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She looks down at her cup of tea, long since cold. She sets it aside.
I don’t really talk about her. When I left Seattle, I set that life aside. My kids know very little about her. It’s still painful, even after all these years.
I’d rather bulldoze my past than live with it every day. So I left Seattle and went to Harvard for medical school. Met Michael there. We spent the money it took for fertility treatments and now we have everything we ever wanted. I have my life here. My kids. And maybe having a present means it’s okay not to have a past.
August 15th, 1990
Today I find myself in the heart of farm country. Though I live in the city, I grew up in a more rural area, so I can appreciate the beauty of long fields full of perfectly spaced crops. Not the kind of place I’d ever want to live, but Carroll, Iowa is a lovely place to visit for a day. The Stevens family lives on thirty-six acres of land, where Mark Stevens raises some livestock, though corn is the main source of income here. Marabelle, the matriarch of the Stevens household, is my interview subject for the day. She is in her mid-60s, but looks at least ten years older. The harsh Midwest winters (as well as the unfiltered Camels sitting on the dining room table) will do that to you. Even so, there is a plate of cookies and a pitcher of lemonade sitting out as I come in, and I am not one to deny such hospitality. She lights a cigarette as I munch on a snicker doodle.
MARABELLE: My late husband, Marcus, he was my second husband, you know. This story I’m telling is about my first husband. That son of a gun is dead too, from what I hear. I liked him well enough when I was with him, but what did I know? What does any nineteen-year-old know? Not much, young man. Not too much at all. But still, you should be allowed to make a few mistakes when you’re nineteen. It’s a magic kind of age where all your troubles can run right off your back. My heart breaks for the nineteen-year-olds who get stuck with decisions they have to live with forever. Lord knows I wish I could take some of my own decisions back.
My first husband Eli, he was a little older than me. I was working as a candy striper at a hospital in Cedar Rapids when I met him. He was there seeing a doctor about his leg, since he’d been hurt in the war. He was so handsome. Tall and good looking. He was handsome the way movie stars back then were handsome. He was twenty-seven or twenty-eight. I don’t remember exactly how old he was now. But the only boys I knew were just that: boys. Eli was a man.
I do wish, looking back on it, that I’d gotten to know him a lot better
before I married him. I know that sounds silly to younger people. They’re used to being together, or even living together these days, long before they get married. But that just wasn’t the way it was when I was that young. If you met someone and...well, if you really wanted to be with someone, then you got married. Not that every girl did that. There were some who would hop into bed with a boy anyway. But I wasn’t like that. I’d like to think I was a nice girl. So after about four months, we got married and moved into his house outside of Cedar Rapids.
You see...the whole thing would be a lot easier if he was a bad guy. But he wasn’t. He treated me well. He did nice things for me all the time. He tried real hard to make me happy. But at the end of the day, he lied to me. Even if it was just not telling me the whole truth, that’s another kind of lie. And it can be just as bad.
I got pregnant in 1948, and I was so happy. Over the moon. One of the things I liked best about working at the hospital was helping take care of the babies, so the thought of having one of my own was so exciting. And Eli took very good care of me all the way through the pregnancy. See, that’s what made all that so hard. He really was a good guy...
The day Kevin was born was one of the happiest days of my whole life. I held him up in my arms and he looked up at me with those big brown eyes. Eyes like his daddy’s. I was in love. And Eli loved him too. Carried him around everywhere. He took care of him and helped me clean the house. Changed diapers. He even cooked, bless his heart. But all the while...the whole time Kevin was growing, there was that lie brewing right in the center of him.
Kevin was about six months old when I first started noticing something was wrong. He always felt warm. Warm like he had a fever. I brought him into the doctor, but they just said that he was fine. That “some kids are just warmer than others”. I thought being at ninety-nine degrees all
the time was a little much, but I tried to believe it. They were doctors, after all.
Kevin ran fevers a lot in that first year. I wouldn't have known except I checked his temperature all the time. Sometimes the fever would last an hour, sometimes it would last the whole day. His temperature was up and down all the time. Always too hot.
He had his first birthday just a couple weeks before he got sick for the last time. It was another fever, but this one seemed different. He didn’t want to eat. Slept all the time. I’d gotten used to the fevers, but this one just wouldn’t go away. On day three, I knew I had to bring him to the hospital. They kept him there overnight, trying to break the fever. It would go down for a bit, then right back up. And up. And up. 102. 105. 107. His skin was bright red. Touching him felt like touching a stove, and it just wouldn’t stop.
It was right about noon the next day. I’d been there all night, and Eli had been in and out. Kevin was still unconscious. I hoped and prayed...but I knew that this was different. There was a part of me that knew he wasn’t coming back. I didn’t want to listen to that...but I knew it. My little boy was fading away. Burning away.
Right around noon, he started having trouble breathing. One of the nurses came in and tried to help, but he started to crash. The doctor rushed in and tried to get his heart under control, but it wasn’t working. He gave one, long, rattling breath and then nothing. I started screaming.
The doctor called something out and one of the nurses brought him a syringe. They told me later on it was full of adrenaline, which was supposed to kick start his heart. I screamed again when they pushed the needle into his chest. It almost seemed like it worked for a second but...Kevin sat straight up, his eyes wide open. I was about to run to him when...oh lord, help me. The things I’ve seen. He screamed real loud and all of a sudden there was fire everywhere. On in skin and in him. The flames came spilling out of his
mouth, and right away the whole room was on fire. The doctor rushed us all out the door.
It was an hour before they had the fire under control. They had to clear out the whole building. Once all the smoke cleared, I asked one of the fireman if they’d found my boy in there. But all they’d found was ash. My poor boy was just ashes. There’s wasn’t even anything I could bury.
I left Eli after that. Not right away, but soon after. Divorce wasn’t too common back then, but I couldn’t stay with him. My mother tried to talk me out of it. She said I could just have another child with him and be happy. But she didn’t know...have another child with that man? With Eli? No. No, absolutely not.
After Kevin died, Eli told me that he’d been part of an experiment when he was in the army. Before they’d been sent off to Germany, they’d been part of a top secret thing down in Texas. I didn’t know at the time just what they’d done to him, but I knew in my heart that he was responsible for what happened to Kevin. Kevin was a beautiful boy, but he was damaged. And it was the fault of whoever did that to Eli. And it was Eli’s fault for not telling me. So...have another child with him? No. Never. I don’t think anyone should have children with those people. It may not be their fault, but that doesn’t make them normal. And the children...I don’t want anyone to have to go through what I did. Maybe I’m cruel for thinking it, but I think it would be more humane for all those people just to not have children. They can adopt if they like, maybe. And then, before too long, they’d all be gone and then nobody would have to worry about that anymore. It sounds awful. I know that. I’m not stupid. But I watched my first born die the most horrible death I could possibly imagine. I want to save other folks from that. If I’m awful for that...then so be it.
&n
bsp; May 12th, 1998
I meet Bob Bukowski at his grandson’s little league baseball game. He has coached this team in the past, but he took this season off after getting knee replacement surgery. “The virus doesn’t fix everything, I guess,” he says of the surgery. But baseball has been with him for most of his life. And even now, still on the mend and decades removed from his career in the major leagues, he still can’t get away from the game. The game we’re watching is a pretty low-scoring affair, but the kids play with a joy and enthusiasm that makes up for it.
On first appearances, the only way you’d tell that Bob Bukowski is a baseball legend is the Cleveland Indians baseball cap he wears with the number 67 emblazoned on the back. Otherwise, he’s just a grandfather like all the others.
BOB: You see the boy out in left field? Number twenty-two? That’s Scottie. That’s my grandson. Hey Scottie!
Bob waves. Scottie stops paying attention to a rogue dandelion long enough to wave back.
He’s terrible at the game. I guess that’s what he gets for being my grandson, right?
He laughs, deeply and heartily, and spits a bit of chewing tobacco behind the bleachers where we sit.
You know, I hadn’t thought about the war in years. Probably near on ten years or so before you called. Not traumatic or anything. Just feels like a totally different life. Like someone else was over there. Never was a fan of goin’. Didn’t want any part of it. I’m glad that they did away with the draft. Now people got a choice. I would have rather stayed and played baseball.
I was pretty decent at the game when I was in high school. I wasn’t too fast, but I could catch pretty well and I had a good eye for the bat. I didn’t know if I was good enough to go make money at it, but I sure didn’t want to do anything else. I never felt inspired by anything else. Always got
bored with school. I just wanted to be out on the field. I even got to talk a bit with a scout from the Cleveland Indians. But then I got my draft papers and off I went.
Now, the way I understand it, when you get the virus the changes can happen pretty quickly. Other times, it takes a while. Luckily for me, I wasn’t showing any differences right away. I know the boys who got it quick got shoved off to the front lines, but that wasn’t me. By the time I ended up in France, the front line was a long ways away.
I guess sometime between me leaving Texas and ending up in France, the virus started doing its work. I was so much stronger than I’d been before. And I know it wasn’t just from hiking everywhere, because my main job was driving jeeps.
I was one of the lucky ones. I saw a little action, but didn’t come back all messed up, or in a box. I knew I was changing, but I kept quiet about it when I was over there. I didn’t want them to send me to Hitler’s welcome mat because I was special. Because I wasn’t. I wasn’t special, I was just me. Still am.
I got back stateside in ‘48 and right away wanted to get back to doing what I loved. I had the option to go on and do some college, but that wasn’t for me. Classrooms always bored me. I needed the sunshine. So when I got home, I took all the money I had and hopped on a train to Cleveland. I figured I could find that scout who I’d talked to before and get a chance to play with the team.
I tell you what, I was about as wrong as it gets on all accounts. When I showed up in Cleveland, they told me that the scout I knew had gone to work for the Brooklyn Dodgers. I would have gone too, but I’d ran out of money just getting to Cleveland. I told one of the managers and he looked a little annoyed and a little sorry, so he set me up working in the groundskeeping crew at the stadium. They had a little place where I could
sleep there, so I just stayed at the ballpark all the time. Now, you might think that I’d have been down in the dumps, what with living in a broom closet and working every day. But I loved it! I was around the sport I loved all the time, hanging out with the players and watching the games. And wouldn’t you know it, the Indians went on to win it all that year! Oh it was a heck of a time to be with the club.
It wasn’t till the next spring that I got a chance to try out for the team. And it wasn’t like they have it in the movies, where some scout or the manager saw me playing ball all by myself and gave me a spot on the team. No, I just asked. I’d been around the team the whole year, hung out with the guys. Drank with some of ‘em. And so right before spring training, I asked them to give me a day to work out with the team. I don’t know if they just felt sorry for me or whatnot, but they agreed to it. So I got to head down to Arizona with the rest of the team, mostly to keep track of the equipment, but also to try out.
Now, I was so damn excited to try out that I wasn’t even thinking much about the details. Right when I got back from the war, I was in pretty good shape. But I’d been living in the ballpark for a year. I didn’t have a kitchen or anything, and pardon my French, but I ate like shit. I wasn’t out there running or anything, so I was in pretty poor shape, especially compared to a lot of the other guys trying out for the team. Add to that the fact that I hadn’t been in a real game in years, and my prospects were pretty grim. By the time I got around to batting, I was pretty sure I was done for.
Before I went up, and this part kinda does feel like they’d show in a movie, a coach pulls me aside and said “Son, you can’t run, you can’t catch, and you can’t throw. Unless you can hit that ball like a son of a bitch, you’re out.” No pressure, huh?
They put me up to bat against one of the guys on the team. And when I say “one of the guys”, I don’t mean some backup relief pitcher. I
mean they had goddamn Satchel Paige up there. I felt like I was going up to bat against Jesus Christ. He sent the first pitch and I don’t even think I swung at it. He sent another one and I swung, but I was too slow. Way too slow. And then he wound up and threw that third one.
Now, maybe I’m wrong and they would have been a little more lenient, but the way I figured it, I was either going to hit this ball or get on the bus back to Cleveland. So I got my head right and put the bat on the ball. And I’ll tell you something: when you put the bat on the ball and you really hit it, you can feel it. You don’t even have to watch it. That ball just tells you as soon as it leaves, and that one went screaming off and over the wall.
The guys were all cheering as that ball took off, and I was cheering louder than all of ‘em. We weren’t playing a game or anything, so I didn’t have to run the bases. I just took my bat and started off back towards the dugout when I heard someone calling out to me.
“Hey there, boy!” Satchel shouted. “Why don’t you come on back and see if you can do that again?” And though it took another two pitches, I did. And he and I went on like that for another hour or so. Sometimes he’d get me six or seven pitches in a row, but every one I hit, I sent out of the park. And just like that, I was on the team.
Now, I was on a few different teams when I played ball, but I never had a better time than when I was on the Indians. They’ve always been my favorite.
Scottie, no longer relegated to left field, is now up to bat. We watch as the boy takes a valiant swing, missing the ball by several seconds. The next pitch results in a hit, and a strong one, but it flies foul. The next is another far miss, and Scottie is back in the dugout. Bob gives him a big round of applause anyway, and a whistle the likes of which is known only to grandfathers.
What was I saying? Oh right, the Indians. See, this was way before anyone was thinking about the virus. And if anyone was thinking about it, they
weren’t thinking about ballplayers. I know for me, it didn’t even cross my mind. My head was all about baseball.
In ‘49 and ‘50 we didn’t do too badly, but we weren’t going after the pennant. And then there was 1951. There wasn’t anything different about it, coming into that season, except that I’d gotten my feet wet and was playing a lot better. Was in better shape. I was running a lot faster, throwing a lot better, and most importantly, I was hitting a lot more consistently. And, just like with Satchel, I was hitting ‘em out a lot.
By September, I was just eight behind The Babe, and I figured I really had a shot, and with four games to go, I hit number sixty. Holy cow it was a feeling like you wouldn’t believe. I’d just tied the record of the best ball player that ever lived, and I still had three games left. On the first of three, I hit two runs. On the second, I hit another. For the final game, the stands were absolutely packed. Now, we weren’t in contention. Our record was pretty lousy, truth be told. I scored a lot of runs, but we still lost a lot of games. And that final game, we were playing Detroit, and they were doing worse than us. In any other season, our parents wouldn’t have even bothered coming to a game like that. But there wasn’t a spare seat in the place.
The people came to see me hit, and I didn’t want to disappoint. I never had another night like that one, but that’s okay, ‘cause most people don’t even get one. I hit four home runs that night. Four. That put the record up to sixty-seven, and that still stands. They’ve got some real massive guy in the big show right now, that McGuire guy. He’s looking like he might make a
go at it, but even if he makes it that won’t make me any less proud.
Bob smiles as he watches Scottie, who seems fairly distracted as a pop fly drops to the ground a few feet away from him.