The Sox sucked and the Yanks soared, but not in Brooklyn; in Brooklyn the Sox remained ascendant. Ted took to taking his morning coffee and buzz in the prelight dawn on the steps of the house. He was there when the paper came flying in. He would throw it away, or stash it under his bed, and fall back to sleep for a couple of hours, the up of the coffee and the down of the weed battling it out in his tired brain.
A few hours later, Ted would “wake up” with Marty. He’d help Marty get dressed in his Red Sox fan attire. “Don’t you feel a little stupid, a grown man wearing the clothes of a sports team, like a little kid?”
“No,” Marty said. “I like it. It identifies me. Like a bird’s plumage.”
Then they’d go down to Benny’s kiosk. Today, after the fake Boston win, no wheelchair and no cane. Marty had pep in his step. The Sox skid was over and so was Marty’s.
The gray panthers might have been a tad overzealous preparing the charade. But then again, they had nothing else to do, absolutely nothing. Ted’s first clue of this was the appearance of the Times delivery boy speeding toward them on his bike, screaming, “Fuck fuck fuck cocksucker mothersuckerfucker dickass French kiss big tits nipple whore Yankees!”
“I like this kid,” Marty said, and then to the kid, “What’s wrong, squirt?”
“Sox won?” Ted asked hesitantly, by way of cueing the boy. The kid had obviously been given carte blanche by the panthers to do some experimental cursing in his role. He was quite a natural. Sounded good, real.
“Sox won! Fuuuuuuuuuckkk…” and he was off, the “fuck” trailing behind him like sonic exhaust.
Ted saw Schtikker about twenty yards away, gesticulating to the kid to bring it down a notch. The kid certainly was over the top, but enjoyable, a little like a little blue Don Knotts.
Here came another suspicious dude in a suit making way too much of a bee line for Ted and Marty.
“Goddamn Red Stockings of Boston!” he declaimed in nineteenth-century diction as he passed by. Gotta give that guy some notes, Ted thought, and update his fucking playbook. As they approached the kiosk and the gathered men, Betty leaned out her window on cue, and for the first time in her life, sounded wooden, insincere, and just plain weird. “Sixty years of waiting is over, Marty.” She looked down at something; was she looking at a piece of paper, a script? Jesus Christ.
Marty called up to her, “I’d wait another sixty for you, sweet Betty.” Betty looked at the panthers and put her hands up, like what now? Clearly she was not prepared to improvise. She seemed to panic, screamed, “Go Sox! Curse of the Babe! Damn Yankees! Bambino! Yazzz-ce-ze-stremski!” like a greatest-hits run of baseball clichés, and then slammed the window down. The panthers were laughing as they came forward to see Marty. Every moment Marty had his back turned to one of them, Ted would receive an exaggerated wink or the okay sign.
“Ivan, come here and let me check your age.”
“I thought you’d never ask,” said Ivan.
Benny, or rather a hand, reached up over the kiosk counter with Benny’s voice. “Here is your paper, Marty. Your special paper. Special for you.”
“What is this, the Yiddische theater?” Ted said for the benefit of the panthers only.
“Got it, Benny. Thank you.” Ted took the paper, stopping Benny from incriminating himself with further bad acting.
Tango Sam took Marty in hand like he wanted to dance, and Marty looked like he was going to take him up on the offer.
“Marty,” Tango Sam said, “successful advertising executive and long-suffering Sox fan, you look tremendous, loan me fifty.” It was gonna be a good day.