasn't his son," I looked over at Marty's father, who maintained a stoic expression, but blushed a bright red,. "I had turned my back on all of my friends to the point I didn't have any. I felt none of them had ever been my friend, anyway."
He picked up Mortimer. "I was thirteen years old and convinced that the only creature on Earth who loved me was Mortimer, my teddy bear."
He returned to the key, telling us he was ready to open the box. "Then God stepped in as my friend Eric came to the door. I didn't see him as a friend then, but I do now." It became my turn to blush. "He showed up not only that time, but the one other time I picked up the key to the gun safe. He is one of many people I owe my life to." He left out the sex.
Marty told us how he knew he wasn't an alcoholic because his alcoholic father told him as much. All he needed to do was learn how to drink like a man. "Yet, my older brother told me he thought I was a drunk, something I hated hearing at the time. But I can see now that he planted a seed in me. I knew I wasn't an alcoholic because alcoholics sat on park benches, put their bottles into paper bags, got drunk, and passed out on the bench. And, at thirteen, that is exactly what happened to me. That was when Mr. B came into my life."
He told about watching Mr. B jog by numerous times. "For whatever reason I decided to talk to him one evening". He left out the sex, since the reason he wanted to talk is that he wanted to suck the man's cock for money. "I stood up, staggered over to him, and proceeded to puke over his jogging pants and shoes. It just so happened I puked over a guy who had twenty plus years of sobriety. It was on that night of drinking out of a paper bag in the park that my life started to change."
That was when Marty got into the "what happened" phase of the talk. He told how he woke up in a strange bed in a strange house with a strange man sitting next to the bed. The first words he heard from Mr. B were, "You never have to drink again."
"Of course I didn't believe him, and a few relapses after meeting him proved to me that he was wrong. Then came my last drunk, on New Year's Eve when I was fourteen. It put me in the hospital with alcohol poisoning and into rehab before I could figure out what was going on."
Marty went on to tell how Mr. B and his wife treated him like family and nursed him back to health. He talked about how important Mr. B's young son, Jeffrey, had become to him as he spent more and more of his life at the home of his sponsor and mentor. He left out the sex. Marty mentioned how Mortimer became a huge comfort to him in his struggle to remain sober. He left out the sex.
Marty went into how he started to live the twelve steps. He told of his making amends and how it brought him back together with friends, and especially his best friend, Rich. He left out the sex yet again. He mentioned his service work, telling how there were two recovering boys he helped sponsor. He was talking about Dallas and Mikey. I could see that Dallas looked pleased with the mention. Mikey looked to the front without any expression. I knew he was still reeling from the sudden change in his life that had him in drug and alcohol rehab. I hoped he could come back—he was a good kid from a good family whose life had spun out of control.
Marty also told how his father rejected his amends and threw his first repayment back into his face. "I hated my father even more then. More than once he had me on the verge of drinking, and often encouraged me to man up and get drunk."
Marty then got to the part of his speech that required real courage from him. He came out to the audience as being gay, and how that had contributed to much of his loneliness and self-loathing. When he got to the day he came out to his father and was evicted from his house, I saw looks of anger and sadness on the faces of much of the audience. Once again Lewis Carlson showed no emotion. I had to wonder what Marty's purpose was in inviting his father to the speech. The two of them had barely gotten back to speaking terms, and now Marty appeared to be dissing his father every time he could.
Marty started to wrap up with Mr. B becoming his dad through his high school years. He talked of how Jeffrey became his little brother (leaving out the sex). He let them know that Rich was now more than just a friend, but was his partner—implying there was sex.
"The promises have certainly come true for me in sobriety. I have a full life like I never imagined as a frightened, lonely young teen who had all but lost his desire to live. I received a wonderful family, I graduated from high school with honors, I was all-league in football as a senior, all-state in baseball as a senior, the MVP of the Class A State Tournament as my team, a team made up of my friends, won the state title. We all dreamed of being state champions when we were in middle school, and we made it a reality. I now play major college baseball on a full scholarship. None of this would have happened if not for this fellowship, the program itself, and my higher power."
I thought he was finished, but he stopped and took a long sip of water from the bottle on the podium. "But for all of that, I still had something missing. Things just didn't feel complete. I had resentment eating at my insides. Mr. B kept telling me that I needed to set things straight with my father to truly understand sobriety and be grateful for the blessings I had. But I couldn't do that. I was still full of hate, and blame. I continued to point the finger at him for all of my problems, even after five years of sobriety. And that hate was eating away at my soul—I was suffering from a soul sickness that kept me from finding the peace the promises told me I should be feeling.
"I was told by more than one person that I needed to love my father. I was told it is easier to love than to be loved. I was told that acceptance was the answer. Well, my father got a blue light special, and has now been sober for over six months. Still, I did not want to face him...and I did not want to face the feelings that were eating up my insides.
"Recently, I ran into him at a meeting. He asked if he could take me out for coffee to talk to me. I absolutely did not want to go, but I went anyway. It was in a café near to the meeting room that he made his amends to me. I'd already made my required amends to him. I had nothing more to say to him. How do you make amends to the man who did all he could to ruin your life as a kid—the man who kicked you out of your own house when you were a freshman in high school? I'd done my part years before. He did what he had to do, and there was nothing more to be said."
Marty opened up the other item he had taken to the front—a blue book. He read a passage, finishing with a quote that said, "And acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed it is because I find some person, place, or thing—some fact in my life—unacceptable to me...Until I could accept my alcoholism, I could not stay sober; unless I accept life completely on life's terms, I cannot be happy. I need to concentrate not so much on what needs to be changed in the world as on what needs to be changed in me and my attitudes...When I complain about me or about you, I am complaining about God's handiwork. I am saying I know better than God."
He took a deep breath. "Mr. B told me yet again that all I needed to do was to love my father. After that I had no control over anything and had to accept him for who he was and who he is. I had to accept that as much as it hurt, he did the best he could at the time.
"He showed me a prayer that reminds us about putting God's will ahead of our own. It is the prayer of St. Francis. It tells us that `it is better to comfort than to be comforted, to understand than to be understood, and to love than to be loved.'
"I am not always the quickest learner when it comes to sobriety. I'd been hearing the same things for a long time, but couldn't accept them. But, my father was sober. He had made sincere amends to me, which I brushed off. A few days ago, I stopped by the house I grew up in. I went there to see my father. I sat down with him and made my amends, only this time from my heart. This time I made them because for all of my father's flaws I could give him my love, just like he was giving me his love even with all of my flaws. I made them because my father was showing the kind of man he was becoming and it was time for me to show him the kind of man I had become. I made them because I had to tell him I had changed my behavior, which is what an amend is all about. When we talked in that café, I was no different than the angry fourteen year old he had known, except that I wasn't drinking.
"My dad and I both understood at that meeting that just saying you're sorry isn't enough of an amend. Dad asked me what he could do to set things right. I told him that all he had to do is love me as his son with all of his heart. He told me he already did. He told me that what he wanted was for me to continue to be the great son I'd become. We hugged each other. We should have put a bucket under us to deal with the tears that were shed.
"I made those amends because I needed to tell my father I loved him. I invited him here today, and he came. Dad, I apologize if I put you through the wringer today, but that is my story—that is where I was. Where I am now, is that I love you, dad, and I think I can now be the son you want me to be, just like you think you can be the father I want you to be. We may never get there, we both have a lot of pain to overcome, but our love will carry us far. After all, it is progress, not perfection that we seek.
"Self-seeking will slip away, the promises tell us. I hope our love as father and son will have us seeking the promises together. I love you, dad." Marty looked around at the audience.
Needless to say, there were many damp eyes when he finished, including mine and Marty's father's. The audience stood and gave a rousing standing ovation. I've never been drunk in my life, but listening to Marty told me more about what being sober means than an entire lifetime of abstinence could.
After the end of the meeting rituals, Marty chatted a bit with the members who came over to comment on his speech. It was interesting to watch him. His speech had been so smooth and polished, and here he was engaged in friendly chatter with people he had never met. This was a much different Marty than the drunken one who had the key to his father's gun safe in his hand when I stopped at his house on two different afternoons. It was also great to watch Marty exchange heartfelt hugs with his father and his brother, getting a sense of his family back.
We had reservations for dinner at a nearby restaurant. Marty, Rich, Mr. Bednarzyck, Jeffrey, Sammy, Milton (The Schnoz), Dallas, Mikey, Frankie, Marty's father, John, Noah, and I all attended. Four tables were placed together.
Picking out our seats turned out to be an interesting process. Marty was the center of attention; it seemed almost everybody wanted to sit with him. I think Milton, Mikey, Noah, and I were the only ones who didn't pester him for one of the four seats at his table.
Jeffrey was very insistent about being able to sit with the celebrity of the day. I watched Marty take him aside and whisper something in his ear that engendered a big smile. This time I think he did mention sex.
Marty ended up having his father to the left side of him, Mr. B to the right, and Rich and Mikey across from him. Jeffrey sat next to his dad and Frankie to the left of Marty's dad.
"I wonder if it gets this complicated to put together the seating for a White House function," Noah mused.
"I hope nobody ended up having hurt feelings because he couldn't sit next to Mister Popular over there," I said.
"I doubt it. In fact I think it will end up working out very well for a certain Hurricane." We found out later that Jeffrey was amply rewarded in bed that night.
It was a good dinner and a good day. Marty told me later that he and his dad had a civilized conversation about his baseball, his grades, college in general, and how much of his growing up his dad had missed.
Marty and Rich had ridden with us to Olympia from Mayfield. After we finished eating, we all piled into Noah's car. We dropped Mikey at the rehab center, with Rich making sure his younger brother actually went inside.
"I sure would like to know how he ended up becoming such a mess," Rich said. I knew he was talking about more than Mikey's physical appearance. We all agreed he looked terrible with his shaggy hair and thought it was a good thing he still wasn't able to grow facial hair or he would look even worse. Mikey had made is plain he wanted nothing to do with rehab and threatened more than once to run away, which was why we all kept a careful eye on him.
"Alcohol is cunning, baffling, and powerful," Marty said. "It can bring down somebody even in a good family like yours, Rich."
"Which I have sadly discovered. I found out there is a history of alcoholism in my family on my mother's side. Looks like Mikey had the gene. I am even happier that I never went back to drinking after I got drunk out on the farm." Rich got drunk in seventh grade at the infamous alumni kegger. That was where he and Marty became friends.
Marty had once admitted he'd always thought Rich was cute, a thought Marty kept trying to squelch since he knew he wasn't gay. His hope had been to get Rich drunk again and seduce him.
"I think it worked out much better this way," Rich said at the time.
"I think you would have loved losing your cherry while you were wasted," Marty said teasingly.
"I think there are times you are still crazy."
"You will get no disagreement from me."
It had been a good day for all of us. I was grateful for the invitation to Marty's speech. Not only had he become a polished speaker, but it meant a lot to listen to him tell his story. He said his speech was a success if it got even one person to think about his condition, just like the speaker did back when Marty was thirteen. The talk didn't change his mind about anything at the time, but the message was one he couldn't shake, especially since it came from a peer.
I doubt you would be surprised if I told you that, outside of Noah, my two best friends when I graduated from high school were Kevin and Marty. I am sure you know the reasons why for both of them.
<Thursday, July 18, Mayfield Cemetery>
[ERIC]
I knew things were different because Noah asked me to accompany him on his trip to the cemetery. That had never happened before on this date. Instead, his demon was his lone companion for the visit. This time, his boyfriend would be his companion.
Today was the fifth anniversary of Bobby's accident. Each of the first four anniversaries had been somewhat traumatic for Noah as he battled the demon that had all but convinced him that Bobby's accident was his fault. But this time was different, as I learned last Sunday night.
"You know that day is coming," Noah had told me.
"Um...I'm sure some day is coming, yeah," I said as my brain locked up and didn't comprehend what Noah meant. The look on his face unlocked my brain in a hurry. "Oh, shit, sorry Noah. I had a brain fart." We were sitting downstairs on the living room couch. I quickly gave him a tight, special hug.
"It's cool," he said. "Sometimes I wish my brain would lock like that." I kissed him on the cheek. He leaned over and rested his head on my shoulder.
"Are you okay?" I asked.
"Yes, I am. I am going to the cemetery, you know."
"I figured as much. You've gone there each year since."
"There is going to be one big difference this year."
"That being?"
"That being I am leaving Mister Demon behind and taking my boyfriend with me in his place."
I hugged Noah tighter to me. It was one more sign that our trip to Montana had been worthwhile.
I parked the car on the drive close to Bobby's grave. The morning was cloudless and warm. Noah grabbed a plastic sack off of the floor and I took a pot of flowers from the floor behind Noah's seat. We walked silently to Bobby's gravesite where Noah set his bag on the ground. I handed him the flowers, which he carefully placed in front of the headstone. Both Noah and Bobby's mother kept the site looking neat. Tyler helped as well when he was home from college.
Noah opened his sack and took out a small plaque. He hadn't told me what was in the sack, saying I would find out at the appropriate time. He handed the plaque to me and I looked it over.
It read, "Bobby Neal #10 `State Champion'."
"Nice, very nice." I handed it back to Noah and he placed it against the headstone.
"I don't know how long it will last in the elements, or if it will even stay here," he said.
"Do you think it will walk off, or that grave robbers will cart it away in the night?"
"I wasn't really thinking along the lines of somebody taking it. It probably won't happen, but the weather will eventually get to it. I just wanted anybody coming by for now to know he was remembered as part of the Go to State Team."
We stood over the grave holding hands. I could see that Noah was fighting back tears. "Don't hold them back," I said gently.
"But...,"
"This time they're your tears. This time they are genuine tears for him, not the ones forced on you by the...the...by you know who." I found myself not wanting to say the word demon in a cemetery.
He let the tears fall for a couple of minutes, pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, and dried his eyes. "Thanks," Noah said. "There were times I thought everybody had forgotten him. That's why I wanted his shirt hanging in the dugout at Safeco, so that we could win with Bobby being a part of the team."
"He wasn't happy unless he left the practice field and a game with dirt and grass stains on him. I think that legacy carried over and became a part of us. Even if it was subconscious, we were thinking of Bobby all of the time. His shirt hanging in the dugout was a constant reminder for us."
"You know, I love you," Noah told me.
"I've heard the rumor."
Noah pulled me toward him and placed a gentle kiss on my lips. I kissed him back and we added passion to what had started as a love peck. When we broke up, I looked down at the grave. "Sorry, Bobby," I whispered.
"Nothing to be sorry for," Noah said. "Bobby is an important part of our lives. But he is no longer our life, if that makes sense. I think he would want me to be in love, and would be very pleased to know my lover is you."
We kissed again, and then each blew a kiss to Bobby. "Tonight is the night," Noah said.
"What night?" I asked, realizing I was sounding stupid for the second time in a week.
"THE night," he said as if it made perfect sense. "The time we talked about in Montana last year; making love in our special place."
Of course I felt stupid again. I don't have Noah's ability to sense what people are thinking, a fact he sometimes forgot. "You want to do it tonight? You want to do it on this night of all nights?"
"Why not? What better way to bury that demon for real. We already picked the place, and now we pick the time. The day will be hot and beautiful. The night will be warm. The grass will be green. We will both know from now to forever that there is nothing that stands between our love for each other. Tonight I become totally free—no, make that WE become totally free."
We kissed one last time and returned to the car. Our Legion team had practice at Kentburg at noon for those who weren't working. Noah and I still had our little lawn mowing business going and set our own hours of work. We had already told our customers that we would be closing up shop on August 15, as we prepared to leave for college. All of our customers said they were sad to see us go. Korey and Chandler had been doing some of the lawns for us, and looked to be ready to take over our little business.
We stopped at Noah's house and had lunch. He put on his gear and we went to my house where I got ready for practice. I also grabbed a small box out of my closet, which I put into my gym bag. The box had been waiting for "THE night", and if this was going to be `THE night" I figured I'd better have the box with me
<Thursday, July 18, Mayfield High School baseball field>
[ERIC]
Practice had been pretty basic. Ten of the fourteen players on the roster were able to show up. The other four had to work. We had infield/outfield practice and batting practice. It took an hour and a half. We were in the area postseason tournament with our first game on Friday.
After practice we returned to Noah's house and went swimming, in the nude of course. Nicky and Jeffrey were there and swam with us. It was a fun, non-sexual time. Believe me, being non-sexual around Nicky and Jeffrey was not easy, but since the two had gotten off three times, once in the pool, during the day, they made it easy on us. Noah and I were saving our sex for after dark.
We showed up at the high school field after dinner. The younger Falcons, most of whom would be entering the eighth and ninth grade, were playing Kentburg. Their uniforms were the same style as the big Falcons, even though they were run by a different organization.
The organization that was in charge of the younger team, the Raptors, consisted of a core of adults, while the board of the Falcons still consisted of six players and three adults. I knew that the two organizations worked closely and there was talk of merging them in some way. Whatever happened wasn't my concern, although I hoped the older Falcons would continue the tradition of being run by the players.
But right now I just wanted to enjoy baseball. Nicky, Jeffrey, and some of the other younger kids we knew played for this team. The Raptors were ahead 9-4 going into the seventh inning and had to hold on for a 9-7 win.
The Falcons would be playing Harborview next. Those teams were made up of entering juniors and seniors. Noah and I knew almost all of the boys playing for Mayfield very well. Some we even knew on a sexual basis, like Blaine, Justin, Toby, Korey, and Chandler.
Marty helped with the grounds keeping. After he quickly dragged the field, the Falcons took infield, followed by the Harborview team. He ran the rider mower out to the parking lot where he and Fred, the parks head groundskeeper, loaded it onto a trailer. Marty came back to the stands and took a seat next to us in the bleachers.
"Where's Rich?" I asked.
"He's working at the middle school field today. He'll be here as soon as he and Fred get things put away there." Unlike the high school field, the middle school field didn't have lights.
"The Falcons are looking good," Marty said. "They should go far in the postseason."
"Yep. They're following in our footsteps," I said. The Falcons were tied for first with Meadow Park going into today's game.
Nicky and Jeffrey had shucked their uniforms and sat with us after the first inning, wearing just tee shirts, shorts, and flip-flops. Rich showed up during the second inning. We enjoyed watching baseball together on the warm summer night.
The Falcons used timely hits and tough pitching from Blaine to take a 7-1 lead after four innings. "They don't have the power we had the last two years," Noah said. "Nobody like Marty or Scott or Carl who could go yard at any time."
"Especially Carl," Marty said. "Too bad his sport is football, because the dude could hit the ball a long way. And, yeah, they don't have our power, but I'll tell you, those dudes can hit. They just keep coming at you. Between Blaine, Chandler, Justin, and Toby, their pitching is as tough as ours was, and their defense is lights out."
"Three state titles in a row next spring?" I asked.
"We all know how tough winning one of those is," Marty said. "But those guys are going to be in the mix. We built something pretty good here."
"That we did."
The Falcons ended up winning 10-2. Nicky and Jeffrey left to meet their dads, who were sitting a few rows away from us. Marty had to put away the bases, put away some loose equipment, lock up the concession stand, and turn out the lights before he could leave. He had Rich with him to help, so he'd be getting home quickly.
"The two urchins aren't riding with you?" Marty asked.
"They know we're staying here for awhile," Noah said.
"You are?" We hadn't told him or Rich about our plans for the night.
"We are," I said. "We have something special planned."
"Special, as in really special?"
"I think you have the right idea."
"Out there on the field?" Marty acted as if this was stunning news. This was a guy who made jerking off in class, the showers, and on the team bus a common occurrence in middle school.
"Eric and I wanted to have a special place to have sex on a special day," Noah said. Marty and Rich were two of the few people we could be this open with. "We picked the baseball field as the special place just before State. This morning we decided this was the special day."
"Holy fuck, doing it on the baseball field; that is really special." He looked at Rich. "How come we never thought of something like that?" he asked.
"Maybe it's because you're almost twenty and your brain is suffering from the brain freeze of old age," Rich said with a chuckle.
"Well, some hot sex will unfreeze things in a hurry. Come on over to my place...I'll show you a good time."
"You're on."
Marty gave Noah a serious look. He reached out and gave him a hug. "I know what today is about," he said. "I love you, Noah, and I think you and Eric are doing the exact right thing tonight." He let go and gave Noah a kiss on the forehead, then started to leave with Rich.
They stopped and wished us well. "I doubt anybody will wander onto the field in the middle of the night. The fence and the bleachers will block anybody from seeing inside except for a couple small places. You should be fine," Rich said.
"Unless, of course, somebody gets a Tweet to take in the entertainment on the high school baseball field," Marty said.
"Marty! You wouldn't!" Noah squeaked.
"No, but it is deliciously tempting." He looked up into the sky. "Clear night with a full moon—it's going to be perfect for you guys."
"It's why we picked it," Noah said.
Marty laughed and waved as he and Rich drove off. Noah tucked the blanket he brought back under his arm and I grabbed my gym bag. We locked the fingers of our free hands together and strolled back to the field.
"Where do we want the blanket?" Noah asked.
"You mean you don't want to do it in contact with the fresh green grass of Mayfield?"
"I thought we'd recover on the blanket."
"Where will we put our clothes?" I asked. I could see that we would be following Noah's plan, which did not bother me in the slightest. I wanted him to win his final battle against the demon his way.
"In the dugout, where else?"
"Since you asked, place the blanket halfway between the pitcher's mound and second base."
"Perfect. We both played second base and you pitched. That piece of turf is as much ours as anybody's."
Noah laid the blanket out on the soft grass. I placed my gym bag on the blanket. I kept waiting for Noah to ask me why I brought the gym bag, but, like the person he is, he was patient. I knew he was waiting for me to reveal the reason in my own way and my own time, just like he picked our special night in his own way and his own time.
We walked into the dugout and faced each other in the dark. I placed my lips on his and gave him a light kiss. Noah put his arms around me and increased the pressure of the kiss. I could feel myself stirring inside of my shorts. I broke our embrace and reached for the bottom of his t-shirt, pulling it up over his head. He raised his arms and let me remove it. The light of the full moon reached into the dugout, giving his smooth torso a silvery sheen. I drank in the beauty of it. I thought he was beautiful when we were in the sixth grade, and since then he has only become more beautiful.
"We should have worn our baseball uniforms into the dugout," I said.
"No, this is perfect," Noah said. I knew it had to be perfect just as Noah said, because my lover wasn't going to settle for anything less than perfect on this night. "We'll be naked and into each other's arms quicker."
He returned my favor by pulling off my shirt. Then it was my turn. I unbuttoned his shorts, and slowly lowered his zipper. I could see the bulge pushing out his white briefs. I knew he was wearing the briefs for me, knowing how sexy I thought those tighty whiteys were. He was right, I did think they were sexy. The way they gleamed in the moonlight as he stood in front of me made them even sexier.
Noah never got to see me in my briefs. I was wearing a pair of soccer shorts, which Noah stripped off of me along with my white briefs. Before I could remove his, he smiled his most seductive smile and pulled his briefs down to his ankles. He kicked them off along with his flip flops. I kicked off my sandals. We were now standing naked in the dugout where we had spent so many hours of our high school years.
"Time to walk out on the field, I think," Noah said.
I nodded and once again took his hand. The grass felt soft beneath my bare feet as we ambled toward the infield. "Sparky Anderson never stepped on the foul lines when he went out to talk to a pitcher," Noah said. "He considered it bad luck." We both carefully stepped over the first base foul line, not wanting to disrupt the flow of good karma floating around us.
"The grass is so soft and cool," Noah said. We stopped between the mound and second base. We both had walked on the infield of a Major League ballpark and knew that our grass didn't match up to the sod of Safeco Field. Having played on countless high school baseball diamonds, we also knew that our infield grass was pretty damned good, as good as or better than any in the county. And, it was our grass, which made it extra special sod to walk on.
We released our hands and looked at each other in the moonlight. I didn't feel at all self-conscious about standing naked in the middle of a baseball diamond and I was certain that Noah didn't either. I put my lips to his and gave him a light kiss. He wrapped his arms around me, adding pressure to the kiss. I let my tongue slither slightly out of my mouth and dance across the crease where his sensuous lips met. I felt his tongue come out of its hiding place and slip across mine.
In a ritual that had gone on as long as our sexual lives with each other, the kiss ended and he removed his glasses. Why we rarely thought of removing the glasses first, I don't know. Except for when we initiated sex when we were already in bed, we almost always kissed before the glasses came off. It was as if Noah needed to have me in focus before we started having sex so that I would remain sharp in his mind as our lovemaking unfolded.
He held his glasses at his side and I looked into his deep blue eyes. In the moonlight, they were still the deepest, most beautiful eyes I have ever peered into. They were full of intelligence, humor, and love. Noah took a step over to the blanket and started to set his glasses down.
I knelt down behind him and pulled the black box out of my gym bag. "Keep your glasses on," I told him.
Noah turned to me with a look of curiosity. I grinned and opened the box, pulling out a gold neck chain. I stepped up to him and fastened it around his neck. He gazed down at it, seeing that there was a design on the front. He lifted the neck chain to get a closer look at the design, but I gently grabbed his wrist.
"Mine is exactly the same," I told him as I pulled a second chain out of the box, holding in front of him. He held it in front of him and smiled.
"It's beautiful," he said.
"Can you tell what it is?"
"It took a second, but yes, once I saw it I could tell it was perfect." In the middle was a baseball, and around the baseball the letters ES and NM were intertwined.
"I wanted our numbers in there, too, but the artisan thought it was better to keep it simple."
"Who did the work?"
"A friend of Espowyes," I said.
Noah took his glasses off to wipe away some tears. "Wow, it is so perfect, and what a perfect day to give them to...to...to us."
"I was waiting for this day ever since we decided to make this our special place. Espowyes was super about seeing that the necklaces were made quickly."
"I will never take it off," Noah said.
I shuffled uncomfortably. "I was thinking...um...that...well, that this is an extra special day and that we wear these together on..."
"...on special days," Noah finished.
"Yeah, that. Like the day we get married."
Noah's grin was as wide as his face. "Are you proposing to me?"
"I am. It won't, or tomorrow, and probably not this year, or the next. But when the time is right, we will both know it. I want us to be together forever."
"I like it. I am in full agreement. We do it when the time is right, but our necklaces will be the symbol of our commitment until then." We each had a feeling that there would be a lot of special days coming up. We put our necklaces on. I know it sounds selfish, but I couldn't help but think that the necklace enhanced my lover's beauty.
He wrapped his arms around me, our naked bodies touching. We had both lost our erections with the distractions we'd created, but the warmth of our body contact started having its effect.
We traded light kisses, our tongues flicking. As we kissed our hugs became tighter, and as our hugs became tighter, our kisses became deeper and more passionate. Somehow, we ended up on the ground, our bodies rolling on the cool carpet of grass, our mouths locking and our tongues battling. My hands moved across his smooth, hard body and I could feel his hands wandering around mine. My erection was so stiff and hard I thought it was going to burst. I felt so much love and desire surging through me I could barely contain it. It was as if I was a thirteen year old who had just graduated from middle school instead of a newly minted seventeen year old high school graduate.
I wanted to be inside of my lover, but I had to make sure that was what he wanted. Reluctantly, I broke our marathon kiss. "Who's going to bottom?" I asked in a hoarse whisper, as if I didn't know the answer already.
"I need you inside of me," Noah said, almost dreamily. "I need you in me to push the last of him out." Noah was referring to the demon who would be getting his final purge in the middle of a baseball diamond on the anniversary of the most traumatic day of Noah's life. "Fill me with the seed of your love," Noah said. "Love me, please, Eric, love me and make me yours...I want to be yours."
Once again I reached into my gym bag, this time pulling out a tube of lube. I slicked us up. I was so ready to make love to the beauty on the infield grass. Noah was on his back, his legs raised, his feet almost back to his ears. I was instantly inside of him. There was no holding back as I pushed my steel hard six inch cock deep into his ass until my pubes touched his smooth, athletic butt.
I kissed him passionately one more time, then started doing what both of us wanted. I started making love to the person I loved more than anything in the world. I thrust, and I humped—I varied my rhythm and my pace, I varied my depth of penetration. I could feel my cock ride across his sweet spot and hear his cries of delight as I touched that intimate place.
"Fuck me, Eric, fuck me harder...fuck me deep, oh Eric...Eric...Eric, oh, I love you Eric. Make me yours...yours...yours..." He was almost crying with anguish, his face looking like it was pained even though I knew he was lost in a sea of sensual pleasure.
I used all of the tricks I had learned in my brief life as I did everything I could to fill the amazing and wonderful person beneath me with enough pleasure to finally end the pain that this date had brought him.
Noah's head rocked back and forth, his arms spread to both sides of him. I saw tears running down his face, reflecting the silver light from the full moon above us. His naked torso was covered with a sheen of sweat, his necklace flopping across his bare chest.
My cock could take no more. Even if I slowed down, I knew I was going to cum. My body was shaking with pleasure, my cock felt like it was six feet long and filling all of Noah and then some. I heard a cry of such intense pleasure that it could have been mistaken for one of pain as Noah raised his hips and tried to shove his ass onto my cock. It was as if he wanted my entire body to follow my thrusting erection into his moist, tight, dark insides.
"Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh gawwwwwwwwddddddddddddddd Eric I love youuuuuuu...mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmfffffffffffffffff..." His arms lifted into the air, his body rose almost totally off the ground and his cock spewed out shot after shot of hot cum, covering his hairless torso, squirting on me, wads of his seed blowing out in a no touch cum.
His ass muscles squeezed my cock, and I was done—finished—all I could do was ram myself as deep inside of him as I could get. I felt my balls release their accumulated seed, I felt it fire out of me as I screamed Noah's name, my necklace flopping on my sternum as I filled my lover with the essence of my love, my orgasm lasting for what seemed like an eon. I shot so hard I expected my semen to come out of Noah's mouth.
I collapsed on top of Noah, my tears of joy falling on his wet face, my body dropping onto his sperm-covered torso. We both fought to catch our breath as we came down from the most intense orgasms we had ever experienced together.
The ballpark was quiet; the only sound was our breathing. The moonlight gave the grass, the infield dirt, the bleachers, the fences, the dugouts, and our damp bodies an eerie glow. I kissed Noah's lips, then licked his tear stained face.
"That was amazing," Noah said.
"It was as special as it gets. I love you so much." I planted another kiss on Noah.
"My life would be so empty without you," Noah said. "I love you beyond anything words can express."
I think we would have loved to just lie on the grass together for the night, but we knew it wasn't what we were going to do. I finally got up, surprised that my knees weren't shaking after what I'd just experienced. Noah rose off the ground, too. His body glistened with sweat and semen, bits of grass and dirt sticking to him.
"I can't remember ever being this happy," Noah said. "I mean, I know I've been happy, but I don't remember ever being happier. All I know is that today I feel free. I know that Bobby will always be in my heart, but I also know that you are the one who fills my soul."
"You can be so poetic, you know." I kissed his damp check.
"He was a stubborn redhead at times," Noah said. I understood that Noah had just admitted that there was nothing he could have done to prevent Bobby's accident. It had been almost a year since we sat in a meadow by a lake in Montana and Noah purged his demon. Tonight he let go of the last stubborn remnants. We were ready to move on.
Noah took my hand in his. "Let's walk around the field," he said.
And so there we were, two seventeen year old boys, naked, damp with sweat and semen, holding hands, walking across the pitcher's mound to home plate. We turned and walked the 90 feet to first base and continued along the foul line into the outfield.
"It's beautiful," Noah said as we slowly strolled toward the left field fence. "I love this place, and I love this game. It is all so perfect...all so beautiful."
"Sometimes I think I know how an artist feels when I'm out on a ball field playing," I said. "When I turn a 6-4-3 double play, making the pivot just right, getting the out at second, pegging the ball perfectly to first—it's like I've created a work of art, like I've performed the steps of a dance."
Noah's hand squeezed mine. "I've always seen you as an artist when you were on the mound and I played behind you," he said. "I see you doing something you love and I see you creating your work of art as you pitch to each batter. I read somewhere that at the same time we love baseball and excel as artists on the field, we also have to be machines on the field—that we did our art in public, and that we made out masterpieces not only because of our creativity, but also because our repeatability. You can turn a 6-4-3 because you repeated it so often in practice. You can place a curve on the inside corner because you are the machine creating the art."
"Like I said, you are a poet."
"That's not an original thought."
"Neither is a 6-4-3 double play, but each one is a unique work of art, no matter how we work at being machines."
We were walking parallel to the outfield fence, still holding hands. "Football teams are mobs," Noah said. "Same with soccer teams. Baseball is the individual creating his art. It's the batter versus the pitcher, the fielder versus the ball, the second baseman versus the runner on that 6-4-3. It's why I love it. Baseball isn't a mob sport— each of us who plays, whether we are at the top of the Major Leagues or is a seven year old playing T-ball, is an individual artist."
I nodded. Noah was saying exactly why I thought baseball was the perfect game. I had just never been able to express it in that way before; baseball as an art form, the perfect mix of the creativity of the artist and the retentiveness of the well-trained athletic machine.
"You can't let your masterpiece burden you down, you know," Noah said. I knew he was referring to my perfect game.
"I'm not. I'm just...well...just trying to be humble about it."
"Sometimes you just have to say fuck humility. If it isn't burdening you, why do you keep trying to hide from it?"
"I never wanted to overshadow my teammates."
We had arrived back to our starting point, not realizing we'd circumnavigated the field. Noah bent down and lifted a corner of the blanket, pulling out a plastic bag that he had expertly hidden from me when he brought the blanket to the field. He handed the bag to me. It had a large, flat object inside of it.
"Pull it out," he said.
I took out a wooden plaque. I flipped it so I could see the front. In the moonlight I could see a photograph of me releasing a pitch from the Safeco Field mound. Behind me was the scoreboard, showing seven scoreless innings, seven hitless innings, seven perfect innings. It was a picture of the last pitch of the State Championship game. Under the picture was the date, the score, and the teams, and the names of the fifteen players on the roster.
"Noah...." Now it was my turn to let some tears flow.
"It's from all of us. The team wanted me to give it to you when your birthday party came, and I will do it then for a second time. But tonight was the perfect time for you to see it. I freed myself, now you can free yourself. Remember, a perfect game means no errors, and your teammates had your back on every pitch and every play. They are as proud of you as I am...but they don't love you quite as much," he finished with a grin.
I placed the plaque on the blanket and pulled our gloves and a baseball out of my gym bag. "Go to second," I told Noah as I tossed him his glove. I took the ball and went to the shortstop hole. Noah knew what was coming and broke for the bag in time for me to feed him the ball like I would at the start of a 6-4-3 double play. He pivoted, but held on to the ball, lacking a first baseman to receive his toss.
He returned the ball to me, and we did it again, and again, and again. We were machines and artists. In the light of the moonlit diamond we knew exactly what to do. It was as if we were in a dream.
We switched positions, and Noah fed me, as I did the pivot dance that I'd learned as a ten year old from a great Little League coach. We finished our solo dances and put our gloves back in the bag.
I took my beauty into my arms, and walked him to the mound. "You're right, I felt like an artist on the mound, always wondered what I would create when I pitched. Even as a little kid, I had a special feeling standing on a mound with a baseball. A bad game would be like coloring a picture outside of the lines, but it was still art."
I put an arm around him and held his left hand up, leading him in a dance. We danced around and around on the mound to the sound of silence.
"We dance to the ballgame," Noah whispered.
Before I could question what he meant, he started singing some familiar words. I grinned and joined in with him as we continued our nude dance.
"Take me out to the ballgame, Take me out with the crowd. Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack, I don't care if I never get back."
Our singing was muted, our eyes on each other, our bodies united in our slow dance in the moonlight.
"For it's root, root, root for..." we paused at the same time and grinned, Noah's white smile brightening the dim light. "...the Mustangs," we started out together,
"If they don't win, it's a shame. For it's one, two, three strikes, you're out, at the old ball game."
We danced some more in silence, our exposed cocks once again hard, our bodies pressed together. Our dance stopped between the mound and the plate. We rubbed together, dry humping as we stood, both of us knowing what it was we wanted. I kissed my lover, holding him tightly against me, rubbing my boner against his, until we nodded in silent agreement, turning until we were side by side, arms around each other, masturbating ourselves with our free hands. My cum soon shot out onto the infield grass, Noah cumming within after I did. Our emissions landed in the grass, allowing us to leave behind an important part of ourselves, a part that would be mixed into the sod of the Mayfield High baseball diamond forever. Even after the wildness of our earlier sex we were able to perform a quiet and sensual act of mutual masturbation with a message. It was an act that was sexual, and yet not sexual at the same time. It was sex as art.
Noah and I were now close to exhaustion and the evening was rapidly cooling down. I started to pack my gym bag, but Noah stopped me. "It's a long drive home," he said.
"Noah, home is five minutes away no matter whose house we go to."
"Don't move," is all he said. I watched him enter the dugout and then emerge wearing only his flip-flops. He walked around the dugout and through the gate into the bleacher section, then he disappeared into the gloom. He soon returned with the large plastic sack that he had left in the trunk of the car. He pulled out two pillows.
"We're sleeping here?" I asked. Right away I had a vision of the two of us being caught sleeping naked on the high school field.
"I'm sure the rising sun will wake us long before anybody even thinks of coming around this field," Noah said as if reading my mind. "And, just in case, I set my alarm for seven."
"You've thought of everything."
"Yep. Sleeping cuddled up to you on our home baseball field, it's the perfect way to end a perfect night."
We lay on the ground and covered ourselves with the heavy woolen blanket. We cuddled close, both for warmth and for comfort. The cool grass was under us and we knew there would be a definite indentation in the infield after we left in the morning.
I wrapped my arm around Noah, taking in the scents of his breath and his body, along with the special smell of cut grass that always seems to hover around a baseball field. My mind was on the two of us and baseball when I drifted off to sleep on the moonlit field.
+++++++++++++++
If you had been able to spend that evening in the Mayfield High bleachers, watching the two teen boys, you would have sat in the moonlight watching a long, improvisational dance. You would have seen the naked beauties in their wild sexual bacchanalia, the quiet interlude as they circled the field, the baseball ballet at second, the slow love dance around the pitcher's mound, and the finale as the two artists left a small part of themselves on the infield grass.
If you'd stayed longer, you would have watched them draping a big blanket over their nude bodies and falling asleep in each other's arms. You would have noticed the silence that was barely interrupted by the light, rustling breeze. You would have sworn that the banks of lights had come on, although it may have been the love of the boys under the blanket that illuminated the field.
And if you looked to the middle of the infield and concentrated, you would have seen a pitcher on the mound and heard his grunt as he released his pitch. You would have heard the sizzle of a fastball as it sped to the plate. You would have heard the unmistakable pop of the ball hitting the catcher's mitt echoing around the field. There would have been a silent pause, broken by the loud voice of the umpire shouting out "STEEEEEERIKE THREE!" as he rang up the final out, while two beautiful boys slept in loving innocence, dreaming diamond dreams, dreams about baseball, The Perfect Game.
THE END
Thanks to The Donkey and Brendan, my alpha and beta readers. A special thanks to Perry for putting in hours of work as my editor-in- chief. Thanks to my last minute nitpicker for finding all of the mistakes the rest of his missed before I sent a chapter in for posting. All mistakes that remained (and some did) are my responsibility.
Thank you as well to all of you readers who stuck it out through three stories and 179 chapters. I appreciated your emails and I appreciate your dedication. You were a special group. All of us will truly miss having the boys of Mayfield in our lives.