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  “Not about this,” said Mike. “It’s my problem.”

  Mom called them inside for dessert. Sophia was sitting on Dad’s lap and Tiffany was wearing some of Mom’s costume jewelry. To Mike, everybody looked flushed with contentment. He felt like he was on the other side of a window, looking in. He was glad for them, scared for himself. It’s my problem.

  He pretended to object when Mom and Dad insisted he stay home and get to sleep while they drove Tiffany, Sophia, and Scotty back to the city. Scotty was going to stay over with a friend before tomorrow’s flight to Amsterdam. Mike could use the sleep. Big day tomorrow.

  In the driveway Mike hugged Sophia and Tiffany and promised to come visit soon. Scotty pulled Mike’s head down and whispered, “Give the old man a chance.”

  “Right,” said Mike.

  He didn’t sleep. He visualized the meeting, Budd-style. He would stride into Cody’s office, hard-faced, and before the coach could say anything slap everything Zack’s hacker friends had found on his desk.

  “I’m giving you a chance to resign and leave the area,” he would say in a Law & Order mode. “Otherwise, I go to the FBI.”

  He’d be prepared for Coach’s sneery grin, maybe even an attempt to push him out of the office. “You drunk, Semak? You do want to graduate, don’t you? Go to college?”

  “Not as badly as I want you out of this school,” he’d snap back. “You’ve got five minutes to leave, Roger Wald.”

  The look of terror on Cody’s face, the sweat popping out of his shaven skull, was the MVP trophy he had dreamed about.

  Mike, you are in some Billy Budd fantasy. Dream on. He’s not going to go down that easy.

  FORTY-TWO

  He felt big and strong and loose in the halls. Tori looked up as he strode through the front office. “Mike!”

  He ignored her and opened Cody’s door.

  Cody was in his friendly position, perched on a corner of his desk, talking to Nick, who was sitting in a straight chair. That makes sense. The mole. They looked startled as he burst in.

  Don’t lose the advantage.

  Cody slipped off his desk into a defensive posture, balanced on the soles of his feet, open hands waist high. Mike thought of a cage fighter. “Captain Mike! Just the man I always want to see. Thanks for stopping by, Nick—you can go now.”

  Nick got up. “I’ll check back later, Mr. Cody.”

  “It’s Mr. Wald,” said Mike. He felt warm, zoned. “His real name is Roger Wald. Stick around, Nick, the FBI is going to be interested in you, too.”

  Cody laughed. “Don’t tell me you got caught in that scam, too, Mike. It’s old news. Must be Zack the Hack. Look, I don’t want to press criminal and civil charges against Berger and his family, but if this keeps cropping up I’ll have no choice. And against you, too.”

  Mike dropped a sheaf of papers on Cody’s desk. “Then there’s the emails between you and the buscones. We had to get some of them translated. I was surprised you were getting a piece of the action if any of their players got pro contracts.”

  Cody snatched the papers, began tearing them up. “I’m doing you a favor, Mike. You could go to jail for this.”

  “Unless I get a whistleblower’s reward from Homeland Security. Falsifying information on the status of an immigrant is pretty serious.”

  “Don’t try to bluff me,” said Cody.

  Nick hadn’t left. He said, “Those geeks can put anything all over the world in a minute.”

  Cody said to Mike, “What do you want?”

  “I want you gone.”

  Cody’s big muscles went into tremors under his white shirt. “What’s this about? That nutty slut you hooked up with?”

  BillyBuddBillyBuddBillyBudd. He was surprised to be hearing that name in his head. Why not? It was Billy who got me this far. “You messed over a lot of people in this school.”

  “I kept this school secure.”

  “From what?”

  “You stupid punk,” said Cody. “Good men die so you and your candy-ass friends can play ball, screw your brains out, repeat any kind of dumb bullshit that makes you feel hip. It’s a mean world out there, gangbangers and drug pushers and terrorists, and I’ve kept them out of this school. Kept you safe.”

  “Kept us under your thumb.”

  “Who told you that? Your big-mouth pal Andy Baughman who sent Oscar Ramirez and his dad back to the Dominican Republic?”

  Nick snickered. Cody shot him a triumphant look and rocked back on his heels.

  “It doesn’t take much pressure to make losers fold. Zack and those pukes settled pretty fast, your head case Tigerbitch couldn’t wait to run away, and you were all set to snitch, weren’t you?”

  I don’t know, Mike thought. He remembered how numb and nervous he had felt that Monday morning, unsure what he was going to say if Cody pulled him out of class to grill him about the Saturday trip into the city with the Cyber Club. Was he set to snitch? He never found out. Nick beat him to it.

  Cody bellowed, “I said, ‘weren’t you?’”

  Cody seemed to grow taller, expand, loom over him. The office was hot, it was hard to breathe. He felt small and weak. What made him think he could pull this off? Should have listened to Andy: “He won. Leave it alone.”

  “You better leave now,” said Cody. “Before I press charges. You plan on coming back to school, you better bring your dad along.” He snickered. “Mister Dealmaker.”

  “Mister Dealmaker. I like that. Might put it up in the store.”

  Mike whirled. Dad was standing in the doorway, smiling, hands in his pockets. He looked relaxed. Cool. Behind him, Tori and the office staff were trying to peer over his broad shoulders.

  “What the hell you want?”

  Dad’s hands came out of his pockets, opened, palms up, so here’s the deal. “Thought I could help out before anyone has to go to the police. Of course, for all I know, identity theft, impersonation, lying on federal documents, could be matters for the FBI, Homeland Security. I’m just a flooring salesman.”

  Nick was on his hands and knees, looking at the papers Cody had torn and thrown on the floor. “There are official files here.”

  “They hacked it,” said Cody. “People are afraid of nukes in suitcases. They should be scared shitless of pukes online.” His eyes were wild. “The next terrorist strike is going to come from cyberspace, shutting down everything, light, heat, air traffic, defense systems…”

  Nick was waving the torn papers. “This true?” The web on his neck seemed to be quivering.

  “It’s true,” said Mike. “He’s a con man.”

  “Conned me, too,” said Nick. He was almost babbling. “Promised to keep me out of jail if I snitched for him.”

  “You little junkie,” yelled Cody, aiming a kick at Nick, who scrambled out of the way. “I’ll have you back in juvenile hall for knocking Mike off his bike.”

  “What was that about?” said Dad.

  “I’m sorry, Mike,” said Nick, “I was trying to cover my ass, make the pukes think it was you ratted them out.”

  “Endangering minors,” said Dad. “That’s for the local cops. The chief’s my customer. You’re done here, Cody.”

  Cody said, “You’re making a big mistake, Semak. Your kid’ll go down with this.”

  “You heard my dad,” said Mike. He felt big and hard. “You’re done.”

  Cody turned on Mike. “I put you on the varsity, Semak.” He was sweating. “I put you in center field. Made you the captain. Why are you doing this to me?”

  Mike thought, Because it’s what I thought Billy Budd would do. Is that a reason?

  “What’s going on here?” Dr. Howard had pushed past Dad into the room.

  “I’m not going to let them turn this school into a circus.” Cody stuffed papers into a briefcase. “But you can bet I’ll be back and you will all be in the worst trouble of your life.”

  Mike got out of his way as Cody charged through the office, shouldering past Dr. Howard and Dad
, out his door, scattering the staff.

  Mike felt exhausted. A little scared. What’s next?

  “How about some breakfast?” said Dad. “Didn’t get a chance this morning.” He was smiling, rubbing his hands together.

  Mike was glad to see Dad’s hands were trembling, too.

  FORTY-THREE

  He felt the springy green grass and soft earth under his spikes, the June sun cooking the hairs on the back of his neck. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes to hold the moment. He remembered visualizing this day back in March, before the season began, a lifetime ago, before Kat and Oscar and Zack, when Cody was the coach and Billy Budd was a mythical creature on his screen and on his wall.

  “Yo, Mak.” Ryan, trotting out to right field, lobbed a soft toss. Mike caught it, turned, and lobbed it to Eric Nola in left, who made the long throw over Mike’s head to Ryan. He had wondered if he and Ryan would ever be best friends again, if he even wanted to be, but after a while they had drifted back together, throwing soft punches and wisecracks, and he realized that their friendship was long but not deep, and that was okay, too. He was glad Andy had rejoined the team. As captain, Mike could use a wingman with a big mouth.

  Craig finished his warm-ups and stood impatiently on the mound as Coach Sherman, Jimmy Russo, and the infield gathered around to calm him down. Of all the seniors, Craig had taken Coach Cody’s sudden disappearance hardest. He lost his swaggering confidence for a while, as if he had gotten it from Cody. He wasn’t the only one who expected Cody to show up one day, in camo, armed, to clean up the school. But as weeks passed and the cops and the counselors assured everyone that Cody was gone for good, Craig’s fastball started cooking again. Still, he was tight and jittery before a game. Who wasn’t?

  Mike rechecked the flag moving gently above the scoreboard. The light breeze was still blowing in. Fly balls would hang. Need to play even shallower than usual.

  The band struck up the school song and the cheerleaders began a tumbling routine. Lori and Tori twirled. They still weren’t talking to Mike, but Lori had given him a tight smile as they passed in the hall today. He felt sorry for Lori although her suffering act was getting old. Ryan said if he groveled just a little he could hook up with her again, but what was the point? You can’t go backward.

  The meeting at the mound broke up and Coach Sherman yelled, “Shake your eyeballs, Rangers.” When he took over there was talk about changing the nickname back to Ridgerunners but the school board didn’t want to pay for fixing the scoreboard and the uniforms. Maybe next year. He wondered if Cody was keeping up with the team, wherever he was. He was a good coach, Mike thought, and he brought me up to the varsity. But he was a bad guy. The local police and a woman from the FBI had talked to him, but not all that much, and it was not as exciting as CSI. Dad said the school and the town wanted to keep it all as quiet as possible. There was a notice that Cody had left for “personal” reasons.

  Wonder what Oscar’s doing back in the DR. Maybe he’s already sneaked back into the country to play at some other high school. Be great to see his name on a major league roster someday. Imagine if he signed with the Yankees, pushed Billy Budd to left field. Of course, not the way Billy’s playing this season. We’re burning up our leagues together again.

  He scanned the stands until he found the Mike Semak section. Mom and Dad were waving. They had even less time now with both stores open, but they made at least a few innings of his home games. Love to see them here, but I’d understand if they didn’t show. They’ve always been there when we needed them, Scotty was right about that. And Scotty was right to tell Dad about Coach Cody. Couldn’t have done it alone. Still get chills thinking about Dad walking into Coach’s office like in the closing minutes of Law & Order. Scotty loved hearing that, cheered him up. His ensemble did okay in Amsterdam but they didn’t win. The viola. Next time.

  Zack and the Cyber Club were sitting behind Mom and Dad cheering for him. Josh and Tyler were there, although he still wasn’t sure which was which. Some of the old folks, including Regina Marie. He promised to go back to the senior center after the season. Teach them how to hack. That got a laugh from Zack.

  On RidgedaleReform.org he’d read that Nick had been spotted buying a beer in a Nearmont bar just before it was busted for serving underage kids. He was narking again for the local police. Need to catch up to him one of these days. Not such a bad guy.

  Time to get your head in the game.

  Easy, Mak, you’ve got a minute. You can’t enjoy the now unless you remember the then. Who said that? You did.

  Not bad for a dumb jock. Remember to tell Kat that one. She said she’d call after the game. I finally have a reason to leave my cell on, especially at night when she has time to call. Lots of activities and meetings and therapy sessions in that group home. With every call her voice sounds lighter, clearer. He could tell she was as happy to hear his voice as he was to hear hers. She was taking less medicine, she said, and coming to better understand Kat and Tigerbitch. She might be back for a visit this summer. His body flushed at the thought.

  He’d never talked so much to another human being as he talked to Kat late at night. She loved to hear about him and Zack teaming up to bring down Cody. Made him tell that story over and over. She always howled with laughter at his junk food runs for Zack, and the first couple of times he described the final scene in Cody’s office she started sniffling when Dad showed up.

  And she loved to hear about the first times he had watched the video that won the Billy Budd contest, how his own focus had slowly widened until he saw all the other people in the room.

  He tried to talk about what had happened inside him since that March afternoon in the boys’ locker room, how he had changed, but he just wasn’t ready yet. Maybe he was saving that for when they were together again.

  Okay, Mak, drill down. Game time.

  The first batter strutted to the plate. Right-hander, a pull hitter according to scouting reports. Mike waved Eric closer to the left field foul line and signaled Ryan to take a few steps in.

  He zoned in, hummed to himself, We’re born again, there’s new grass on the field.

  About the Author

  ROBERT LIPSYTE is an award-winning sportswriter for The New York Times and USA Today and is the author of a number of acclaimed books, including The Contender and Raiders Night. He is also the recipient of the Margaret A. Edwards Award honoring the whole of his contribution to literature for young readers. He lives in New York. You can visit him online at www.robertlipsyte.com.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

  ALSO BY

  ROBERT LIPSYTE

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  Raiders Night

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  The Summerboy

  Jock and Jill

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  The Contender

  Credits

  Jacket art © 2010 by Jonathan Barkat

  Jacket design by Amy Ryan

  Copyright

  CENTER FIELD. Copyright © 2010 by Robert Lipsyte. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Lipsyte, Robert.

  Center field / Robert Lipsyte.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Mike lives for baseball and hopes to follow his idol into the major leagues one day, but he is distracted
by a new player who might take his place in center field, an ankle injury, problems at home, and a growing awareness that something sinister is happening at school.

  ISBN 978-0-06-055704-1 (trade bdg.)

  ISBN 978-0-06-055705-8 (lib. bdg.)

  [1. Baseball—Fiction. 2. Conduct of life—Fiction. 3. High schools—Fiction. 4. Schools—Fiction. 5. Identity—Fiction. 6. Family life—New Jersey—Fiction. 7. New Jersey—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.L67Cen 2010 2009014586

  [Fic]—dc22 CIP

  AC

  EPub Edition © January 2010 ISBN: 978-0-06-199735-8

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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