“Yeah,” Miss Melba said. “A guy’d have to be a Cal Ripken Iron Man to reach the playoffs uninjured.”2
“What Hasn’t Happened Need Not Happen”
And, at 9:30 p.m, Augustus did just what he said he would. Announcers declared that last night the Braves had taken a 5-to-4 lead on a top-of-the-ninth solo homer by J.-B. Lollis: his second solo shot of the evening. Then, in the bottom of the ninth, their young closer, Poe Kalischer, had taken the mound and secured the win with only ten pitches: a strikeout and two feeble infield grounders.
Joel-Brock had long ago left his cardboard cave, but now he padded into the aisle of TV displays, where he actually did sense a funny kinship to his namesake on this other Braves team. The guy seemed a touchstone to his missing family. What if he really was a long-lost brother from another reality, a reality that Joel-Brock Lollis the Younger also belonged to? The players warming up on TV tonight wore the same odd uniforms they’d worn before, but they did not look quite so funny now.
An ad came on the FōFumm. It urged viewers to fly to the Sea of Tranquility on the Moon and spend two days at the Lunar Ritz-Carlton for the low price of thirty-seven dillies. On the Moon, they could climb craters, zip along low-gravity zip-lines, and sing to their sweethearts in the off-Earth moonglow. The shots of all these attractions looked like lovely spiffy fun to Joel-Brock.
“Today’s computer-graphics people really have talent,” Miss Melba said.
“That stuff did look real,” Augustus agreed, and the game came back on.
J.-B. Lollis the Elder, batting cleanup, rifled a double into right field to score the Braves’ first run. Lollis, an announcer said, had now hit safely in forty-seven straight games and had more votes than anyone else for this year’s All-Star game, which would be held in August, midway through the season’s two hundred games.
“Two hundred!” Augustus cried. “That’s crazy! It’s too blasted many!”
“Yeah,” Miss Melba said. “A guy’d have to be a Cal Ripken Iron Man to reach the playoffs uninjured.”
Joel-Brock had a thought: This TumTong TV—or whatever—was broadcasting their Braves game from a dozen years in the future. He, Joel-Brock, the Home Run Hitter of the Future, had grown into the slender, muscular body of the J.-B. Lollis now standing humbly on second base.
Terrific! Joel-Brock thought. I am truly the Home Run Hitter of the Future, a ball-swatting macho guy like Jason Heyward!
His chest swelled like a battle-ready blowfish. Then he exhaled—for he would have gladly traded his future powers as a hitter for the return of his family. He’d sell can openers for a living or teach little kids to tie their shoes. Just let his parents come back from captivity; Arabella, too, whom he loved even when she stuck a Sticky Stuff leech on his forearm and Sophia his mother could only get it off with Ooze Ouster.But these Braves lost in the bottom of the ninth, 4 to 3, and his future self did not get another hit. But he did make several fine defensive plays in centerfield, robbing one Padres player of a double and throwing out another who had dashed from first to third thinking that J.-B. would never catch his teammate’s drive. But the Braves still lost, and Miss Melba, Mr. Hudspeth, and Joel-Brock all moped around before the big TV feeling bruised and betrayed.
“That’s enough for me.” Augustus pointed a remote at the traitorous FōFumm.
“Wait!” Miss Melba cried. “A reporter’s going to talk to Joel-Brock’s brother.”
“I don’t have a—”
“Shhh,” Miss Melba shushed him. “Shhh, shhh, shhh.”
*
Outside the visitors’ dugout, a young woman named Calla faced Joel-Brock’s “brother” and spoke into her microphone: “J.-B., this defeat must have been especially tough. You had a two-run lead going into the bottom of the ninth.”
J.-B. said, “Give the Padres credit. They fought back against our best closer and scratched out three hits.”
“No regrets, then?”
“You can’t regret a well-hit ball that doesn’t drop for a hit. You can’t regret not catching a long fly that surfs an updraft before you reach it.”
“But you’ve fallen four and a half games behind Miami in your run at winning the Eastern Division. That’s got to hurt.”
“Plenty of season left.”
“The Marlins have won eleven of their last twelve. Over the same span of games, the Bravos are barely breaking even.”
Lollis rubbed his thumb on his jaw. “Is there a question in those statistics?”
“Don’t you find them discouraging?”
“A month ago we won nine straight while the Marlins struggled. They had every right to get down, but they didn’t.”
“So you don’t see this as a really tough loss?”
“It’s a stumble in a long-distance race. Tough losses just don’t occur in baseball—unless you think baseball has the same juice and savor as life does.”
“But sports provide ‘juice and savor’ to life, don’t they?”
“Sure, Calla, but tough losses don’t occur on baseball fields, tennis courts, or even stock-exchange floors. Tough losses happen elsewhere.”
“Like where?”
“In our daily lives, among our families and friends.”
“Do you speak from personal experience?”
“Anyone with an awareness of life’s various pitfalls could do the same.”
“Please tell us a little more about that.”
“Forgive me, Calla, but I need a shower and some rack time.” J.-B. Lollis ducked into the dugout, out of camera range
Augustus clicked the set off, and both Miss Melba and Augustus looked at Joel-Brock. Their gazes fell on him like wet beach towels, as did Calla’s final question about J.-B.’s personal life: Thirteen years from now, his family’s kidnapping was still unsolved.
Augustus said, “You’re J.-B. Lollis! J.-B. Lollis is you all grown up!”
“My family never came home,” Joel-Brock said, as this fact sank in. “That means that . . . that they never will.”
Miss Melba hugged him. “No, punkin. Everybody knows you can change a future that hasn’t shaken out yet.”
“I don’t know that,” Augustus said.
Miss Melba shot him a look. “It just makes sense: What hasn’t happened doesn’t need to. What needs to happen can, if folks work to make sure it does.”
“Horse feathers,” Augustus said. “Chicken’s teeth.”
Joel-Brock rubbed his eyes and considered Miss Melba’s words, but all he said was, “I need a shower and some rack time.”