The Hitting Zone
chapter-737

I had put the broken pieces of my bat back in my bag and relaxed on the bench with Noah.

Noah glanced at my bag. "You're going to keep the pieces of that bat?"

I shrugged. "I've kept the others."

"But those held some significance to you."

"I think they all do." I told him. I didn't want to throw any of them away. I can never go back to an aluminum bat. No amount of healing can make me forget how I almost died. The wood bats saved this sport for me. It just feels wrong to throw them away.

"Well, I guess you could start marking how and when each one broke." He suggested. "That would be pretty cool. I don't know if I have that many empty shoeboxes though."

"I'd like that." I grinned, and looked towards Bryce who just got another strikeout to end the inning. "Bet Bryce would not."

"Nah, he totally would." Noah laughed. "He'd probably take pride in that. Let's ask him after the game."

We sat on the bench and watched the game without being involved. Bryce really did well if you excluded the first inning and the homer he gave up to me. As for Marshel? He was replaced once he started to give up hits in the late innings of the game. He was sent to the bench as someone new was brought in.

"You pitched well today." Noah said to Marshel as he passed us to go sit on the bench.

Marshel glanced our way, but didn't say anything back. He just continued on to his bag and sat down.

"Why'd you compliment him?" I asked, feeling a little annoyed.

Noah smirked. "It wasn't a complete compliment. If he had pitched really well, he wouldn't have been benched. But besides that, I'm a nice person. A good team player."

I raised an eyebrow. Noah hadn't lowered his voice and I'm sure Marshel would be able to hear him. I didn't blame Noah though. I could remember Marshel from the bus incident a few months back. He had once accused Noah of dragging the team down when Noah was struggling at the plate.

Mr. Miller came back to the rather quiet dugout. He looked around, but didn't see anything out of place. The game wrapped up soon after the switch. Bryce did the whole seven innings for his team, only losing by one. Not that the score mattered.

Since Noah and I were on the bench, we had already changed out of our cleats and had packed our bags. After a simple goodbye to Mr. Miller, we left the dugout.

"Hold on a second." Noah told me, heading for the other dugout. I slowly followed after him. "Hey! Bryce!"

Bryce came up against the fence, sweating and a little bit dirty. "Yea? What's up?" He looked at me. "You sure you're okay, Jake?"

I nodded.

"Yea, yea, he's fine." Noah waved. "We were just talking about Jake keeping his broken bats. We want to start dating them and marking down where and against who. That kind of stuff." He grinned. "You're now officially a part of Jake's history of broken bats. You're number three. I'll be sure to mark down that you gave up a homerun."

Bryce laughed, not offended in the slightest. "That's fine. Next time I break his bat, it's going to be an out. Better mark that down correctly then too."

"In your dreams!" Noah scoffed. He took a step back. "Anyways, good game today. I can't believe you fielded Jake's bunt by yourself."

Bryce shrugged. "No one believed me when I said he was going to bunt. After all, Jake has been hitting bombs. Why would someone like him bunt?"

"Then how did you know?" I asked, curious.

He grinned. "As soon as I saw you talking to Mr. Miller, I knew you weren't going to do your usual thing at the plate. You showing bunt was a dead giveaway."

I pouted.

He laughed. "Don't get down on yourself. I know you well. I also know Mr. Miller." He glanced at Noah. "I really wanted to throw Noah out at second though. That would have been best to be able to catch him off guard like that."

Noah laughed. "I'm too fast for ya!"

Bryce smirked. "Not fast enough or you would have scored."

Noah stopped laughing. "Whatever. Bye loser." He walked back to me and pulled me along. "Let's go."

I held back a laugh.

We left the field together, and headed for the bleachers. I guess a different game must have ended before ours, because there was now a line going up the bleachers towards where Jeremy was.

"He'll be a minute." Zeke approached us with Coach and Alisha trailing behind him. "You guys played well."

"Someone has definitely improved in the speed department." Coach looked at Noah. "Protect those legs of yours. I think you could break the school record for stolen bases if you really tried." He looked to me. "And I think you could make a run for the homerun record. Which is held by Zeke here." He slapped Zeke on the shoulder. "Watch your back. They're coming for you."

Zeke smiled. "I don't mind. Records are meant to be broken. As long as they can win league back-to-back, that'll put them ahead of me."

Coach looked to me again. "Tell Jeremy thanks on behalf of the school. I'll be in contact with him over the weekend."

I stared blankly at him.

He nodded at Alisha. "Let's go see how the other game is going." He waved at us. "See you boys later." He and Alisha hurried up the hill to the game that was still going on.

"Thanks?" Noah asked. Then his eyes widened. "Guess the school really is going to get a better weight room!"

Oh. I remember Jeremy mentioning how important it was to a school to have a good weight room. It could really help a team gain some extra muscle.

"They had a good talk. Jeremy knows his stuff." Zeke told us.

"You know stuff too." Noah pointed out.

Zeke gave a small shake of his head. "I don't know anything about donations to a school. There's a lot that goes into it. Like permission from the school board, principal, athletic director and so forth. How fast another building could be built and for what use. Jeremy has almost everything done besides a good start date. He really put a lot of effort into this."

"Wow." Noah grinned. "Guess he wasn't all talk." He nudged me. "He's really turning the corner."

"I think so too." I nodded. Then looked up at Jeremy still signing autographs and taking selfies with the players. "Do we just sit here and wait for him?"

"Yea. We will." Zeke said. "I've already messaged the twins that they could head home whenever. I'll take Noah home after Jeremy is done. We'll wait with you."

I smiled at him. "Thanks."

We found an open spot on a different bleacher and sat down.

"You got your phone on you, right?" Zeke asked me.

I nodded, then started to search my bag for it. I pulled it out and showed him.

"I was just making sure." He looked at the broken wood pieces in my bag, just hanging out loosely. "You didn't throw it away?"

Noah cut in and explained what we were going to do.

Zeke nodded, understanding. "I'll talk to Dad about what we can do. Especially if you want to make some kind of cubby to hold all of your bats now. I know we can't store them in the garage, but they take up a lot of space in your room, right?"

Noah shrugged. "It's not bad. Just the bottom part of our closet. I can probably make more space if I clean up my room and get rid of stuff I don't need anymore."

They started to talk it over. I had no ideas or suggestions so I listened and nodded along.