A High Five for Glenn Burke: Chapters 10–19

Webb’s the one who’s taught me all about the sweet spot. It’s where you want your bat to meet the ball, the spot where the optimum amount of energy gets transferred.

Whenever I’m playing center field, I always keep a wad of seeds in my cheek and spit them at patches of grass, divots, pieces of paper, and dandelions.

Webb brought him in to pitch the final frame, but by the way he trudged to the mound, I knew he didn’t want to throw.

But since I’m moving with the pitch, I have a great jump on the ball, and on the dead run and with my glove fully extended, I snag the ball backhanded and knee high.

In the late 1960s, nearly a decade before Glenn Burke raised his hand and invented the high five, Lamont Sleets Sr. was a soldier serving valiantly in the Vietnam War, as a member of the First Battalion, Fifth Infantry, a unit better known by their nickname, the Five.

In the late 1960s, nearly a decade before Glenn Burke raised his hand and invented the high five, Lamont Sleets Sr. was a soldier serving valiantly in the Vietnam War, as a member of the First Battalion, Fifth Infantry, a unit better known by their nickname, the Five.

“We live in a time where the difference between fact and fiction, the difference between truth and untruth, is more difficult to discern than ever. Far too many are far too quick to believe anything and everything they hear.”

“Your mother’s erring on the side of caution. You know how she gets.”

Even in the dark, I can see the rows of star-shaped stickers Haley has stuck to the vanity’s cabinet door.

When it reaches a structure that resembles a silo, it pushes a lever, and the top pops up.

Coach Noles is manning the pitching machine by home plate. He’s been mixing speeds and trajectories the whole time Brayden, Ernesto, and I have been out here, but so far, I’ve chased down every ball, and I’m chasing down this one, too.

Malik at short and Jason at second are both racing back, but Malik veers off because he knows it’s the center fielder’s ball, and I never give way.

I also manage to keep my eye on the ball—which has changed direction—and with my bare hand, I reach back and snare it.

“Silas.” He smiles, then laughs. “I’m not; I won’t. All I’m saying is, don’t underestimate them.”

“Nothing’s changed. You’ll still never give away an at bat; you’ll still never concede an out.”

I close my eyes, and for a moment, I listen to the sounds of the park—the hum of the lights down the foul lines; the clicking of the water sprinklers on the next field; the lowering of the metal gates at the concession stands; the steady, low roar of the traffic on the road beyond the parking lot.

“A word for gay people,” I say. “A slur.”

“A bundle of sticks used for kindling, for burning heretics alive centuries ago.”

“Heretics?”
“People who believed things that were considered wrong by society,” Webb says. “People whose actions and beliefs went against the church or the establishment.”

“I’m serious. You be you. Keep being authentic.”