The New York (25 page)

I shook my head very slowly in case it was loose. Then I tasted some of the beer to get the taste of Wild Turkey tamed down. Then I dialed information and asked for the number of the Holiday Inn.

I must have been drunk because it seemed like a good idea to call Charlene at two in the morning and tell her I was suddenly home. A sober person would reflect on that before taking action, but I was a man of few words and they were getting fewer.

I called the room of Miss Charlene Cleaver and let the phone ring and ring and ring. This also seemed like a good idea. She might be sound asleep and only my patient ringing of the phone sixty or seventy times would be able to rouse her.

“Mfphm?”

“Charlene? It's me,” I said. I thought I said it cheerfully.

“Mfphm?”

“Charlene, are you sleeping?”

That brought on a witty silence for a moment. And then she said, “No, why would I be sleeping at two in the morning?” I had to laugh then because Charlene is just great when she's being ironic.

“I just got in.”

“Where were you?”

“With Raul Guevara. We found this great bar on Third Avenue called Tapas. It's like a Spanish place. Like in Spain, not Mexico. Met some of his friends there, fellow named Riccardo. He's a court interpreter for people who don't speak English. And this punk name of Estavar, sort of an asshole. Another guy is a limo driver, I might be able to get him to pick me up at the airport when I get in from road trips.”

“You found this great bar? And you got drunk with one of your wetback ball players talking all night, to some guys about whatever fascinating stuff you men talk about? Oh, yes, and the courthouse interpreter, whatever that means.”

Now, there was something of the ice princess in the tone of her voice but nothing could stop me now because I had passed over the threshold from merely charming to being bullet-proof.

I said, “Why don't you come over? Just get a cab and come on over and we can have a good talk.”

“I don't want a good talk, Ryan. I want to go to sleep “

“Well, okay. If you don't want to come over, okay. But I was just asking you over. I missed you, honey.”

“I flew two thousand miles to see you.”

“You didn't let me know, I would've been here.”

“I got in at five in the afternoon and I took a cab down here from Newark Airport —”

“Actually, it's up here from Newark. Newark is down there if you read a map rightside up.”

“Shut up!”

I did. It was something in the tone of voice again, but this time I was listening.

“And I waited and waited and waited and then I went to a coffee shop and had a bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich, which I never eat, never, never, never, and then I waited some more and then I decided about nine o'clock that you were just dead somewhere, lying on a street in New York City, being run over by taxicabs and I came here to this Holiday Inn that I walked six blocks to get to.”

“It's more like four blocks, Charlene, don't exaggerate. I keep my car there in the parking lot.”

“Shut up!” she said,

“Why'd you come up here? Is something wrong?”

“Yes, something's wrong. Why would I come up if there wasn't something wrong?”

“What's wrong?”

“I'm going home in the morning. This is stupid, I wasted my time off to spend all this money on coming up because I needed to see you and you're spending all your money and time getting drunk with a greaser in a bar when I thought you were dead in the middle of New York City.”

“I don't like you to use that language,” I said.

“Well, go fuck yourself!” she said.

Don't get the wrong idea about Charlene. She is a sensitive and caring person and she does not use slurs in ordinary conversation or use bad language unless extremely provoked. It was probably something about it being two in the morning that set her off, that and spending $109 for the privilege of sleeping in a king-size bed in the middle of northern New Jersey.

Just think of how provoked she would have been if she had been in Manhattan shelling out 300 bucks a night to listen to the serenade of the garbage trucks.

“Charlene, what's wrong, honey? I didn't know you were coming so I don't think you can blame me if I was trying to reach an interpersonal relationship with one of my players. He's very troubled. He's got a girl back in Havana and he's so lovesick that I was worried about him.”

“What about you, Ryan? You had a girl back in Houston. I bet she never came up in the conversation, did she?”

“As a matter of fact, you did, quite often.”

“I won't have my name tramped through the mud of a New York saloon,” she said.

“It was not tramped. It was brought up, Raul told me how much he loved this little girl named Maria Velasquez and how much he missed her and I told him how much I missed you. He even asked to see your picture.” I made that part up.

“You don't even have a picture of me,” she said. “You got as much sentiment as wet adobe.”

“I said I didn't have a picture of you because I didn't need none. I carried your image in my heart.”

“You said that? Was this before or after you got drunk?”

“Before,” I said.

“You're a liar. You'd never say that sober.”

“I love you. I think I've been sober saying that.”

“They
arrested Jack Wade for income tax evasion,” she said.

Plunk. Just like that.

“They
arrested? Who arrested?”

“The FBI I think.”

“The FBI arrested Jack Wade?”

“Oh, I was so scared for you, Ryan. I just know he's gonna rat on you and drag you into this.”

“Rat on me for what? He sold me a car once.”

“He said he gave it to you.”

“Jack Wade is a car dealer, Charlene. He don't give away anything he can sell Sort of like being a whore.”

“I was so sure you were in trouble —”

I was getting sober in that painful way that is like sliding down a three-story razor blade on your tongue. I shook my head loose and it hurt. I held the phone very tight against my ear.

“Charlene, I ain't in no trouble. I never had no deal with Jack Wade.”

“He told me that you and him was thick as thieves.”

“Jack Wade is a liar like all natural born salesmen. Also a thief, apparently, though I don't hold income tax evasion as a major crime the way the government does.”

“Then you're not guilty?”

“I ain't even been accused of anything to feel guilty about. Except by you, honey, and I just told you I loved you.”

“Oh, honey.”

Honey and honey. It made me smile. “Hurry on over.”

“It's two in the morning, honey. I can't get no cab.”

“Shit, then stay where you are. I'll come over.”

“Oh, Ryan. You're drunk, aren't you?”

“Yes, ma'am, I am. Took a cab home all the way from Manhattan, driven by a homicidal maniac, cost me fifty bucks.” The lies were coming as thick as … well, thieves. “I saw the Statue of Liberty today for the first time.”

“Why?” Charlene said.

“Took the kids out on an excursion. Went up to the eighty-seventh floor of the Empire State Building, too. Never did that before.”

“Why?” Charlene said.

“Show them the city, try to make the kids feel at home. They're all so homesick, writing letters all the time they were on the road trip.”

“You never wrote me a letter.”

“I don't write, we ain't in Cuba. I can call you just as easy.”

“You didn't call me all week,” she said.

“I missed you,” I said.

“If you missed me, you'd have called me.”

“Not necessarily.”

“You were too cheap to call.”

“I ain't cheap. I'm careful.”

“I just spent $413.98 on an airplane and fifty dollars on a cab and $109 plus tax to sleep in a big old bed in this Holiday Inn. I'm on the side facing that big old bridge there. Don't these people never sleep? Traffic bang bang bang all night long. I can hear it now.”

“It's the garbage trucks,” I said, making a logical connection.

“Ryan. You stay put and so will 1.1 want to go back to sleep. I want to see you, but I don't want to see you in the state you're in.”

“I'm carrying on a perfectly rational conversation,” I said.

“You talk like a drunk.”

“I never drink anything but beer.”

“Then you must have drunk a barrel tonight.”

“Drank. Drunk is what I are, drank is what I did,” I said. I was so incredibly witty by this point that it was all I could do to stop from laughing.

“I'll call you in the morning,” she said.

There was a final note in that and I didn't fight it. If a lady says enough, it's good enough for me. “Sorry about Jack Wade,” I said to her.

“Mmm,” she said. “I'm glad you're not in trouble.”

“So am I,” I said.

“Are you sure you're not?”

“I'm sure,” I said. I didn't want to think too much about that IRS guy asking Jack about dealing with me. I figured that handling these Cuban players and all, I was working with the government.

“Good night, Ryan,” she said then.

“I love you,” I said then.

And then, of all things, I thought about that sad look of pity in Raul's eyes. Shit,

Just like that, I figured I would have a hard time getting to sleep. Women can do that to you.

The doorman in the lobby called me around nine in the morning and told me Charlene wanted to come up. That gave me about two minutes to run into the bathroom, stand in the shower, wipe myself off with a clean towel, and present my hungover presence at the front door.

Charlene had two coffees in paper cups in a bag and a large muffin of the kind that roughage is made out of and is totally inedible. She also had her green dress on, which is more than a heart can bear at nine in the morning. If I had to work with Charlene every day, I'd have my ass hauled in on sexual harassment charges inside of a week.

“You look terrible,” she said.

“Just took a shower,” I said.

“I didn't say you smelled terrible, I said you looked terrible,” she said.

I scratched my chest just to have something to do when Charlene pushed by me after I tried to kiss her. “Whiskey breath,” she said.

I went back into the bathroom and closed the door and put a half-pound of Crest on my teeth and then rinsed the whole lot of them in Listerine. I even brushed my hair. There wasn't much I could do with my eyes, though.

I put on my robe and went back into the rest of the apartment, which is just one big room off a Pullman kitchen.

“Ryan, you ever get tired of living in one room?”

“Sure I do. But I don't see the need for a bedroom when all I'm gonna do is sleep in it.”

She had sat down at the kitchen counter and opened her coffee. I did the same with mine.

“Brought you a muffin. Banana-apple.”

“I'll drink some coffee first to get lubricated,” I said.

“You look like you were good and lubricated last night. I didn't know you had a drinking problem.”

“Charlene, I just went out with one of my players and we were over-served, is all.” I took a sip and scalded the tip of my tongue.

“Charlene, why'd you come up here? To tell me about Jack Wade?”

She opened her purse then and threw it on the counter. I picked it up. It was an envelope addressed to Ms. Charlene Cleaver of Houston, Texas. I opened the unsealed envelope and took out the sheet of paper.

It said:

Ms. Cleaver:

That awful man has been pestering me again and it is more than I can stand, knowing that he is two-timing you at the same time he is sweet talking me…

It went on in this vein but I skipped through it to the signature.

Roxanne Devon.

I stared at the signature for a good ten seconds. It was a loopy handwriting, the kind that sophomore girls practice. She didn't draw smiley faces instead of dotting her i's, but it was in the same category as that.

I put the letter on the counter and took another slug of coffee.

“What do you want me to say?”

“Tell me what you want to tell me,” she said.

“I do not know nor have I ever known anyone anywhere named Roxanne Devon.”

“Tell me another one.”

“Charlene, we don't play until eight tonight so why don't you and I go over to Brunswick, New Jersey, and go through the phone book and try to see if we can run down this Roxanne Devon.”

“You probably know she probably doesn't even live in Brunswick, New Jersey. She just mails her letters from there,” Charlene said.

“Why would she do that, Charlene? If she don't live someplace, why would she go there to mail poison letters to some woman she don't even know in Houston, Texas? Tell me that.”

“Jack got arrested day before yesterday and yesterday I get this letter in the mail and I ain't heard from you for a week.”

“We been on the road. In Cleveland and Chicago and then Kansas City. I don't think of nothing on the road except the baseball games I still got to play”

“So you don't think of me, is that it?”

“I think of you all the time, Charlene.”

“I don't want you to think you got to lie to me,” she said.

“Why would I think that?”

“It's not like we're married,” she said.

“I know that.”

“‘Course you do. Got this bachelor apartment in this fancy building with a doorman. I bet I ain't the first girl that doorman announced to you. He didn't seem surprised by me or nothing.”

“Lewis ain't been surprised since he got a draft notice to report to Vietnam in 1965,” I said.

“You think you can talk your way out of anything.”