Enhanced by Cosca Paul

Author:Cosca, Paul [Cosca, Paul]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Superhero | Supervillains
Published: 2017-02-20T05:00:00+00:00

May 12th, 1998

I meet Bob Bukowski at his grandson’s little league baseball game. He has coached this team in the past, but he took this season off after getting knee replacement surgery. “The virus doesn’t fix everything, I guess,” he says of the surgery. But baseball has been with him for most of his life. And even now, still on the mend and decades removed from his career in the major leagues, he still can’t get away from the game. The game we’re watching is a pretty low-scoring affair, but the kids play with a joy and enthusiasm that makes up for it.

On first appearances, the only way you’d tell that Bob Bukowski is a baseball legend is the Cleveland Indians baseball cap he wears with the number 67 emblazoned on the back. Otherwise, he’s just a grandfather like all the others.

BOB: You see the boy out in left field? Number twenty-two? That’s Scottie. That’s my grandson. Hey Scottie!

Bob waves. Scottie stops paying attention to a rogue dandelion long enough to wave back.

He’s terrible at the game. I guess that’s what he gets for being my grandson, right?

He laughs, deeply and heartily, and spits a bit of chewing tobacco behind the bleachers where we sit.

You know, I hadn’t thought about the war in years. Probably near on ten years or so before you called. Not traumatic or anything. Just feels like a totally different life. Like someone else was over there. Never was a fan of goin’. Didn’t want any part of it. I’m glad that they did away with the draft. Now people got a choice. I would have rather stayed and played baseball.

I was pretty decent at the game when I was in high school. I wasn’t too fast, but I could catch pretty well and I had a good eye for the bat. I didn’t know if I was good enough to go make money at it, but I sure didn’t want to do anything else. I never felt inspired by anything else. Always got

bored with school. I just wanted to be out on the field. I even got to talk a bit with a scout from the Cleveland Indians. But then I got my draft papers and off I went.

Now, the way I understand it, when you get the virus the changes can happen pretty quickly. Other times, it takes a while. Luckily for me, I wasn’t showing any differences right away. I know the boys who got it quick got shoved off to the front lines, but that wasn’t me. By the time I ended up in France, the front line was a long ways away.

I guess sometime between me leaving Texas and ending up in France, the virus started doing its work. I was so much stronger than I’d been before. And I know it wasn’t just from hiking everywhere, because my main job was driving jeeps.

I was one of the lucky ones. I saw a little action, but didn’t come back all messed up, or in a box.

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