2 and 0
by Don Mayhew
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2010 by Don Mayhew
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment. If you’re reading this and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for you, please consider going to Smashwords.com to purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, events and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual locales or events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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For Kim – and the rest of my teammates.
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Chapter 1
The baseball jumped from the pitcher's right hand toward home plate. It never ceased to puzzle Josh how clearly he could see a fastball when the rest of life was such a blur.
The world falling off its hinges had made it worse, of course. But his brain had been in a race against – what exactly? He had no clue – since long before that. As a kid, lying in bed in the dark, waiting for sleep, he'd given great thought to the 21st century: how old he'd be, where he'd live, whether his wife would be pretty, two kids or three.
Twenty-five years later, a fresh millennium wasn't at all what he'd imagined. Instead, he lay in bed, thinking about stupid shit. Breakfast burritos, for instance. Or the bass line from that White Stripes song they played nonstop on the rock station. Then there was the war on terror, the cute girl behind the counter at the drug store on Academy Avenue, boob jobs, weapons of mass destruction, Sammy Sosa's corked bat, left-wing, right-wing, a coup somewhere in Africa, that hott mom in the snug, paper-thin sweatpants he'd seen both at the grocery store and retrieving her kid from kindergarten, the Ebola virus, the war on drugs, Iraq, Afghanistan, peanut butter jelly time, anthrax, that adorable Mexican girl with the long, jet-black hair he'd seen waiting tables at Fermin's, SARS, orange-level terror alerts and ... .
Slumber, when it arrived, was fitful. Josh had this dream where he hit a baseball over the outfielders' heads. It looked like an inside-the-park home run. But every time he turned one base to run to the next, there was another. And another. It never ended until he woke up, his legs oddly tired.
Awake, he was just as restless – if not manic, like the guy in Bruce Springsteen's ''Roulette.'' Josh liked the song, but it made him feel uneasy, like a rat scurrying through a dark maze filled with traps and poison, bat-wielding maniacs, boot-wearing skinheads and maybe a pissed-off 10-year-old from a broken home with an abusive stepdad whose only toy was the flame thrower his crazy uncle the former Marine gave him last Christmas.
Yeesh.
People said you'd never see it coming, ''it'' being some tragic twist of fate that screwed you over. That made Josh laugh. Oh, he'd see it coming, all right. Thing was, the world threw so much at him from so many angles, he wouldn't be able to move out of the way fast enough. Working late at night, sweeping the polisher back and forth over dirty classroom floors, he could feel something bigger, something better, maybe just a moment of clarity, out there in the dark someplace, just beyond his comprehension.
Maybe he'd never make sense of it all. He even had two baseball announcers in his head, doing play by play of his day. Technically, he figured this made him a little insane. But there'd been a lot of craziness after 9/11, and no one seemed to notice. Besides, it wasn't as if the voices were telling him what to do. They just kind of kept him company. Even at the plate, as the pitch hissed toward him, Josh heard them start up.
Welcome to today's game, folks. Chaps McGhee here. If you're just joining us, the Fresno Sox are threatening to break open a scoreless game in the bottom of the first inning. With runners at second and third and two out, the Sox's new center fielder, Josh White, is at bat. Next to me in the booth here, I've got the coloredest color man in baseball, Reggie –
Chaps, I think they realize I'm black.
Hello? Reggie? This is an imaginary radio broadcast. The people at home are going to need pretty fucking good eyesight to see that you're black.
Just keep this shit up for much longer, they'll get the picture real quick.
Ah, Reggie, that's what I like about you – your thick, thick skin.
I'm serious, Chaps.
Josh tried to focus. Almost idly, his eyes searched the red stitches on the ball bearing down on him. Two-seam fastball or four? Chaps and Reggie kept talking.
So anyway, it's a great day for baseball. Nice and warm for June here in California's San Joaquin Valley, where relentless heat awaits us the rest of summer. It is, of course, a dry heat. But today we've got a mild breeze coming from the northwest for this Fresno Old-Time Baseball contest between the Sox and, uh – who is it they're playing today?
It says Forty-Fives on their uniforms.
Forty-Fives? What kind of name is that? Is that the year they were born?
Maybe it's the average number of runs they give up per game.
Ouch. Reggie, you da man! Gimme some, right here, up high.
Stop.
What? I'm just trying to give you props for that little zinger. Don't leave me hanging.
Can't we just talk about the game?
We can. But as you know, this isn't exactly scintillating baseball out here. They bat 10 or 12 or 15 to a side and freely substitute players on and off the field, making it seem more like a giant game of tag than baseball. Then you have to be at least 30, and most of these guys are so old, they can barely count to 30 anymore. It takes at least three of them, so they don't run out of fingers.
I know what you mean, Chaps. There's over the hill. Then there's over the hill, past the river and through the woods. Some of these guys are halfway to grandmother's house. Hell, a few are married to grandmothers. Even the ones who used to be able to play a little, their peak is no closer than the Sierra mountains east of here.
There are mountains to the east? Are you shitting me?
Nope. They're behind that curtain of hazy smog that chokes us all summer.
Brown sky. Josh still couldn't get over that.
Josh has struggled away from the ballpark lately. But hand him a bat, point him toward the batter's box, and it's all good. Well, mostly good. Good with a smattering of bad.
At bat was the one place Josh truly lived in the moment. The past didn't haunt you. And if you made a habit of learning from your mistakes, experience at the plate only helped.
He's hitting .437 nearly a third of the way into the season. And I know what you're thinking there at home: You're wondering whatever happened to that fastball. Well, just hold onto your ticket stub, Missy. We'll get back to that in a moment.
Chaps, you'd think they'd never hit the pause button on their video player or something.
No kidding. We need to talk about this guy on the mound, whoever he is.
You don't know his name?
I thought you did.
Nope. If you stop and think about, we're really crappy announcers.
Speak for yourself, Tonto. I do know that this guy throws decently hard. Probably his high school's ace, back in the day. Maybe even a little college ball someplace.
But he comes at you straight overhand. Hard as he throws, the ball goes straight. He also throws his curve overhand, hard, so that it darts down.
Does he throw a changeup?
If he does, he's keeping it a secret. That means you can sit on the cheese. And you know, Chaps, when you're hot like Josh right now, the game slows. Every pitch looks like a beach ball floating to the plate.
As the fastball closed in – a four-seamer, by the way – Josh inched his right foot toward the pitcher. At the same time, he lifted the bat off his shoulder and, almost imperceptibly, moved his hands so its handle pointed at the catcher's head.
Most people, even a lot of baseball fans, think of a good swing as one fluid motion. But it's more a series of small competing movements that allow a guy to swing off his ass without falling on his face.
Zzzzzzzzz. Oh, sorry. Was I snoring? That's fascinating, Reggie. Really. Any chance you could save it for the commentary on the DVD? I understand little extras like that really give sales a boost.
Josh's left foot began to pivot. His hips turned. His hands started forward, then stopped.
This beach ball is going to be wide, a few inches off the plate. Josh watches it pass. The count is 2 and 0.
In the dugout, his teammates buzzed.
''Attabaybee, Josh.''
''Good eye up there.''
''Right man, right spot.''
You know, the joy of baseball at this level isn't measured by wins and losses. It's that intangible feeling you get when you smell a newly mowed outfield. Or you step onto infield dirt and notice how it gives just a little bit, solid enough to run like wildfire but soft enough to throw your body into a hook slide perfected through years of practice. Or simply the crack of the bat....
I call bullshit.
What?!
C'mon, Chaps. Look at that outfield. Hasn't been mowed in a month. The infield's so craggy, you couldn't drag it thoroughly with a team of Times Square transvestites pulling two-ton metallic bras. And when someone connects with a pitch – excuse me, if someone connects with a pitch – it'll be a lot more ping than thwack. Only an idiot would use a wood bat when aluminum sends the ball faster and farther. So stuff that romantic crap in your ball bag.
It was true. What made Josh happy on the field wasn't poetic or picturesque. It was the chatter that crashed from the dugout, pitch after pitch. Nothing particularly funny or exciting had to happen. A batter could, as Josh just had, take a close one for a ball. A teammate could muff a high-five. Someone could fart. Didn't matter. Suddenly, everyone was yapping. Laughter would erupt, fill the air like a short string of firecrackers and disappear, gone until the next pitch.
''Here we go, Josh. Ducks on the pond.''
''Hummina, hummina, huhhhhhhminnnnaaaaah.''
''Swing the fuggin' bat, you big baboon.''
The Sox are quite boisterous, Reggie. That last bit of – what was that? Verbal excrement disguised as encouragement disguised as sarcasm? Whatever it was, it came from Ignazio Santino.
No one curses more, complains longer or laughs louder.
It's almost as if, as a child, someone set his volume to 10, and somewhere along the way, the knob broke. And in case the name has you fooled, Zio – as his teammates call him – is quite Italian, from his greazy black hair down to his red cleats, white laces and green grass stains on his pants.
The colors of the Italian flag.
Right. Santino really is amazing. For the third straight year, he leads the league in racial slurs.
Teammates say barely an inning passes without him reminding someone that he happens to be Italian.
Really?
Oh, yeah. Either he'll point out how some random, ridiculous thing is derived from Italy, or he'll ask someone else about his ethnicity. That's excuse enough to start in about all things dago or wop or – on special occasions – guinea. His Italian Insight Index, which pits everything he says against the number of times he mentions Italy, being Italian or eating Italian food, remains a robust .387.
For someone who doesn't actually speak Italian, that's pretty impressive.
No kidding. I think it's safe to say that when it comes to being Italian, Zio gives 110 percent.
With several Italians on the team, there was a lot of loud name-calling among them. They assumed that gave them license to make fun of their Mexican, German, Polish and Armenian teammates – to say nothing of the one black guy on the roster, who caught nine innings almost every week, no matter how hot it got. He'd shake his head, mutter something about plantation work, and everyone would ignore him.
It doesn't seem like the banter and quibbling among the Sox ever get nasty, Reggie. Does that surprise you?
Not at all. It's been that way on almost every team I've played on. Baseball draws people together in motley groups. If you're lucky, the result is a rainbow coalition of stupidity.
Baseball helps people overcome prejudice then?
Whoa, hold on there, Biggun. No, no, no. It's more like they tuck their beliefs under the bench, with their other equipment, and leave 'em there for nine innings. You know, bonds form. Guys get to know one another, and they make exceptions. But put 'em in a confrontation later with someone who's different, and it gets ugly.
Ugly like your momma?
Your momma was so ugly, it looked like someone put out that fire on her face with a pickax.
So it wasn't all ''Sesame Street'' in the dugout, despite the furry characters cheerfully spouting nonsense from the bench. But playing again did lead to the kind of fun Josh had hoped for on a Sunday morning months before, when he'd shown up at the last moment to league tryouts, carrying his glove and cleats in a crinkled, torn brown paper bag, nothing but socks on his feet.
And if you'll recall, one of those socks had a ragged hole where his big toe pushed through. He looked like he'd fallen off a movie poster for ''The Grapes of Wrath.''
On the field, a dozen guys in various stages of baseball attire – T-shirts with half-sleeves, shorts or gray pants, a clashing assortment of brightly colored caps – awkwardly played catch. A fat guy holding a clipboard by home plate yelled instructions. Everyone ignored him. Josh figured he must be in charge anyway and checked in, giving the guy his name and the league fee in cash.
Josh walked behind the backstop and sat. A grizzled old guy with a nose the size of a meat hook sidled up, took one look as Josh pulled his muddy cleats from the torn bag and quietly said, ''Oh, sweet. Is that one of those new Nike duffels?''
Josh smiled at the insult. He immediately felt at home.
''I'm Josh,'' he held out his hand. The guy shook it: ''Theo Higgs.''
In khaki shorts and a navy Fresno Old-Time Baseball championship T-shirt, bony knobs for knees and a narrow, pointy face, Higgs looked far too old and frail to actually play baseball. Slung over his shoulder was an equipment bag. It appeared to be bigger than he was. Josh thought of an ant lugging a giant blue vinyl breadcrumb back to the nest. He pegged Higgs for someone's grandfather. The old guy did have three grandchildren, as it happened.
''You here to try out?'' Josh smiled. He meant it as a joke but posed it seriously enough that Higgs could take it either way.
''Nah,'' Higgs said. ''I'm scouting the new meat. Our roster is pretty full, but you never know what you might find scrounging around out here. I run the Sox.''
''Red or White?'' Josh asked.
''We're what you might call ambivalent about that,'' Higgs sighed. ''Some of us argued for Red, but we have a couple of Yankees fans on the team, and there was no way they were going to agree to that. So someone else suggested White, but then the one guy from Chicago on the roster grew up on the North Side.''
''A Cubs fan.''
''Naturally. So we actually wear green.''
''Green?''Josh winced. ''The Green Sox?''
''Yeah, I know. Like puke, right? See, this is why they don't run pro ball teams as little democracies. You can't settle anything. You compromise, then everybody hates the result. So we call ourselves the Fresno Sox and leave it at that.''
They were interrupted by the fat guy with the clipboard calling Josh's name. It was his turn to hit. His small bag wouldn't have held a bat, even if he had one to stick in it. He looked around a moment and started toward the field emptyhanded.
''Here,'' Higgs said, pulling a bat from his blue bag and handing it over. What was left of its black leather handle was held together with ragged strips of white cloth tape. The aluminum probably was red once. But the paint was so chipped, dinged and faded that it appeared to be a sour pink.
''It's only a 32-incher,'' Higgs said. ''I'm not quite the strapping young man I used to be. It's all I've got.''
Josh shrugged and took the bat, found his way to home plate and realized it had been a long time since he'd tried to hit a baseball. The guy on the mound didn't have much on the ball, which in theory should've made it easier to hit. But he also threw with a little sidearm motion that made his pitches tail away from a lefthanded batter in a sloppy, loopy arc.
Everyone on the field turned toward the plate as Josh stepped into the box.
The 6-foot White usually avoids calling attention to himself. But at bat, it's different. He embraces the tension as the focus falls on him.
You have to have that, Chaps, that ability to flip the switch up there at the plate.
Here comes the first pitch, and Josh starts his swing too early. He barely fouls it off.
Josh took a deep breath and watched the second pitch skip across the dirt in front of the plate. Shaking off rust is easier when you're getting strikes. But you get what you get, so when the third pitch looked just a little wide, Josh flailed at it and hit another foul tip.
This is not going well, Reg. The next one is a weak pop-up that lands harmlessly in front of the third-base dugout. Sucks to be Josh right now.
The rough handle of the little bat gnawed on the soft spot of his left hand between the thumb and forefinger. He knew from experience that he was about six swings short of a blister.
The infielders started talking among themselves. Something about a hangover. The guys in the outfield were clumped together in threes or fours, cracking up at something one guy yelled across to the others. They weren't laughing at Josh, and he knew it. He sensed not derision but disinterest. Derision might've been easier to take. But nobody was paying much attention now.
Next pitch: another one in the dirt. Not good. Then he got a pitch over the outside half of the plate, belt-high – and the parts of his swing that had been fighting with one another suddenly fell into place. He didn't exactly crush the ball. How could he with the little baby bat? But he sent a low line drive between third and short that whistled into left field.
How about that? The turd can actually still hit a ball every once in a while.
Then a lazy fly ball to right-center on a pitch that was a little high. Then Josh turned on an inside pitch and hit another low liner. This one buzzed down the right field line.
''Next,'' the guy with the clipboard said.
Back behind the backstop, Josh returned the bat to Theo.
''Well, that was ugly,'' Josh said.
''Where'd you play ball?'' Theo said, looking straight at him.
The question caught Josh off-guard. Based on what he figured was one of the most unimpressive rounds of batting practice ever, he didn't think anyone would assume he'd played anywhere.
''Oh, I played a little junior college ball back East,'' he stammered. He shrugged. ''It was a long time ago.''
''All right. What's your – what is it you youngsters call 'em now, 'digits'? Your number?'' Theo said. ''I'll give you a call.''
''Isn't there a draft or something?'' Josh said.
Theo laughed. ''The idiots out here today wouldn't know a real hitter if he smacked 'em right between the eyes with a line drive. They'll be glad when I tell them that I want you on the Sox. But I suspect with a better bat and a few more rounds of BP, you'll do just fine.''
''Hey, if you say so.''
And that's how Josh found himself in the middle of the Sox lineup a few months later. There'd been some grumbling from other teams about him sandbagging when he hit two home runs the first three games of the season. He'd done well since. But it wasn't like he was thrashing every pitcher who walked out there.
Besides, grumbling was second nature to almost everyone in the league. It was like breathing, only louder. Except when someone tried to score from first on a double. Then, back in the dugout, the breathing was louder than the grumbling. But there was always grumbling.
His teammates' voices broke from the dugout.
''C'mon, Josh, get us going now. Any way you can.''
''Put that good stick on it.''
''Let's knock this guy around early.''
Josh scratches a spot in the batter's box with his left foot and plants it there, then steps into the box and squares up to home plate.
Chaps, days like this are made for hitting. The bat feels warm and light when you pick it up. A cold day, even if you put the barrel of the bat on the ball, it might sting a bit. But today, a pitch will rocket in the opposite direction if you hit it solid. You don't even have to swing hard.
Yes, but a 2-and-0 count often gives Josh fits.
That's right, and it shouldn't. You're in control. The pitcher has to throw a strike. You can look for your pitch. But Josh's approach at the plate is feral. Since his mind races like a bunny fucking on meth, he knows from experience that thinking too much at bat can be paralyzing. See ball, hit ball. That's what they tell you. So more often than not, he takes a big hack 2 and 0.
To be fair, Reggie, he's gotten some big hits that way. The rest of the time, though, he looks like a damn fool swinging at what could've been ball three.
Woulda, coulda, shoulda, Chaps. If my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle. You can't worry about what isn't. It's a capricious, unfair game anyway. You hit a line drive 250 feet, and sometimes it seems like your odds of getting a hit are the same as someone who sends a blooper half that far. But as someone told me once, you love baseball like you love a woman who's bad for you: stupidly and with all your heart. The attraction lies in the impossibility of it.
The next pitch is another fastball. The pitcher takes a little off, trying to get it over for a strike. It darts for the heart of the plate, thigh high, begging to be crushed. Josh has no trouble getting the barrel to it and smokes a line drive just to the third baseman's left!
Ohhhhh, but it disappears into the guy's glove for the third out.
Can you believe that shit? Practically left a vapor trail behind it.
It happened so fast, Josh hadn't even dropped his bat yet.
Fuckin' game.
Chapter 2
The doors on the New Jersey Transit train slapped shut, and the commuter lurched toward New York. Tino staggered in the opposite direction down the aisle of the third car. He had to laugh at himself. As long as he was on that train, he could walk as fast as he wanted toward the back. It was going to take more than that to get out of going to work today.
Tino found his legs as the train left the Red Bank station, took a few more steps and flopped onto one of the dull orange vinyl seats. The color always reminded him of his mother's kitchen, remodeled in full-blown 1976 décor and still that hideous shade a quarter-century later. She'd been so proud. She could no more admit it was outdated than acknowledge that the crow's feet crowding the corners of her eyes wouldn't go away with a good night's sleep.
He didn't care what the kitchen looked like anyway – it always smelled fantastic. This was particularly true Sunday mornings. As a kid, Tino would wake to the pungent aroma of spicy Italian sausage simmering to life in a big pot of his mother's homemade sauce. She'd get up at dawn to get started. The meatballs would come later, rolled into shape after the family got home from church. Then more pots, pasta boiling.
Cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents would descend on their house midafternoon, and they'd feast the rest of the day, laughing and eating and telling stories on one another. It had been that way as long as he could remember. The only exceptions came when they'd left town for one of his baseball tournaments.
It was great when Tino was little. But as a teenager, he began to resent the family's intrusion on his weekends and his home. Complaints to his mom fell on deaf ears. More than once, she reminded him that family came first. But he wasn't like them. He was kind of quiet. Yeah, he could be sarcastic. But he liked to pick his spots. The rest of them were incessant and loud and obnoxious and bossy and, loving though they might be, dead certain they were right about everything every moment of the day.
As they'd be the first to tell you.
Tino sighed. He didn't miss the family much, but his mom's cooking was a different story. Once he moved out, he rarely went back for Sunday dinner. It had been, what, several months since the last time?
All he could smell inside the train was the faint scent of the antiseptic that the overnight cleaning crew used to wipe down the seats, the bitter bouquet of his coffee and – what exactly was that stench? He looked on the floor below the seats next to him and found the culprit. They'd missed a damp clump of yesterday's newspaper. Its inky stench crawled through the berth like a crack whore climbing from the gutter.
He kicked it away, farther beneath the seat, and unfolded the Post he'd been carrying under his left arm. He ignored the giant, scandalous headline on the front and flipped to the back page, where the sports section awaited. Roger Clemens' start for the Yankees had been postponed the night before because of the thunderstorms that had rolled through the city. Rain was about the only thing that could stop that guy right now. Holy crap, 18-1? He was going for some kind of record. What was it? Most wins with only one loss in a season? Something like that. The story said Clemens would try again tonight.
Tino sipped his coffee, felt it burn the tip of his tongue, and looked out the window. He always sat on the east side of the train: right side headed to work, left side going home. He didn't know why. Just liked the view better. Or maybe he felt closer to the city that way, watching the towers come into view across the water if the sky was clear.
And today was crystal clear. Summer was winding down, and the forecast was for a picture-perfect day: blue skies, warm and sunny, not too windy. The sun wasn't up yet, but the eastern sky hinted at the warm yellows, blues and pinks that would come as night gave way to dawn.
He sighed again. The end of summer always felt bittersweet. Growing up in New Jersey, summer meant freedom and humid heat and baseball, usually all at the same time. The World Series was still a month off, but that was little consolation as the days got shorter and the air colder. The promise of spring evaporated right before Tino's eyes. The trees would have one last hurrah, leaves brilliant yellow and red the next few weeks. Then the color of everything became muted. No way around it, the whole world ground to a close just as the year did.
Tino felt this melancholy every year through his 20s. But it seemed worse today, his 30th birthday. The numeral loomed in his mind like a phantom: the Big 3-0. He couldn't roll down the street without being reminded by 30 mph speed limit signs, the 30 percent off sale banners in shop windows, 30, 30, fucking 30, everywhere he looked.
So it had been a special treat to drive along Highway 30 – more like the Highway to Hell – through Camden into Philadelphia during Labor Day weekend to celebrate his birthday early. The trip had been his wife's idea. Tino quickly said yes, then regretted it right away. It would be very romantic – just Tino, Mary Elizabeth and their 9-year-old daughter, Belladonna, squeezed into a small motel room.
Late the first night, with Belle snoring in the other twin bed, he'd tried to slip his fingers beneath Mary Elizabeth's cotton pajama top. She'd swatted his hand away and told him to cut it out.
''Not with the baby in the room.''
The baby? The baby?!? She was 9. And sound asleep. Tino had rolled his eyes in the dark, not like that would do him any good. He stared, a zombie in the night, at the wall, where a splotch of color from a traffic signal sliced through the crack between the heavy curtains. Red to green and back, 'round and 'round, never ending. Happy birthday, motherfucker. He sighed. Mary Elizabeth was unmoved. Pretty soon, she started to snore quietly.
When she'd first suggested the trip, Tino thought maybe they'd catch a Phillies game. He wasn't a huge fan, but the team was in first place, locked in a tight pennant race with the Braves. Even so, getting tickets at the cavernous Veterans Stadium at the last minute would be no problem.
When he'd floated the idea, his wife and daughter looked at each other, then at him.
''Fillies?'' Mary Elizabeth said. ''We don't like horse racing.'' Belle nodded vigorously.
Silly Tino.
''It's baseball. The Phillies are a baseball team.''
''Ohhh, baseball,'' they said together.
They bit their lips trying not to laugh. It didn't work. They had a good, long chuckle.
So, no, instead of watching Scott Rolen go deep to beat the Expos, Tino had the privilege of quietly following his wife and daughter from one antique store to another. He saw more quaint duvets, beat-up water jugs, witch bottles and fiddle-back chairs than any man had a right to. He wanted to get angry about the whole thing, but it was so boring he couldn't even work up a good snit.
Belle had wanted a bassinet for her dolls to sleep in. Mary Elizabeth thought it was the cutest thing she'd ever heard. Why it had to be an antique, Tino had no idea. That part was Mary Elizabeth's suggestion. At least his wife was interested in certain old things – just not him.
It took them all weekend to find a bassinet that Belle thought was perfect. Whose birthday was it again?
Tino looked out the train window, inhaled sharply and shut his mouth tight. He slid his tongue between his front teeth, in part to convince himself that he could still unclench his jaw. The phrase ''Dead Man Walking'' popped into his head. Technically speaking, he knew his life wasn't over. He had another, what, 40 reasonable years? Probably 10 more unreasonable ones after that.
None of it made him feel better.
Outside the train, tenements, highways and billboards flashed past as the train clacked and wobbled toward the city, crossing the inlet before the stop in Perth Amboy. The sun was almost up, infusing the sky and water with a soft warmth. At the stop, the train filled with more commuters. Tino scooted toward the window, finished his coffee, shoved the cup between his hip and the seat. He folded the Post and set it down, put on his headphones and pressed Play on the disc player tucked into the side pocket of his black backpack. The gunshot snare and chiming chords of Bruce Springsteen's ''The Ties That Bind'' filled his ears as the train started up again.
This is what it must feel like when you die and your life flashes before your eyes. Scenes blink as if through a train window, and the music you love provides the soundtrack. Tino closed his eyes and thought of his brother, Dante. Nearly 10 years had separated the two of them, and Tino idolized him the way only a much younger brother can.
If not for Dante, Tino never would've grown up hitting lefthanded. He threw with his right arm. But Dante insisted his little brother bat lefty from the time he was a baby. By the time Tino was old enough to remember, his swing was as natural as breathing. Dante also taught him how to hit the curve. He'd take him to Liberty Oak Park in Freehold, and they'd play stickball for hours. The place was called something else now, named after some local muckety-muck. But he and his brother called those games the Oak Series, up to the day Dante died.
Their mother had taken the cover off an old baseball they'd nearly obliterated, stuffed a sponge in it and stitched it back up. She did it so Tino would stop breaking windows with his baseballs. But it was perfect for games of one-on-one. You could throw some nasty shit with that thing, making it dart like a big-league slider. If you hit it right, it would go just beyond the fence of the tennis courts where they played most of their games. But if you got under it just a little, it was an easy catch for an out.
Tino thought of a night years before, in the middle of a brutally humid summer. Dante had moved out by then, but he came by late one night and told Tino to grab the bag with the ball and plastic bats and meet him in the car. It was after midnight by the time they got to the park, snuck in and set up home plate. It was so late, the dampness in the air didn't feel stifling anymore, just comforting, a wet washcloth on your forehead in the middle of a fever dream.
The rules of the game never changed. They each took a current major league team. You had to bat the same way as the real player in the regular lineup. Since Tino batted lefty, he always took the St. Louis Cardinals, even if they were the Mets' rivals. Five switch-hitters and two lefties, if you named Darrell Porter as your catcher. Since you could bring in pinch hitters for the pitchers, the only bump was cleanup hitter Jack Clark.
Though Dante was much older, the games were always close. Tino's brother was a good athlete, but he preferred to play a little of everything. Tino, on the other hand, lived to hit. Any kind of bat in his hands, the boy could rake.
They battled back and forth in the night, alone except for the raccoons that scurried through the brush outside the fence. Every once in a while, one stopped to watch, all shiny eyes and shadows really, just beyond the dim light of the tennis courts.
Dante, playing as his beloved Yankees, blasted three early home runs for an 11-run lead after five innings. One cleared the fence by so much they thought they might have to call the game early when they lost sight of the ball. Tromping through the prickly plants, Tino refused to give in – even after a raccoon scared the shit out of him with a low growl and a sudden sprint past his feet. It took another 10 minutes to find the ball.
Arms scratched from rutting through thistle, eyes bleary from the late hour, Tino nevertheless made a monstrous comeback. Three runs in the bottom of the ninth cut it to 20-19 with runners at second and third and two out. Dante intentionally walked Tino as Tommy Herr, bringing up Clark with the bases loaded.
Tino tried to pinch-hit for him with lefty Mike Jorgensen, claiming Clark had pulled a hamstring. Something about hurting himself wrestling a raccoon, Tino joked. Dante wouldn't go for it, insisting Tino bat righthanded. He got two quick strikes, then Tino popped up to end the game.
''You know you'll never beat your old brother, right?'' Dante teased afterwards. ''Physically impossible. Can't be done.''
Tino tried to pout, but he was too tired to care.
''Whatever, shithead.'' There was a pause. They burst out laughing together.
''That's my bro,'' Dante said, shoving him lightly in the chest.
As Tino dumped the bag with the plastic bats and sponge ball into the trunk of his brother's blue '82 Toyota Celica, he saw a Freehold police cruiser slowly enter the parking lot. They opened the doors to leave, but the officer pulled directly behind their car, blocking them.
''Is there a problem, officer?'' Dante said.
The guy got out, puffed up his chest, tried in vain to suck in his ample gut and gave Dante his best withering look.
''You put something in your trunk just now?''
''Yeah, just some stuff we use to play stickball. Coupla plastic bats, a cardboard home plate, the ball.''
''Mmm-hmm,'' the cop nodded skeptically.
Tino's stomach rumbled nervously. His right leg started to twitch. He took a deep breath, but he couldn't get it to stay still.
''I can show you,'' Dante told the officer.
As he moved toward the rear of the car, the cop took a couple of steps back and put one hand on his holstered gun, the other around the handle of a long flashlight in his belt. Dante gave him an innocent look, shrugged and unlocked the trunk. Slowly, he pulled out the bag.
''See?'' He dumped the bag on the pavement. Bats flew out. The ball rolled under the police cruiser.
''You just found this stuff in the park?''
''Nah, we bought it,'' Dante said.
''You bought these toys?'' He eyed Dante.
Dante took a deep breath. ''Yeah, my ma stitched that ball together herself. It's just a baseball cover with a sponge inside. Can I get it back?''
''Don't move. You know you're not supposed to be in this park after 10 o'clock?''
Nervous, Tino couldn't help himself.
''Geez,'' he blurted excitedly, ''we were just playing stickball, man. What are you gonna do, get us for throwing a spitball without a license?''
The officer pulled the flashlight from his belt, shined it in Tino's eyes and said, ''Step away from the car and put your hands up, behind your head.''
Tino froze, and his eyes got real big, real fast. Dante held up both palms, looked over at Tino and gave him a wink: ''Go ahead, Tino, do what the officer asked. It's all right.'' To the cop, he said, ''He's my little brother, all right?''
''No, it's not all right,'' the cop said. ''I need to see some identification from you both.''
''Sure, officer,'' Dante said. ''But he's only 13. He has no ID. I've got my license in my wallet. I'll get it.''
''Stay right where you are,'' the cop said. ''I want to see your hands, both of you, at all times.''
''Okay, okay, it's cool.''
''No, it is decidedly not cool,'' the cop said. ''Turn around, put your hands on your car and spread your feet.''
Dante did.
''You,'' the cop said, turning the light back on Tino, ''do the same thing.''
''Are you sure? You just told me to back away from the car. Which one do you want me to do?''
Dante gave Tino an exasperated look that said, ''Shut the fuck up and do it.'' Tino was shaky, didn't like the cop, didn't like the way he was treating them and was a natural-born smart ass. Screw this Mayberry mofo. But Tino knew not to mess with his brother. He moved toward the car.
The twitch in his right leg had spread to the left one. Damn. Tino tripped over his feet and fell to his knees. The cop got pissed.
''You fuckin' with me, kid? I told you to put your hands on the car.''
Still holding the flashlight, the cop pulled out his handcuffs as he moved toward Tino, stuck a knee in his back and yelled at him to get down with his arms at his sides. The left side of Tino's face scraped the pavement. With an agility that shocked both boys, considering his girth, the cop slapped the cuffs on Tino and had him totally helpless in a matter of seconds.
Dante started to protest, but the cop yelled at him not to move.
''Just give me a reason, one reason, and this can get a whole lot worse,'' the cop said as he stood. ''Now where's your identification?''
''My wallet's on the passenger seat.''
''Okay, go get it,'' the cop said. ''Move slowly.''
Dante put his hands in the air and walked to the side of the car as the cop moved next to him a few feet away. He picked up the wallet.
''Take out your license. Hand it to me.''
Dante did.
''Look, I'm trying to cooperate here,'' he said. ''I opened my trunk to show you it was just bats and balls.''
''I didn't ask you to do that,'' the cop said.
''I'm not saying you did. I just ... .''
''Follow me to the back of the car,'' the cop interrupted. ''Stand the way you were, hands on the car, feet spread, and don't move.'' He shined the light into the trunk, which contained the spare and not much else.
The cop got into his cruiser, got on the radio and checked Dante's license, then the plates on the Celica. Satisfied that he wasn't dealing with hardened criminals, or any other kind, he got out and uncuffed Tino.
''You boys should know not to hang out at the park after hours,'' he said. ''Bad things can happen. We wouldn't want that.''
Subdued, Dante and Tino nodded.
''Pick up your things and get out of here,'' the cop said.
Dante grabbed the bag and bats and tossed them in the trunk. The ball was still under the cruiser, but even after the cop moved to let them leave, they left it lying there, as absolutely still as the windless night had become.
Maybe the raccoons could play with it.
They listened to Springsteen's ''Nebraska'' all the way home, streaking east toward dawn on Highway 18. Dante rarely listened to anything but the Boss. Windows down, the cool air whipped at their hair as sunlight crept into the sky.
Just before sunrise, outside Tinton Falls, ''Mr. State Trooper'' came on, and the brothers howled the tune together, making up their own words and laughing all the way: ''Overweight loser, please don't cuff me, please don't cuff me, please don't cuff me.''
The song ended, and Dante turned down the stereo.
''Man, that was some Clint Eastwood shit back there,'' he said. ''And you, you mouthy wop: 'Throwing a spitball without a license'? Go ahead, Tino, make his day.''
Tino could barely keep his eyes open, but he smiled. He lived to entertain his brother. He lowered his voice to mimic the cop, sat up straight in the passenger seat and sucked in his gut: ''Bad things can happen. We wouldn't want that.''
Dante laughed and said, ''You know, we can't tell Ma what happened. She'll never let you out of the house with me again.''
''Yeah, but what about Dad?'' Tino said. ''He can be trusted. Once he sees we're all right, he'll think it's funny.''
''Yeah, he can be trusted – to tell Ma. They share everything, Tino. You know that. I think we've got to keep this between us.''
They quietly snuck into the house through the back door, but their mother was waiting for them in the kitchen.
''I'm glad to see you could make it home before the crack of noon,'' she said.
''We were just playing stickball in Freehold,'' Tino said.
''What's that on your cheek?'' She got up from the table and walked straight to him, pinched his chin between her thumb and forefinger and turned his head so she could see the left side of his face, which had a neat swath of dried blood streaked across it.
''Oh, I just fell off the fence onto the tennis court.''
Without letting go of Tino's chin, she turned and looked right into Dante's eyes.
''You wouldn't let your little brother get into trouble, right?''
Dante knew better than to look away, which would've betrayed the lie as sure as if he'd handed her a surveillance video of their late-night brush with the law.
''Of course not,'' Dante said with a smile meant to reassure her. He was afraid if he looked at Tino, they'd both start giggling the way they had in the car.
The mother of two rowdy boys, she was no dummy. She knew better than to believe them – or to pry any deeper. It would just make the lie more awkward. Sometimes it was good to make your kids squirm a little, but this wasn't one of those times. She understood there was more to the story than they let on, and they understood she would let them off the hook if they shut up and behaved.
A lot went unspoken in an Italian kitchen.
''Okay, good,'' she said after a moment, letting go of Tino's chin. ''Now, would you boys like some cannelloni?''
Dante took her up on the offer. But Tino staggered upstairs to bed, pulling the sheets and pillow over his head before the sun made it impossible to fall asleep.
He awoke with a start on the train to New York as it pulled out of Rahway, sunshine streaking through the window onto his face and Springsteen singing about having a hungry heart.
That night in Freehold had been the last time they'd played stickball there. It also cemented Tino's mistrust of authority. So he found it sort of funny when he wound up working for the Port Authority years later – not as an officer but a maintenance technician. Or as he told his buddies, ''That's a janitor to you and me.''
Mary Elizabeth kept telling him he could do better, that he should become part of the police force. Better pay, nicer work clothes, a challenge he could handle if he put his mind to it.
''So you can stop telling your friends your husband is a janitor?'' he asked. ''We don't need no stinkin' badges.''
Quoting ''Blazing Saddles'' left her unmoved. She didn't even crack a smile. If it wasn't a chick flick, she really wasn't interested, and ''Blazing Saddles'' was no chick flick.
The truth was, Tino had been thinking a lot about trying something else, and joining the force was on the table. But it was more complicated than he'd imagined. He'd have to go back to school. They didn't really have the money for that. Inertia struck. He couldn't figure out how to get from A to B.
Mary Elizabeth's brother knew a guy from high school who'd become a PATH officer. Tino had met him at work, mentioned the brother-in-law in passing and tried to become friendly with the cop. The guy agreed to meet with Tino and offer his guidance. Today was supposed to be the big day, if the guy had time.
The train pulled into Newark. Tino got out to change to the PATH train that would take him across the river and into the belly of the World Trade Center. Ah, another day of greasing the wheels of capitalism – or at least removing grit from some of the gears. Yeah, his was a shit job. But the benefits were decent. He mostly worked days and not many weekends. He made the mortgage every month. Plus, there was just enough left over to take the occasional antiquing trip to Philadelphia. Woo-hoo, what more could a guy want?
Tino started to sigh again when he caught his breath. There she was, the girl in the long-sleeved Rutgers Volleyball T-shirt. He figured her for a student making her way to campus. She was a Tuesday regular at the station. Well, semi-regular. He hadn't spotted her since spring.
Yeah, he was married. But he wasn't dead (yet), and she was adorable. She didn't always wear the T-shirt. But when she did, the scarlet lit up her blue eyes and set off her straight blond hair in a way that made Tino weak in the knees and twitchy everywhere else.
It wasn't just her looks, though. It was the way she flashed a bright smile to strangers as she made her way through the crowded platform away from the gate where Tino switched trains. It was the way her posture – unnaturally straight, shoulders pulled back as far as they could go, chin up – oozed confidence and optimism. It was the way her eyes danced, taking it all in, while nearly everyone around her stared blankly and trudged to work.
Tino knew nothing more about her, even whether she actually went to Rutgers or played volleyball. She was certainly fit enough. But she was a little on the short side, no more than 5-foot-5. Maybe she was – what are they called? – a setter. He didn't know.
He'd tried to imagine a scenario in which they spoke, even as he realized the folly of his crush. He was attracted to her youth as much as who she was, whoever that might be. He could introduce himself: ''Hi, I'm Tino Renzo.'' Maybe he could make a joke, nothing too racy.
Then she'd say, ''Oh, Mr. Renzo, you're so funny.''
Thirty fuckin' years old.
He watched her ponytail bob through the sea of commuters swarming the terminal. She stopped and turned, looked up and hugged a tall guy in a Rutgers hoodie. He must've been 6-foot-8. Now that was a volleyball player. She stood on her tiptoes as he bent down to kiss her lips.
Tino looked down at his feet and laughed at his fool self. Any disappointment he felt was muted by the knowledge that he'd never be tempted to embarrass himself by talking to Miss Rutgers. He could stay in his empty shell of a life, where he belonged.
He looked up to see his train there, doors open, beeping a warning that it was time to go. He hustled on and took the last empty seat as the train began to crawl.
The lonely harmonica that sets off ''The River'' echoed through his headphones. He reached around to his backpack and stopped the disc. He already knew the story, even better than most Springsteen fans. Others might have thought it ironic: same girl's first name, same result, a life of disappointment. Tino knew better. Coincidence is not irony. And he was living proof life is no song.
It seemed long ago, the night he met Mary Elizabeth. He first set eyes on her at a teammate's end-of-the-season party. His junior college team had lost a state semifinal up in Paramus the night before, and everyone was ready to blow off steam back home.
Mary Elizabeth got there late, turning the head of every drunk ballplayer in the apartment from the moment she entered with a couple friends.
Tino had seen brunettes before, but nothing like this one. Mary Elizabeth's hair was jet black but luminescent. A few beers in, he was entranced by the idea that something could be so dark and light at the same time.
She wasn't like the goth girls – with their piercings, tattoos and pouty mystery – that so many of his teammates chased around campus. She wasn't the cheerleader type, either. She seemed regal and tall. Tino was surprised later to discover she was only 5-foot-8. She had sort of a pear shape, but beautifully proportioned.
No lie, he noticed the hair first. But that rack was a close second.
They didn't hit it off right away. Tino made the mistake of calling her Mary after they were introduced.
''It's Mary Elizabeth,'' she said icily. Ohhh-kay.
But it turned out that his cousin Pino knew her older sister. They'd dated, stopped but remained good friends. Mary Elizabeth knew him pretty well. At the time, it seemed like a blessing that Pino was a good guy. Anyway, that was enough for Mary Elizabeth to let Tino grab her a beer out of the ice-filled bathtub. They followed a group from the party to a club, where someone bought them tequila shooters and something called Cherry Bombs. He wasn't sure how many. More than two and, um, fewer than 20.
Turned out neither of them drank much, except that night.
Despite the iffy circumstances hooking up, they got on pretty well. She didn't know a thing about baseball. Seriously, not even the difference between a double and a double play. When Tino tried to explain how a batting average was calculated, she held her hand in his face to stop him and said, ''Nope. Nope. No math, please.''
He convinced himself that her lack of interest in baseball wouldn't be a problem. Couples didn't always have to be interested in the same things, right? And no one was coming around to offer him a scholarship or contract to go pro, even though he'd led his team in hits and walks. Maybe it was the fact that he'd hit one lonely home run all season.
Whatever. Even minus the beer goggles, Mary Elizabeth was a knockout. And she seemed so happy. She talked enthusiastically about transferring to a four-year school and getting a business degree.
''Why be a secretary when you can be the one in the office with a secretary?'' she said.
It made sense. When she came to him with the news that she was pregnant just weeks later, he was surprised that he wasn't struck with doom. He knew they hadn't been together long enough, but why not get married?
So they did, quick and quiet. Not as much of Tino's family was there as his mother would've liked, and not everyone was polite about the circumstances. Screw 'em. He knew what he was supposed to do. He'd been raised right.
Plus, the rumors he'd heard about pregnant sex were true. Mary Elizabeth was voracious the next few months. Even though he didn't want to know the baby's gender ahead of time, it didn't seem like that big a deal when Mary Elizabeth learned it was a girl and got so excited she blurted the news to him the moment she saw him next.
But a few months in, there were warning signs. He'd wanted to name the baby Theresa. Mary Elizabeth wanted to name her Belladonna, after her beloved grandmother. They talked. There were tears. He gave in. So Belladonna it was.
By itself, it wasn't any big deal, and the baby was darling. She lit up a room. But the tussle over naming rights set a pattern. Decision after decision, Tino gave in to Mary Elizabeth's whims. It seemed easier that way. Besides, she seemed to care about him. When Dante died, she was there for him. Why shouldn't he go along?
Here they were, nine years later, and it felt as if Tino were living not with one stranger but two. From the time Belle could talk, she and her mother seemed to speak a secret language. They played together. They shopped together. They ate together. Even at the dinner table, he felt like a guest. It wasn't so much that Tino couldn't get a word in. They just listened politely, then turned away and started speaking to each other again in hushed tones that he couldn't understand.
He was an intruder on their little world. When they laughed, it seemed to be at his expense, never with him. When he tried to talk baseball or basketball, they looked at him as if he were from the jungle.
The train pulled out of the station and into the tunnel beneath the Hudson River, going dark inside. But not dark enough. Tino closed his eyes tight and just tried to hold on.
Chapter 3
Here in the eighth inning, Theo Higgs has just bolted from the dugout and called time out. Reggie, I think he's a little worried right now.
You would be, too, Chaps, if your ace pitcher had just given up a two-run double that cut your team's lead to one run.
I see the home plate umpire has lifted off his mask and raised both arms, the international sign for, ''Everyone stop what you're doing and stand around. Take this moment to adjust your crotch.''
I'll be sure to do that. Here's the thing: A good umpire doesn't have to say much. Did you see that look he gave Theo? In baseball, that's widely understood to mean, ''It's really fucking hot out here. You've got about six seconds before I join you and your pitcher on the mound to run your ass back to the dugout.''
It doesn't help that this is the thirteenth straight day that it's been 100 degrees or hotter here in the Valley. It must be July, huh?
Got that right. Sunday afternoon games this time of year are particularly murderous on anyone who has to wear protective gear, Chaps. The forecast calls for a high of 108 degrees today. You'd think the sun would get tired of kicking our butts all summer.
Not a chance. You have to admit, though, the nights are beautiful.
Yeah, if you can survive the days.
Take it easy, Reggie. The sun will settle into that dusty brown western horizon in just a few hours.
Whatever you say, Keats.
In the meantime, get a load of Theo marching those knobby knees to the mound double time.
He's sweating more than a $2 Mexican whore.
In the back of a taco truck.
Feverishly performing back-to-back blow jobs.
During lunch rush.
With no air-conditioning.
Deep in center field, Josh White is slowly making his way back to his position, panting heavily. That last double was a scorcher over his head. It short-hopped the outfield fence, bounced around the warning track a couple times, and by the time Josh picked it up and threw to the cutoff man, it was 8-7.
Zio got Josh's attention from left field and motioned him over. They met halfway.
''Theo's asshole is so tight right now,'' Zio said, ''you couldn't pound a needle into it with a jackhammer.''