The white ball flew a ways then sliced hard to the right. It disappeared from view, and then they heard it crash through the trees on the far side of the field.
“I thought you learned how to golf this summer,” Pete said.
“I thought I did too.” Johnny teed up another ball and drove it into the field. This one sailed straight at a low trajectory toward the setting sun until it reached its apex. It hung in midair before falling back to earth, a tiny speck in the distance. “See,” Johnny said, “I hit most of them just like that, but once in a while they get away from me.”
He handed the driver to Pete. Pete teed up a ball and stood over it then swung the club like a baseball bat. The ball went straight and landed near Johnny’s among the dry broken stalks of last year’s corn. The field hadn’t been planted this year.
They aimed their shots at the solitary tree that stood in the absolute center of the field, an oak, wider than it was tall, and so far away that the best of their drives didn’t make it halfway. Johnny had never seen the tree close up, but its trunk must have been huge. He imagined a farmer a long time ago with his plow horse, sitting in its shade, eating his lunch.
Pete hit the last ball and Johnny grabbed another grocery bag full of them from the back of his Jeep. He dumped them on the ground.
“How many of those do you have?” Pete asked.
“I’ve got more balls than you can count.”
Pete drove another ball with his baseball swing and watched until it landed.
“You really want to hit them all?” he asked. “We’ll never find them.”
“I don’t want to find them.”
“You’re not going to golf up north?”
“I’ll be happy if I never see another golf ball. It’s like it’s a game to hit them at the guy raking sand traps.
Pete handed Johnny the club. “Have you talked to Clare?”
“Nope,” Johnny said, swinging the club hard and slicing another shot.
“She knows you’re leaving tomorrow?”
“I’m sure she does.”
“And you’re not going to call her?”
“If she wanted to see me, she’d call.”
Johnny leaned the club against the Jeep and sat down on the tailgate. Pete went inside the house. He came out with two beers.
The late August sun was now below the horizon, a red sky in its wake. They sat on the tailgate drinking. Johnny picked at the label with his fingernail. Neither one spoke for a long time, not an awkward silence, just a silence. Every few minutes one got up, hit a few balls, then sat back down.
“I think you’ll regret it if you don’t at least try to see her,” Pete said.
“I know.”
Pete went inside for more beers. Johnny was alone, the sky completely dark now. The stars were out. Good country stars. Not northern or western stars. They were far away, but they were good.
Johnny teed up the last ball and focused on the technique of his swing. He hit it into the darkness and didn’t care where it would land.
