The Complete Collection. William Wharton

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СКАЧАТЬ him off at third!’

      ‘Watch out for the steal!’

      ‘Sacrifice!!!’

      ‘Texas leaguer!’

      ‘Cut down the lead-off man!’

      We’re throwing balls every which way. We’re running around the room now. The balls are bouncing off the padded walls. We’re completely out of hand. I keep trying to throw one through that high window. We’re all getting hit by baseballs now. It’s like a free-for-all snowball fight. I’m almost wishing Weiss would get up off the floor and join in.

      We start running around the bases. We’re throwing balls and catching them or picking them up as we run. We keep up our wild yelling. The toilet is first base, the back corner is second, Birdy’s sleeping mat is third, and Weiss is home. We’re running round and round. We’re tagging Weiss with our foot each time.

      Then the playing starts turning into a game. Each of us stops to throw when we’re at home plate, that is, Weiss. We’re all throwing up at that window now. The window has bars on it and must be fifteen feet high. The bars are set so there’s enough space for a ball to get through if it hits right. Three or four times we hit the bars and Renaldi yells, ‘Ground rule double!’

      We get going faster. I’m running out of breath and I’m afraid one of those balls is going to hit me on the jaw. I can see myself trying to explain to the doctor at Dix how I hurt it playing baseball in a padded cell.

      ‘Then, suddenly, you stop at home plate, Birdy. You put up both hands like an umpire calling time out and you walk forward a step. I almost expect you to take out a little whisk broom and brush off old Weiss.’

      Birdy says, ‘Pinch hitter!’

      ‘Two men on base!’

      ‘Two outs!’

      ‘We’re behind by two!’

      ‘Last of the ninth!’

      ‘Batter up!’

      We stop on the bases to watch. Birdy has three balls. The first misses the window to the right. The second is a little low. The third goes through the bars, there’s the sound of broken glass and the glass falls down the wall. Renaldi’s at third, standing on Birdy’s bed. I’m straddling the toilet at first. Renaldi yells. ‘It’s a home run, a case of Wheaties! Clear the bases!’

      He runs toward Weiss who’s stuck his head up at the sudden quiet and the sound of broken glass. Renaldi races home. He tags up, then goes over to the door and opens it. I’m rounding second. Weiss’s ducked his head back down as I come on home. Renaldi gets over in time to shake my hand. Birdy’s just behind me and we both shake his hand and pat him on the back as he goes by us. Weiss is pushing himself up and Birdy hurdles clear over him. The height he jumps, he could’ve gone over Weiss if he’d been standing full up.

      ‘Then, Birdy, we run out the door and lock Weiss in there.’

      Birdy’s been listening and laughing through the whole story. He even puts in some parts the way it always happens with us. We keep interrupting and correcting each other to make it better and then agreeing that’s the way it really is. I stop and Birdy stares at me. We’re winding down.

      ‘Honest, Al. How many times are you going to have to pin your old man? Jesus Christ, I’m not throwing baseballs at Weiss for you. It doesn’t make sense anymore. God, we’re practically grown men. If you don’t watch it you’ll be taking it out on your kids, making them into wrestlers or football players or something so you can convince yourself that you really did pin old Vittorio. The whole thing has to end somewhere. Don’t you know, time pins everybody anyway.’

      Fucking Birdy! It’s the knife all over again.

      ‘All right, hotshot flying ace! Let’s hear your ending. Are we all going to just fly over the walls or something and pretend it didn’t happen?’

      ‘OK. This is the way it goes, Al. Before we leave here, after the ball game, we gather up the baseballs and put them in the box. Then we climb up onto the roof of the hospital.’

      ‘I knew it, Birdy, I knew it!’

      ‘Listen, Al! Up there, we start throwing the balls out over the walls. It’s a beautiful day, blue sky, sunshine with big, soft, fat clouds. We’re just whipping those balls underhand and overhand up against that blue sky and watching them sail over the wall.

      ‘Then we look behind us and there’s Weiss, he’s smiling at us gently, he isn’t wearing his glasses. You offer him a ball to throw but he just keeps smiling, a big, soft, loving smile. It’s the kind of smile that helps you know inside that you’re valuable.

      ‘We watch Weiss as he reaches over his head to the back of his neck. He starts pulling and it’s like a giant zipper. He unzips over his head, across his face, his neck, over his stomach and down to his crotch. Then, he steps out of his fat-major-psychiatrist suit. He stands there in the sunlight and he’s beautiful.’

      ‘Aw, come off it, Birdy!’

      ‘Let me finish, Al. Weiss is thin with long, strong sinuous muscles. His movements are quick and lithe, and he’s covered with a golden-colored down like a baby duck. Without the glasses we can see that his eyes are round. He springs to the edge, motioning us to follow him, smiles, then glides, with his back arched, his arms out flapping strongly, quickly but without hurry and his feet flipping gently. He glides across the grounds to the wall surrounding the hospital and lands there. He turns back and motions again for us to follow.’

      ‘Not me, Birdy. I’m not even going near the edge. I’m not going to jump off a building and get myself killed.’

      ‘I’m not either, Al.’

      ‘So what do we do then, Birdy?’

      ‘Well, we take the suit that Weiss molted and we put it in the box with what’re left of the moldy baseballs. We go back downstairs and check the box at the entrance. Then we walk right on out of here, out the gates.’

      ‘Just like that?’

      ‘Just like that.’

      ‘And, so what happens then?’

      ‘Nothing, Al; just the rest of our lives.’

      ‘Is that all?’

      ‘That’s all?’

      ‘And that’s the way it ends?’

      ‘Not really, Al. It’s never that easy. Nobody gets off that way.’

      But it’s worth trying.

      Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter СКАЧАТЬ