The little guy ringing the bell now had friends. By the top of the ninth, Puppy could barely see through the pain. Wavy blurs, dry heaves, knees wobbly. His ears hurt and he didn’t know why. He snapped one off at the knees on a 3-2 count.
Barking shook the Stadium.
Puppy 14, Mooshie 14.
The second batter lofted an infield pop. The second baseman squeezed the ball, earning hate from his teammates for denying Puppy another chance at a strikeout. He gallantly waved his gloved hand for everyone to relax. He didn’t know how much longer he could raise his right arm.
Two outs. The BU cleanup hitter swung the bat slowly, waiting.
A curve caught the outside corner. Strike one.
“Oof, Puppy, oof.”
A fastball dipped at the knees. Strike two.
“Oof, Puppy, oof.”
He walked behind the mound, rubbing the ball. His teammates were silent, afraid a word would break the spell. He wound up and the ball floated slowly toward home, catching the hitter off-balance with a feeble swing.
Strike three.
Annette flung her signs into the air and ran onto the field. Puppy fell to hands and knees, surrounded by teammates who lifted him up, then lifted up Annette. He clenched his groin to the sky a la Mooshie, laughing hysterically. He threw up on a teammate. The players carried the lovers together in the air and they kissed, big happy smiles because they owned the world.
“Come on, man. I’m getting cold,” Vern complained, waiting to hit.
Puppy rubbed the ball. The oh so charming Frecklie’s Mom sat about eighteen rows behind the visitor’s dugout trying to be as inconspicuous as you could when players outnumbered fans. He tipped his cap and, sneering, she moved back a few more rows.
Puppy stared into the rickety waist-high screen behind home. His pitch made it on two bounces. Vern swung anyway, corkscrewing into the left-handed batters box. Some hoots echoed out of the Falcons dugout.
Ty clapped encouragingly. “Way to keep the ball down.”
Puppy waited for the shoulder to hurt. Nothing. A slight twinge from disuse. He threw another pitch that landed in front of home. Vern missed that one, too.
“Nice,” Cobb shouted approvingly.
“Why don’t you roll the ball?” yelled a wise guy in the Falcons’ dugout.
“That is rude.” Shannon stepped toward them.
The Falcons kept up the mocking calls. Vernon skip-stepped away from the next pitch, which still caught his shin.
“Just throw the damn ball,” Ty yelled. “Throw, it, hard.”
“Bring back the HGs,” another Falcons wag said, producing laughter.
A blur shot behind home and into the Falcons dugout. When Ty was finally dragged away, two Falcons were unconscious and a third was spitting out teeth.
• • • •
THE NARROW RED micro-fibric seat wobbled beneath Tomas’ bulk, his hands illuminated by the dreary black-and-white images flickering on the Tremont Avenue movie screen. The droning melodrama was a whisper in the deserted theater. Grandma had been overly sensitive to accusations of propagandizing all entertainment. Too sensitive, he thought. Get it done like she got everything else done from wiping out social media to the Miners.
But Grandma insisted the heaving bosom cinema recalled her childhood. Where exactly that childhood was, she never said, smiling enigmatically. Beijing, Manila, Ho Chi Minh City, Pyongyang, Mombai. He suspected Paris since most of the approved movies were old French New Wave, peppered with saucy Italian and absolutely dim-witted British comedies.
Music was fine, let it roll and rock in all directions. Vidnews and vidshows were largely ignored; dutiful white noise. Live theater had been hooted away for its banality long ago, shorn of subversion. Movies, old tear-jerking movies, a couple cinemas in each major city presenting Sunday matinees of ancient Disney animated films, was about all that was left. Safe. Her head of security preferred safe.
Tomas sensed that all he knew about being safe was slipping away.
The round-faced man in the bulky overcoat two seats away dove into the popcorn with hungry relish. Tomas faked attention to the screen, where a reedy-looking young man dangled a ‘bacco from the corner of his mouth, seducing a pretty girl with his eyes and motorcycle.
“I have waited two days.” The Paris Collector leaned over casually.
“Not enough food?”
He grunted and resumed devouring the popcorn.
“How is Paris?”
“We survive as always.”
The world’s oldest profession as perfected by the French had found a permanent home, Tomas thought sourly. “Is the interest from the Son genuine?”
The Collector nodded.
“Are you sure?”
“We cannot be sure of anything with those people.”
“That’s not good enough,” Tomas whispered harshly. “I worry about a trap.”
The man chuckled, spraying popcorn on the seat in front. “Why risk that? An assassination Of would unleash nuclear retaliation. Even the Council of Muftis is beyond that. They are too fat in their wealth.”
“But the Son isn’t.”
“He is restless and young. Very smart.”
“Is it just him?”
The Collector sighed. “He wouldn’t do this alone. He wants to succeed.”
Tomas pressed into the seat, the images sitting on his lap. “Grandma needs more than that.”
The man dug out a stray kernel from his back tooth. “The Son can only go so far on faith.”
“So can she.”
The man turned, offering the popcorn. “Who would question Grandma?”
He had some nagging ideas. Tomas scooped a handful of popcorn into his mouth.
“You do not like any of this,” the man asked as a statement.
“That’s not for me to say. She thinks this is a last chance for real peace. Her legacy.”
“Writing history while you still live it can be dangerous,” the Collector said.
“We have to make sure that doesn’t happen.” Tomas grabbed the raised overcoat, pinning the muscles onto the side of the man’s neck. “This is not good enough.”
“You want guarantees?” The man jerked away with surprising strength. “Peace is more dangerous than war. Most of the world is used to this arrangement. You live well enough. So do they. Yes, the goats blow each other up from time to time over some argument, but they’re Allahs. To them it is like pissing. But one powerful person now wants to change. Ask yourself why,
