Pinch Hit (6 page)

“Can you do that?” McKenna asked.

“Watch me,” Trevor said.

The stage manager knocked on the door. He apologized to Trevor for the delay, saying they had some technical issues with the lighting but that they were ready for him now. Trevor opened the door, and McKenna followed him out onto the set. Gabriel appeared, trying not to look flustered.

“Who was yelling out here?” Trevor asked him. “I thought I heard shouting.”

“Something about the stand-in,” Gabriel said. “There were some issues. Anyway, they got another one.”

“Issues?” Trevor admired the way Gabriel hid the truth without actually lying.

“You should ask Pierce.”

They both knew that Trevor wouldn't ask the director such a thing when they were ready for a shot. Pierce was famous for his intense focus and his equally intense displeasure when someone distracted him. The closer he got to the shot, the angrier he was if someone disturbed him.

“No big deal,” Trevor said, noting the relief on Gabriel's face.

Trevor stepped up onto the set and watched the new stand-in disappear. He was surprised at how quickly they'd managed to produce another boy with nearly the same size, shape, and hair color as Trevor and Sam, but they did it. Trevor took his mark. Someone handed him a sword.

“Okay, Trevor, remember what's just happened.” The director's voice came from behind the bright lights. “Your mother's been killed and you're crushed. I want you fighting back the tears. Then,
boom
, out of the lava, the living dragon appears, and you're stunned because now you know the legend she always told you is true. You got it?”

“I got it,” Trevor said, conjuring up the emotions that Pierce Everette was asking for.

“Okay, now I'll cue you on the dragon. We'll CG that in, but I want you to be shocked, completely in awe.”

“Got it,” Trevor said, breathing deep and putting himself into a kind of trance.

“And … action!”

Trevor gave the director what he wanted … almost. They did twelve takes before Pierce called it quits and Trevor got to go back to his dressing room. McKenna headed onto the set as he was leaving and slapped him a high five like they were tag team wrestlers, one going off while the other took over the battle.

Back in the dressing room, Trevor dialed up his mom. He heard the caution in her voice as she greeted him, but he pretended not to notice. “Can I go to McKenna's to swim and have a cookout after we're done shooting? I guess she's gonna have some people over.”

“I've got a dinner with the hospital board anyway, so that works out great. Sure. I'll be done about nine-thirty; can I pick you up then on my way home?”

“Great. Thanks, Mom.”

“Everything else okay?”

“Sure. Like what?”

“I don't know … anybody unusual you meet today?”

Trevor pretended to think. “No, Everette had his family here yesterday, some cousins or something I took pictures with. That who you mean?”

His mom hesitated. “Yes, them. I'm glad you met them. Everette doesn't have a lot of family. Have fun, angel.”

Trevor got off and smiled to himself.

Sam's dad spent the rest of the day writing while Sam dug deeper into
The Count of Monte Cristo
. When his dad finally left his desk and stretched his back, he asked Sam if he wanted to go get something to eat before being dropped off at McKenna Steele's.

“I think we're having dinner there. I'm ready when you are.”

Sam's dad pushed the curtain aside and studied the Ferrari. “Let me just wash down the car. It won't take thirty or forty minutes.”

Sam knew better than to argue. If his dad was driving into the heart of Beverly Hills, he was going in a clean Ferrari. He returned to his bedroom and picked up his book. Forty-five minutes later, Sam heard a shout from out front. The Ferrari shone like a polished gem and his dad beamed with pride.

“Nice,” Sam said.

They climbed in and headed toward town in style. The Ferrari was on its best behavior, and Sam's dad clucked his tongue as they turned up McKenna's street.

“McKenna Steele.” Sam's dad touched his own forehead. “I can't believe it.”

“I told you, Dad, she's just a nice person. We hit it off.” Sam stared out the window at the beautiful homes packed together along Beverly Drive.

“In five minutes?” Sam's father sat up straight and stuck his arm out of the window, obviously proud of their ride.

“She said she liked my face. This is it, twenty-seven-nineteen.” Sam pointed to the number on the stone gatepost of a Spanish-style yellow home with a red clay tile roof and wrought-iron balconies that matched the front gate.

Sam's dad eased the car up into the circular stone driveway. Sam hopped out and headed for the front door.

“Well, have fun,” his dad said through the open window. “I'll pick you up at eight-thirty.”

Sam turned and waved to him, wishing his father would stop sitting in his car gawking at the house. Sam rang the bell. A maid with a strange accent greeted him warmly and said McKenna was out back at the pool. Sam turned and gave his father one last wave. His father's face beamed with pride, as if Sam had just hit a grand-slam home run in a championship game. Sam had his swimsuit in a plastic grocery bag and he held it up, asking the maid if there was a place he could change.

She told him there was a pool house and led him through a home with towering ceilings and plaster walls covered with fancy oil paintings in thick gold frames of carved wood. Antique furniture sat on large Oriental rugs. Sam tried not to touch anything.

Out in back, carefully sculpted shrubs and trees surrounded a rectangular pool and a small cottage with a roof that matched the big house's. At the end by the diving board, McKenna and Trevor sat on thick lounge chairs, both intent on their own iPhones.

The maid pointed out the pool house to Sam, saying he could change there and asking if he would like a drink.

“Gatorade would be great, if you have it,” Sam said, waving to the movie stars as he slowly descended the wide stone steps.

After changing, Sam studied his muscles in the mirror, clenching his hands and looking for veins in his forearms before he moved up to his teeth and scowled at the uneven edges of his two top fronts. After looking at himself in the mirror for too long, Sam emerged from the pool house with a towel around his shoulders and sat down in a chair next to Trevor.

“Glad you could make it.” Trevor slapped Sam a high five.

“You've got some house.” Sam looked at McKenna.

McKenna put her iPhone aside. “Thanks. Glad you could make it.”

The maid brought drinks for them all. Sam sipped at his and watched the other two to see what he should do. They put their drinks on one of the cocktail tables and Sam did the same.

“We asked you here for a reason,” Trevor said.

“He's always planning things,” McKenna said.

“It stinks what happened.” Trevor's face looked sorry, but Sam couldn't help remembering that he was an actor. Then Trevor said, “Do you think we could be twins?”

Sam felt like someone had punched him in the face. He blinked. “What?”

Trevor shrugged. “Come on. Look at us. McKenna?”

“You're pretty exact.”

Trevor swung his legs off the lounge chair so that he sat sideways and closer to Sam. “You're adopted, right?”

“How did you know?”

“If we're twins, that's what happened. Your birthday was yesterday, right?”

“No,” Sam said, actually feeling some relief. “My birthday is
July
second, not June.”

Trevor looked at McKenna with confusion. McKenna sat sideways on her chair now, too, and said, “What if someone just changed the month on the birth certificate. How hard would that be? It's just two letters.”

“I'm not from here,” Sam said. “I'm from Sandusky, Ohio.”

Trevor waved a hand through the air. “We could have been born in Tibet. That doesn't matter. Look, I think it's why my mom freaked out.”

“It wasn't about me asking you to help with my dad's script?” Sam asked.

“I told you that when we texted.” Trevor held up his phone as a reminder. “We think she doesn't want me to know about you, and the fact that I have a brother out there.”

“Why would she care?” Sam asked.

Trevor shrugged. “I don't want to sound snooty, but people like my mom think different. They always worry that people want things from them. Or, maybe she feels guilty? Maybe she knew about both of us and chose me. You got left behind.”

“I'm not ‘left behind,'” Sam said. “My dad's the greatest.”

“I didn't mean that.”

“Okay.”

“You're a good baseball player, right?”

“I'm good. Yeah.”

“On some big travel team? Playing for a city title?”

“With the chance to get into USC's Elite Training Center.”

Trevor nodded vigorously. “All right. So, I've got something that's going to sound crazy, but I want you to think about it. I want you to think about how great it would be for you and for me.”

Sam squinted at Trevor. The fancy house and pool and the maid and pool house, along with the eager look on McKenna's face, made him feel like a fly in a spider's web.

“What would?” Sam asked.

“I want us, you and me … to trade places.”

“For how long?” Sam asked.

Trevor was surprised at Sam's question, but maybe he shouldn't have been. If they really were twins—and Trevor had no doubt now that they were—then it made sense that they'd think alike, too.

“I don't know how long. A couple weeks? Not forever.” Trevor laughed at that idea.

Sam nodded, thinking. “Why?”

“You can live the life of a movie star.” Trevor opened his hands and held them out to Sam as if to give it all to him right then and there. “You want to go to the beach and have a campfire? You fly in a helicopter to Malibu. You want to have a party? We've got a video arcade, a soda fountain, a home theater, a bunk room, pool, guesthouse, bowling alley, dance floor, three-hole golf course, almost anything you can think of.”

“No,” Sam said, cutting him off. “I'm not asking why for me. I'm asking why for you?”

Trevor laughed. “Baseball. I want to
play
.”

“Why can't you play?”

Trevor felt his face scrunch up. “Why can't I? I know. It's crazy, but my mom says no. My career is the reason. My career and my parents' lifestyle. When I'm not in a movie, we're off living in Paris or Tahiti or someplace nuts on location with my dad, or with my mom. Travel team baseball doesn't have a place in my world. Man, I don't even go to
school
.”

Trevor almost said “It stinks,” but he kept his wits about him and held his tongue. He wanted this trade, so he didn't want Sam thinking his life was anything but a fun-filled adventure on Easy Street.

“How are you gonna play for me?” Sam asked. “I play all the time. I'm good. I'm real good. My team's gotta make it into the finals for me to get to USC.”

“I can carry your weight. I don't play, but I bet I practice as much as you, if not more. Every chance I get. I've got my own batting cage. I've got a coach who comes three times a week. You know who Tom Royal is? He used to play for the Dodgers. He says I've got what it takes. My dad laughs and says he's trying to sell me more private lessons, but I know I'm good. I could do it. I just need the chance.”

Sam went quiet. He looked down at his bare feet. “I live by a landfill.”

“I don't care,” Trevor said, the excitement building in him. “Listen to this, this is why, no matter what else, I
know
you'll want to do it.”

Trevor allowed a dramatic pause, the way he would if he was delivering a big line in a movie.

“You can get your dad's script into the right people's hands.”

“The right people?”

“Producers, agents, directors, studio executives,” Trevor said. “When you're me, you're going to have access to everyone, and if you say you want them to do it, if you say you want to act in it? Then you can get your father's movie to get optioned and then all the way to a
green light
.”

Sam's eyes lost focus for a moment. Trevor flashed a grin at McKenna.

She clapped her hands. “This is like something in a movie, only it's real.”

“Won't people know?” Sam asked.

“Not if we cut your hair. McKenna's got some tanning spray and a way to give you a birthmark like mine. No one will ever know, and if either of us has questions or problems? We'll just text each other.”