The Fan by Peter Abrahams

every ball cleanly and had a strong arm. Twenty-three’s arm was even stronger, and this time when the man with the whistle said, “Nice job,” his tone said it too. Twenty-three was a big kid, not possibly the same age as Richie.
    Gil was aware of a man stepping down through the stands, sitting beside him. “Hi, Gil,” he said. “Aren’t they cute?”
    Gil turned. Tim.
    “Who?” Gil said.
    “The kids. It’s the best age.” Tim held out his hand. “How’re you doing?”
    Gil shook hands. “They’re not all nine, are they?”
    “Supposed to be,” Tim said. “The tens are next, then the elevens and the twelves. The draft’s in a couple weeks, not that it matters where Richie’s concerned.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Only a handful of nines make the majors. The rest play in the minors. No pressure.”
    But Richie was good. Gil remembered how they’d rolled a tennis ball back and forth across the floor while Richie was still in diapers. “He’ll be right up there,” Gil said.
    “Sure.” Tim opened a file. Inside were sheets of paper with five or six lines of handwritten
W
s on the top half and crayon drawings of wigwams, willows, and winter below. Tim made a red check mark on the first sheet and wrote, “Wonderful!” underlining the
W
, then turned to the next one.
    “Twenty-six,” called the man with the whistle. Richie came forward, chewing on his glove.
    Hustle
, thought Gil.
    “Hustle,” said the man with the whistle.
    Richie jogged to center court, his right foot glancing out to the side slightly on every stride. “Does he always run like that?” Gil said.
    “Like what?” asked Tim, looking up from his papers.
    The man with the whistle hit the first ground ball, right at Richie, but much harder than any of the other ground balls yet hit, Gil thought, and picking up topspin on the composite floor.
    Glove down, glove down.
    Richie stuck his glove down, but too late, and the ball went through his legs.
    “Oops,” said Tim.
    “No problem,” said the man with the whistle, and hit Richie another. Again: harder than the balls he’d hit the other kids.
    “Glove down.” This time Gil said it aloud, but quietly, he was sure of that.
    Richie got his glove down a little faster, deflecting the ball to the side. He ran after it, bobbled it, scooped it up, threw a sidearm rainbow that bounced a few times and finally rolled to the feet of the teenager.
    “Much better,” said Tim.
    “How long have you known about this?” Gil said.
    “About what?”
    “This tryout.”
    “A few weeks?”
    “Have you been practicing with him?”
    “In this weather?”
    The third grounder was on its way. “Look how hard the asshole’s hitting it,” Gil said, not loudly, and, not much louder, “Butt down, butt down.” Get your butt down and the glove comes down automatically. Had Richie heard him? Probably not, but he did get down for this one, and the ball popped into his glove.
    “All right, twenty-six,” said the man with the whistle. Richie threw the ball in, a little more strongly this time, but still a sidearm toss that didn’t come close to reaching in the air.
    “Crow-hop, for Christ’s sake,” Gil said. But quietly.
    Richie looked into the stands.
    “Here we go,” said the man with the whistle, and tossed the first fly ball.
    Richie turned from the stands, realized what was happening, tried to find the ball, glancing up wildly at the gym ceiling.
    “Get your fucking glove up.”
    “Hey,” said Tim. “Easy.”
    Richie got his glove up, but never saw the ball. It arced under the gaudy championship banners for basketball, football, wrestling, and hit him on the head.
    Richie collapsed screaming on the gym floor, holding his head, jerking around in agony. The coaches with the clipboards, the man with the whistle, the teenager, all ran to him, but Gil got there first. He knelt, put his hand on Richie’s shoulder, felt his boniness under the sweat shirt.
    “Richie, it’s me. You’re