KEEPING SCORE

chapter twelve

            Sam was falling asleep at the table, so we called it a night soon after. Kevin walked us to our car.

            "Good luck next weekend," Kevin said. "I'll be rooting for you."

            "Even when my team's playing yours?" Sam asked.

            "Especially then." Kevin waved and walked off. I liked the way he looked from the back. 

            "What's next weekend?" I asked when we were in the car.

            "Our first tournament!" Sam exclaimed in an I-can't-believe-you-didn't-remember tone. And then my stomach flipped again, for completely different reasons. If the first tournament was next weekend, that meant the last day of school was this Thursday. Camp would start the following Monday. I needed a babysitter for Friday and a carpool for camp. I had spent so much time worrying about Sam's pitching technique and other stupid details about baseball that I'd forgotten the most important stuff.

            After Sam went to bed, I pulled out my laptop and logged on to my email. The first message was from Mike:

Parents:  Just a reminder that we will start up our summer schedule this week. Practice every Tuesday and Wednesday from 5 till 8 at Dogwood Park. And Saints has released the schedule for next weekend's tournament. All games at Chamberlin High. We play at 8pm Friday, 9am Saturday, 8pm Saturday. Sunday depends on how well we do on those three games. Yes, I know the schedule sucks. There's nothing I can do about it. Mike. P.S., Has anyone seen the cash box from the snack shed?

            The news was just getting worse and worse. Since swim meets were every Wednesday night and Saturday morning, Sam was going to have to quit the swim team. I loved those meets. I loved hanging out with the other parents, timing races, and even getting splashed. Sam wasn't an elite swimmer, but he could do the butterfly -- pretty tricky for his age group -- and had been on the team since he was a "six-and-under.”

On the other hand, since all those parents thought I was way too competitive, maybe it wasn't such a big loss. And I wouldn't have to worry about getting Sam to a morning or afternoon practice.

            I replied to Mike's email saying I had the cash box and would return it to him at Wednesday's practice. Then I sent an email to the swim team coach, apologizing profusely that Sam couldn't swim this summer because of baseball. The reply I received was soaked in subtext: “I think Sam made the right choice.”

            Was everyone in Persimmon an asshole, or just the parents I had to deal with? 

            Sunday was a low-key day; the last we'd have for a while. Sam slept in, and I made pancakes. He reverted to his usual eating style without Kevin around, gobbling them up while I was still putting them on his plate. Since there were no finals in the fourth grade, we threw out most of his schoolwork and went through his old clothes. Not surprisingly, most of his stuff from last summer didn't fit. Sam's face turned red and he got a little teary as he struggled to fit into his year-old clothes.

            "Don't worry about it," I said. "You grew about three inches since last year. Of course nothing's going to fit."

            "I shouldn't have eaten all those pancakes," he moaned. "I really need to go on a diet."

            I took his face in my hands and looked him straight in the eye. "You're going to be tall and strong when you grow up. You'll see. Don't worry about this too much. You're just going to make yourself miserable."