Sophomore Campaign (5 page)

Murph sighed ruefully. “I told you, Molly, and I meant it. He will play only for as long as he wants to. That's it. If he decides to quit, and Dennison fires me because of it, so be it. I will deal with it. I just don't want you to worry.”

Molly rubbed his face gently with her index finger and smiled softly.

“Now try to relax. Tomorrow will be just fine. And Mickey and I will be home after we're finished at the park. Please. Do not worry. I am telling you he'll be fine.”

“Not worry?” she said. That was something she wished for every day. Her frown deepened and she shook her head. “Not worry?” she repeated. “I think that ship has already sailed.”

A short time later, the locker room was alive, the musty air punctuated once more by the sound of clinking metal doors and mindless banter. All around the room the players sat, hands busy with the contents of their bags, mouths engaged in the sharing of their off season exploits and ultimately their expectations for the upcoming season. Those who had arrived early, like Pee Wee McGinty and Arky Fries, were sitting across from each other, embroiled already in yet another contest of Canasta.

“You gotta be kiddin' me,” Danvers said smiling as he slipped past the two. “You guys are at it already?”

“We got a lot of catching up to do,” McGinty replied, making the cards dance in his hands with his patented riffle shuffle. “It was a long winter.”

“Well you might want to take a little break, McGinty,” Danvers continued. “Your boy, Mickey, just came in. And he was asking for you.”

Mickey sat quietly at his locker, removing one article at a time from the gunny sack that Molly had taken from the farm before she left for good. First were his socks—six pairs in all, separated carefully by length and degree of wear. Next came his cleats, which he always placed at the bottom of his locker, each on its side, with the spikes lined up in perfect accord. Then came the baseballs. Fifteen brand new, pearly white Spaldings, which he set on the top shelf in five rows, each three deep. He had just begun to hang his jersey and fold his pants when he heard from around the corner the familiar sound of his best friend on the team calling his name.

“Mickey Tussler. Where are you boy? Cripe, I know you can't be hiding!” Mickey's spirits soared when he caught sight of Pee Wee, who sat down next to the boy and shook his hand. Pee Wee was Mickey's refuge on the team, the one guy who, from the very beginning, watched out for Mickey, particularly when he first arrived and the others razed the hulking pitcher unmercifully. He was Mickey's mentor, at Murph's behest, but had grown to really love the kid. He remembered just how much when he finally saw him.

“Well ain't you a sight for sore eyes,” he said. “I heard you weren't coming back.” Mickey stared back blankly, but was enormously pleased.

“Nah, Mickey is playing baseball, Pee Wee,” he said. “I love baseball.”

“Well, I'm glad to hear it, Mick. Really.” Pee Wee folded his arms and smiled. A slight moment of awkwardness fell on them, as
Pee Wee struggled for something to say. It had been so long. And so much had happened. “So, what did ya do all winter, big fella?” he asked. “You all settled at Murph's place?”

“Mickey made snow balls, Pee Wee,” he answered. “One hundred eight. Lined ‘em all up in the yard. It was cold outside, and my feet got all wet. You should have seen.”

Pee Wee chuckled quietly as the familiar patterns of discourse emerged once again. “That's great, Mick. Really. We had some snow in Chicago too. I did quite a bit of shoveling for my mom.”

The two of them continued to volley tidbits about the past few months, stopping only once or twice to allow Mickey to finish his sorting and organizing. Pee Wee watched as his friend transformed his locker into an orderly masterpiece.

“Well, whatta ya say, Mick,” he said. “You ready to go win us something special this year?”

Mickey stopped and rolled his arms wildly, the same way he did before every pitch he delivered. Pee Wee stood before him, silent. It really had not been that long, yet he found himself amazed by the startling reality that this enigmatic kid, who was riddled with all these peculiarities and idiosyncrasies, was the team's most valuable player. He watched him, trying to delve deep behind the eyes, and thought that perhaps the boy finally got it. What he meant to all of them. Christ, he was the Baby Bazooka, the talk of the town.

Surely he had to know by now.

“Well, Mick? How about it?”

“I'm sorry, Pee Wee,” he said. “They all melted now. The snowballs. I can't show you.”

One by one, the others trickled in. Each brought with him his own story. Clem Finster arrived sporting a full beard, and spent a good fifteen minutes explaining to all of them how his facial hair had changed his life immeasurably.

“I'm telling you guys, it's amazing. Everyone treats me differently. Guys are afraid of me. Nobody wants to mess. And the women? It's crazy man. The women are always looking. Christ, it's awesome. It's like I'm a new man.”

Buck Faber, who had shown up twenty pounds heavier than when he had left in September, laughed and poked at Finster playfully. “Well, does a new batting average come with this new man?”

A wave of raucous laughter rose from the ranks.

“Good one, Bucky,” Rube Winkler said, rushing to Finster's defense. “But at least Finster there is sharing
his
news. Looks to me like you've been holding out on us.”

Faber scrunched up his nose and shrugged. “What the hell you talking about, Ruby?”

Winkler smiled and patted his belly gently. “Heck, is this the way your good friends have to find out? Why didn't you tell us you were expecting?”

One of the last ones to arrive was Jimmy Llamas, whose penchant for making an entrance had not diminished any in the off season. Each year, Llamas came back to camp with a new persona. Some identity he had adopted as his own. He was lost in a perpetual search for self, so most of them just laughed, knowing full well that it would never last. That by the second week of spring training, he'd be James Borelli again—“Jimmy Llamas,” the same old puffy lipped, gap-toothed cartoon character whose very being provided more comic relief than Bob Hope. But his antics, as benign as they were, really irritated Woody Danvers, who was a bit of an egotist himself and perhaps the most irascible guy on the team. Danvers thought he had cured Llamas of these sophomoric antics the year the kooky centerfielder came to spring training with a pipe and smoking jacket, professing to have discovered “culture.” Danvers, unbeknownst to Llamas, mixed a little cow manure in his tobacco
blend. Later that day, Llamas lit up, puffed hard on the pipe while pontificating about “the finer things in life,” only to fall to his knees, hands clutching his throat, when he realized what had happened.

“Howdy, partners,” Llamas bellowed, entering the room wearing a ten-gallon hat, leather vest, and black lizard skin cowboy boots. “How do I look?”

Here and there were whispers and muffled laughter as the attention of the entire room turned immediately to Danvers, who had stood up, slammed his locker door, and narrowed his eyes in Llamas' direction.

“Like you just took a ride on the idiot wagon, and hit every bump along the way before finally falling off.”

The entire room roared. Llamas blushed and fired back, mumbling something about Danvers's mother. Everyone laughed again. That drew the ire of the chiseled third baseman even further.

“Okay, numb nuts,” Danvers warned. “It's a little early, but you asked for it.”

Danvers rushed for Llamas, collared him and cocked his fist behind his ear while the others looked on. This was usually the time that Boxcar stepped in, right before anything really serious transpired. He was the law. But he was noticeably absent, which left the responsibility to Murph and his sententious assistant, old man Matheson.

“Enough already,” Murph hollered. “It's way too soon for you two idiots to be doing this. I have enough of my own crap to worry about without babysitting you two jackals. Okay? Am I clear? Now get your crap together and make sure you're on that damned field in twenty minutes.”

Murph stormed off, leaving a trail of overturned laundry bins and batting helmets in his wake. They all just stood around for a moment, stunned by Murph's explosive rant, uncertain what to
make of the atypical outburst. It was only Matheson's inane commentary that shook them from their collective stupor and sent them all scrambling for the field, while he just continued to spew his vapid remarks.

“Well, what are you all standing around for, hunched over like a pack of dogs crapping razor blades. You heard your skipper. It's show time. We've got a clean slate. Yeah, that's right. Atta boy, Woody. You too, McGinty. What about you, Finster? Ha ha. That's what I'm talking about. Hustle out there. Go get ‘em. Slice the melon. Fly in the face of it. This here's a hard row to hoe fellas, and believe me when I say…”

Baseball was back everywhere. High above, as though suspended by invisible strings, a band of crows flew idly, listlessly, desultory stains pressed against the pale blue sky. With eyes both dark and ulcerous, Chip McNally stood, arms folded, and spoke passionately with his Rangers about the upcoming season. It seemed impossible that anyone should be unhappy on a day such as this, when the world had burst open once again. Who could find fault with today, especially McNally, whose team was coming off a rousing victory over Murph's Brewers en route to the championship. “Last year is last year, boys,” he began, pounding a fist into his open palm. “It means nothing right now.” He shook his head violently, and a reckless rage settled around his heart.

“And, we shouldn't be too proud of ourselves. We barely hung on. Christ, to have those rat bastards nipping at our heels on the very last day. Inexcusable. Completely inexcusable. We will bury them this year! All of ‘em. From that whining has-been Murphy to Mickey, that freakish wonder boy. Ya hear me. Bury them! I will settle for nothing less.”

Lefty Rogers, whose face and neck bore the painful reminders of his run-in with Mickey just months before, listened quietly in the lengthening shadows of the others as McNally continued his harangue.

“And we open up with those turds in just about a month. So we need to be sharp. Ready. There's not a minute to be wasted here.”

The manager's words filled Rogers with an unavailing wrath. Since that fateful day last season, when he lost all hope of nailing down a championship for the Rangers and most likely a call up to the big show, all the workings of Lefty's frustrated imagination had been concentrated on vengeance. It's all he thought about. Dreamt about. He had carried it with him all winter. He held it at the hospital, as doctors worked tirelessly to put his battered body back together. It haunted him at night, when he lay his head on the pillow after hours of rehabilitative exercises. It trailed him everywhere, this frustration, a roiling pulsation that ate at him mercilessly in the absence of a tangible outlet. Oh, how he had waited for this day. A chance for redemption. Vindication. His frustration, now unfettered, held up a torch to the fragile fabric of his inner demons, illuminating the pitcher's festering malevolence.

“I'm all for that, Mr. McNally,” he said, stepping into the center of the group. “Count me in. Just hand me the ball and point me in the right direction. I'll be there.”

Back at Borchert Field, under a sky splashed here and there with rectangular strands of white filament, some of the Brewer pitchers began loosening their arms, the annual ritual of resurrecting those muscles which had lain dormant for many weeks. Gabby Hooper grabbed a ball and paired up with Rube Winkler. Packey Reynolds did the same with Butch Sanders, and the foursome headed down
the left field line, moaning and jawing about sore shoulders and stiff biceps.

“Hey, Mick,” Sanders called back. “Wanna join us over here?”

Mickey, who had spent several minutes studying the pattern of the laces in the webbing of his glove, started to yawn, as if a simple game of catch was of no interest to him, then emptied a bucket of balls of his own at home plate and scampered down the opposite foul line, stopping when he reached the right field corner. With a quick smile and a jovial, audible “perfect,” he placed the empty bucket on its side, then trotted back down the line and proceeded to line up the mess of baseballs—four perfect rows, each five balls deep.

The foursome continued to throw softly, struggling with the rust that had formed on each of their arms with the five-month lay off. It was evident that none of them was any better off than the other, but bravado soon got the best of all of them.

“Jesus Christ, Hooper,” Winkler said. “That's all you got? Hell, I've seen better arms on my grand daddy's chair.”

Sanders, who caught Winkler's eye and was suddenly aware of the public scrutiny, shot him a quick grin before throwing his next ball to Reynolds with a little more zip on it.

“Yeah, you should talk, Ruby,” Hooper fired back. “You couldn't break a pane of glass with that puss ball you've been throwing.”

They all laughed, and began peppering each other with a litany zingers until, through the mist of insults, a thunderous sound, like a gun being fired in a stone canyon, halted their attack and left them wide eyed and gape jawed.

“Holy shit,” Winkler said. “I don't believe it.”

There was a moment of pure, motionless disbelief, when all else seemed to stand still, as the four of them watched with astonishment and incredulity as Mickey bent over to pick up another baseball.

“Did he, uh, just do what I think he did?” Hooper asked, shaking
his head rigorously as if to extricate the madness which had entered his head and altered his senses. “From over there?”

They had scarcely reconciled the enormity of the feat when Mickey rolled his arms, licked his lips, and let fly a second baseball. The little white sphere rocketed through the still air like a meteor, its trajectory crisp and true. With eyes wide with wonder, Hopper, Winkler, Sanders and Reynolds stared as the ball careened off the center of the bucket, splitting the silence with a deafening crash.