One Last Day Game
One Last Day Game
By Robert Prochaska
They lived in a squat, one-story house whose outer shell consisted entirely of concrete. I was only able to enter the house when Muriel’s mother was sick and I had to deliver a prescription from the drugstore. At eight years of age I did what my parents expected me to do, but mostly I was too busy reading the backs of baseball cards to decide which ones I might trade to my unsuspecting friends.
My mother spoke to her frequently, the usual gossip, and I used to leave the room whenever Muriel appeared because they talked about things that made me blush. The days she would come to visit she brought over a strange-looking pink rectangular carrying case. There were all kinds of scissors, brushes, combs, hairsprays, and tubes of cream inside, and Muriel would draw a towel from her apron and wrap it around my mother’s neck. For the next two hours newspapers were opened and scattered on the floor. Her job completed, Muriel gathered the hair-filled newspapers from the linoleum and walked back to her house, the screen door banging into place. The only other occasions when I would see her occurred when she walked briskly down the alley past our house on her daily constitutional.
There seemed to be no end to the things my mom and Muriel talked about, there being the news, who gave birth to whom, the local businesses and how they were faring, and, of course, the older population (dying by the minute). Their white-varnished house, next to a garden twice its size, seemed to be an outpost on a ranch rather than a living space. Harry, Muriel’s father, ardently tended his garden, growing huge, red tomatoes in the summer as well as several rows of corn, asparagus, carrots, and lettuce.
But Muriel’s visits were the most anticipated. A tall lady with auburn hair, she reminded me of a lost debutante. I remember the afternoon she brought me a souvenir she had bought on a visit to New York, a heavy gray metal model of the Empire State Building that both entranced me and made me aware that Muriel had a cosmopolitan flair for living. I kept it in a safe nook in the den.
Harry barely seemed to have the time to do anything but water the garden and give orders to his wife. Around the summer when I turned 10 I was told to pick up some of the old man’s tomatoes. The tomatoes would be outside their screen door in a sack. Since I could see the package from my front porch, I simply kept checking during the day to see if they were there. At six o’clock I noticed the aforesaid bag of tomatoes. Full-bodied, heavy, ripened to perfection, and emitting that tangible country aroma that makes you want to bite into them then and there. Sometimes he would bring over large brown paper bags filled with shucked corn and leave them by our front door.
A couple years later I was outside painting the white picket fence again, the wood having been riddled with wear from the aftereffects of snow and sleet during the winter. It was a monotonous task, trying to get into the little notches that made up the fence. I was busily daubing the interstices at the top of one of the fenceposts when I felt a presence in front of me. I looked up from my paint-spattered fingers to see heavy beads of sweat that had gathered in the crevices lining his face.
* * *
“Did I ever tell you what I did before I moved here, young man?” Harry asked. Before I could answer he continued. “Let me show you, better yet I’ll come around and show you,” and before I had a chance to object, he was walking with slow, slightly inverted steps down the narrow stone pathway and around the dying willow tree.
I was trembling a bit but determined to keep my composure. He came around the garage to meet me at the far end of the fence. He was over six feet tall and had an angular face with large ears and an ample supply of white hair that flared out in all directions at the back of his head. He seemed to stand crooked but with an air of confidence. He’s 70 years old if he’s a day, I thought.
“You like baseball?” he offered.
“I play in the Catholic league.
“Take a look at this,” and he thrust out his left hand, palm down, to show me his middle and index fingers. The bones had been broken, and the knuckles bulged out in opposite directions to create a grotesque angle that appeared to be shaped like a rusty wrench.
“Yep, I used to play double-A ball down in southern Illinois. I was a catcher. Caught some real fireballers. Hell yeh! Do you know who did this to me?” There was a long pause as his eyes moved over the hills. “Satchel Paige. The one and only. He threw so hard it felt my bare hand was catching the ball. He hit me dead center many times. You can feel it if you want.”
I braced myself and turned the question over in my mind. But I decided it was worth a few seconds of anguish so I touched those mangled fingers until I was compelled to grab my paintbrush again.
“I made it up to the bigs for a week,” Harry said, and I relinquished the brush. “Was up to bat seven times. Had a walk, flied out twice, was hit by a pitch, I think it was a curveball, struck out twice, and sent a scorcher to the second basemen. Connie Mack sent me back to the minors.”
“You ever play against Babe Ruth?”
“Never did. He was a wiseacre. We were in Washington and St. Louis those seven games.” There was a pause as he seemed to inspect his hands once more. “Gotta go now. It’s time for me to rest.”
When I started high school, I began to take less notice of Muriel when she would appear. Then one summer the great grass expanse that separated our home from my grandfather’s place across the way disappeared when the town council decided to go ahead with the construction of a road. There must have been four to five feet of turf and dirt excavated. Then the overwhelming smell of tar being laid down, as the new road reshaped the whole dimensions of the place. Only a small grassy embankment was left over once the road was tarred and finished.
Come September of my 16th year the weather was changing like it always does. A few kids ran down the alley past the kitchen, stirring the gravel that broke into tiny dust particles in the sun-drenched shadows. As the weeks went by Indian summer approached, and the leaves stirred and scattered across the land like wayward sons. The crows were landing in large numbers, harvesting the last of their food that came tumbling down out of the trees. There was an anticipation of things that cannot be remembered, only stored in trunks in the attic.
On a particularly rainy afternoon in late summer there was a dim knock on the door. I thought it strange, but Harry was going away for a couple of days.
* * *
There’s an instant awareness of anyone who remotely looks like a tourist when you hit the streets of New York. This was certainly the case with Harry as he got off the train at Penn Station and started to roam the mammoth passageways of its gilded and pristine interior. He walked outside with his small suitcase and ventured a few blocks uptown, eventually resting his worn-out body on a barstool at an Eighth Avenue Blarney Rock. The crowd didn’t take notice of him in here, as there were many blue-collar types with angry and sooty faces who were dying to have their afternoon fix.
“I’ll have your best whiskey,” he offered as the white-aproned barman leaned over to ask what he wanted.
As he drank the Johnny Walker, Harry became lost in a reverie so strong it almost put him to sleep. He thought of brass spittoons and the thrill of riding those gold cages in hotel lobbies when he traveled with the club that summer of 1925. He remembered the shards of wood flying off his bat that hot afternoon, how the crowd roared when the throw beat him to first base. He took another sip and realized that this is the town where he should have played, this would have been his ticket. It pained him that he didn’t get more at-bats, but he really wasn’t going to get a shot with that A’s catcher staying healthy every spring.
The air was getting warmer again in the Northeast, and Harry felt a long-lost sensation run like a shot of adrenalin through his bones. He ordered a Reuben sandwich after checking his wallet. The meat was tasty and reasonably priced, he thought. Thirty-eight dollars left, enough for one night’s rest in the neighborhood and some eggs and bacon for breakfast. But first he had to find a place to rest his head, there had to be one nearby. The bartender, who wasn’t really interested, told him of a place. Then Harry finished his whiskey, the fourth of the afternoon, and laid his money down with a wink and nod.
The Wallington Arms just off Eighth Avenue was around the corner. A cigar-chomping man showed him a third-floor room facing the flashing lights of Times Square. He checked what money was left. Enough for tomorrow, he thought. As the sun set a humid haze fell slowly over the city. He lay in bed contemplating his long life. The Reuben was now a brick in his stomach, but it made him sleep.
After waking early Harry caught the D train up to the Bronx at noon. For the whole game Harry watched from the third-base line as Baltimore’s hitters drove balls past the monuments in deep center field. Were these really the old St. Louis Browns, who couldn’t hit a side of beef if it was right in front of their eyes? By the sixth inning the score was lopsided in favor of the visitors. A few fans remained to watch Mickey Mantle play out the season. They watched as The Mick took some big swings but missed by a mile trying to hit the relief pitcher, who was throwing nothing but knuckleballs.
An eerie quiet pervaded Yankee Stadium. All the radicals and longhairs had taken over the city, Harry thought. “I only wanted to hear the noise of the crowd behind me,” Harry thought, “and I didn’t even get that.” Back at the hotel Harry packed his few things and took a cab to Penn Station. Entering the terminal, he fumbled in his pocket for the ticket and went to the track number printed there. The train would arrive in ten minutes. The conductor checked the ticket and told him to have a seat on the bench.
“You look out of breath mister,” the man said.
“I am,” Harry replied. “I got to get to my garden now.”
The conductor turned, evidently a bit amused, but not knowing what to say.
“You know, you have to water tomatoes at least four times a week so they don’t lose their color,” Harry bellowed. “You’re talking to a man who knows!”
“I believe you,” was all the conductor could muster. “You rest there. Your train is coming on this track.” Harry nodded and the conductor walked out of sight. The zephyr entered the station and a blast of steam carrying a large plume of smoke enveloped Harry’s head. Blinded for a moment, he reached out to grip the wooden arm of the bench as tightly as he could. It felt like a bat handle in his hand, but he couldn’t get it off the ground. There was a sea of faces passing him and he didn’t know why. It seemed like they were waiting for him to get up and go somewhere.
The sound of train brakes resounded in his ears. There were voices telling him to get up. One man helped him to his feet. There were other men in uniforms talking to him and he asked for his suitcase. The train lurched forward and he was helped to his seat. When he awoke he heard a voice behind him: “You should be careful with your things, mister. I gave the guy your train ticket. It dropped out of your pocket. And this stub from the Yankee game.”
Harry grabbed it and fell back to sleep. Time slowed to a standstill and the crisp autumn air infused the grass with fresh morning dew as the train pulled into town.
Robert Prochaska was born and raised in the Midwest. He is the author of two poetry collections, Epiphanies on the Promenade (2004) and The Horse Portraits (2011), both from Ara Pacis Publishing. His work has also been published in various journals over the years, including The Louisville Review, Slipstream, Exquisite Corpse, and The Literary Yard. He is currently working on a book of reminiscences of his life in small-town midwest America. Although moving to the East Coast some years ago he remains a lifelong Cubs fan.
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