Chapter LIV: I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

Chapter Fifty-Four: I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

“That's the second time today, Oggy,” a kid with short hair was saying as I opened my eyes. “One more time and you win a trip to Florida.”
Another dark haired Greek-looking guy was looking over his shoulder with a water bottle in his hand, smoking a cigarette. A guy with a crippled arm looked the most concerned.
“Oggy, it's been so long since I swung. I couldn't hold on. You OK? You got fahkin’ creamed.”
Oggy? Creamed? Who were these lunatics? Maybe they had drugged me.
“What the hell is happening? Who are you people? Where am I?”
“Leary Field. You alright, Oggy?”
Oggy? This time the name sounded familiar coming from the kid with the crewcut. Was I Oggy? I reached up to find something, a hat. It wasn't there.
“Where's Dewey's hat?” I asked as my senses came back to me. Then I remembered part of my vision. “I mailed it to my son and he didn't care. Where is it? That bastard son ignores my hat, doesn't even write that he got it. He spits in my face. I raise him up to respect the Sox and he spits in my face for it. His mother moved out west.”
I frowned bitterly as I realized my youth was gone and the Red Sox victory meant nothing. I was an old man with neither a hat nor respect. Soon, death would carry me away, yet I had no close family to grieve for me and no home to collect my effects; everything had been a waste.
“I gave my hat to my youngest son. And he didn't care.”
The Greek looked at the Crewcut with a look of peculiar loss.
“So now he's totally lost it, Kodiak. Oggy's finally gone. He cracked.”
“Hey, Sticky,” responded the Crewcut. “Your mouth is moving, but I only hear shit.”
Kodiak? Sticky? These names had been part of my life once. My past was smoky, but the details were coming back.
“Wait. You, Sticky, you called me 'Ogden' and you, you're Kodiak. Aren't you? You never wrote to me after the Sox won. Then I had two kids with two different women.”
“That's the first sign it was a dream,” Said Sticky to Erin with a wink.
Dream? I looked at my hands and saw they weren't wrinkled. My knee still ached in the one spot above the knee cap where I slid into a second baseman. My face was still cut up from shaving. I recognized the kid with the crippled arm. His name was Gordy “Clutch” Clutcher, and I played Whiffle Ball with him.
“You've been out fa' five minutes, man. The bat caught you on the nugget and you went face first into the snow.”
Erin nodded, “I wanted to call the ambulance, but Sticky said you'd come around. Roddy and Moony brought Gena and Tom back, but they said we could use their car. You want a ride to the hospital?”
Roddy and Moony were the two Monahan brothers who lived on Richards Ave. Gena was the retarded girl who broke into my house and attacked me with a whip. I had no idea who Tom was. Erin and Sticky were my friends from school.
“But Sticky had a girlfriend. He had a girlfriend and he called me Ogden. I read in the paper that he died.”
Sticky shook his head.
“I haven't called you Ogden in twelve years.”
“Since 2039?”
“Come on! Quit joking. He didn't hit you that hard. Since 1980.
This news hit me like another bat in the head.
“Wait. Twelve years ago? It's only 1992?”
“And the sand is running out, kid.”
I ran my hand over my face. My chin was a little sore and still sported some shaving scars, but it was wrinkle free. It was twenty-years-old still, reborn tight.
“I had two kids and I drank and no one cared about the Red Sox winning the series anymore.”
“If they get a manager, they stand a chance of beating the Jays. Somebody from the national league, someone who can play small ball, right Clutch?”
As Gordy nodded I held some snow on the bump on my head.
“But we did everything Bullwhip asked for. We struck out Ray Knight. Right? I get my sock back, don't I?”
Bullwhip was gone. He wasn't in the bleachers and he wasn't in the dugout and he wasn't in my head. Holden Caulfield was right, you do start missing everyone once they're gone.
“If you want to put it that way,” offered Erin. “That kid in the wheelchair actually threw a decent pitch past Clutch. Sinking fast ball. Then the bat hit you. I don't know where that crippled kid went, do you Sticky?”
“Yeah,” said Cristo. “Roddy and Moony pushed him back to their house. As soon as he found out they run that escort service he was pulling out the checkbook. At least one kid in this rotten town is gonna get lucky tonight. Chrissy's a whore anyway.”
“I thought Vance owned First Class.”
“Not anymore. His loss is our gain. That kid couldn't sell a dime for five cents.”
This was too much to absorb at once. Justin had struck out Ray Knight and now was on his way to have sex with one of my former classmates? What next?
Erin asked, “You alright, Oggy? You were mumbling while you were out. Talking about Dewey and Fisk.”
I waved my free hand.
“Wait! The Sox didn't win? You mean the Mets still won in '86? I traded six years of memories so the Red Sox would win.”
“Oh,” said Cristo, “That's all we mean to you? 'Look at me. I'm Oggy and I'd sell my own mother for the Red Sox. I don't care about my friends.”
“Did they win, Sticky?”
“You know the Sox lost, Oggy!” he yelled. “You've been calling my house for the past five years talking about replacing Schiraldi with Stanley and Buckner with Stapleton and lately you've been talking about putting Boggs behind the plate. Some crazy shit. The Sox blew it. Gave up three runs with two outs. Then they lost Game Seven. Don't tell me you don't remember.”
“I ended up at a supermarket with a bunch of TV dinners. I was in the long line and it wasn't moving.”
Said Erin, “Why not go to the express lane? You know if you've got ten items or less you can...where are you going?”
I used Erin and Gordy as supports and tried to get up. I wasn't as dizzy as I had been when I Sticky hit me in the head with the baseball. Instead, I was clear-headed, my vision sharp, my hearing acute. Leary field, the Basketball courts, the mill pond, the Junior High School were where they belonged. Lincoln Ave. was right down that street. I looked for Bonigan where he had been standing in the dugout, but only saw the most recent graffiti spray-paint. Erin brushed some snow off my back. Gordy handed me something. It was my hat, Dewey's hat, and I put it on, wincing as it hit the bump on my head.
As I started for Lincoln Avenue and one last mission, Sticky called out, “What about Gillies? Kodiak leaves tomorrow. Roddy gave him your five hundred from the bet. Hey, Oggy.”
I looked at back at Erin, who was happily waving a stack of twenties. In the distance was the Junior High School and Wynn's water fountain and the Little League Field. Gone were the normally clear voices I heard from 1983. I listened closely for Wynn's voice telling me he had just kissed a girl. I listened for JoJo predicting a Home Run on the next pitch. I listened for the sounds of Market Square Day, the funnel cakes, the lemonade stands. I listened for the 1982 carnival that found Kurt and me on the Rock-O-Plane ride, suspended upside down as all the stolen quarters slipped out of our jeans pockets and fell like Toto songs onto the crowd below. How we had howled over the mill pond, over the fields, over the years, yet there was only stillness now. All that remained was Bone Harbor, 1992.
“Order me a hamburger,” I said pleasantly, “And a hot dog.”