Fast Pitch

In the novel’s final chapters, the narrative arc climaxes and resolves as Shenice finds the hiding space Jack referred to: “There’s something hidden here that looks as though it’s wrapped in layers of that plastic wrap stuff my mom uses to cover leftover food in the fridge” (158). Paralleling JonJon’s baseball trunk from the novel’s beginning, Shenice questioned whether Jack’s evidence box truly existed. Both objects act as dual symbols for the Lockwoods’ family history and, more broadly, that peoples’ histories cannot so easily be erased. Stone closes the novel with the reminder that people continue leaving marks on the world and that who people are perceived to be is not who they need to be forever.

Stone also demonstrates how people and families can change by introducing Kathleen, Jacob Carlyle’s granddaughter. Kathleen chooses to “do something that would make him roll over in his grave” when she donates $75,000 to the Fulton Firebirds (172). Her only request is that the money go to providing the team with new and better equipment—because Jacob tried to take away the Lockwoods’ place in sports history, Kathleen wants to make amends by aiding the only all-Black team in the league in securing their place in history. Shenice’s letter to JonJon serves as a closing message to uplift unheard voices and listen to the stories people try to erase. Stone wants everyone to be able to own and access their histories.

Chapters 16-18 carry the majority of Shenice’s character growth because Stone shows the culmination of themes, symbols, and conflicts that come together in the final softball game. The Firebirds know they cannot win, which adds additional significance to Shenice’s final words to her teammate up to bat: “I’m just glad to have friends like y’all” (168). Thus far, Shenice has worried about what she means to her team as their captain and her family as the inheritor of a now-rewritten legacy. Stone further demonstrates the shift in Shenice’s letter to JonJon, when she tells him, “And though I can’t guarantee the ball-playing gene will continue in my children [...] I can promise that your TRUE legacy will live on forever now” (174). Shenice’s internal conflicts revolve around how she perceives her legacy relative to JonJon’s legacy that Carlyle erased. With JonJon’s legacy restored, Shenice knows that people are not measured by what they do, but by how people remember them—something she can now carry forward in her family.

In the novel’s final chapter, Stone explains the symbolism of the softball team’s name—the Firebirds. Though they lose the tournament in the final match, Shenice does not allow the team to become discouraged. Instead, she tells her friends, “Well, it looks like we’ll have no choice but to rise from the ashes, Firebirds” (169). Firebirds are otherwise known as phoenixes, which in folklore die and reincarnate from their own ashes; they create a never-ending cycle of life and death, where death is not a limiting factor in the creature’s survival. Like the phoenix, Shenice’s softball team must overcome a difficult season and come back stronger than before. Likewise, the message takes on a grander meaning when placed in the context of the team—a team of all-Black players who overcome adversity every time they walk onto the field. Stone ends the novel with a hopeful tone that adversity and oppression are not the end, and to continue rising above it to become stronger through the challenges.