Me, Johnny, and The Babe

by Mark Wirtshafter

into a position where I could hit him.”

  Johnny placed his head down on the open palms of his hands as he continued to speak.

  “A few seconds later I could feel his weight shift just enough for me to get my arm free. I reached back as far as I could and slammed the brick right into his head. I swung it with all the anger I ever felt in my whole life. I swung it so hard that the thud it made when I hit him would have made your stomach sick. As soon as I hit him he fell to the floor like a rock.”

  “He wasn’t moving and I should have probably just walked away. Maybe he was dead and maybe he wasn’t, but I didn’t hesitate even for a second. I jumped on top of him and started pounding the brick into his face and head as hard as I could. I must have hit him a dozen times, even though I was sure he was dead after the first two or three. I was so scared that my whole body was trembling. I left him there and went straight back to my house.”

  “I was covered in blood and knew I had to clean up and get rid of my clothes. I ran home and got new clothes without anyone seeing me. I threw my bloody clothes in a paper bag and ran out to the old rail yard and buried them in the ground under the waste dump. I waited at the yard until after noon when I knew you would have had to leave for the game, and then I went home.”

  “I couldn’t think straight and didn’t know what to do,” Johnny said taking another deep breath.

  As Johnny told his story, I sat there stunned. I completely forgot that we were sitting in Yankee Stadium, and all I could feel was my heart racing as he spoke. I do not know if he was looking for me to say something as he finished talking, but I could not get even a single word out. I tried to talk but could not get anything to come into my head, let alone through my mouth. I really did not know what to say. I stared out onto the deserted field and sat stoically.

  I wanted to comfort Johnny, but I was so unprepared for this that I could not find any of the right words. I wanted to tell him that it wasn’t his fault and that he was only defending himself, but I couldn’t. I wanted to tell him that I was his best friend and that if he told me what had happened, that I could have helped him through it, but I didn’t. There were so many things that I could have said, but I didn’t say any of them.

  Johnny finally took his eyes off the field and turned to me. I could see tears welling up in his eyes, in a way I had never seen before. Even as a kid, I never remember seeing Johnny cry. He did not try to hide his tears. They were flowing freely down his cheeks and he did not raise a hand to try to wipe them.

  I put my arm around his shoulder and tried to comfort him, knowing full well that the time for comforting him had long ago passed. Any bits of wisdom that I could give to him now would probably not help ease his pain. I rubbed his shoulder and waited for him to finish speaking. I was only shaken back to reality by the voice of the usher as he appeared next to me in the aisle.

  “You two are gonna have to get out of here now.”

  “We gotta clean this section and we can’t work around ya,” he finished.

  He walked away as if to give us a minute or two before he would have to come back and physically throw us out. He went to the front of the section and began picking up some of the trash that the fans had left behind.

  I sensed that our time together was drawing to a close. I searched for the right thing to say, or do, that might make a difference in Johnny’s life. Something that might put him back on the right track, and help him put his life in order.

  “You should come back home to Kensington and you can stay with me,” I blurted out.

  He looked at me as if he thought I was crazy.

  “I ain’t ever goin’ back to Kensington,” he said. “I was glad when I left it behind and I’ll never set foot in that place again. There’s nothing there for me. I don’t give a damn about anybody or anything that’s left there.”

  “What about me, and what about your family? There’s no way that I’m not telling them that you’re still alive.”

  “I don’t care what you tell ‘em, there’s no way I’m ever coming back.”

  I looked in his eyes and knew he was never coming back. Even though it was hard, I would have to leave him behind to lead his life, such that it was. I swallowed hard as the usher started cleaning the row directly in front of us, and knew it was time for us to go. Just as I started to stand up to begin leaving, Johnny grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me back down to my seat.

  “There’s something I want to give you before you leave,” Johnny said.

  He reached under his seat and pulled out a small, old, cardboard box. I watched him carefully open the brown flaps and pull out a small object. The object was wrapped in stained yellow paper. Johnny slowly unwrapped it, careful not to drop it out of his hands as he did. When he was finished taking the paper off I instantly recognized what it was. It was the baby deer antler that I had found that day, long ago, in the park when we went fishing with Uncle Eddie. The deer antler that Johnny had wrestled away from me; and apparently had kept with him all these years.

  “Here, I want you to have this, it should have been yours all along,” he said. “I thought it would bring me good luck, and somehow protect me, but it didn’t do either.”

  He handed me the antler and I held it in my hands. It was even smaller than I remembered it to be, but it was as perfect a specimen as I had recalled it being that day we found it. I moved my fingers over it to feel how smooth it really was.

  Johnny then reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of copper metal. He held it between his fingers and pushed it into the palm of my hand. It was a blank, semi-round piece of copper that I could not identify. I looked at Johnny for an explanation, but before he spoke, it came to me. It was the penny we had flattened on the railroad tracks that day we almost were killed. Johnny assumed that I recognized it, and looked away as he finished handing it to me. No further explanation was necessary.

  Johnny was giving back to me two things that he had ripped out of my hands when we were kids, and maybe in his mind trying to make right two perceived wrongs. I took the flat penny and placed it in the crevice of my wallet. I picked up the small box and put the baby deer antler back in it.

  “It’s time for us to go,” Johnny said.

  “Johnny, you were the best friend I ever had. I’ve thought about you every day since you left. From that day, I never had another best friend. It was as if I kept the slot open just in case you ever came back. I don’t want to lose you again.”

  Johnny looked away from me and shook his head.

  “There’s just no going back, not now, not ever.”

  I waited for him to get up and stand before I moved. He motioned with his head towards the exit of the stadium and I got up and started to move in that direction. When we reached the street, Johnny held his hand out for me to shake. I reached out and grabbed it, squeezing it tightly. I was fighting back the tears that were just beginning to form in my eyes. I tried to keep them from coming, but before I knew it I could feel them rolling down my check and into the crevice of my mouth. I used the edge of my sleeve to wipe them off my face.

  As I felt Johnny starting to let go of my hand, I pulled him close and wrapped both my arms around him. I never remember hugging Johnny when we were kids, but I held his body next to mine and clasped my fingers around his neck. I hoped that the tears would stop flowing, but they didn’t. I knew when I would let go that he would leave, and that I would probably never see him again. I held on for as long as I could, but finally I felt him stiffen his body and he pull away from me. He held my wrists at arm’s length and said, “It’s time to go.”

  He held his arm out towards me as he stepped away. I reached out towards him, he grabbed my forearm and we did our secret handshake. It was something from our childhood that I had completely forgotten about. Something that had been lost in the years, but came back to us one last time.

  He turned and started walking away from me without saying another word. He was about twenty steps away when I yelled out his name.
He turned back towards me and waited for me to speak.

  I walked up to him and said, “There’s something of mine that I want you to have.”

  I reached into my back pocket and pulled out the small wooden pocket comb that had fallen out of Babe Ruth’s back pants pocket.

  “You may not believe this, but this comb actually belonged to Babe Ruth,” I explained to Johnny.

  “Don’t ask me how I got it, but just know that this really did belong to the Babe. I carried it with me every day since the game he played at Boger Field. I always thought that this was somehow magical, and that it really did bring me good luck and protect me. It has been better to me than any lucky rabbit’s foot. If you carry it, I know it’ll protect you and bring you good luck too.”

  Johnny took the pocket comb from me and held it in the palm of his hand for a moment. I was wondering what was going through his mind as he looked at it. He ran his fingers over it, flipping the teeth of the comb, just as I had done on the day I found it. Just as any kid would do to hear the clicking sound that it would make.

  “This really did belong to the Babe?”

  I nodded yes.

  “I can’t believe you’re giving to me but if you’re stupid enough to give it away I sure will be happy to keep it.”

  As Johnny turned and walked away, I could see the hint of a genuine smile light up his face. It