Dogfight, A Love Story by Matt Burgess

Author:Matt Burgess [Burgess, Matt]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2010-09-21T04:00:00+00:00

Meanwhile, Roger Clemens enters the batter’s box. In Corona, Elmhurst, East Elmhurst, Jackson Heights, Cambria Heights, Astoria, Hollis, Glendale, LeFrak, Queensbridge, Jamaica, Rockaway, Fresh Meadows, Kew Gardens, Malba, Maspeth, Ditmars, Douglaston, Howard Beach, Beechhurst, Bellerose, Rosedale, Richmond Hill, Forest Hills, Floral Park, Ozone Park, Rego Park, College Point, Hunters Point, Willets Point, Breezy Point, Bay Terrace, Bayside, Sunnyside, Woodside, Woodhaven, Ravenswood, and Ridgewood, revenge-mongers lean forward in their seats. Beat cops on Thirty-seventh Avenue stare at a TV through the window of the Headz Ain’t Ready barbershop. In Whitestone, at a bowling alley, Baka watches the TV set up behind the bar; in Corona, Alex and Bam-Bam Hughes sit on their couch, an empty space between them; and in Elmhurst, the game plays on a television suspended above Vladimir Shifrin’s hospital bed. It ain’t all TVs, of course. There are the radio listeners: drivers stuck on the BQE and Grand Central Parkway, Con Ed employees, dishwashers and doormen working in Manhattan, a little boy on a sticky tar roof, Max Marshmallow behind the counter of his candy store. And at Shea Stadium? The hot dog vendors and peanut slingers do what they’ve explicitly been instructed not to do: they turn around and face the field. The fans have all been standing since the top of the third inning. They cheer the Mets and boo Clemens, but they’re holding back, these fans. They’re keeping a little something in their pockets, waiting for the release, the consummation of long-anticipated violence.

The Mets pitcher throws at Clemens and misses. It happens that fast. The ball sails three feet behind him, lands in the dirt, and rolls to the backstop. That was it—their one chance. Piazza hangs his head while the umpire issues warnings. Clemens smirks. He tips his helmet at the pitcher, and an entire borough deflates.

“Season’s over,” Jose says. “We’re done.”

“It’s June,” Alfredo says. “There’s like a hundred games left.”

“We’re done,” Jose says. The next pitch is a fastball right down the middle, which Clemens fouls off. “You see?” Jose says. He waves a disgusted hand at the television. “You see? We missed him, now we pitch to him, and the season’s all gone straight down the drain. You need confidence to play this game and we’ve lost all confidence. Aw Christ, Dito,” he says, as if Alfredo’s naïveté was not only obvious but blameworthy, responsible for the long stretch of winless baseball games in front of him. “Don’t you understand?”

“Seasons don’t end in June, Papi, just because we missed hitting a pitcher in the ass.”

“Don’t you understand, Dito?” Tariq says, perfectly mimicking their father’s Nuyorican accent. He scratches his dog behind the ears and smiles at Alfredo, who doesn’t know if his balls are getting busted here or if Tariq is winking at him over their father’s head. “You need confidence to play this game,” Tariq says.

Jose squeezes Tariq’s hand and looks up into his face. “Here’s the problem,” he says, his voice dropping, and it seems to Alfredo that Jose is

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