Game Seven (11 page)

19

AS THE GAME
played on the transistor, I yanked the third coconut from Luis's grasp. I wedged the fingers of both of my hands into the opening he'd made. Then, using all my strength, I tore away the green casing with a grunt.

“There, now all three of them have their shells exposed,” I said, shoving it back at him. “Crack them open anytime you want.”

“Yeah? I thought you wanted me to chuck them,” said Luis.

But I wouldn't get into it with him, and didn't respond.

Ramirez ahead in the count, no balls and two strikes, on the Yankees' right-handed-hitting third baseman. Here's the windup and the pitch. Swing and a miss. El Fuego blew it right by him for strike three. One out in the bottom of the ninth. . . .

“My brother's untouchable in situations like this,” said Uncle Ramon, his voice ringing with confidence. “And when you add on the thought of being World Champion? I wouldn't want to be any of these hitters right now.”

“He's bringing the fire,” said Gabriel.

“That's because it's burning inside him,” said my uncle. “Since he was a kid.”

Strike one to the Yankees' right fielder. The former Japanese all-star standing in against the former Cuban National. Ramirez right back to the rubber. He gets his sign from the catcher and quickly goes into his windup. The pitch—an absolute BB on the outside corner, strike two. That registered one hundred and one on the radar gun. No wonder the batter let it go by. Ramirez ready to go again. But the hitter steps out of the batter's box, asking for time, trying to disrupt Ramirez's rhythm. He's back in now. El Fuego focused and into his delivery. Oh, and Ramirez got him to chase one out of the strike zone. Strike three!

“Uno mas,”
said Uncle Ramon, pumping a fist in the air. “Just one more out!”

All I knew was that Papi was about to be a hero in front of the whole world, and I didn't want to hear it happen.

Here's the first pitch to the Yankees' left fielder. He swings and it's a high chopper over the pitcher's head. Ramirez spears at it. Oh, it deflects off his glove. The runner's safe at first. And suddenly, the Yankees have life. If Ramirez had only let that ball go. His second baseman was right there. It looked to be a sure out. Now the tying run is on first base. . . .

“Come on, my brother. Trust in your teammates to do their jobs,” said Uncle Ramon, as if the transistor was a one-way microphone feeding directly into Papi's ears.

The crowd's into it now, and here's the Yankees' first baseman stepping to the plate. Ramirez working from the stretch. He deals. First-pitch swing. And there's a long drive to left field. It's off the wall and right back to the left fielder. Here's the relay throw. The runner's being held up by the third-base coach. The batter chugs into second with a double. And listen to the voices of the Yankee faithful in the stands. . . .

“Can you pray for an out in a baseball game?” asked Luis. “Is that allowed?”

“If it isn't, I earned a ticket to hell before I was fifteen,” said Uncle Ramon flatly.

Then Gabriel turned away from the wheel and said, “You can pray for whatever moves you. And Ramon, I don't believe your passion for baseball will bring you to the gates of hell.”

The designated hitter to the plate for the Yankees now. The tying run is at third. The winning run at second. . . .

The vibrations from the sound of the radio ran through my arm. I gazed out the window into the darkness. Then my eyes settled on a star—one almost off by itself, one that seemed to be burning around its edges.

Ramirez undoubtedly wishing he'd kept his glove off that chopper up the middle. That was the error that began this potential Yankees rally. But it's a decision he'll have to live with, and here we are with high drama in the Bronx. El Fuego goes into his stretch. There's one high and tight. Ball one. The crowd booing as Ramirez brushes the Yankees' DH back. Ramirez glaring in. He quickly comes set again. Here's the next pitch. He swings. It's ripped into right center! It's rolling back to the wall. Both base runners score. And the Yankees win! The Yankees win! They now own a three-games-to-two lead in this best-of-seven series, with the scene shifting back to Miami in two days. Oh, how fortunes can change in the space of just a few pitches. . . .

Sinking into the backseat, I shut off the transistor. I struggled to keep any expression at all off my face. Part of me was smiling on the inside, thrilled that Papi had blown the save and taken his lumps. But another part of me felt like a complete traitor—a traitor to my family, and to whatever ties I had left to Cuba. And I kept feeling both of those opposing sides as the Buick rose and fell with the waves.

Uncle Ramon was quiet for a good while after that loss. Then, finally, he said, “Don't worry, Julio. Your papi will be all right. There are still two more games left. And pitchers like him, they have a short memory. They need to. It's the only way they can move forward. Wipe the slate clean and go out to the mound next time and be focused.”

Those words—
short memory
—stuck with me like a huge boulder tied around my neck. I thought about sharing that weight with Uncle Ramon, telling him about Papi's new son. But in the end, it was my burden to carry.

“I think you described Papi perfectly,” I said. “I don't believe he has any problem putting things behind him.”

“Life's always into the future, never backward,” said Uncle Ramon. “There's no stopping that.”

“The world could spin ten times faster,” said Luis. “I'd never forget my mother.”

Uncle Ramon nodded his head in silence.

After a moment, Gabriel said, “It's where we've been and what we take with us that count.”

“You sure you're a fisherman, and not a philosopher?” I asked him.

“There's lots of time to think on the ocean. The way it pushes and pulls you,” Gabriel replied.

“Maybe that's what the tides and currents are all about,” said Luis.

That's when I looked at my cousin like he might have been a professor, if he'd had the chance to go to school without any females around to distract him.

Sometime around midnight, Luis announced, “It's been fifty-three hours.”

“Your papi's probably on a plane home already,” Uncle Ramon told me. “I wonder who's closer to Miami right now, him or us?”

I didn't have an answer. But for a while after that, I was drawing lines in my head on an imaginary map—one line for Papi's plane, and one for the Buick. Sometimes those lines intersected in Miami. Other times they were miles apart. Only no matter what, none of them ever took a straight course.

Later on, around three o'clock in the morning, I was drifting in and out of sleep. On the surface, the waters were calm. And except for the muffled sound of the engine, everything inside the cabin was quiet.

Then, out of nowhere, the Buick was broadsided. I felt a blast of power shake me from left to right. For an instant, we were up in the air, and I swore we were going to flip over, like a turtle on its back.

“Hold tight!” screamed Gabriel, from behind the wheel.

I could hear the cries of my uncle and cousin, too. But I couldn't make any sense of them. My brain was shaking inside my skull. And all I could think was that another car had run a red light, slamming my passenger door. Then I remembered where we were, and thought maybe a huge ship had collided with us.

The Buick splashed back down, right side up. And just as suddenly, everything was peaceful again.

Uncle Ramon reached into the rear, grabbing Luis and me by the arm.

“Are you boys all right?” he asked.

We both nodded before looking out the windows for the lights of whatever had pounded us. Only there was nothing at eye level except darkness.

“What the hell was that?” Uncle Ramon asked Gabriel.

“Maybe it was some kind of sea monster,” said Luis, who sounded like he was only half joking.

“My best guess is a rogue wave—a small one,” answered Gabriel, still getting himself together. “A big one would have capsized us for sure, and then buried us beneath a ton of water.”

“A
rogue
wave?” I asked.

“Strong currents and winds, even miles away, can cause them. Those pressures clash head-to-head, building, until all that force rises up. And when it does, you don't want to be in its path.”

“Like a wave on steroids,” Uncle Ramon said. “One with 'roid rage?”

“Sounds right,” said Gabriel.

“But everything was so smooth and calm,” Luis said.

“It's a reminder of where we are. Of what can happen at any moment,” said Uncle Ramon. “It's not that different from living in Cuba.”

“It
is
a reminder,” I said, “that sucker punches like that can come no matter where you are.”

20

THE BACK OF
my eyelids were filled with orange light. So even though my eyes were still shut, I knew that the sun had come up. I hadn't brushed my teeth in days. The worst taste in the world was living inside my mouth. I opened my lips a crack to suck in some fresh air, trying to diffuse it.

Suddenly, someone grabbed my upper arm in a frenzy. I figured we were about to be slammed by another monster wave, and my entire body tensed.

It was Luis, and he shouted, “Land! I think that's land!”

He was pointing straight ahead into the distance. It took a few seconds for my eyes to focus. Uncle Ramon was awake now, too, jumping up and blocking my view. But when I finally was able to see over his shoulder, I saw that Luis was right.

There were tall buildings and a beach, maybe four or five miles away.

Only Gabriel was sitting calmly behind the steering wheel.

“When were you going to let us know?” Uncle Ramon asked him excitedly.

“At first, I wanted to make sure it wasn't a mirage. That I wasn't dreaming,” answered Gabriel, with a look of satisfaction. “Then I decided that I didn't want to cheat you out of that moment of seeing it for yourselves.”

“Is it Miami?” I asked.

“We won't know for sure until we're there,” answered Gabriel, pressing the gas pedal to the floor.

“Pinch me, Julio,” said Luis. “I want to know that this is for real, not a dream.”

“All right, but you don't need to pinch me,” I replied. “None of my dreams have been this good lately.”

Getting closer, we could see windsurfers on their boards. Luis and I climbed up onto the roof of the car/boat and started waving. Then a cluster of windsurfers gathered, before turning their sails around and heading toward us.

“Think they're excited to meet Cuban refugees?” Luis asked.

“No, I think they've never seen a green fifty-nine Buick before,” I answered.

That's when I heard the siren. There was a big gray ship, probably a mile off, closing in from our right. I could see the US flag on its side.

Gabriel hit his horn in return, and the sound waves vibrated through the soles of my feet.

“You see the red, white, and blue?” asked Luis.

I nodded my head, thinking how it was the same three colors as the Cuban flag, only with fifty small stars instead of a single giant one.

A voice came over the ship's loudspeaker in Spanish.

“This is the United States Coast Guard!” it bellowed, with an echo. “You are in US waters! Shut off your engine! Put your hands on top of your head!”

– – –

“Have we made it far enough to stay?” I asked my uncle, leaning down into the cabin. “Not to get sent back?”

Uncle Ramon climbed onto the roof with us, while Gabriel kept driving with the engine still running.

“Gabriel
thinks
this is good enough,” said Uncle Ramon.

“How could it be better?” I asked.

“If we were standing on US soil,” he answered.

The voice on the loudspeaker repeated its demands. Then that ship launched a smaller, faster boat, full of uniformed men.

“I'm not taking any chances,” I said. “I'm going to swim for the beach.”

Luis told his father, “You go, too. Maybe it'll help us all.”

“No way I'll leave you here,” my uncle said, an instant before I dove into the water.

I was swimming in a straight line, as fast as I could, riding every wave to pick up speed. Gabriel finally shut off his engine. Glancing back, I could see them all with their hands on their heads.

That smaller boat reached the Buick, and now a second one was motoring after me. I was kicking my legs harder, reaching with every stroke. I was already exhausted. But there was no way I was going to stop.

Ahead of me, one of the windsurfers had broken away from the others, coming in my direction. He reached out a hand, like he wanted to pull me onto his board. But I kept on swimming.

“Behöver hjälp?”
he asked, lowering the sail and paddling alongside me.

I didn't know what language that was. All I knew was that it wasn't English. And that really freaked me out, like I might be swimming toward the wrong shore.

That boat was getting closer, and I'd reached a group of windsurfers, maybe a hundred yards off the beach. I was so focused on going forward that my brain couldn't link together their words. But my ears understood they were speaking both English and Spanish to me.

My arms felt like limp rubber bands, and my lungs ached until I thought they were going to explode. Then, about fifty yards out, I heard the cheers from the people on the beach. And that sound gave me an added surge of strength.

I heard the motor of that boat getting closer. So I turned my head to see where it was. That's when a wave broke overtop me and I swallowed a mouthful of seawater.

I was closer to the shore than that boat was to me. I was choking and gagging now. Someone grabbed me around the shoulders and started dragging me in. But as soon as it was shallow enough for my feet to touch the bottom, I got myself free from that person's grasp and propelled myself toward the sand.

Before I knew it my chest was out of the water, and then my waist. I staggered onto the dry sand, falling to my knees. I touched the ground like it was home plate and I'd been rounding the bases. Only I wasn't safe. I was
free
.

The applause and the motor were ringing in my ears.

I collapsed face-first into the sand, and it stuck all around my lips and mouth. I'd seen photos of people kissing the ground, grateful to be somewhere. But this was different. I could
taste
it.

Then someone in the crowd turned me over, putting something ice-cold into my hand.

“Drink. Drink,” a woman said in English.

I looked and it was a can of Pepsi.

The sound of the motor stopped and the circle of people around me opened. A man, maybe in his early thirties, with a complexion that looked like mine, came walking through. He was wearing a blue uniform and hat, with a holstered pistol strapped to his right hip.

I put the can down into the sand, before I ever took a sip. Then I held out both my wrists, expecting him to handcuff me.

He stood over me with his hands on his hips. Then in Spanish he said, “I'm Chief Petty Officer Sebastian Rodriguez. You sail from Cuba? Looking for asylum?”

I nodded, with the salt water dripping from my chin.

“You didn't have to swim so fast. Once you hit the water, I wasn't going to stop you from reaching shore. I'm just glad you didn't drown. Do you need a doctor?”

I shook my head. And when I finally caught my breath, I asked, “You won't send them back, my family in the car/boat?”

“It's not up to me,” he answered. “There's a government agency—Immigration and Naturalization Service. They take care of that. But unless you're terrorists, you'll probably all be allowed to remain. Basically, it's your reward for surviving the trip.”

“I'm not a terrorist,” I said. “I'm a shortstop.”

“That's always better,” he said, smiling from the corners of his mouth.

I couldn't believe it. I was actually here, alive and in one piece. It was like being reborn. Every breath seemed new, and even the sun felt different on my skin.

Suddenly, there were more sirens, this time from the street beyond the beach, and the sound of another motor on the ocean in front of me.

Uncle Ramon, Luis, and Gabriel were coming ashore with some officers in a small boat. Then a pair of ambulances and three carloads of agents in blue Windbreakers with the letters
INS
across the front and back arrived.

Luis leaped onto the sand. He ran up and threw his arms around me.

“How long?” I asked him.

“Sixty-two and a half hours,” he answered through his hug.

“That's a long trip in a Buick,” said Officer Rodriguez. “Who put that thing together?”

“That was our guardian angel here,” answered Uncle Ramon, kissing Gabriel once on the forehead. “We made it on a wing and a prayer, right?”

“Always,” answered Gabriel, with his hands clasped to heaven.

“My men are checking it over from top to bottom now,” said Officer Rodriguez. “If it's clean, you're probably in good shape to stay.”

“Don't worry. No drugs. No guns,” said Uncle Ramon.

“Just three coconuts waiting to be cracked,” added Luis, lightly punching my arm.

People all over the beach were taking photos of us with their cell phones. But Officer Rodriguez wouldn't let any of them pose with us.

“Buena suerte con su beisbol,”
said Officer Rodriguez, wishing me well before handing us over to a Spanish-speaking INS agent.

“Good
luck
?” questioned Uncle Ramon. “This is the son of El Fuego, soon-to-be World Champion. He was born with skills.”

That statement brought more cheers and photos from the crowd.

I couldn't tell by the look on Officer Rodriguez's face if he'd ever heard of Papi or not. But for some reason, I almost wished he hadn't.

“Family's important,” said Officer Rodriguez, with his brown eyes on mine.

Then he turned away and gathered his men, before walking back to his boat.

We didn't want any medical treatment. So that INS agent took us to his car.

“Excuse me, but what year model is this?” Luis asked him as we got in.

“I believe it's a twenty-twelve,” he answered.

“Can you imagine that, Cousin? A two thousand and twelve,” Luis said in awe. “I'll bet you it rides like a dream.”