Mickey moved into the left-handed batters box, promising to give up the bat soon. Ty threw at his head. Puppy underhanded the loose ball back to Mick, who easily caught it one-handed. His boyish grin would’ve set new smile-o-meter records.
But how could they not remember what happened next: Miners, rebellion, the Infamous Day of 10/12, ballparks razed to the ground. It didn’t explain it even if they’d been in mental hospitals, drunks, good old-fashioned DVs in every possible definition like his father; they had to know something.
Mick lofted the ball into right field. Ty clapped sarcastically and took the bat. Cobb missed the first two pitches, slamming the bat on the ground. On the third toss, he ripped a shot into the right field corner. Puppy sat up. Cobb cracked the next pitch over second base and followed with a rope over the third base line.
Not bad, Puppy thought. Not bad at all. The morning rain splattered his hair. He didn’t notice.
“Get the balls, boy.” Ty fussily put his suit jacket back on, disdainfully tossing aside the splintered bat. “And take me to my bank.”
Mick had wandered into short center field to retrieve a ball.
“There’s a fucking skeleton here,” he screamed.
7
Light glistened off the tight black curls dampened on his broad head. Sweat clung to the back of his neck and dripped carelessly down his tanned, muscular back. Zelda swallowed and waited another moment as the boy mopped the wood, his triceps popping out. He bent over to dump out the bucket.
“Excuse me,” she said.
He glanced up with a polite smile. Zelda stepped around the puddles.
“I’m here for the fishing.”
He frowned.
“Fishing. Salmon.”
The boy, not a boy, he was mid-twenties with blackish eyes and a strong chin, pointed up and down the dock.
“Right. Lots of boats. I’m looking for The Intruder.” She waved the authorization from Mr. Pietro. “One of Saul’s Salmons boats.”
The boy/man wiggled his fingers sadly.
“Does that mean the boat’s gone?” She didn’t care how hot he was, this was annoying.
He nodded.
“It’s supposed to leave at noon. It’s only eleven-thirty.”
He shrugged that time was of no concern and listlessly moved the mop around, widening the puddles. She didn’t understand why a wet dock needed washing.
“But it’s no more?” She wiggled her fingers.
He held up three fingers.
“Does that mean it returns at three o’clock?” As he shrugged maddeningly, her voice rose. “Or in three days?” He mopped around her feet, wetting her shoes.
She tried giving him the official letter again, which he ignored and figure-eighted about, mopping. Zelda stumbled a little, off-balance from her aching vagina; the woman last night was voracious. Now she was in pissed off pain.
“One more time. I’m with Saul’s Salmon. Your employer. As in, we, pay, you.”
“Are you the owner?” he said, grinning.
Zelda was taken aback by his delicate voice. “Well no, I’m not the owner. I work for him.”
“Like me.”
“Yes,” she said, exasperated.
“Only I work for Mr. Lee. He owns The Intruder.”
His mocking smile irritated her. “You’re pretty fucking insolent, aren’t you?”
He held up his mop, shrugging sheepishly. “That’s why I’m mopping the deck when the ship’s not here.”
“What’d you do? Be rude to a colleague?”
“I disagreed with Captain Lee. He’s the Captain. That’s wrong.”
Just go back to the office, Zelda, and ponder the virtues of salmon salad and why it has never overtaken tuna salad. Chug, chug, up the hill, taste my gill. No, she frowned.
“You talking to yourself?” he asked, bemused.
“Yes. That’s how I think, playing different roles, people attached to my thoughts, ideas, whatever. Are there any flights later today?”
“You mean sailing?” he snickered, but good-humoredly. His eyes made him difficult to dislike.
“Yes. Boats. “
He shook his head. “Tomorrow at eleven.”
“Not noon?”
He frowned. “Right. Noon. I think. Captain Lee knows. Why don’t you wait for him?”
“I have tons of work.”
The guy grinned. “By the time you get back to Kingsbridge it’s at least two hours. It’d be almost time to go home.”
“How did you know my office was there?”
“We work for the same company.” His smile made her swoon. The guy was the bahm diggidy. “I’m Diego.”
Zelda sat on a bench across from the dock, sketching several boats, putting happy salmons on deck until she remembered Mr. Pietro’s admonition about humanizing fish. Zelda humanized or life-sized, life-sensed everything. She preferred brushes to people; one had promise, the other only dabbled. When she was six years old, she’d disrupted her class, imagining her charcoal pencils talking and singing. The children and teacher and school thought she was disturbed, but her parents fought for her artistic expression.
Until her father’s tie business faltered and they were moved into the DV. Then her parents had no time to worry if their daughter talked to trees or made games with shoes or gave forks names, first and last, occasionally a middle initial. The DV school didn’t care; they focused on specific, practical routes to success since you were already crouching in the shit if you were there. Staging shows on the sidewalk produced by/directed by/starring the Incomparable Zelda Jones and expecting someone to cough up coins to hear you prattle on about the souls of birds only deepened the poop puddle.
Except she had a teacher named Mr. Willis, hunched and gray, whose eyes watered when she performed in the hallways or classroom, who showed her how to draw and where to kick someone when they bothered her. Right below the knee, then the groin, he said with that quiet dignity. He sponsored her application to the Regulars School and, when she appeared before the invitation committee, they treated her like an undiscovered genius. She hadn’t known Mr. Willis was a famous performance artist whose wife and kids were killed
