The H-Bomb and the Jesus Rock (2 page)

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We will bury you.

Lou

Ralph better come back. He said we’d go look for bottles today. He promised. And if you promise something and then you don’t do it, that’s like a lie—it
is
a lie—so that’s a sin and you have to tell Father.

I went last week. I got Father Clay.

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been three weeks since my last confession. The sins that I remember are: I lied to my teacher, I quarreled with my brother, I hit a kid at school, I disobeyed my parents, I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die.

That’s what Ralph said he told Father Rowley.

I’m sure.

It’s from a record our dad always plays when he’s drunk. Johnny Cash. He has a deep voice. Daddy was playing it last night when me and Ralph were in bed. Our mom made him turn it down but then he started yelling about the president and the Pope being in cahoots. I asked Ralph what’s cahoots. He told me never mind, just make sure I say a sincere Act of Contrition before I go to sleep.

In case they drop the bomb, he meant.

I told him I went to confession last week.

He said my soul had to be spotless.

I said it was.

He told me to say one anyway.

I told him it wouldn’t be sincere.

He told me just say it.

I asked him if he was scared.

He didn’t answer.

I asked him again.

“Little bit,” he said.

So that scared
me
a little, Ralph admitting it like that. So I said a sincere Act of Contrition for everything I ever did—every sin, I mean—especially the sin of hitting people, that’s probably my biggest fault.

So now I’m spotless.

But you know what I would like to tell Ralph? What puts a nice big spot on your soul? Promising something and then not doing it. So if he thinks they’re going to drop the bomb on us today he better get back and go looking for bottles.

I had to watch
Road Runner.

I usually watch
Bugs Bunny
before
Garfield Goose
but it was all news except
Road Runner
. I hate
Road Runner.
I wish he would at least talk, or the dog, say
something
. Sometimes the dog will hold up a sign that says
Help
or
Oops
or something, but they never speak, either one of them. Road Runner just says
Beep-beep,
with that smile on his face.

I wish the dog would kill him.

Ralph

It was nice out for being practically Halloween, plenty warm enough for baseball, so I brought my glove and wore my Sox cap, and sure enough a bunch of guys were already in a game. They let me in, out in right field.

I like baseball. It’s one of my favorite things. I wouldn’t mind being a pro when I’m old enough, you know? Playing baseball for money? That would be perfect. Right now I’m ten so I should be in Little League this year, except we didn’t have the money, and anyway I didn’t really want to join. They got uniforms and coaches and umpires and dugouts and chalk lines and brand new white balls and people in the stands—I’d be way too nervous. I’d be so afraid of making a bad play it wouldn’t be any fun.

But I like it at the park.

I like doing the play-by-play in my head, even when I’m
in
the play:

High fly ball out to right field, Cavaletto camping under it, aaand he makes the catch. Throws it back in. Trots on back to his spot. Spits on the ground. Tugs at his cap. Looks up at the sky. Not one little cloud up there. Not one little...single little...

I started picturing a giant mushroom cloud going up and up, spreading out, filling the whole sky, rumbling like thunder but a thousand times louder, and I punched my glove, the pocket I mean, trying to get back in the game:

Cavaletto hoping for another one hit to him, look at him out there punching his glove, punching it, punching it...

Toby

It was warm out this morning so I was sitting on the top step of the front porch with my boxes of cards, open for business, trade or buy, a tall stack of toast and jam on a plate beside me.

Mom made the jam herself, with actual strawberries.

She still wasn’t back from Mass. She probably lit some candles afterwards in front of Mary and said a rosary. Plus it takes her a while to walk from there. It’s only a couple of blocks but it takes her quite a while.

Poor thing.

Anyway, so far it was a slow morning. This bony old Greek guy across the street, Mr. Pappas—no hair, no teeth—came out in his bathrobe and grabbed the rolled-up newspaper off his porch, and then he just stood there looking up at his tree. He’s got this tree on his lawn, the leaves all red and yellow now, very pretty I admit, and he stood there looking up at it—or maybe at a bird in there, you could hear it whistling away, tweet-tweet. He stood like that for five minutes, I swear. Then he looked over at me with a gummy grin and held up his thumb like he does.

I don’t think the guy’s got all his marbles.

After he went back inside I sat there listening to that stupid bird. Why do birds sing like that anyway? What are they trying to prove, how happy they are? Compared to us down here?

Sometimes I wouldn’t mind owning a BB gun.

I asked Mom for one last Christmas but she doesn’t trust me. I told her if I had a father I bet
he
would trust me. She told me go get myself a father, then. I’m not always able to use that on her. Depends on her mood.

Anyway, somebody finally came along, this kid Joey Olson, with his entire collection of cards held together in a single rubber band.

“Hey, Tubs,” he goes.

I told him, “Keep walking.”

He apologized for calling me Tubs.

I put my hand behind my ear. “Come again?”

“
Sorry,”
he said.

“Sorry for what?”

“For calling you Tubs.”

“Say the whole thing.”

“I’m sorry for calling you Tubs.”

I sat back. “Approach and state your business.”

Lou

My mom came in and sat with me on the couch in her housecoat.

I was wishing it wasn’t
Road Runner
. I was only watching because Bugs Bunny wasn’t on, because it was news. I didn’t want her to think I liked
Road Runner
. I told her how much I wished the dog would kill him.

She said it wasn’t a dog, it was a coyote.

I don’t know what that is and I didn’t ask because I don’t care. I was just waiting for
Garfield Goose
.

I like when she watches something good with me, something funny and she laughs too, like when Soupy Sales was doing the Mouse one day, that’s a dance he does, and she laughed out loud. But then later on I did something stupid, I did the Mouse in front of her in the kitchen. She was ironing and she nodded and smiled, meaning “Very nice.” I was embarrassed.

There was a commercial now and she got up. “Let me just check on something.” She went over and changed the channel.

Bishop Sheen.

“No, Mom.”

She kept turning.

I don’t like Bishop Sheen. He reminds me of Dracula, the way he stares at you, and that long cape he wears.

She turned to a news guy and sat on the floor. He was talking about what’s going on with the Russians and their missiles, all that. She was listening hard, you could tell.

“Ninety miles from the mainland,” the guy said.

I keep on hearing that,
Ninety miles from the mainland
.

“Is there gonna be a war, Ma?”

“I don’t know, hon.”

That scared me a little, the way she called me “hon” like that.

Bishop Sheen

They have thrown down the gauntlet and they have reminded us that the choice before the world is either brotherhood in Christ or comradeship in anti-Christ, and it is for us as a free nation to choose the truth, to choose the good, to choose and affirm God!

Toby

Joey Olson approached and stated his business. He wanted a Minnie Minoso card.

I said, “So do a lot of people.”

“Okay but look what I
got
for ya.” He started coming up the steps.

“
Stay
,”
I told him.

He stepped back down.

“Continue.”

He said he’d give me a Jim Landis, a Don Schwall, and a Hector Lopez.

That was pretty funny and I laughed.

He added Wayne Terwilliger.

I sighed like I was tired, very tired.

He offered up some more nobodies I already had.

I told him I might
sell
him a Minoso.

He said he’d give me thirty-five cents.

More humor.

He made it forty.

I told him to come back when he was ready to get serious.

He said he
was
serious.

I told him to get off my property.

Forty cents for a Minoso. Who’s he think he’s dealing with?

Minnie Minoso is a colored guy but he’s probably the most popular player on the White Sox. I don’t know why, I don’t follow baseball. All I know is, guys are always wanting to get their hands on a Minoso. So there’s no way I’m selling one for less than a dollar and a half, at least for now.

Next year, who knows?

Look at Roger Maris. Before last year I couldn’t get more than a quarter for him but after he beat Babe Ruth’s record I had a nice little bidding war going on. This one kid even offered me his dog. I hate dogs. I had three Maris cards to work with and I ended up with six dollars and fifty cents, a Swiss army knife and that dime-store turtle I mentioned.

I named him Timmy. I thought maybe I could put together a little show, you know? Set up a tent, charge admission:
Toby Tyler and His Turtle Timmy.
But I couldn’t train that stupid turtle to do
any
thing, even roll over, even when I put him on his back—he would just kick his legs around and stretch out his neck, looking at me with this sad little ugly face:
Why, Toby? Why?

I ended up trading him to this kid Phil Burlson for that paperback I told you about,
Shameless Lady.
Ever read it? It’s about this lady named Ramona who’s totally shameless, if you know what I mean. There’s this one part, she’s in a hotel room completely naked with two completely naked Mexican guys, Juan and Pedro, except she doesn’t know which is which. And here’s the thing: she doesn’t even care.

That got to me.

She doesn’t...even...care.

Ralph

Base hit out to right field, Cavaletto runs over, scoops it up nice and easy, throws it back in—hard, on a line to second base, one bounce, perfect.

The shortstop, this kid Stu Gardner, yelled out, “Attaboy, Ralph!”

I punched my glove.

I wish I had a nickname, maybe “Scooper,” you know? For the way I scoop the ball up so good.

Attaboy, Scooper!

I punched my glove some more.

I like my glove. It’s real old. It used to be my dad’s. The fingers are like sausages and when the ball hits the pocket it makes a fat sound. On the strap it says
Spalding
and along the last finger it says
Marty Marion
—he used to play shortstop for the St. Louis Cardinals. Dad says he was really good, a really good fielder. Dad used to play second base for a semi-pro team called the Bruins. He says he was really good, like Nellie Fox. He wasn’t bragging, he was just saying. He doesn’t brag. Maybe sometimes when he’s drunk. But then the next day he’ll say, “That wasn’t
me
talking, that was a fella named Jim Beam.” That’s the name of the whiskey he drinks, Jim Beam. “That was Jim
Beam
talking,” he’ll say. But I don’t know. It wasn’t Jim Beam doing the
drinking
.

We used to play catch together, me and Dad, in the backyard. I would use the glove and he would use his bare hands, tossing me pop-ups and grounders, always telling me, “Two hands, Ralph.” Guys who one-handed the ball were hot dogs. That’s what he called them, hot dogs.

But you know what I like the best about my glove? The smell of it. If you put it over your face and take a deep breath it smells really good, like old leather, like old times, like my dad. I don’t mean he smells like old leather, it just reminds me of him, that’s all, of when we used to play catch together.

So that’s what I was doing, standing there smelling my glove. Then everyone started yelling,
“Ralph! Ralph!”

Lou

My mom put
Road Runner
back on and went out in the kitchen.

The dog painted the side of the mountain to look like a tunnel so the bird would try to run through it and smash himself into the mountain but the bird ran right through like it
was
a tunnel, but then when the dog chased after him it was the side of the mountain again and he smashed into it.

I got up and went out in the kitchen.

She had a cup of coffee on the table in front of her. She wasn’t drinking it though, or even holding it. She was just sitting there with her hands in her lap.

I told her about the dog painting a tunnel and how he ended up.

“Huh,” she said.

“We’re all out of bread,” I told her, so she’d get up and get dressed and quit sitting there like that. “I ate the last piece,” I said. “Sorry.”

But all she did was light up a Lucky.

I asked her if she had any money.

She told me I didn’t need any money.

“For
you
,” I said. “For the store. You’re going, right? Aren’t you?”

She set the Lucky in the ashtray and felt around in her housecoat pocket. “C’mere,” she said. I went over and she turned me around and pulled my hair back into a ponytail and tied it up in a rubber band. Then she did something else, she gave me a quick hug from behind.