“Don’t you say that to me, you bastard! The plan would not have worked without me! Remember, George? That boy is out of your way for a while because of me! And now the sheriff is talking to me. Okay? So, what about us? Huh? What about that promise you made? I’ve been waiting, George.”
Lefty sighed with vexing exasperation. “Meet me outside, in back. And leave after me, so nobody sees.”
The moon, through thick clouds, was vague and ominous. The air was cool and bothered the sweat on her forehead. She found him out back, leaning against a trash receptacle.
“Look, George, I know you told me never to come here again, but you don’t return my calls and I have been—”
“Shut up!” he screamed. “Just shut your mouth, you little tramp. I don’t owe you nothing. Nothing, you hear? That promise don’t mean a hill of shit. Seems to me I already paid for that, long time ago. I kept you around longer than I should have. There’s nothing happening here. Got it? I have a lot of people to see. I don’t have no time for some alley cat. It’s over. That’s it. Now get your shit together and don’t ever show your face again.”
She felt dizzy and her helplessness raged anew. “What are you saying?” she screamed. “Why, George? Tell me why.”
He had no answer for her.
She cried. She cried a lot. She just stood there before him, and cried. And then it happened. Laney saw deep into him, as if his eyes had somehow become portholes to his blackened soul. She shuddered and gasped, and in that one instant, her loneliness and misguided affection for the man turned to loathing.
“You asshole!” she screamed. “You fucking asshole! I am not some worthless piece of shit. Do you hear me? Don’t you walk away from me! Do you hear me? You will respect me! You will respect me!”
The words fell softly on Lefty’s back.
WARMING IN THE PEN
Quinton Harrington and Chip McNally sat in the dim light of Quinton’s office and toasted their recent good fortune. A lamp resting precariously on a teetering pile of binders threw a flat, yellow beam across the room, forming a circle that expanded to include Quinton’s tight jaw, his manicured fingers wrapped carefully around a clear, beveled glass containing a brown liquid, and some stray papers placed errantly in front of him.
“Here’s to sweet victory,” he announced, lifting his glass in the direction of the ceiling. “And to a well-executed plan.”
McNally also raised his glass and smiled. Then he pulled out the sports section of the morning paper. “And to a two-game lead in the standings,” he added, “with just fifteen to go.”
It made them both smile. The Rangers had made up an incomprehensible amount of ground in such a short time and were on the brink of eliminating the Brewers and clinching a postseason appearance.
As time went on, the yellow beam seemed to expand, extending farther to reveal the dark circles under McNally’s eyes. He had spent all night working on his lineup, aware that the next game, a pivotal matchup against the Brewers, could prove to be the final nail in their coffin. What little sleep he managed to get was punctuated by broken dreams, a peculiar patchwork of episodic exchanges between Murph and him. In the most haunting of the series, he is young again, the fleet-footed number nine, dashing through the outfield in pursuit of a fly ball. His eyes are focused on the ball; his mind wedded to that vision of a game-saving catch. He is there, just about to snare the ball in his glove, when he is run down by another outfielder—Arthur Murphy. So there’s no catch. No glory. Nobody screams his name, ever again. It’s all gone, in one, fleeting moment. Gone. All that’s left is a busted knee and broken dreams that spill out all over that outfield.
In the confines of the dusky office, with the smell of leather and new carpet perfuming the air, the residue of that dream lingered. He could still hear the sound of the collision; his knee still throbbed. They were both painful reminders. But alcohol was good—it dulled the senses. Helped him forget. As for so many others, the bottle was McNally’s good friend—the great equalizer, the momentary panacea for many a shattered baseball career.
The two men continued to drink their whiskey and light cigars, then resumed their discussion.
“I think tomorrow should be the knockout blow,” McNally said cheerfully. “Murphy is reeling over there—poor bastard. They’re really down. One more loss, they’ll fold their tents.”
Quinton stood there, pouring whiskey down his throat, his mind clicking fitfully like some tired contraption. “I’d like to believe that’s the case. It sure would be nice. I know Mickey’s still on the shelf. But are you sure that Rogers is not available? I don’t need any flies in the ointment.”
McNally jiggled the ice cubes in his glass and smiled. “I am positive.” He held up two fingers on each hand and clicked down as if to type quotation marks on the stale air. “Sore arm.”
Across town, a different kind of meeting was taking place, one laced with anger and vitriolic exchanges.
“Mr. Murphy, have you seen the morning paper?” Dennison asked bitterly.
The question sort of floated, lingered for a while like a dandelion seed caught on a spring breeze. Both men sat quietly in the veiled light of Dennison’s lair, staring at each other. The reproachful silence angered Murph. His spirit writhed with exposure and shame, not because of Dennison’s remark, but because of his own inability to ameliorate the disaster left in the wake of Mickey’s injury.
“Yes, Warren, I have seen it.”
“Two games Arthur—two. With only fifteen left on the goddamned schedule. Do you understand what that means? My God, how could you blow such a big fucking lead?” Dennison struggled with the brutal misfortune that had befallen them. “Look, I am the first one to admit that I was not in favor of this kid joining our team. I was wrong. He’s the best thing that ever happened to us. I get that losing him was quite a blow. But, Arthur, for Christ sake, that was a month and a half ago. When are you going to get your shit together? What is it that you are doing about this?”
Dennison’s condemnation was a logical consequence of the team’s subpar performance; but the bilious owner’s incessant attempts to belittle him, to impugn his character as a baseball man and manager, irritated him, scraped against his grain to the point of complete exasperation.
“You know something, Warren? I’m dealing with a mountain of shit here. Are you aware of that? I lost my best pitcher, whom I still feel personally responsible for. My other stud is a fucking head case, who the rest of the team wants to string up by his balls. And now this whole investigation that Rosco wants to conduct has everyone feeling sick and out of sorts. So you know what? I don’t need your bullshit also. All things considered, I think I’ve done a pretty damn good job holding this thing together.”
Dennison sat back in his chair, rolled his shoulders as if to shake off the ill effects of a blindside, and glanced out the window. The sun was going down with a riotous swirl of brilliant color, varying shades of pink, orange, and sea-foam green. He looked on, with vague interest, then shook his head. He had always had a vision of Murph as someone who would, someday, take the disappointment of unfulfilled promise and convert its turbulent energy into sweet, vindicating success. It’s the reason why he’d given Murph the job.
“I believe you’re hungry,” he told him that very first day. “Hunger is good. It’s the key.”
But some years later, Dennison had yet to see that hunger yield anything more than mediocrity, which led him to believe that what he had perceived as hunger really was, at best, a whimpering vacuity.
“Let’s go about this thing a little differently, shall we, Arthur?” Dennison said in forced conciliatory tones. “Because I’m at the end of my rope here. Maybe I have not expressed myself clearly enough.” He wrinkled his nose. For a moment, it was all too much for him. He tossed around a cluster of ideas that resonated in his head like a roomful of people all chattering at once. Some were soft, and understated, while others possessed an earsplitting energy that threatened to suffocate those l
ess inclined to promote themselves vaingloriously. He entertained all of them for a while, then just let them go and went with his gut instead.
“It seems to me, Arthur, that there comes a time in every man’s life when he is tested—really tested—when fate grabs him by the balls and forces him to look inside himself and see what he’s made of. You know, to really take stock. I really believe that. And fair or not, ready or not, goddammit, this is your time.”
The room grew tight and oppressive. Arthur’s mouth opened, but he didn’t have any words ready. Dennison sensed his distress and took out a cigar from his top desk drawer, lit the end with a silver Dunhill lighter, and blew a perfect ring of smoke into the heavy air.
Arthur’s mouth quirked in annoyance. His lips pressed tightly together to hold the anger. Who the fuck was Warren Dennison, a guy who had never played an out of professional baseball, to question him? What the hell did he know about pitching woes, defensive lapses, and hitters with trained eyes who were all of a sudden swinging wildly at 2-2 sliders in the dirt? How could he know what it was like to manage such a combination of divergent personalities, to give each the room to grow and play safely? And what about game day— game management? The X’s and O’s. Sacrifice or swing away? Hit-and-run or straight steal? Leave the pitcher in or go to the pen? Infield up or play for two? What the hell did Dennison know about any of it? Arthur knew the answer—it was there all along. Always was. Dennison didn’t know shit. So the anger boiled. And like magma bubbling beneath the earth’s crust, it sought some release.
“Do you think it’s easy to manage a ball club, Warren?” he finally said. “To throw nine guys out there who will execute the plan the way it’s drawn up? Do you? Do you even have a clue? Maybe you haven’t noticed, but I don’t have the ’27 Yankees out there. I work with what I’m given. And sometimes, well, to be perfectly honest, it ain’t enough. You’ve heard it before, Warren. Matheson’s famous line? You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken shit. And then I bring you Mickey, this phenom sent straight from God. Someone who can improve the quality of the entire team. And you balk. Tell me I’m crazy. Question my ability to scout. But he does exactly what I knew he would. And you just admitted that yourself, but you still don’t give me one ounce of fucking credit, even though that kid put us back on the map. But I still say nothing. I just suck it up and keep winning games. And life is good. Then he’s taken from me, and everyone else can see the giant hole it created except you. I cannot fill that hole. We patch it now and again. But the hole is the hole. It’s there and it’s real. I am playing shorthanded. So don’t call me in here and give me some lame bullshit about me finding myself, and don’t lay this whole goddamned thing at my feet. I will not listen to you drag my name through the mud any longer.”
Two Victorian bowls of frosted glass set neatly on the wall to the left of the desk held flickering bulbs that had previously bathed the room with the soothing mimicry of candlelight; now, however, instead of that peaceful glow, the constant spattering of light hit Dennison’s eyes hard, making him wince as if his retinas were somehow detaching. He glared at Murph with a red, swollen face, suffocating now that he had not only been questioned, but challenged so irreverently.
“You may be in charge of the on-field duties, Mr. Murphy, but that is only the case for as long as I say so,” Dennison fired back. “The fact that you may know a little bit more about the nuances of the game than I do does not preclude my need for you to be successful.” He spoke with a heightened purpose, his face still red and swollen. “And, at any point you demonstrate that you are incapable of doing so, and I trust you are aware of what I’m about to say, then I will have no alternative but to find someone—and I will—who can.”
Murph did not get up at once. Even after Dennison excused himself, Murph just sat there, staring at the flickering lights, his heartbeat matching the erratic cadence of the mechanical flames. He was drained, his resiliency recoiling from sheer exhaustion. He would have to get up, sooner or later; he knew that. But the thought was daunting, for sitting there, with his vitality and will to fight draining from him, he could not imagine facing a world turned suddenly to furious, unpredictable motion.
TUSSLER FARM—LATE AUGUST
The honey tint of the early-morning sky was a mirror of the bright, awakening earth. Molly was up prematurely, having been bothered all night by the curious feeling of a current of water flowing though her body, swiftly, inexorably, into nothingness.
Arthur Murphy’s visit had gotten her to thinking and had created a heightened sensitivity to everything. She was suddenly aware, for instance, of this sound, a faint rattling that she was previously incapable of understanding—a sound that she had been hearing all along but was unable to put a name to. Standing there, her hands blistering from the plunger she pushed through a threadbare butter churn, she thought that perhaps she finally knew.
Near the edge of the property, by the gray, weathered fence, she saw Clarence walking dumbly beside Oscar, who had wandered out to the road to wallow in a shallow puddle just inside the gate. She watched as this man whom she viewed more and more with an unaffected scorn teased the porker, rolling a turnip between his fingers, in sight of the pig, then pretending with a sharp, deft motion to throw the delicacy into the puddle next to him, rendering the animal confused and agitated. Clarence repeated the torture, laughing louder and louder each time, stopping only when Molly, who had seen enough, called to him.
“Hold yer horses, woman!” he bellowed. “I’m a coming.”
Clarence faked three more throws before tucking the turnip in his pocket and heading back up. With the sun having ascended, she saw him in full, reflectionless light and heard that rattling again, this time louder.
“That pig’s dumber than a stump,” Clarence said as he approached. He laughed and turned his head to her in righteous declaration. “Just like the boy.”
She hated that expression, ever since the first day he’d used it. Mickey must have been five, maybe six years old, and Clarence had just shown him how to get water from the well. He was standing back, arms folded, watching as the child attempted to replicate the procedure he was just taught.
“Go on now, boy,” Clarence instructed. “Fetch us some water.”
Mickey was cautious, moving with great trepidation, fearful no doubt of drawing his father’s ire should he fail to please him. His steps were measured and small, buckling under the tremendous weight of Clarence’s stare. He stopped several times, his face awash with fear. It seemed the young boy was infinitely weary of just contemplating another step. His stomach burned, and behind his eyes, a throbbing pain knocked mercilessly. His feet froze. All he wanted to do was lie down, right there in the grass, and go to sleep.
“Go on, boy!” Clarence repeated impatiently. “Do as your told.”
Mickey took a few more steps. Once at the well, he placed his hand on the crank and, looking at his father, began releasing the coiled rope from its spool, lowering the metal bucket into the black hole. With each crank, the winch creaked and more rope unfurled. It was all going according to plan, until Mickey was seized by an overwhelming dread attached to the swaying of the bucket. Why was it shaking so? Surely he was doing something wrong. His face contorted and he groaned in protest. Then, in desperation, he reversed the process, cranking the bucket back to its original position. Clarence just rolled his eyes.
After hiding his face in his hands for fear of being judged insolent, Mickey made another pass. He placed his hand back on the crank and tried again. But each time the rope was lowered, the bucket swayed uncontrollably to the side. He must have started over seven or eight times before Clarence finally flipped.
“What the hell in tarnation are ya doing, boy!” he hollered.
The young boy quaked. “The bucket,” he tried to explain. “Mickey can’t get the bucket to stop moving.”
Clarence opened his palm and covered his eyes. His head dropped helplessly for a moment, before his temper reared its ugliness.<
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“The bloomin’ bucket is supposed to move, you imbecile!” Clarence screamed. “Holy Christ, this can’t be happening. You are dumber than a stump.”
Clarence’s abuse of Oscar had taken Molly right back to that day. She had never forgotten those words, or the crestfallen expression on her little boy’s face.
“Let’s go inside, Clarence,” she said now, blinking her eyes wildly in an attempt to erase the painful recollection. “I’ll fix your breakfast.”
Molly and Clarence ate by the sun’s yellow light with cool, damp winds blowing through the open windows that suggested an afternoon rain. The smell of freshly baked bread, strudel, and ham steaks belied the discomfort of the moment.
Clarence cut his food vigorously and slurped his coffee. Molly watched quietly as little scraps of food flew from his mouth and into his beard and onto his shirt and the table in front of him. Repugnancy had grabbed her by the throat and was tightening its grip. She strove terribly to speak.
“So, were you able to fix the bucket on the corn planter?”
“Sure was,” he said. “Darn thing just needed a little elbow grease, that’s all.” He finished his coffee and wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his shirt. “What about you, little Miss Molly? You were up a mite early today. What’s got you all bushy-tailed?”
“Nothing particular now. Just figured we could use some fresh butter, that’s all.”
“What fer, woman? Today a holiday I don’t know about?”
“No, no holiday, Clarence. I just thought I’d do some baking. That’s all.”
Clarence shot her a look that went through her like a pin that paralyzed her momentarily. “You plan on doin’ some baking, do ya? Why’s that? Are we expectin’ someone?”
“Uh, no, Clarence. Who would we be expecting? That’s crazy. You know how I just like to bake.”
“Don’t get short with me now, woman. I won’t tolerate none of yer sass. I was just a wonderin’, that’s all.”
The Legend of Mickey Tussler Page 19