The Click
Chapter Two

Oliver Hitchcock, six foot-four and thin, looked and felt more than twenty years

younger than his seventy-eight years bounding up the old brick steps to the front door. Dressed in baseball gear with a big ‘M’ on the cap that covered his bald head, he KNOCKED at the door and immediately let himself in. Hitch’s daughter, Kathy, waited at the bottom of the stairs with a stern expression and folded arms.

“Dad, what’s wrong with you?”

“Where is he? OJ.”

“Four times just this morning he heard it.

Hitch stepped to one side of Kathy and yelled up the stairs. “OJ! Game time! Oliver Junior, Hitch’s eleven year old grandson and namesake, raced down the

stairs in his Muckraker’s baseball uniform. Kathy stretched her arms out to block him. “No! You are not …”

OJ ducked under her arms, grabbed his baseball glove off a table, and charged out the door.

“See, OJ wants to play. He’s …

Just then, meek and fragile Christopher, Hitch’s younger grandson, appeared at the top of the stairs.

“Kathy looked up and barked at him. “Christopher, stay in your room.” He disappeared without a word. She turned back to her father with venom in her eyes.

“No. You want him to play. We both know what he’s hearing.”

“What’s he supposed to do? Stay in his room until... He isn’t even sick yet.” “I guess throwing up in the middle of the night doesn’t count.”

Hitch raced for the door. “For God’s sake, the Mudrakers are playing for the championship. What do you expect?” He really couldn’t understand his own daughter. Why wouldn’t she want what could be his last weeks to be memorable?

Just as he and OJ arrived and raced into the crowd of parents and fans, the players on the opposing team, the Possums, were taking the field and Hitch’s riff with his daughter no longer occupied his thoughts. He remained focused on the game through all six and a half innings. It was the bottom of the seventh, the Mudrakers were up by one, three to two, but the Possums had bases loaded. OJ stood on the mound, distressed and grim-faced. The count was two balls and one strike. His eyes darted from the batter to his grandfather in the dugout. He stepped off the mound and dropped his glove. The palms of his hands moved up to his temples as his eyes closed, as he grimaced, a grimace obvious enough for Hitch to see—and ignore even though he could imagine the CLICK, CLICK, CLICK filling OJ’s head.

OJ opened his eyes, looked back at the scoreboard in leftfield, a hologram projected twenty feet up, turned back to the batter and picked up his glove. Hitch stepped out from the dugout. “Come on, OJ, finish this kid.”

OJ returned to the mound, looked at the base runner on third, then wound up and pitched. “Strike two,” the Umpire behind the plate called. The count was two balls and two strikes. Again OJ grimaced and again Hitch could imagine the CLICK, CLICK but ignored it once again. He could even see the sweat dripping down OJ’s cheeks. “One more strike OJ, that’s all.”

OJ acknowledged his grandfather with a nod, wiped the beads from his cheeks, wound up and pitched—way outside causing the catcher to fall to his right with his mitt extended to make the save. Hitch was so focused on the save; he didn’t notice his grandson fall to his knees until he heard the Umpire call timeout. “Get another pitcher, Hitchcock,” he snapped.

Hitch waved him off, jogged out to the mound, and helped OJ up. “Grandpa, it’s so loud. I …

“Son, you’re no quitter.”

“I’m trying. It’s … It’s that sound.

“Forget that. Forget the crowd. Just concentrate on the strike zone. Just one more pitch.” Hitch patted him on the back and headed for the dugout. The Umpire jumped into his path. “Are you crazy?”

Hitch snapped back. “Just do your job.”

Play resumed. All eyes were on OJ who wiped the sweat from his brow and fixed on the batter. The Crowd CHEERED, players on both sides HOOTED and HOLLERED. OJ glanced at his grandfather. Hitch nodded and CLAPPED his hands.

The count was full, three balls and two strikes. OJ wound up and delivered the ball right down the middle. The base runners took off, and the batter swung, strike three. The Muckrakers beat the Possums, three to two. Hitch could see his grandson from the mound with his hands up and a victory grin across his face. The Muckraker fans swarmed the field in celebration hiding OJ from view. All of a sudden, Hitch heard the Umpire’s voice. “Hitchcock! Get out here.”

Hitch wedged his way through the celebration, spotted the umpire, then his grandson on the ground. He crouched over OJ who was on his back, stiff, motionless, and for a moment he froze. He looked up at the umpire who glared back.

In an uncharacteristic fit of anger, Christopher insisted he wanted to see his brother and father play ball. Kathy was just as adamant that they not go, that is, until her mother showed up at the front door. Edna Hitchcock, whose matronly appearance contrasted sharply with Oliver’s youthful exuberance, had no intention of denying her favorite grandson his wish and she made that quite clear to her daughter.

After navigating the typical Saturday afternoon traffic through the Virginia suburbs of Washington DC by allowing her scud to take control and negotiate side streets it found were clear, Kathy pulled into the parking lot as one car after another streamed past her. “The game must be over,” she said after pulling into a space.

“Mom, look!” Christopher pointed to flashing red lights.

Kathy jumped from the car allowing her to see the paramedic truck, then dashed off knowing exactly what she would replace. She could feel her heart racing faster than her feet could pedal as she approached a crowd surrounding the flashing lights. She slowed down allowing her mother and Christopher to catch up. She needed someone to hold on to. Two paramedics were carrying a stretcher with a body covered over causing her to let go of her mother’s hand, and Christopher’s, and push through parents and kids, then fling herself onto the stretcher. She closed her eyes and WAILED. By then Hitch and the umpire were at her side. She looked up filled with the anguish only a parent knows and saw her father looking limp and woozy. The umpire stepped between them and spoke the very thoughts that echoed across her temples. “A Preemie in the throes of The Click and you let him play?” The umpire walked off shaking his head as the remaining crowd was shocked into silence. Only sobs and moans from the dead boy’s mother could be heard.

Kathy turned away from the stretcher as it was lifted into the paramedic truck and grabbed onto her younger son, purposely blocking his view while quietly glaring at her father.

“He died a champion, not in bed. … At least I gave him that,” he said in a whisper loud enough for his daughter and the others to hear. He marched on to the empty field and fell to his knees at the pitcher’s mound. Kathy could hear him sob but remained where she was, frozen in time, praying she would blink her eyes and discover there was no such thing as The Click or Preemies.

While everyone seemed to have a difficult time at the funeral, Kathy was devastated. OJ had been her first miracle, Christopher here second. She and her parents and Christopher as well as the others sat on wooden folding chairs at the burial site listening to the minister from their Liberal Church of Spirituality when she noticed her father standing to one side staring off in the distant. She followed his gaze. She could see across the road a lone woman leaning against a tree and staring back in her direction. The woman was wearing a black leather jacket with VAMA in yellow along one sleeve. Kathy knew the jacket and VAMA, the Vaccine Assurance and Management Agency, but didn’t have the slightest idea why she was there or why her father even noticed …except for the fact the woman seemed quite attractive.