WHERE WERE ALL THESE METS fans back in March, when the stands were so empty I could sit wherever I wanted? To make matters worse, three chicks in short shorts were sitting in the seats behind home plate that I’d come to think of as mine. I’m not saying that they were only there on account of our ten-game winning streak because, to be fair, they were advertising the shit out of the fact that it was the one-hundredth anniversary of big-league ball, but the two things combined sure have brought everyone out of the woodwork.
Still, the sight of those three blond chicks in face paint and tight-fitting shirts waving their blue-and-orange pom-poms made me wonder if maybe I didn’t like the Mets a little more when they were losing all the time. At least then I could kid myself into believing that they belonged to me, if only because no one else wanted anything to do with them. Jimmy won’t admit to it now, but at the beginning of the season he’d cast them off as a bunch of misfits. Ironic, I know. I think the fact that the Mets came to New York the same year as me is why I was a fan from day one. Not to mention the kinship I felt with a ball club mired in losses, clubhouse drama, player antics, defections, and historic misery.
It didn’t matter to me that Chacón didn’t know a word of English, so that Ashburn had to learn how to call for the ball in Spanish if he didn’t want Chacón crashing into him out in shallow left. I was and would forever be there for the Mets and knew they would always be there for me, too. It was a tremendous feeling. There really was a ball club out there for everyone.
Shortly after the start of my fifth year at Claremont, I found a letter from Dad waiting for me on my pillow. Which, don’t get me wrong, was nice. I always wrote him back immediately. I had so much to tell him about Claremont and my new best friend Zuk, because I knew that he would be proud of me. It was just that no matter how many letters I wrote or received, somehow I never gave up hope that one day he would show up on my doorstep, take me into his arms, and carry me off back home.
I kicked off my shoes, climbed atop the bedsheets, and opened it. In it, he mentioned having married a woman from Blakely. I reread that sentence three times before I moved on to the part about how Grampa Frank had broken his hip, and that as a consequence of no one being around to take care of the orchard, it was up for sale and they were all moving to Florida. I reread the whole thing a second time, just to be sure that I had it all straight. After that I just stared at it. Married a woman from Blakely? No one left to take care of it? What the hell’s going on?
I set the letter down and decided to hell with it. It had been a year since I’d gotten a call from him, and for the last six months I had waited every single day, convinced it would be him each time the phone rang.
Mom was in the bathroom, getting ready for bed. I hid behind the doorjamb in the kitchen and crouched low to the floor so she wouldn’t hear. I dialed our old number and cupped the phone. A woman whose voice I didn’t recognize picked up. I froze. She said, Hello? Who’s there? I was about to say, Who the hell’s this? But then she said, Is this you, Johnny? I know it’s you. How’d you get this number? I told you never to call me here. I’m done with you. I’m starting a new life. Now don’t ever call this number again, or I’m calling the police.
I hung up. Mom came into the kitchen with her toothbrush in her mouth.
Who was that?
I looked up dumbly.
I’ve warned you about calling that Suzie girl too many times. Look at what it’s doing to you. It’s making you miserable.
I know that what Mister McGovern wants to hear a kid like me say is that as high as the cost of the Mets’ winning streak has been to me personally, I wouldn’t have it any other way because even if it’s bad for me, it’s good for the team and probably underachievers everywhere. But hell. Here we are in September, and the scalpers crowding around the subway entrance across from the ball park, over on Meridian Road, are asking an arm and a leg for bleacher seats. Christ. What’s a kid gotta do to see his hometown team these days?
It’s not pretty, and I’m not saying it’s for everyone, but I snuck in amid the hustle and bustle of the beer trucks jockeying for position out by the service gates, trying to get their kegs delivered by game time. I slipped in among the trammel of heavy-lifting dollies and chain-smoking beer vendors and spent the next four hours crouched atop the john in a bathroom stall, reading the latest Steinbeck novel, waiting for the damned gates to open to the general public, all the while wondering why on earth Zuk would pass up a golden opportunity to see one of the last home games of the regular season. It just wasn’t like him.
I figured what the hell and invited Mom to come. She laughed. A three-hour ballgame? Are you serious? She thought I was joking. Which is why it hurt a little every time I looked at the bald guy sitting beside me and wished so much that Suzie Hartwell was sitting there instead. Between innings, I’d play that awkward interaction we’d had during the game against the Phillies back in my mind, thinking about what I could have said to change the outcome. Even if I’d wanted to smack her then, I still felt that it would have been so much more fun if she were with me now. Naturally, my mind turned to how I’d dodge that bullet if I had it all to do over again, wondering if there was a way for me to keep my pride and her, too.
I’d been having this recurring dream where I was standing out at center court in our gym, during a pep rally or school assembly or something like that. You know how dreams are. You can’t really tell exactly what the hell’s going on or where you are exactly and have only a vague sense of place. Like it could be ten different places mixed together, quite possibly overlaid on each other, as if that sort of thing were possible. Anyway, the marching band is blaring their horns behind me, and everyone in the stands is going hog wild, having been won over by my game-winning shot at the buzzer, when none other than Suzie Hartwell swoons down from high up in the stands and lovingly tugs at my jersey as I express to all my adoring fans my heartfelt gratitude for the honor of leading us, the Claremont Lions, to yet another Division III championship.
Although there’s really no telling, I figured that it probably just had to do with how much Suzie meant to me and how important it was for me to somehow measure up to her expectations. You know? For me to be good enough for her. Something like that. I dunno. Maybe I just felt a little inadequate or something. But who knows? It could just as well have meant that I had better start practicing with those kids hanging out all the time in the ball courts downstairs if I ever wanted to be anything but the team mascot.
When I told Mom, she chuckled and called it puppy love. I told her it was more than that. The thing is, there was something special about Suzie. I’d tell Mom how I’d never met anyone like her before. I explained that not even Zuk could tell you the batting averages and on-base percentages of the entire Mets starting lineup. It wasn’t just that she knew that Chacón was weak going to his left side or that Bud Harrelson got a surprising amount of walks for a guy who wasn’t hitting that well. Or maybe it was. I dunno. It was hard to tell. All I knew was that she was in a league of her own. Aside from a thoughtless comment here or there, she was dynamite. Besides, who’s perfect? I guess maybe I’d fallen for her despite some of the things that came out of her mouth. I thought that if anyone could understand that, it’d be Mom. I guess that when all was said and done, I was just hoping that Suzie and I would get to go to another ball game together. Truth is, I was eager to give her as many chances as she’d need to show me that she wasn’t really as bigoted as that day had suggested.
So yes, the Mets were very important to me. Because between Zuk going AWOL and Mom working off her newfound freedom like an indentured servant and Suzie not having called me back since that game back in May and Dad’s having gotten married and moved without having the decency to introduce me to his bride, it was starting to feel like they were all I had left. Which is why I shoved the fat bitch in front of me with the big hair and shoulders like a halfback and told her to scoot the hell over. Can I get some space over here?!
It was bad enough that I was stuck all by myself out in the right-field bleachers, five miles from home plate, so far I needed a radio telescope to see the number on Bud Harrelson’s jersey, hollering my effing brains out, knowing full well that Harrelson couldn’t hear me tell him that the right fielder was playing him shallow. On one side I had the burly bald guy sloshing his beer all over my frickin’ sneakers and on the other was a fuckin’ Cubs fan—of all things—booing Harrelson directly into my right ear, while this fat ass in front of me had her big blue hair piled so high I couldn’t see a damned thing.