Billy Saddle, the Baseball Novel, Chapter Sixteen: Sprays of White and Blue

Buy the book on Amazon Kindle.

 David’s on his duneside ledge, watching the sun melt through the marine layer like lemon sorbet. Up in the lounge, Isaiah breaks out a stride rendition of “Makin’ Whoopee.” David is halfway through a clove cigarette and actually enjoying it. Word among the kids is that cloves are the purview of effete intellectuals. He can hang with that.

            It’s an absolutely perfect Fourth of July. Hot, with a slight breeze and a spotless blue sky. Ice cream sales were through the roof, David and Derek scooping the good stuff while Pablo worked the crowd from his cash register. Pablo is still there, running down the chores on his closing list as he serves the late customers. David realizes that this will place Pablo in a too-familiar scenario – alone, late at night, counting large quantities of cash – but perhaps this will fit with Parthenia’s plan.

            His wife is a phantom. She has taken her shame into the evenings: support groups, exercise classes, and the same nighttime constitutionals that once belonged to him. His move to the guest room was predicated on the difference in their sleeping schedules, but is, in fact, a way to banish the question of sex to a day when both of them feel more comfortable with Elena’s body. Perhaps Derek will write a poem about it.

            “Howdy.”

            It appears to be Billy, who has arrived by way of the beach. Perhaps he followed the sand all the way from Point Damon. But why would Billy be addressing him so directly?

            “Got the drums okay?”

            David smiles. “Courtesy of the North Beach music department. If this thing becomes popular, we have until September to assemble our own kit.”

            “Ride cymbal?”

            “Right side, as you asked. I am betting that you do most of your brushwork on ride and snare, which leaves your diaphragm open for singing.”

            Billy makes a smacking sound with his lips. “You are much too smart for a bass player.”

            “Thank you. I think. Are you set for brushes and sticks? The ones I got are a little beat up.”

            Billy pulls a leather pouch from his shoulder and reveals the contents: a pair each of retractable brushes, thin jazz sticks, padded mallets and half-volume “power sticks,” bundles of dowel rods wrapped in rings of tape.

            Having extracted sixteen words from the man, David feels nervous – as if twenty will initiate some subatomic event. Ravel’s Bolero drifts from the room upstairs, followed by a burst of green fireworks from the beach.

            “Whoops! There’s my call. We’re opening with Ramsey Lewis, if you’d like to join us.”

            The rusty beard sprouts a smile. “’Tis a foolish drummer who would pass on ‘The In Crowd.’”

            Twenty-seven words. And yet, life continues.

            David’s guess about Billy’s drumming is dead-on. He uses the brushes to slap eighths on the ride, strikes the one and three on the snare, and places the rest of his focus on the singing. Once they venture into the solos, he throws in fills, crashes, off-beats. But even at minimum force, the drums add a great deal to the sound. Mostly, thinks David, they sound more like a jazz band. Slower tunes bring the crackling soup-stir of brushes on snare. “Fever” comes with its familiar jungle rolls. A stick on the rim supplies the cha-cha claves of “Girl from Ipanema.”

            The big test is “Take Five.” With the bass and piano carrying the 5/4 pattern, the drummer’s job is a bit of a puzzle. Billy’s answer: whatever he wants. Using the power sticks, he variously matches the piano groove, strikes the downbeat alone, or sits back and sends out little rolls and crashes wherever he pleases. The surprise comes at the end of David’s bass solo, when Billy points the sticks at himself. The solo that follows is an expansion of the random approach: long fills and combinations tossed into the stew at a whim, as well as sudden suspenseful pauses.

            After a long train of cymbal crashes, sealed by a roll on the snare, Billy takes a mischievous look around and nods them back to the start. Expecting lyrics, they get a scat, a replica of Paul Desmond’s famed sax line on syllables capped with b’s and d’s. They end with a chaotic rumble, inspiring a raucous response from what is now a packed lounge.

            The time is right for a dance party, so David pulls out his surprise: a white Stratocaster, relic of an old blues band. Their strategy is to attack the new rock repertoire with rhythm guitar, while Isaiah fills in the bass part with his right hand. They’re praying that their singer got the set list from Abbey.

            Billy switches to solid sticks and they roll through “Move It On Over,” “Hey Bartender,” “Boom Boom” and “Mustang Sally,” stretching each song with David’s chordal solos and Isaiah’s usual brilliance. When he’s not freaking out over his rusty rhythm skills and a repertoire that may not last the night, David looks out over a field of oscillating limbs and butts and begins to really enjoy himself. It’s a sensation he has almost forgotten.

            The music doesn’t run out till 1:45, but their tireless tribe is demanding another song before the 2 o’clock closing. Billy utters the phrase “What’d I Say” and Isaiah is off on the intro. David feels majorly lost, but he reads the chords from Isaiah’s handiwork and sends out some funky shots. Billy makes up some new verses, and they keep going until their dancers begin to resemble marathoners at the end of the race. Billy plays a long fill that is clearly headed for an ending, and his cohorts follow him into a final resounding crash. He stands from the drums to confer with his bandmates.

            “Isaiah – give me a long intro for ‘Georgia.’ I’ll make a few announcements while Davey gets his bass.”

            David switches instruments as Isaiah draws out broad gospelly chords and Billy delivers a patter worthy of a pitchman.

            “We want to thank you for making our Independence Day one big slice of Disneyland, and we invite you to drop back in any old Friday night, because we will be here. Please, if you will, produce a few hand-generated percussives for my brilliant piano man, Isaiah Silverstein!” Applause, applause. “And also for our master of all things with strings, David Falter!” Applause, applause. “I am your humble skin-beater and vocalist, Billy Redman, and I would like to sing this last song for Abbey.”

            “Georgia On My Mind” was never Larry’s best. His natural style was so smooth that any attempt to sound like Ray Charles came out as a cartoon. Billy’s voice is just as rich and resonant as Larry’s, but he’s also able to produce a rough New Orleans edge, a little bit of Harry Connick, Jr. As David plays along, he’s guessing at a little South in Billy’s personal geography, and is amazed at the intensity of emotion he’s able to invest in these quiet lines, as if he is relating a series of tragic events from his own life. At the end of the bridge, it finally clicks in. He looks toward Abbey’s booth to find her staring straight ahead, her eyes streaming with tears.

            Billy finishes the vocal, stands from the drums and gives his players a rolling hand gesture. Keep going. He walks to Abbey’s booth and extends a hand. She rises to dance with him in the aisle. Sprays of white and blue fireworks fill the windows. Abbey rests her head on Billy’s shoulder and keeps crying. Billy sways her slowly and strokes her hair. David recognizes the motion: it’s just the way he would console one of his boys, when they were little.

Photo by MJV

Poem: Wanted

Wanted

Fallopian door, Ceasarean

arch, Arturian pipe Dickensian

ash I

stalk the halls of history,

posting flyers for a missing cat.

Whiskers, tabby, Scorpio, Libertarian

I do

not

actually own a cat, but I

find that I enjoy the sympathy.

Halo of vulnerability, mistcloud

of loss, pathos, cocoa-

smelling allure of a

sniffle man who has lost his

beloved sigh pet.

I tried sincerity once and

came away with bronchitis.

What I really want is sex.

And money.

Save the philosophy for

mahatmas, betterworld bingo,

feelgood abstention.

Sex. Money.

A mild climate.

First published in Willard & Maple

Champlain College

Burlington, Vermont

From the collection Fields of Satchmo

Photo by MJV 

Billy Saddle, the Baseball Novel, Chapter Fifteen: Leprechaun Frat Party

Buy the book on Amazon Kindle.

 The trio chunks to a halt at the end of “Mack the Knife” and receives a fair-to-middling applause (the interminable overcast is not helping their attendance). Billy looks to his players for the next selection, and the bassist, the one who has a thing for Abbey, leans over to speak.

            “Okay if we take a break?”

            “Sure.”

            “You can join us if you like. We just hang out in the parking lot.”

            “Nah, that’s okay. Fifteen?”

            “Yep.”

            Billy watches the two of them leave through the restaurant, then he heads for the back stairs. He knows if he hangs out in the bar he’ll be inviting questions. And questions are the enemy.

            Isaiah throws back a mini-bottle of whiskey. “You realize we’re taking a chance. He might not come back.”

            David laughs and sips at his gin. “I wasn’t gonna make it without a break.”

            “Being attacked by roving gangs of ice cream tweakers?”

            “Not while Pablo’s on the job.”

            “Pablo! Back from the dead.”

            “That kid is amazing. He could probably run the place by himself. I’m only paying him minimum. He says he doesn’t care. Parthenia says it’s time to get back on the horse.”

            “I told you. Parthenia is a wizard.”

            “Yes. I’ve heard that about fifty-three times now. But my God, what did I ever do to deserve such a great kid?”

            “Did you change his diapers?”

            “Yes.”

            “Isn’t that enough?”

            He holds his nose. “Yes.”

            Isaiah cracks open another whiskey. “You ever walk Point Damon?”

            “All the time. The ocean side.”

            “Oh yeah. I was down there yesterday, way at the end, where the water sort of circles around the point.”

            “I love that.”

            “And I saw this sort of teepee made out of driftwood. Looked like one of those barricades from Les Miserables. And there was smoke coming out of it! So I walked over to check it out, and I swear there was a pot dangling over a fire – like something from Grimms’ Fairy Tales. It smelled like chicken curry soup. Delicious!”

            “You tasted it?”

            “The smell. What’m I, a hobo?”

            “Well, okay.”

            “I was about to leave when I saw a flash of red. There was a small limb extending inward from the wall, and dangling from said limb was, get this: a scarlet Bavarian cap.”

            David recalls the naked guy bathing in the harbor, and decides that this is not necessarily a detail to be shared.

            “You suppose he lives out there?”

            “God, I hope not. I wouldn’t be surprised if that spot pretty much disappears during big storms.”

            David starts laughing. “Have you seen those sweatshirts at Sandbar Gifts? The front says In case of Tsunami…”

            “And the back says Run Like Hell! Yep, when you live at twenty inches above sea level… ” Isaiah takes a last swallow and chucks his bottle into the truck-bed.

            “Well,” says David. “The first thing we can do is go in there and get our beach bum a gig fee.”

            He finishes his gin and chucks his bottle in the same spot. As he walks around the truck he sees that the bed now holds some fifty tiny bottles.

            “My God, Isaiah. It’s like a leprechaun frat party back there.”

            Billy’s looking for a good signoff. ’Round Midnight is too obvious. But it’s getting near one and and his giant piano player is giving him that look. He leans away from the mic and says, “‘Goodbye’?”

            The giant thinks about it. “Gordon Jenkins?”

            He wants to say how impressed he is – is there anything these guys don’t know? – but he fights the urge. Just being here is pushing his luck. But the singing is like heroin – Abbey was right – and the sinewy, smoky torment of something like “Goodbye” is freakin’ paradise. He savors the end of Isaiah’s back-alley intro, dangles on the downbeat for an eyeblink, and enters.

            David is expecting another end-of-song sneakoff, and finds Isaiah, as usual, reading his mind. He ends the song along with Billy; David lets his final note buzz along for a while before damping the strings. He sees that their front man is not yet across the dance floor, so he leans over to the microphone and says, “Billy Redman, ladies and gentlemen!”

            The late-nighters respond with a warm applause. Abbey adds a look of consternation. But not Billy, who tips his scarlet cap and heads for the exit. Abbey heads out after him.

            She returns a few minutes later and directs a district-attorney stare at David.

            “Billy Redman?”

            “Sort of a… nickname.”

            Isaiah draws up a stool. “He’s not upset, is he?”

            Her expression softens. “No. In fact, he wants you to use it from now on.”

            David takes a quaff from his lager. “You’re lucky I didn’t say Rumpelstiltskin.”

            “Pardon?”

            “Inside joke.”

            “Subterranean.”

            “Hey Rog,” says Isaiah. “A drink for Billy’s agent.”

            “Vodka gimlet,” says Abbey.

            When Isaiah goes for his wallet, Rog waves him off. “If you’re the one who brought us the singer, you get all the free drinks you want.”

            Abbey smiles sweetly. “Thank you.”

            “That guy is amazing,” says Roger. “Where’d you find him?”

            Isaiah and David turn as one. “Yes,” says David. “Tell us, Abbey.”

            Abbey laughs. “Flat tire. Quinault Casino. I have to admit, he scared me at first. But it’s pretty obvious how harmless he is. As he was doing the lug nuts, he was humming ‘Moon River,’ and I mentioned my karaoke bar. Imagine my shock when he actually showed up.”

            “Are you aware,” says Isaiah, “that he’s living on Point Damon?”

            “Well. Yes. He’s strangely attached to that place. It’s like he wants to be first off the continent when the shit goes down. But I outfitted my tool shed with an old sofa and a space heater, and have been much relieved to find signs of use. And I’m not telling you one thing more, because there are reasons that someone becomes homeless, and if you want to keep your new singer, those reasons need to remain private.”

            “Hey,” says David. “I’m surprised you told us this much.”

            Isaiah laughs. “Blabbermouth.”

            Abbey sets her drink on the bar and delivers a smart punch to Isaiah’s shoulder.

            David laughs. “Did I mention I’m Abbey’s weightlifting coach?”

            Isaiah rubs the spot. “Yeah. Thanks.”

            Roger looks up from his dishwashing. “Hey, Isaiah. Ralph says he’ll throw in an extra hundred if you can find a drummer for the Fourth. Maybe throw in a little rock ‘n’ roll for the dancers.”

            “Jesus!” says Isaiah. “How many miracles are we supposed to pull off this month?”

            Abbey snickers into her gimlet. “Okay. There’s one more thing I can tell you about Billy.”

Photo by MJV

Poem: Corpus Callosum

Corpus Callosum

Caustic intelligence works a

neon scatter along Castro Street,

lightning bug riots alive with

nationalities, screwjets, gearheads.

Disassemble the universe with an

Allen wrench, put it back

together with a gas-

powered tennis racquet.

Microwaves scrimmaging the dish,

pulsar grasshoppers, genetic

codes on the back of a stamp,

accelerators spraying the

hills with database.

We are edgewalkers, tectonic scuttlebutt;

wipe a hand through the air and

come away with pixels.

Graymatter princes who can

barely form a civilized

sentence map out the

escalators of human evolution,

tapping at their cyberphones like

seedless finches.

First published in Willard & Maple

Champlain College

Burlington, Vermont

From the collection Fields of Satchmo

Art by Greg Hill

Billy Saddle, the Baseball Novel, Chapter Fourteen: Hired

Buy the book on Amazon Kindle.

 David crosses the street at the Texaco station. The station is a notable site. On July 4, 2000, a local kid, Chris Kinison, spent his holiday waving a Confederate flag and threatening minorities. One of his targets was Minh Hong, a Vietnamese kid from Seattle who was so terrified by Kinison’s taunts and throat-slashing gestures that he stole two paring knives from the Texaco convenience store. When Kinison attacked Minh’s twin brother, Minh jumped in to defend him and ended up stabbing Kinison to death. Minh was tried for manslaughter, but freed when a hung jury voted 11-1 for acquittal.

Ocean Shores is 90 percent white, but racism isn’t generally an issue. The bigger danger is boredom. Kinison’s friends claimed that the flag and the racial taunts were just a ruse for picking fights, and David wouldn’t be surprised if that were at least partly true. Still, his Darwinian side finds a morbid satisfaction in the result. It’s a nice switch from the usual scenario, in which perfectly good people are wiped from the earth while the assholes, like cockroaches, live on. The loss of Randy will stick in his craw for the rest of his life.

This is not a good frame of mind, he thinks, but he supposes he might be forgiven for feeling surly. Every recently graduated teen in Washington came to the store today, and each one brought friends and family. Being a history teacher, his mind strayed often to Little Big Horn. Sitting Bull and his high school graduates were pissed off by the long wait. And, of course, determined to take their sweet time once they reached the counter. A couple of them maintained cell-phone conversations all the way through the transaction. Too many screaming children, too many shouting parents, and no time to bus tables, which piled higher and higher with sticky refuse.

At closing time, he fell prey to a joke he used to tell at parties: “I’m self-employed, but my boss is a bastard.” With a dozen people still on line at eight o’clock, he kept serving – because he also kept the books, and he knew they needed every cent. Which is why he’s walking home at eleven, past the long, dark stretches of the golf course. Feeling bitter, feeling trapped.

When he gets home, he hears the chimey, harpy soundtrack for World of Warcraft and finds Derek at the keyboard, doing battle with a beastly red-haired mountain man. He pauses the action to spoon something from a bowl.

“Oh God. Is that ice cream?”

Derek laughs and swallows. “Sorry, Dad. Long day?”

“The longest. Thanks to you and your… literary genius.”

“Really? The poem? Is that why Mom’s been home all day?”

“Well, yes.”

Derek shifts quickly to defense. “But you always said, you know, the First Amendment…”

“Yes, free speech. But speech has repercussions. Didn’t you think calling your mother a whale might hurt her feelings?”

“It’s an Orca, Dad.”

“Don’t get technical on me. Dammit!” The day is grating on him, bringing him to a boil. He waves a hand, as if he’s requesting a do-over. “Yes, I know about the Orca. The dazzling black-and-white Orca. I cared enough to get an interpretation from Ab… from Ms. Sparling. But right now I’m running the damn shop by myself and your mother is depressed and I have no idea what I’m gonna do about it so thank you very much for ‘keepin’ it real.’”

Derek jumps from his chair, knocking it over. He’s trying to be demonstrative but he’s not very good at it, wagging his hand like he’s dribbling a red-hot basketball.

“You think it’s easy being this smart? I can see all this stuff about to hit this family. I see Mom ballooning up, I see this… gap between you. And… And I’ve got all these friends with divorced parents, and every single one of them is totally fucked up. I don’t want to be like that, I’m weird enough already.”

Crying male teenagers are a puzzle. Let them cry? Hug them like they’re six? David tries something new. He straightens up the chair, asks Derek to sit down and kneels next to him.

“Listen. Son. The poem is brilliant. I’m shocked that some kid with my DNA can write something like that. It’s also dead-on, and I feel like a complete chickenshit for not telling your mother that she’s got a problem. If anything, for the sake of her health. But you have this habit of being right all the time, and as you have probably figured out, people find that to be irritating. Pick your spots, be gentle with us. You are surrounded by a world of fuckups.”

Derek produces a chuckle – a good sign. David continues.

“The other thing is, I think you underestimate how much I love your mother, and how much she loves me. That thing about ‘Til death do us part’? It might sound outlandish, but I actually meant that. And I’m not going to let a little blubber get in the way.”

“A lot of blubber.”

“Yes. Your mother’s an Orca. And what else do they call Orcas?”

“Killer whales.”

“Yes. Sharp teeth. An appetite for seals and second-born children.”

Derek laughs; the tears have dried up. “Is there… Is there anything I can do to help?”

“Sure. Drop in tomorrow about five. Bus a few tables. Watch the register, so I can take a pee break.”

“What you really need is a professional.”

The voice is baritone. The speaker is a big-nosed blond kid who appears to have shaved and put on some clean clothes.

David smiles. “You are so hired.”

Photo by MJV

Poem: Grain

Grain

Take the pause between these

two sentences. Grind it up.

Roll it in a twenty-dollar bill

and ignite. Smear the ashes on

a microscope slide and

discover the following: three

apostrophe fragments, seven

remembrances of a dairy farm,

trace amounts of ballpoint pen,

single molecule from a Mexican triceratops.

So much where in the whereabouts,

it’s amazing we can even

get to the checkout stand,

atoms shuffling past like

shoppers in a mall.

It is entirely possible that part of

my left pinky originated at the

midpoint between Castor and Pollux.

It is entirely possible that

I am making this up.

Willard & Maple

Champlain College

Burlington, Vermont

From the collection Fields of Satchmo

Photo by MJV

Billy Saddle, the Baseball Novel, Chapter Thirteen: The Crazies

Buy the book on Amazon Kindle.

It was the 4^th of July, and the Falter family had lost its progeny to the major urban areas: Pablo and his fellow grads to a Seattle Mariners game, Derek to a comics convention in Portland. Once they recovered from the shock of a quiet house, Mom and Dad headed to the shore.

            With its drive-on beach, Ocean Shores is known as the Daytona of the Northwest. Sometimes with comic results. Just the week before, a middle-aged couple had parked their RV at shoreline, repaired to the rear for some hanky-panky, and awakened a couple hours later to find themselves surrounded by water. They managed to swim ashore, but stood there helplessly as their Winnebago floated off toward Hawaii.

            The beach that day was like a shopping mall parking lot on the day after Thanksgiving. The Falters had to cruise quite a distance before finding a decent spot. They sent Derek’s dragon kite into the blue, and tied off the handle to their side view mirror. David prepped their small barbecue for a batch of razor clams dug up by their neighbors, the Fontescues. Elena assembled a teepee of aged oak and set it ablaze for a beach fire. (David found himself stealing peeks at his beloved’s rear end, which despite some recent expansion was still the finest ass in town.) Soon they were seated in beach chairs, savoring their clams and Pinot Grigio as the sun made its final descent.

            Their reverie was interrupted by the approach of one of Harvey’s whiny rental mopeds. The pilot turned out to be David’s favorite rookie English teacher.

            “What ho, landlubbers!” She kept a firm grip on the handles, as if she feared that the mighty beast could bolt at any second.

            “Abbey!” said David. He and Elena straggled from their chairs to offer a proper greeting. “Honey, this is Abbey Sparling, the brightest new star at North Beach High, and her husband Randy, the brightest new star at Boeing Aeronautics. This is my beauty queen wife, Elena.”

            “The brightest new star at Elena’s Ice Cream Shoppe,” said Elena.

            David gave Abbey a hug and proceeded directly to Randy, with whom he never seemed to have enough chances to talk. He thought of Randy as the kind of individual who could change his mind about the South (an opinion soured by his master’s thesis on the history of lynching). In character, he was like a human giraffe: tall, gangly, a touch awkward. He spoke in a soft Georgia drawl delivered with a quiet gentility.

            “An aeronautics engineer on the back seat? Randy!”

            Randy chuckled. “I think we know who the daredevil is in this marriage.”

            “How’s the commute?”

            “A killer. Thank God for my four-day work week. But take a look at what I’ve got on either end. For an aviation guy – what we like to call a ‘wing nut’ – working at Boeing is like living at the Playboy Mansion. ‘Check out the fuselage on that one. And that one. And that one.’ And then, once I get home, same thing.”

            “Fuselage?”

            He used a hand to describe the curve of his wife’s figure. “Fuselage.”

            “I’ve misjudged you, Randy. You’re a dirty old man.”

            “Well. I hope to be, one day. If I could just get around that Hoquiam crawl.”

            “Ouch! Been there. Whatcha need is one of those flying cars from The Jetsons.”

            Randy smiled, showing a hint of early-onset crow’s feet around his baby blues. “Don’t think I haven’t thought of bringing that up at a design meeting.”

            “Hey, you back there on the bitch seat,” said Abbey. “You ready for launch?”

            Randy laughed. “You hear the way she talks to me?”

            “I think she uses the same approach with her students.”

            “It’s the cute ones who get away with that shit.”

            “The cute ones with fuselage.”

            Abbey turned around and spoke in her best Hollywood starlet-ese. “Just remember, honey, if the ride gets bumpy, whoever’s on the bitch seat gets to grab on to… well. whatever they need to grab on to.”

            “Welp!” said Randy. “Gotta go.”

            Abbey revved up her puny motor and they headed north, fading into the mist and twilight. Watch out for the crazies, thought David. But he didn’t say it, because everybody knew about the crazies.

            If I had asked him one more question. If they had joined us for a glass of wine.

The Falters returned to their chairs and their Grigios. The sun was melting into the marine layer like a scoop of lemon chiffon ice cream.

Elena laughed. “You’re sweet on her.”

David smiled. “Why darlin’, if I wasn’t married to the most bonita muchacha en los Estados Unidos, and if Abbey wasn’t a co-worker, and if I didn’t like her husband so much, and if she didn’t have a husband… But as you can see, that’s already a pretty long list.”

Elena ran a finger up the back of his hair, which she knew drove him crazy.

“I’ll make you forget all about Abbey Sparling.”

David smiled. “I was kinda hopin’ you would.”

Just a second. Two seconds. A longer handshake. Give Abbey another hug. Change the timing. Trajectories.

David sat at his kitchen table, staring at a stack of pancakes that would never be eaten, across from a wife who had slipped into a stupor. At the center of the table the Aberdeen Daily World, peppered with awful, awful words. Teenage driver… alcohol level…witnesses…airlift…stable but serious…vehicular manslaughter.

Through a gap in the vertical blinds, David spotted a hummingbird, its chest radiating opaline waves of red and green. He hovered there for a second, two, three, and then, struck by one of those animal signals that humans will never understand, he vanished.