Peter Abrahams - The Fan

“Fuck that.” Gil grabbed the handle of the driver’s door, struggled with it. The tow truck began rolling. Gil hung on, running alongside, screaming unbidden words through the driver’s window until the bumper of a parked car caught his left knee. He went down, lost his grip, looked up in time to see the 325i go by on two wheels, like a hobbled prisoner, and hear his phone buzzing inside.

Gil got to his feet. Suit pants ripped at the knee, blood seeping through the polyblend fabric. There was blood in his mouth too. He spat it out, and maybe a tooth as well. Cars went by. No one seemed to notice him. No one gave a shit. Well, he knew that already, right? A taxi approached. Gil stuck up his hand and it pulled over, proving he wasn’t invisible.

“Where to?”

“The pound.”

“Dog pound?”

“Car pound, for Christ’s sake.” As the cab pulled away, Gil saw his lucky tie curled up in the gutter. He opened the window and spat out more blood.

A twelve-dollar ride. At the car pound, he paid $50 for parking by a hydrant, $90 for the tow, and $25 for one day’s storage, even though the car hadn’t been there for twenty minutes.

Gil unlocked it, got in. He took a deep breath to calm himself. The nice smell of leather and wax was gone. The car smelled of piss.

Gil saw his face in the mirror, scratched and hard. He grinned. One of his lower teeth was chipped. He ran his tongue along the roughened edge, and thought of serrated blades pounding deep. Was he looking and sounding successful? Taking the offensive? Ignoring rejection? He ran the rules of the successful commission salesman through his mind, searching for some clue. No clues; he just knew he wanted a shower. First a shower, then a drink.

“What’re you waiting for, bud?”

Gil turned the key. His gaze fell on the dashboard clock: 4:27.

4:27. At that moment, he remembered Richie.

He snapped on JOC-Radio. A voice said: “We’ll be right back with the wrap-up and all the scores from around the league.”

Gil stomped on the gas. He shot through the gate of the car pound, fishtailed around a corner, clipping something, he didn’t know what; only to brake half a block later into a long line of rush-hour traffic. The phone buzzed. He grabbed it.

“Richie?”

But it wasn’t Richie. “Been trying to reach you.” Garrity. “How’d it go?”

“How did what go?”

“Everest. What else? Is something wrong?”

“Wrong?”

“You sound funny.”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Gil said. His tongue found the jagged tooth edge and rubbed hard.

“Meaning what, in dollars and cents?”

“Can’t go into it now. I’m on a call.”

Pause. “See you tomorrow, then.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Second Wednesday.”

“Sales conference?”

“You got it, boyo.”

Clouds rolled in from the north, grew heavier, sank over the downtown buildings. On the road, where the best ideas were supposed to happen, Gil waited for one, about Richie, about the sales conference, his tooth, anything. None came. He listened to something scraping under the car, squeezed the steering wheel until his hands cramped. He didn’t reach the ballpark until 5:18.

Gil sprang out of the car, ran to the nearest gate. It was locked. Beyond the chain link, unlit ramps curved away into the shadows. No one was around.

“Hey!” Gil called. “Hey!”

A veiny-faced old man in a red blazer appeared on the other side.

“Yeah?” he said.

“My boy’s in there.”

“Huh?”

“I was supposed to meet him. He hasn’t come out.”

“No way,” the old man said. “We do a sweep. There’s nobody.”

Gil glanced around, saw a few people on the street, but no kids. “Then where is he?” The question echoed through the concrete spaces under the stands, and Gil realized he’d been shouting. He lowered his voice. “Let me in.”

The old man disappeared. He returned a few minutes later. “Checked security. No lost kids. You must have missed him in the crush.”

Gil’s voice rose again. “He’s in there.”

The man went away, came back with a second man, much younger, wearing a suit and the air of authority. “What’s the problem?”

Gil explained.

“Let him in,” said the man in the suit.

“But there’s no kid in here,” said the old man.

“He’ll see that for himself.”

The old man unlocked the gate. Gil went in, walked with them up the ramp and out into the stands. Every seat empty. Fans, players, marine color guard, president of the United States, even the Opening Day bunting-all gone. He made his way down to section BB, seats 3 and 4, just the same, in case Richie had left a note. He hadn’t, or if he had it had been swept up with the popcorn, beer cups, scorecards, icecream wrappers.

“Richie,” Gil called, down the left-field line, out to center, down the right-field line. “Richie, Richie.” The ballpark was silent. The first drops of rain made the infield tarp quiver here and there. Gil turned to find the two men watching him from the walkway above. He mounted the steps, felt their eyes on him all the way.

“Maybe he’s in the can,” Gil said.

“We do a sweep,” replied the man in the suit. “Didn’t you tell him?”

“Sure I told him,” said the oldest man. “You think I don’t know my job after fifty-six years?”

Gil just stood there. The man in the suit glanced down at Gil’s torn pant leg. “That it, then?” he said.

Gil didn’t say anything. The old man said, “That’s it,” for him.

The man in the suit said, “Then show this gentleman out.”

The old man walked Gil to the gate. His mood improved as he swung it open. “Nothing to get stressed about,” he said.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“You know-uptight,” said the old man. “Happens all the time. Probably went home on his own.”

Would Richie know how? Gil wasn’t sure.

“Or he’s waiting in a burger joint,” the old man said, locking the gate.

That was a thought. Gil stepped quickly into the street, without looking. A big Jeep swerved to avoid him. Gil caught a glimpse of Bobby Rayburn at the wheel, laughing into a car phone.

Gil tried all the restaurants and coffee shops within three blocks of the ballpark. He described Richie to a hot-dog vendor, a street cop, and a woman who might have been a hooker. Then he got into his car and drove up and down the streets around the ballpark. Night fell. Probably went home on his own. Gil turned toward the expressway and Ellen’s. Something dragging under the car scraped pavement all the way.

It was raining hard by the time Gil pulled up at the South Shore triplex. Light shining over the front door, no anxious faces peering from the windows: Gil saw nothing unusual except the big Mercedes parked behind Ellen’s car in the driveway.

He knocked on the door. Footsteps. The door opened. Tim.

Gil blurted it out. “Have you got Richie?”

Tim licked his lips. “Ellen?” he called.

Ellen appeared. Her cheeks flushed at the sight of him. That meant she had Richie-thank God, Gil said to himself, he really thanked God-but he asked anyway.

“Richie here?”

“What’s it to you?”

“Don’t start.”

“Don’t you start. Or do you think you’re the injured party? That would be just your style-feeling sorry for yourself.”

“Where is he?”

“Safely asleep in his bed, no thanks to you.”

“I can explain, Ellen.”

“No one wants to hear it.”

“Richie will.”

“What makes you think that?”

“I owe it to him anyway.”

“No one could repay what you owe. And I said he was asleep.”

“Isn’t it a little early?”