Finding the Worm (11 page)

I stared at him in disbelief. “Yeah, that’s me. But how did you know?”

The guy’s expression changed when I said that. The smile left his face, and for a second he looked real nervous and confused.

But then Quentin said, “I’m a Bobby Murcer fan too.”

Now I stared at
him
in disbelief … because I knew he was lying. Quentin’s favorite baseball player is Willie Mays. Right before he got sick, he built and painted a plastic model of Mays making that over-the-shoulder catch in the World Series. The thing was sitting on the windowsill, right behind the bed. But the guy in the suit didn’t notice it. Instead, he began to smile again.

“Make room for me, will you?”

Lonnie got up to make room for the guy at the edge of the bed. The guy sat down next to Quentin and stuck out his hand. “You’re Quentin, right?”

Quentin nodded and shook his hand.

“My name’s Jerry Manche,” he said. “Sounds like there are two e’s at the end of Manche, but there’s only one. People mess that up all the time. I’m with the New York Yankees.…”

That got our attention real fast.

“What I’m thinking—correct me if I’m wrong—is that you know why I’m here.”

Quentin smiled. “You’ve got an autographed picture of Bobby Murcer?”

“Coming right up!” He popped open his briefcase and pulled out a photo, which he handed to Quentin. There was writing in black Magic Marker at the bottom. “You want to read out loud what Bobby wrote? I’m sure your friends would like to know.”

Quentin read: “ ‘To Quentin. From one home run hitter to another. Get well soon, buddy. Bobby Murcer.”

Jerry Manche said, “What do you think about that?”

“It’s great,” Quentin said. “But what about Julian?”

“It’s okay, Quent,” I said.

“He’s a Bobby Murcer fan too. Do you think Bobby—”

“Consider it done!” Jerry Manche said.

“Can you get me Mickey Mantle?” Lonnie asked.

“Now hold your horses—”

“C’mon, you work for the Yankees!”

“In case you haven’t heard, the Mick’s retired.”

“Don’t you know where he lives?”

Jerry Manche started to laugh. “I’ll see what I can do. What’s your name?”

“Lonnie Fine. Sounds like there’s two
e
’s at the end of Lonnie, but it’s
i-e
.”

Jerry Manche gave Lonnie a look. “You’re quite the wisenheimer, aren’t you?”

“No, sir!”

“That’s good to hear,” Jerry Manche said, “because I don’t think Bobby Murcer would’ve agreed to come out here in April, after the Yankees finish spring training, just to meet up with a bunch of wisenheimers.”

My mouth fell open. “Bobby Murcer’s coming
here
?”

“What do you wisenheimers think about that?”

“Can we talk to him?” Eric asked. It was a dumb question, but the rest of us were too stunned to razz him about it.

“You’re going to hurt his feelings if you don’t.”

“What day in April?” Lonnie asked.

“We’re still working that out,” Jerry Manche said. “But don’t you worry. He’ll be here. You can take it to the bank.”

“Thanks, Mr. Manche!” Quentin said.

“There are two conditions, though. The first is that you guys have to call me Jerry. I don’t want to hear about Mr. Manche unless you’re talking about my dad. Do we have a deal on that?”

“What’s the second condition?” Lonnie asked.

Jerry Manche turned again to Quentin. “The second condition is that this guy right here”—he grabbed Quentin by the shoulder and give him a gentle shake—“this guy right here has got to start feeling better. Do you think you can do that? Do you think you can do that for Bobby Murcer and the Yankees?”

“Sure, he can do that!” Lonnie said.

Quentin shrugged. “I’ll do my best.”

“If you give a hundred percent,” Jerry Manche said, “you get a hundred percent.”

“What if you give a hundred and ten percent?” Lonnie said in a real sincere voice.

“Now
that’s
what I like to hear! How about it, Quentin? Do you think you can give a hundred and ten percent?”

Quentin looked him in the eye and nodded. But even he was struggling to keep a straight face.

“Then we got a deal.” Jerry Manche stuck out his hand again. “Put it there.”

Again Quentin shook his hand.

“There’s just one more thing,” Jerry Manche said. He glanced toward the front of the room, near the door, where Howie and Eric were standing. “You boys want to police that area?”

“What do you mean?” Eric said.

“I need you to get that stuff off the floor. Just move it out of the way. Can you do me that favor?”

“Why us?” Howie asked.

“Because you’re standing there.”

“C’mon, just do it,” Lonnie said.

As Eric and Howie started picking up Quentin’s model planes and loose clothes, Jerry Manche stood up from the bed and walked to the window. He slid it open, leaned out, and whistled real loud.

After that, he turned back to us. “Bobby Murcer and the Yankees got a little get-well gift for Quentin. We’re going to set it up in that corner of the room. Now, if you’ll excuse me for a minute, I’m going to head downstairs and oversee the operation.”

“What did you get for him?” Lonnie asked.

“Hold your horses, pardner. It’ll be here in a minute.”

Jerry Manche said that on the way out of the room. As soon as he closed the door behind him, I turned to Quentin. “Why did you tell him you’re a Murcer fan? You don’t even like the Yankees.”

“But you do,” Quentin said. “I figured I owed you.”

“Owed me for what?”

“You pushed back your bar mitzvah ’cause of me.”

“You don’t owe me for that—”

“So I got a nurse to write a letter to the Yankees saying how I was sick,” Quentin said, cutting me off, “and how I liked Bobby Murcer, and could I please have an autograph. I thought for sure they’d send it, and then you
could have it, ’cause he’s your favorite. I didn’t expect it would get like this. So don’t rat me out, okay?”

“I’m not going to rat you out, Quent,” I said, “but that’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. You didn’t need to do that.”

“Yeah, it’s dumb, but who cares?” Lonnie said. “What matters is what’s coming up in the elevator.”

“What do you think it is?” Eric asked.

“It’s got to be pretty big,” Lonnie said.

“I’ll bet it’s a fort!” Eric shouted.

“Why would the Yankees give Quentin a fort?” Lonnie said. “That makes no sense whatsoever.”

“Maybe it’s a baseball bat,” Howie said.

Lonnie rolled his eyes. “I guarantee you it’s not a baseball bat. If it were a baseball bat, Manche would’ve brought it up himself. I’m telling you, it’s got to be big. It’s got to be too big for one guy to carry.”

“Maybe it’s a TV,” I said.

They turned toward me, all at once.

“Now
that
makes sense,” Lonnie said.

“Maybe it’s a
color
TV,” Howie said.

“It could be one of those humongous ones,” Eric said, “with a remote control and a built-in stereo.”

That set us off.

For the next half minute, we were arguing not so much about
whether
it was a TV but about
what kind
of TV it was. But then I noticed Quentin, sitting up on the bed, waving his hand, trying to get our attention. “Um, guys …”

“What is it, Quent?” I said.

“Why don’t you just look out the window?”

We stared at one another for a split second, then jumped up, the four of us at once, and rushed to the window. There was already a huge wooden crate on the sidewalk. Two short, stocky guys in tight jackets were unloading another crate, not quite as huge but still plenty big, from a long truck. Jerry Manche was standing on the curb, near the truck, pointing at the two other guys and giving orders. You could see puffs of smoky breath coming from his mouth.

“It’s definitely a TV,” Howie said.

“No, I don’t think so,” Lonnie said, leaning to the right for a different angle. “Why would there be two boxes?”

“Maybe it’s another TV,” Howie said. “Maybe Quentin’s getting two TVs.”

The rest of us just stared at him.

“All right,” Howie snapped, “then
you
tell
me
what it is.”

I had a thought at that moment, but I couldn’t say it out loud: that first crate, the bigger one, was the size and shape of a coffin. It creeped me out to think that, and I tried not to think it, and afterward I tried to shake the thought out of my head. But it stuck with me.

“Hey, Quent,” Lonnie said, “don’t you want to see what’s going on?”

“Nah, you guys can tell me.”

“Are you tired out?” I said.

“Not too bad.”

Lonnie stepped away from the window. “Do you want us to go? You can say if you do. We’ll clear out in a minute.”

“Nah, I want you to stay,” Quentin said.

“They got the crates on wheels!” Eric said. “They’re rolling them through the front door of the building!”

“C’mon, Quent, let’s meet them at the elevator!” Lonnie said.

“You guys go ahead,” Quentin said. “I’ll meet you out there.”

He seemed to mean it, so we ran out of the room like a buffalo stampede, then out past Mr. and Mrs. Selig, who were sitting at the kitchen table, and then out into the hall.

It took a long time for the elevator to get to the fifth floor. When the doors slid open, we couldn’t even see the guys. It was just the two wooden crates sitting on dollies. But then the crates lurched forward, and we jumped back out of the way, and the two stocky guys steered the crates out of the elevator and into the hall.

The last to come out was Jerry Manche, who looked
rumpled up. He must have gotten squeezed behind those crates and between those two stocky guys. But he managed to wink at us. Lonnie gave him a real goofy thumbs-up sign, and sure enough, Jerry Manche gave him a thumbs-up sign right back. I almost laughed out loud at that, but I turned my head to the side and held it in.

Quentin was standing at the front door of the apartment, holding it open, and his mom and dad were standing behind him.

“We’ll take it from here, folks,” Jerry Manche called. “If you’ll just step back and give us ten minutes, we’ll be out of your hair and gone.”

Quentin’s mom and dad pulled him back into the apartment and out of the way, and the two stocky guys steered the crates toward the front door. It was a miracle the bigger one fit. Right up until it rolled through, I was thinking,
No way!
It was so tight that the guy had to pull in his fingers from the edges of the crate. Then the second guy got the second crate through, and Jerry Manche led them to Quentin’s room. The four of us were trailing behind them, but Mr. Selig held up his hand, as if it were a stop sign, and that was that.

Quentin turned to his dad and asked, “C’mon, what is it?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

Then Quentin turned to his mom, but she made a
motion with her hand as if she was zipping her lips closed.

You wouldn’t believe the noises that came out of Quentin’s room for the next ten minutes. Hammers thudding, screwdrivers twisting, metal parts clanging onto the floor—it sounded like they were putting together a battleship. We were milling around in the living room the entire time, just kind of rocking back and forth on our heels.

Not Mr. and Mrs. Selig—they were sitting down on the couch. But they were listening to the racket like the rest of us, waiting for it to end. Every so often, when it got real loud, Mrs. Selig would wince. I heard her yell to Mr. Selig, “The neighbors must think we’ve gone crazy.” Mr. Selig didn’t answer her, but he gave her a quick hug.

Toward the end, there were other sounds. Not as loud as before, but weirder. Dinging. Buzzing. Clacking. I’d never heard a television make those noises. I glanced at Lonnie, and he glanced back at me, and we both kind of shrugged without shrugging. It was a total mystery.

Then, at last, Jerry Manche came out of the room. The two stocky guys came out right after him, dripping with sweat, and the second guy shut the door behind him. As soon as Mrs. Selig saw them, she jumped up off the couch and asked if they wanted glasses of lemonade. One of them nodded, and then both of them followed her into the kitchen.

Jerry Manche, meanwhile, walked over to Quentin and said, “Now, you remember our deal, right? You’re going to give a hundred and ten percent, and you’re going to start feeling better. We shook hands on that, and I’m going to hold you to it.”

“Right,” Quentin said.

“Remember, you didn’t just make that deal with me. You made it with Bobby Murcer and the New York Yankees. You live up to your end of the deal, and I promise you, Bobby will swing by for a visit when the Yankees come north in April. That sounds like a pretty good deal to me. What about you?”

“Sounds good to me too,” Quentin said.

Jerry Manche gave Quentin a soft jab in the arm, then stepped aside. It took a second for Quentin to realize he was letting him back into his room. As soon as that sank in, Quentin rushed past him, and the rest of us followed one step behind. Quentin flung open the door and stopped in his tracks.

There, in the corner of the room, stood a pinball machine … an actual, full-size dinging and buzzing and clacking pinball machine.

The game was called Challenge the Yankees.

Here’s the fifth essay on good citizenship
I wrote for Principal Salvatore: